Sitting of 1 March 1983

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

Royal Assent
Mr. Speaker: I have to notify the House, in accordance with the Royal Assent Act 1967, that the Queen has signified Her Royal Assent to the following Acts:

1. Agricultural Marketing Act 1983.

2. Pig Industry Levy Act 1983.

Oral Answers to Questions
  DEFENCE

    Latin America (Arms Sales)
    Mr. Hooleyasked the Secretary of State for Defence what was the approximate value of arms sales to Latin America in 1980, 1981 and 1982.
    The Under-Secretary of State for Defence Procurement (Mr. Ian Stewart): I refer the hon. Gentleman to the figures contained in volume 2 of the 1982 "Statement on the Defence Estimates"—table 2·7. More recent figures are being compiled for the 1983 White Paper but will not be available in advance of publication.
    Mr. Hooley: Is the Minister aware that there are a number of serious territorial disputes between the countries of Latin America? Instead of fuelling those disputes by pouring arms into that part of the world, would it not be more sensible to concert our policy with other Western countries and bring in a moratorium?
    Mr. Stewart: I am aware of the factors to which the hon. Gentleman draws attention, but with all defence and para-military sales the Government take into account all relevant factors and deal with them case by case.
    Mr. Stokes: Is my hon. Friend aware that some anxiety is felt by Conservative Members about arms sales to both unfriendly and doubtful powers? Will my hon. Friend have a word with our right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer to ensure that bankers in this country are more discriminating when making the loans that make these purchases possible?
    Mr. Stewart: My hon. Friend may have heard the answer that my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor gave in the House last week when he pointed out that the terms of the financial support for Argentina would make it more difficult for it to devote resources to arms purchases. All such overseas sales are subject to our political, strategic and security interests.
    Mr. McNamara: When the White Paper is published, will the Minister say how many of the nations involved supported Argentina in the recent dispute with the United Kingdom over the future of the Falkland Islands? Which of those South American countries to which we are selling arms have refused to give us bases for the humanitarium purpose of supplying those islands?
    Mr. Stewart: The hon. Gentleman must wait for the publication of the defence Estimates. These factors are all taken into account when dealing with individual countries. Our relations with those countries is a matter for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.

    Trident
    Mr. Farrasked the Secretary of State for Defence what is his latest estimate of the proportion of the cost of the provision of Trident which will be met by British manufacturers.
    Mr. Ian Stewart: We estimate that around 55 per cent. of the total cost of the programme will be spent in the United Kingdom.
    Mr. Farr: I thank my hon. Friend for that reply, but he will, of course, recall that it is a considerable reduction in the original percentage content envisaged. Will he ensure within his Department that all our electronic and engineering companies that could be interested are acquainted fully with the type of mechanical equipment to be provided to build this project?
    Mr. Stewart: The higher percentage to which my hon. Friend refers relates, I believe, to the original provisions for Trident 1. The explanation of the changes will be found in defence open Government document 82/1 published last year regarding Trident 2. They relate to a number of factors, including improvement of the missile and warhead systems, submarines and various financial factors. With regard to opportunities for United Kingdom suppliers, a new unit has been set up within the Ministry of Defence to provide information to British firms that wish to participate in the Trident programme. I understand that satisfactory progress is being made.
    Mr. Cryer: Whatever proportion of resources is being used, is not Trident a gigantic waste of United Kingdom resources, and is it not true that Trident is between four and 10 times more powerful a weapon than the existing Polaris? Is that not fuelling the nuclear arms race, and is that why the Government voted against the Mexican and Swedish proposals at the United Nations for a freeze of nuclear weapons expenditure? Instead of promoting warmongering, why do not the Government give their mind to some peaceful activity for a change?
    Mr. Stewart: The Trident programme is not a gigantic waste of money, but is an important part of our national security, as a deterrent. I would point out that when the Trident system is introduced in this country it is expected to constitute a lower proportion of resources compared with the current Soviet and Warsaw pact resources of that kind than the Polaris force did in 1970.
    Mr. Alton: Given that the estimated cost of Trident in 1981 was £5 billion and that the figure that the Minister gave in the House in December was £7·5 billion, what figure will the Minister give today as the final cost of Trident?
    Mr. Stewart: I have no change to make in the figures already given.
    Mr. Robert Atkins: Is my hon. Friend aware that there is some concern ion the House about the problems that British industry is having in achieving success in relation to offset on Trident in the United States? Is my hon. Friend able to comment on the effects of the so-called Berry amendment on specialty metals and other matters relating to procurement in the United States in so far as they might affect British companies tendering for business in Trident?
    Mr. Stewart: I appreciate my hon. Friend's point on the concern expressed over the participation of United Kingdom suppliers in the Trident programme. Some of the comment in the press on the subject has been wide of the mark. My hon. Friend the Minister of State is in the United States at the moment and he will be raising a number of matters, including those of the type mentioned by my hon. Friend, during his discussions this week.
    Dr. McDonald: Why are the hon. Gentleman and his Government squandering billions of pounds in America when the money could be far better spent in building up our conventional forces and our industrial base?
    Mr. Stewart: I thought that the hon. Lady wanted to run down our conventional forces.
    Dr. McDonald: No. Wrong again.
    Mr. Stewart: The choice of the Trident weapon system as a strategic deterrent is important to our national security and will provide us with that capability more satisfactorily than would any other method.

    Cruise Missiles
    Mr. Stoddartasked the Secretary of State for Defence if he can give a more precise estimate of the cost of establishing a dual key system for United States cruise missiles located in the United Kingdom than that given in his reply of 1 February, Official Report, c. 63.
    14. Mr. Penhaligonasked the Secretary of State for Defence what estimates he received from the United States Government which led him to form his estimate of the cost of a dual key system for cruise missiles.
    The Secretary of State for Defence (Mr. Michael Heseltine): All dual key control systems are based on the ownership and operation of the weapons system involved. The cost to the United Kingdom of providing a force of 160 ground-launched cruise missiles over a period of 10 years has been estimated by the Ministry of Defence to be about £1 billion. The information on which this estimate was based reflected our knowledge of the United States cruise missile programme.
    Mr. Stoddart: That is a very high figure. Does the Minister agree that, high though it is, it is worth it for the defence of the sovereignty of this country? However, did the right hon. Gentleman see last night the ITV programme "The Truth Game" and the statement by Admiral La Rocque, a former high ranking officer in the Pentagon, that nobody in Europe could stop the United States of American firing its nuclear weapon system from this country? Would it not be far better if the Government declined to have these weapons on our soil?
    Mr. Heseltine: The hon. Gentleman is right. The cruise system is justified by the strategic decisions
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    affecting this country. I did not see the programme last night, but I have read the reviews in the national press. It seems that the consensus is that it had more to do with propaganda than with an objective analysis. [Interruption.] I say that because I read the reviews, and that is what the reviews say. The views of Admiral La Rocque have been denied on both sides of the Atlantic.
    Mr. Penhaligon: If we were to say to the Americans that we would give them only £100 million and that we must have dual control, does he believe that they would not let us have the missile system?
    Mr. Heseltine: The hon. Member has forgotten that it was the Europeans who approached the Americans and suggested that these missiles should be based on European territory. All our previous existence, which is considerable and stretches back over 30 years, of operating American nuclear weapons from British bases has been covered, as the House is aware, by the 1952 agreement. It has been found to be satisfactory by all Governments and we have seen no reason to change it.
    Mr. Alan Clark: Does my right hon. Friend recall the various occasions in the past month, notably on the Brian Walden programme, when he has said that each of these missiles would be accompanied by British service men when they were dispersed? Leaving aside the fact that this does not say very much about my right hon. Friend's faith in the 1952 agreement, what would be the cost of the deployment? Would it not involve at least a brigade and greatly distort home defence as well as inflicting another burden?
    Mr. Heseltine: I know of my hon. Friend's concern on this matter, but he will agree that if there were to be deployment of such missiles on British territory it would be appropriate for there to be a British military force while deployment was taking place. It seems right that those arrangements should be made. The cost of providing personnel would be met from within the defence budget.
    Mr. John Silkin: Is not the Secretary of State becoming a little confused? Is not the truth simply that there is no dual key, no dual control, no British veto on the use of cruise missiles and that the British people do not want the cruise missiles here in any event?
    Mr. Heseltine: The arrangements for cruise missiles are those that applied to the F111 and the American nuclear submarines that have a nuclear weapon capability. The arrangements were satisfactory to the Government whom the right hon. Gentleman supported.
    Mr. John Silkin: Will the right hon. Gentleman face one essential fact? Cruise missiles can be launched or deployed, as he said, from any surface in the United Kingdom. What possible control has Britain over their use? Is it not a fact that the Americans would not have the weapons here if we had such control?
    Mr. Heseltine: This is a serious matter and the right hon. Gentleman must not misrepresent the position, as he seeks to do. The fact is that those missiles could not be deployed—
    Mr. Silkin: From bases?
    Mr. Heseltine: —from bases, without the agreement of the British Prime Minister. That is the first stage in the chain of inquiries about which the right hon. Gentleman

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    asks. The second stage would be the firing from outside the base from which the missiles were deployed. The agreement would cover that contingency in the same way as it would cover the deployment from the original bases.
    Mr. Roper: Does the Secretary of State agree that the only previous example of land-based American missiles in this country was the Thor missile, for which there was a dual key arrangement? Have he or his Department had any discussions with the American authorities since 1979 when the Americans offered a dual key arrangement?
    Mr. Heseltine: The hon. Gentleman is right to draw attention to the Thor missile, because that was a system where a dual key arrangement of the sort that we are discussing existed, and the system was owned by the British military command. That gives substance to the view that I have explained to the House that if one wants a dual key in the Thor precedent, a substantial price tag is involved in the process. The Thor missile is 30 years old, as are the circumstances surrounding it. Since then, under all Governments, we have had wide experience of operating the disciplines that govern the American use of bases in this country under the agreements that have replaced, or have been seen to be sufficient in the place of, the original Thor arrangements. It is those new arrangements, embodied in the Churchill-Truman understandings, that have proved to be satisfactory.
    Mr. Rentonasked the Secretary of State for Defence whether he plans further discussions with the United States Government regarding the deployment and control of cruise missiles in the United Kingdom.
    Mr. Frank Allaunasked the Secretary of State for Defence what progress has been made towards the deployment of cruise missiles.
    Mr. Strawasked the Secretary of State for Defence whether the installation of cruise missiles continues to proceed according to plan.
    Mr. Heseltine: Work is proceeding on schedule at RAF Greenham Common to enable deployment of cruise missiles in this country to begin by the end of the year as planned, in the absence of concrete results from the arms control negotiations now under way in Geneva.
    Officials from my Department regularly meet officials of the United States Government to discuss matters affecting the planned deployment. Ministers are in regular contact with their American opposite numbers.
    Mr. Renton: I thank my right hon. Friend for that answer, but is he now sufficiently satisfied with the agreement with the Americans on the deployment of cruise that he will never try to change it under any circumstances? Or does he believe that if subsequent events, such as the result of the German elections next Sunday, were to enable him to negotiate dual key at a much lower cost he would try to change the agreement?
    Mr. Heseltine: I am sure that my hon. Friend realises that he is putting to me hypothetical situations in unlimited circumstances. It is impossible for Ministers to anticipte on such a long time scale and to answer hypothetical questions in that context. I say to him only that the Government, having considered the circumstances in which the cruise missile is deployed, are satisfied with the terms of our agreement with the United States.
    Mr. Frank Allaun: Is not the Secretary of State shirking his duty in refusing to debate this issue with Joan Ruddock of the CND and instead hinting that he will push it off to a junior Minister? Secondly, did not Admiral La Rocque say last night that the British would be fools to have this American missile on their territory, which statement is backed up by the unconditional opposition to the weapon of 54 per cent. of the British public, with only 32 per cent. in favour?
    Mr. Heseltine: The hon. Gentleman must be fully aware that Admiral La Rocque's statement is simply untrue. The hon. Gentleman's first question was why I do not engage in a debate with Joan Ruddock. I cannot see how the Labour party can suggest for one moment that I should have a debate with a Labour candidate who failed to get elected, having secured the lowest Labour vote in absolute proportionate terms in that constituency since the war, and who sent out an election address in which, from one end of it to the other, she did not refer to defence. I do not understand the dogma that says that I should engage in debate with failed Labour candidates when I can debate even more successfully with failed Labour Governments.
    Mr. Straw: Is the Secretary of State aware that with every statement that he makes on dual control and dual key he does not clarify the position of the British Government, but further confuses it? Will he answer a simple, straightforward question? Will a British Prime Minister have the right, at the moment just before the firing of a cruise missile, to say to a United States President "You will not use that weapon"?
    Mr. Heseltine: The answer is perfectly clear. The agreement with the Americans—
    Mr. Cryer: Yes of no?
    Mr. Heseltine: Perhaps I could answer the question in the terms that it was put to me. The agreement with the Americans governs the use of any base from which their nuclear weapons are to be used in this country. Those bases cannot be used without the agreement of the British Prime Minister. In those circumstances, the answer to the hon. Gentleman has to be that the Americans would not use those bases without that agreement.
    Mr. Bill Walker: Does my right hon. Friend agree that for 30 years and more the United States Air Force has been operating from bases within the United Kingdom, flying both theatre and strategic bombers with both free-fall and stand-off capabilities, and that it makes complete nonsense of the Opposition's position on dual key when a bomber hundreds of miles away from its base would appear to he much more potent than a missile that is land-based?
    Mr. Heseltine: I am most grateful to my hon. Friend for putting the position so clearly. The House will be unable to resist the conclusion that the only real change in the Labour party's position is not the strength of the argument, but the fact that that party is now in opposition.
    Mr. Denzil Davies: If the Secretary of State is right—I do not believe that he has convinced the House—that the firing of cruise missiles will be a joint decision and that Britain has control over it, does it not destroy the whole basis of the reason why the Europeans asked for cruise missiles in the first place? Was not the whole object of cruise missiles that they should be American-owned,

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    American controlled, with complete American responsibility for their firing, and that that should be perceived as such by the other side?
    Mr. Heseltine: The original purpose—[Interruption.] I should be most grateful if, before I get out two words, I were entitled to deploy my answers in the same manner as that in which the question was put. The original reason why former Chancellor Schmidt of West Germany raised the potential for the deployment of cruise missiles in Europe was that he saw the need to counter the deployment of SS20s by the Soviet Union with a land-based intermediate-range missile based in Europe. That was the original purpose, and it is the purpose that this Government have supported. Moreover, I believe that it is the purpose that the Labour party, had it remained in government, would also have supported.
    Dr. Owen: Is it not the job of the Secretary of State for Defence to try to ensure the maximum degree of confidence by the nation as a whole in the defence decisions of Her Majesty's Government? Is not the lesson of Harold Macmillan in 1958, in establishing the dual key for Thor, that he had the confidence of all parties and of the vast majority of the people of the country, and that there was never the controversy about the Thor missile deployment that there has been about the cruise missile? Does the Secretary of State agree that opinion polls demonstrate that, were there to be a dual key, the majority of the people of this country would be ready to accept, if necessary, and given failed INF negotiations, cruise missile deployment here, because that would strengthen the Government's hand?
    Mr. Heseltine: The right hon. Gentleman will be fully aware that a major source of the attempt to undermine the confidence of this country is to be found in the fact that the party of which he was once a member is now consistently trying to undermine the credibility of agreements upon which it relied 100 per cent. in every Labour Government since the war. The Labour party, through its official defence spokesmen, Foreign Secretaries and Prime Ministers knew the details of these agreements as they applied to American nuclear weapons and the basis from which they came.
    Dr. Owen: They existed before Thor.
    Mr. Heseltine: And they were current after it. The right hon. Gentleman is fully aware that the systems to which I refer existed after the Thor arrangements, and they were found fully satisfactory by the Labour party and by the right hon. Gentleman when he was in office.
    Mr. Nelson: Will my right hon. Friend remember, in the context of all these discussions, that the overriding consideration is the fact that we face a combined Soviet threat of some 220 SS20 missiles, each with three warheads, which have a combined killing power of nearly 24,000 Hiroshima bombs, and which are all directed at Western Europe? Does my right hon. Friend agree that a policy of deterrence, not acquiescence, is the most credible posture?
    Mr. Heseltine: I am grateful to my hon. Friend, because he puts in the starkest possible context one of the threats that we face from the Soviet Union. The entire basis of our strategy in the West lies in deterrence, and the purpose of the deployment of cruise missiles is not to
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    initiate a new breed of weapons, but simply to counter with our deterrent the deployment of SS20 missiles, which the Soviet Union itself of course initiated.

    Cumbria (NATO Equipment)
    Mr. Campbell-Savoursasked the Secretary of State for Defence what representations he has received from the county of Cumbria on the storage and deployment of North Atlantic Treaty Organisation equipment within the county of Cumbria.
    The Under-Secretary of State for the Armed Forces (Mr. Jerry Wiggin): In addition to written representations in the past from the hon. Gentleman about the role of the NATO armament depot, Broughton Moor, a letter on the same subject from the secretary of west Cumbria peace group was answered by an official in the Ministry of Defence in April 1982.
    Mr. Campbell-Savours: Is it not true that the Secretary of State has received many angry letters about military aircraft training exercises over the national park? Is he aware that joy rides over Lake Windermere by the Patronage Secretary and soothing letters to the Home Secretary do not satisfy public anxieties? Will he stop those flights taking place and also confirm that no nuclear weaponry is held at the Broughton Moor dump?
    Mr. Wiggin: The hon. Gentleman knows full well that we never confirm or deny the presence of nuclear weapons.
    I understand the suffering that low flying causes to the hon. Gentleman's constituents. Nevertheless, he well understands that such manoeuvres are essential training for the Royal Air Force. That is in the interests of Britain's defence and I believe that it has the support of the vast majority of the British people.
    Mr. Robert Atkins: Does my hon. Friend recognise that there are many people in Britain who are eminently delighted that there are aircraft of the Royal Air Force, perhaps even of the Fleet Air Arm, which are flying low in training in order to fulfil a role in the defence of our liberties and freedom as and when necessary?
    Mr. Wiggin: I am grateful to my hon. Friend. I seek to investigate all serious complaints in this matter as understandingly as I can. As I said, I have every sympathy for the discomfort caused and we do everything possible to minimise it.

    Falkland Islands
    Mr. Parryasked the Secretary of State for Defence if he has any plans to pay an official visit to the Falklands.
    Mr. Heseltine: At present I have no plans to do so.
    Mr. Parry: Further to the Prime Minister's reply last week, what steps are being taken by the Government to provide service men in the Falklands with British food, drinks and supplies, particularly British corned beef? What is the cost of the exercise to the British taxpayer? Has Lord Vestey, the No. 1 tax fiddler, made a claim on the Government following the closure of the West Coast Stevedoring company in Liverpool with the loss of 400 jobs, blaming that on the loss of the corned beef trade due to the conflct in the Falkland Islands?
    Mr. Heseltine: I have nothing to add to what my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister said on this subject. As to the detail of job losses, I shall look into the matter and contact the hon. Gentleman later.
    Sir Hector Monro: Is my right hon. Friend aware that if he were able to visit the Falklands in the near future he would find the British forces in a state of high morale? What progress has been made to provide better accommodation for them before the Falklands winter?
    Mr. Heseltine: I am most grateful to my hon. Friend. As a result of the significant number of visits to the Falklands that the House has arranged we have had a full report of the high morale of British forces there. I am immensely grateful to those who lead them for helping to bring that about. The House will be aware that one coastel is already in position, another is on order, which is scheduled to be in place before the winter, and we are considering the possibility of a third.
    Mr. Dalyell: What is the estimated cost of Port Stanley airport?
    Mr. Heseltine: I take it that the hon. Gentleman is considering the possibility of an updated Port Stanley airport as opposed to the existing one. The House will be aware that there is a need for additional facilities on the Falkland Islands if we are to maintain a credible defence there and to be able to reinforce a garrison that could, perhaps, be maintained at a lower level of readiness than is currently the position. In those circumstances it is appropriate that we should invite tenders for the cost of providing adequate facilities in the Falkland Islands in the near future.
    Mr. Dalyell: The cost is £880 million.
    Mr. Heseltine: If we are to put the matter to tender, it is appropriate that we should wait to see what figures we get before we try to estimate the costs in advance. However, I shall make a careful note of the hon. Gentleman's view that the cost is likely to be £880 million.
    Sir John Biggs-Davison: What aircraft will the new Port Stanley airport be able to receive and what is the Government's decision about a second airfield?
    Mr. Heseltine: The principal change will be the possibility of using wide-bodied jets for the transportation of significant numbers of people at short notice, which is an option not now readily available to us. I think that my hon. Friend has in mind the possibility of building an alternative airport at March Ridge instead of renovating and extending the airport at Port Stanley. That is one of the options that will be put to tender.
    Mr. John Silkin: When the right hon. Gentleman visits the Falklands, how does he propose to explain to the people there that British engines and military equipment are getting to Argentina even though Argentina has not renounced war against Britain?
    Mr. Heseltine: The right hon. Gentleman will be aware that arms procurement, and the contractual relationships with our friendly allies that lies behind that, is one of the most difficult of decisions that all Governments must make. The right hon. Gentleman's predecessors had no easier task than the Government and their Ministers. He will be well aware that all contracts that could be brought to an end were brought to an end, that
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    there is no supply of aggressive equipment to Argentina and that we shall maintain that position in all appropriate circumstances.
    Mr. Silkin: How friendly does the right hon. Gentleman think allies are who are prepared to sell equipment to Argentina before the hostilities have been declared at an end?
    Mr. Heseltine: The right hon. Gentleman will have his own views about individual contracts and will fully understand the Government's right to make any appropriate representations. However, it is not within the Government's gift, any more than it was within the gift of previous Governments, to do other than seek to influence their allies.

    Floater '83 (Arms Exhibition)
    Mr. Allen McKayasked the Secretary of State for Defence whether countries purchasing weapons during the Floater '83 exhibition to the Middle East will he required to sign end-user certificates.
    Mr. Ian Stewart: All Government-to-Government sales agreements and, where appropriate, major firm-to-Government contracts, contain sole-use clauses designed to ensure that British defence equipment is not transferred to third parties without the agreement of Her Majesty's Government.
    Mr. McKay: In view of the number of arms caches found in southern Lebanon by Israeli defence forces, what assurances can the Under-Secretary of State give that in the Arab states that are hosting this exhibition, where successful sales will be followed by end-user certificates, arms will not fall into terrorists' hands or go to any other organisation against our wishes?
    Mr. Stewart: Circumstances in the Middle East are taken into account carefully, as they are in other parts of the world, before licences are given for the export of such equipment. The floating exhibition is visiting Qatar, Bahrain, Dubai, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Abu Dhabi, Jordan and Egypt. We shall closely follow our normal processes in those and other countries.
    Mr. Nelson: Does my hon. Friend attach any significance to the fact that the world's largest arms exporter, which is also the country that subscribes least to end-user certificates, is the Soviet Union?
    Mr. Stewart: I hope that the House will draw its own conclusions from what my hon. Friend has said.
    Dr. McDonald: As representatives from Iran and Iraq may well visit the exhibition at its various ports of call, does that mean that British neutrality involves the sale of arms to both sides in a time of war?
    Mr. Stewart: No, Sir, it does not. Our policy on the sale of arms to Iraq and Iran is one of neutrality and we shall supply no lethal equipment while the war continues.

    Nuclear Disarmament
    Mr. Maclennanasked the Secretary of State for Defence what further steps he will take to promote balanced and verifiable nuclear disarmament.
    The Minister of State for the Armed Forces (Mr. Peter Blaker): We have worked consistently for balanced and verifiable nuclear disarmament and shall continue to

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    do so. The first priority is to reach agreement in the Geneva negotiations, where the United States has made proposals for reductions in both strategic and intermediate range nuclear forces. As my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs has explained, Her Majesty's Government fully support the proposals that were made by the Americans after discussion with their NATO allies.
    Mr. Maclennan: Will the Government encourage NATO to consider promoting a battlefield nuclear weapons-free zone in the context of the mutual and balanced force reduction discussions?
    Mr. Blaker: We are aware of proposals that have been made on that subject and we shall study them. The hon. Gentleman will realise that they present certain difficulties, such as the problem of weapons targeted on the zone from outside the zone; the fact that many systems such as the SS20 are mobile; and the question of verification, which would provide particular difficulties in relation to battlefield nuclear weapons because some have dual capability.
    Mr. Denzil Davis: Since the talks in Geneva are bilateral talks between the Americans and the Soviet Union, and since all the weapons on the Western side discussed in those talks are American-owned weapons, will the Minister explain what the Government mean by multilateral nuclear disarmament? Where is the "multi" in the multilateral?
    Mr. Blaker: There are many negotiations going on for multilateral disarmament, but what the right hon. Gentleman and his party are now calling for, contrary to what they used to believe in, is one-sided disarmament. It is to the disadvantages of one-sided disarmament that we draw attention.
    Sir Anthony Kershaw: Will my hon. Friend bear in mind that unless we have some arms in our hands we shall have nothing to bargain with, and that all this verification and so on will not be worth a row of beans?
    Mr. Blaker: I entirely agree with my hon. Friend. What is perfectly clear is that Mr. Andropov has put forward some proposals, unsatisfactory though they may be, because we have continued with our intention to build up our own forces pending a satisfactory agreement. If we were to follow the policy advocated by the Labour party, he would not be making those concessions.

    Arms Supplies (Dictatorships)
    Mr. Newensasked the Secretary of State for Defence if he will make a statement on the conditions on which arms supplies to military dictatorships can be approved.
    Mr. Ian Stewart: Every proposal to export defence equipment is carefully considered on a case-by-case basis, and a wide range of political, strategic and security factors are taken into account before a decision to grant an export licence is made.
    Mr. Newens: Is it not clear that the controls are totally inadequate in view of the fact that Rolls-Royce engines, David Brown gear controls, components for Exocet missiles, radar eqiupment and other components have continued to be supplied to Argentina, despite its refusal
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    to agree to a cessation of hostilities in the South Atlantic? Does this not illustrate that we must change the whole system and that the licensing system at present is useless?
    Mr. Stewart: I share the hon. Gentleman's concern that equipment of this type is continuing to reach the Argentine, but I must also point out that it is difficult to draw the line on such decisions when long-standing contracts are in place between British industry and defence industries in allied countries and when such collaboration is important for our own purposes.
    Mr. Bill Walker: Does my hon. Friend agree that the democracies are in a minority in this world, and that if we sold only to democracies the Russians would be left with all the other parts of the world to sell to and their influence would therefore be extended?
    Mr. Stewart: I recognise the point that my hon. Friend has made so well.
    Mr. McNamara: Does the Minister accept that the interpretation of his statement is as follows: long-term business interests means that business is business, profits are profits, British deaths are British deaths, but that as long as we can line the pockets of the people who make a profit out of arms sales we are doing all right?
    Mr. Stewart: Perhaps I could point out to the hon. Gentleman that nationalised industries are among the biggest arms exporters. The fundamental point is that, wherever possible, all contracts entered into after the Falklands conflict have been cancelled. There are a number of long-standing arrangements where collaborative ventures with friendly countries and industry in allied countries are involved, and those, of course, require much more difficult decisions.

    American Nuclear Bases
    Mr. Alan Clarkasked the Secretary of State for Defence if he will list the occasions on which the arrangements under the communiqué of January 1952 relating to joint decisions regarding the use of American nuclear bases in the United Kingdom have been invoked.
    Mr. Blaker: There have been no occasions on which the operational use in an emergency of United States forces in this country has been in question. The arrangements provided for in the agreement for joint decision-making, summarised in the communiqué of January 1952, have, therefore, never been activated.
    Mr. Clark: If my right hon. Friend is entirely satisfied with these arrangements, why is he making provision for every missile to be accompanied on dispersal by British service men?
    Mr. Blaker: My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has already explained that. In addition, my hon. Friend will realise that missiles need to be protected.
    Mr. Flannery: Did the Minister see the film last night which revealed that there are well over 100 American bases in this country and that the British people had no idea of that? Can he explain why we almost never see an American in uniform in this country? Is it being concealed from the British people just how many there are here?
    Mr. Blaker: If it is true that there are more than 100 American bases in this country, that was the position when

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    the Labour party was in power. The Labour party did not tell the House very much about it, but it is not, in fact, true that there are such bases. There is a considerably smaller number. There are seven operational bases in this country in addition to a number of facilities. As I told the House on the last occasion when I was at the Dispatch Box, one of the alleged bases was discovered on examination to be a petrol pump in the Edgware road.

  PRIME MINISTER

    Bournemouth
    Ql. Mr. David Atkinsonasked the Prime Minister if she will pay an official visit to Bournemouth.
    The Prime Minister (Mrs. Margaret Thatcher): I have at present no plans to do so.
    Mr. Atkinson: Is my right hon. Friend aware that Bournemouth was one of the few places in the country not to have been affected by the recent water dispute, quite simply because the employees of the Bournemouth and District water company are also shareholders in that company, and shareholders do not go on strike? Is not that a sensible formula to introduce into our strike-prone public service industries, where unions are so often prepared to place self before service, to the nation's cost and, ultimately, to their own?
    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend's constituents are fortunate. I agree with him that to have a personal stake in an industry is to have a personal stake in its success. That formula could well be copied among many of the other private water companies and among nationalised industries. I share my hon. Friend's dislike of the abuse of monopoly powers in some of the public sector industries.

    Engagements
    Mr. James Hamiltonasked the Prime Minister whether she will list her official engagements for Tuesday 1 March.
    The Prime Minister: This morning I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. Later I drove British Leyland's new Maestro car in connection with its launch today. In addition to my duties in the House, I shall be having further meetings later today, including one with a delegation from the National Pensioners Convention.
    Mr. Hamilton: Will the Prime Minister find time to drive one of the Maestros to Lanarkshire in Scotland, where she will discover that 62 per cent. of our young people are unemployed—some of them have never even received their first job—that there are now more redundancies in the steel industry and that some of the factories are actually working a three or four-day week? Will she now change her policies, if not at the request of the Opposition, then at least in the name of God and in the interests of human dignity?
    The Prime Minister: As the hon. Gentleman knows, securing more jobs means designing products that will sell, both in this country and overseas. There is absolutely no way round that. As the hon. Gentleman also knows, we are launching, from September, the biggest youth training scheme ever seen in this country. That will be the first time
    128
    that our young people, en masse, have been trained to be equipped properly for the world of work. May I remind the hon. Gentleman that most of the people who are unemployed are unemployed for a temporary period—[HON. MEMBERS: "Oh".] One million are long-term unemployed. The other two million will find jobs. Many, many jobs—something like 6 million—are found in the year as a whole.
    Mr. John Townend: Will my right hon. Friend confirm that civil servants' pay is to be increased at a cost of some £250 million to compensate them for the lax they are to be charged on their perks? Does she accept that drivers of company cars, who are to be taxed on their petrol for the first time with little opportunity to get this tax reimbursed, will consider this another example of where the public servant is feather-bedded as compared with his counterpart in private industry?
    The Prime Minister: No, I would not necessarily accept that. There have been some comments on the changes in taxation of the Civil Service allowances. understand that the allowances are taxable in law, and taxing them when paid to civil servants merely ensures that private sector employees and civil servants are treated equally. It is proposed that the value of the allowance should be grossed up by Departments so that those receiving them are not worse off as a result of taxation. That also happens in the outside world. I am, nevertheless, having further inquiries made into the matter, because it does seem to me to be a rather bureaucratic way of achieving the result that is desired.
    Mr. Foot: I understand that one of the Prime Minister's engagements today is a meeting with representatives of pensioners. What will she say to them about the break in the link between pensions and earnings? Is it not true that that break, which was engineered by her Government, costs a single pensioner £1·45 a week and a married couple £2·25 a week?
    The Prime Minister: As the right hon. Gentleman knows, future pensions are usually the subject of an announcement in the Budget, so he must contain himself a little longer.
    In the four upratings since the Government took office, from the last quarter of 1978 to the last quarter of 1982, pensions have increased by 68·5 per cent. During that same period the retail prices index rose by 61 per cent. and the pensioners' price index by 58 per cent. for a single pensioner household. Therefore, pensions are well ahead of the increase in inflation, especially on the basis of the pensioners' price index.
    Mr. Foot: If the right hon. Lady will not answer my question, will she try to answer it when she meets the pensioners this afternoon? My question did not refer to the inflation rate. Was not the position of the pensioners under the Labour Government very much better protected? They had a 20 per cent. increase. Will she confirm my figures that the break in the link between earnings and pensions is costing a single pensioner £1·45 per week and a married couple £2·25 per week? When will she restore that loss?
    The Prime Minister: The right hon. Gentleman cites figures. Has he forgotten—[HON. MEMBERS: "Answer."]—that during our first year of office we had to make good his Government's failure in forecasting? Has

    129
    he also forgotten that he changed from the historic method to the forecast method, which cost the pensioners a sum equal to £1 billion in today's money?
    Mr. Foot: The right hon. Lady is always running away from her responsibilities. Does she take responsibility for the breach in the link?
    The Prime Minister: The right hon. Gentleman well knows that we changed the law. Nevertheless, the burden on the working population of increased contributions is considerable. There are now 9,040,000 pensioners, whereas when we took office there were only 8,400,000.
    The right hon. Gentleman asked me for what I would take responsibility. In the four upratings since we took office, for which we take responsibility—[Interruption.] The right hon. Gentleman does not like that because it shows how well pensioners have done, based on the retail prices index. Their pensions have increased by 68·5 per cent. During the same period, from the last quarter of 1978 to the last quarter of 1982, the retail prices index rose by 61 per cent.
    Mr. Squireasked the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for Tuesday 1 March.
    The Prime Minister: I refer my hon. Friend to the reply that I gave some moments ago.
    Mr. Squire: Has my right hon. Friend yet received a report on which of the very attractive and popular policies—according to the right hon. Member for Bristol, South-East (Mr. Benn)—were most responsible for the result last Thursday in Bermondsey?
    The Prime Minister: I simply think that the whole lot of the Labour party were rejected by the British people.
    Mr. David Steel: Does the Prime Minister agree that actual polls are more important than opinion polls? Will she take note that in the past 12 by-elections the alliance scored more votes than the Government or the Opposition? Will she give the remainder of the country an early opportunity to register the same opinion?
    The Prime Minister: The right hon. Gentleman will agree that actual polls on general election days are more important than polls on by-election days.
    Mr. Gordon Wilson: Does the Prime Minister realise that more than 85,000 jobs in Scotland are dependent on oil-related activity? Why have the right hon. Lady and the Government taken no action to join the OPEC countries, Norway and Mexico to stabilise oil prices and thus retain employment in Scotland?
    The Prime Minister: As the hon. Gentleman is aware, under the participation agreement that we inherited, the oil is purchased on the basis of the market price at the time. We were left with that legislation, which still exists. Therefore, the oil was purchased at a new, lower price of $30½. Far from taking no action, we did take action and the price was reduced.
    Mr. Hannam: Is my right hon. Friend aware that the Lewis-Merthyr colliery in South Wales is expected to lose £7 million this year? Is she further aware that its closure will not involve a single compulsory redundancy? Will she appeal to the south Wales miners to accept the National Coal Board offer of alternative employment within easy travelling distance?
    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend is correct. Alternative employment has been offered and is available for all men in that colliery who wish to transfer to other business. The pit is expected to make a loss of £7 million this year. Last year it produced 76,000 tonnes of coal at a loss of £84 a tonne. The subsidies to cover losses in Wales are running at £125 million a year—or more than £5,000 a head. That shows the tremendous support that there has been for collieries in Wales and the reasonableness of the National Coal Board in offering alternative employment when it closes a pit.
    Mr. Geraint Howellsasked the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for 1 March.
    The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply that I gave some moments ago.
    Mr. Howells: As it is St. David's Day, may I ask whether the Prime Minister holds the view that people living in Wales should pay higher water rates than those living in Birmingham and London?
    The Prime Minister: At this stage, the hon. Gentleman should address his question not to me but to the regional water authorities and to those who have recently done their level best to raise the water rates—supported by the Opposition.
    Mr. Farrasked the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for 1 March.
    The Prime Minister: I refer my hon. Friend to the reply that I gave some moments ago.
    Mr. Farr: Was not the settling last Thursday of a wage claim by council workers at a rate of 4·8 per cent. a refreshing change from the attitude of the water workers, who held the nation to ransom, supported by the Opposition?
    The Prime Minister: That is, of course, a much lower settlement than that achieved by the water workers. But some settlements, including the one referred to by my hon. Friend, are still a good deal higher than similar settlements in the public sectors of other countries with which we compete. For example, in the public sector in Japan—a major competitor—there will be no increase this year. Britain must compete with such countries in the world market.
    Mr. Cunliffeasked the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for 1 March.
    The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply that I gave some moments ago.
    Mr. Cunliffe: How does the right hon. Lady explain the fact that since May 1979 there has been a 25 per cent. reduction in capital expenditure in our manufacturing industries and that it is expected that there will be a further 10 per cent. reduction by the end of this year? What measures will she suggest to her right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor to put that right in the Budget?
    The Prime Minister: We provided for bigger capital expenditure both in nationalised industries and local authorities than took place. It is not provision from the Exchequer that is lacking in this regard.
    Mr. Hill: May I draw my right hon. Friend's attention to the favourable recommendations of the policy

    131
    committee that was set up by the Chancellor to consider free ports? As, I understand, a statement on that subject is to be made in the Chancellor's Budget statement, would it be right for me to suggest that there should be at least six free ports, one of which should be in the south?
    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend must await the statement on free ports that arises from the report of that
    132
    committee. I think he will find that many of the services and advantages that are available in a free port are also available at the moment in enterprise zones. Some of those zones are in the south. Some, of course, are in the north—there are quite a few of them. It would be better if my hon. Friend awaited a full statement on the subject by my right hon. and learned Friend.

New Member
The following Member made the Affirmation required by law:
Simon Henry Ward Hughes Esq., for Bermondsey.
Mr. Dennis Canavan: Make the most of it; you will not be here for long.

Miners (Strike Action)
3.32 pm
Mr. Ray Powell: 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 decision of the south Wales National Union of Mineworkers to call all their members to take strike action as from yesterday".
The NUM has also decided to solicit support from all parts of the country due to the National Coal Board's decision to close the Tynmawr Lewis Merthyr colliery, Rhondda, and its persistent refusal to make adequate capital investment available for the general development and maintenance of the south Wales coalfield.
The matter is specific because 23,500 miners in south Wales are on strike and the Yorkshire miners will take strike action on Monday. Many other areas are considering proposals for a national miners' strike. Strike action is a direct result of the NCB's refusal to halt the closure of pits and of fear of an escalation of pit closures, a reduction of job opportunities for the present labour force and an eradication of prospects for recruitment.
The matter is undoubtedly important because of the strike's consequences for vital industries' electricity and fuel supplies, the danger to health and hospital services and many other dangers to the well-being of the nation.
The matter is urgent for many reasons, especially for a new deal for miners, the coal industry and the economy, which can only be achieved if discussions between the Government, the NCB and the NUM are held before the strike escalates into a nationwide strike.
I hope that I have proved the essential need for a debate, have demonstrated that the matter is specific, important and overwhelmingly urgent, and that you, Mr. Speaker, will grant my request.
Mr. Speaker: The hon. Member for Ogmore (Mr. Powell) gave me notice before 12 o'clock midday that he would seek leave to make an application under Standing Order No. 9. [Interruption.] Order. The hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) ought to be satisfied that he shouted all through Question Time. He should not try to shout when I am speaking as well.
The hon. Member for Ogmore asks leave to move the Adjournment of the House for the purpose of discussing a specific and important matter that he thinks should have urgent consideration, namely,
"the decision of the south Wales National Union of Mineworkers to call all their members to take strike action as from yesterday".
As the House knows, under Standing Order No. 9, I am directed to take account of the several factors set out in the order but to give no reason for my decision.
I have given careful consideration to the representations that the hon. Gentleman has made, but I have to rule that the hon. Gentleman's submission does not fall within the provisions of the Standing Order and, therefore, I cannot submit his application to the House.

STATUTORY INSTRUMENTS, &c.
Ordered,
That the Local Government, Planning and Land Act 1980 (Commencement No. 8) Order 1983 1983, No. 94) be referred to a Standing Committee on Statutory Instruments, &c.—[Mr. Cope.]

Scotland
3.36 pm
Mr. John Home Robertson: I beg to move,
That leave be given to bring in a Bill to make provision for the election of a Scottish Assembly; to provide for the transfer of legislative and executive powers to the Assembly; and for connected purposes.
This Bill would simply re-enact the Scotland Act 1978, with the addition of a provision for limited independent revenue-raising and development powers and the exception of sections 85 and 86 which relate to the referendum.
The sections that dealt with the referendum are redundant, as the referendum has already taken place. It was held exactly four years ago today, and the people of Scotland voted by a majority of 77,435 to implement the Act and set up the assembly.
Mr. Ivor Stanbrook: Rubbish.
Mr. Home Robertson: The Scottish majority is still waiting for its wishes to be carried out.
A man such as you, Mr. Speaker, who keeps a keen eye on democracy and, above all, on order, might wonder why on earth that referendum victory came to be seen as a defeat. However, Mr. Speaker, you will recall that it was no ordinary referendum. It was held under rules that made it virtually impossible to win, thanks to the 40 per cent. condition that was imposed and contrived by the hon. Member for Islington, South and Finsbury (Mr. Cunningham).
There has been much excitement recently about the spectacular and, some would say, freakish, by-election in Bermondsey. Indeed, the new hon. Member for Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes), whom I congratulate, was said to have won a landslide victory. I have news for him. He had the support of 33 per cent. of the electorate in Bermondsey—exactly the same percentage of Scottish people who voted yes at the referendum. Therefore, according to the criteria that were set out for the referendum by the hon. Member for Islington, South and Finsbury, the hon. Member for Bermondsey should pack his bags and go home.
The 40 per cent. rule was not the only special feature of that referendum of 1 March 1979. I should like to quote from a statement that was issued by a distinguished former Prime Minister and a resident of my constituency—Lord Home of the Hirsel—who was then said to favour Scottish devolution and the establishment of an assembly in Scotland. He said:
"I recommend a no vote because I believe that is the only way to ensure that this important matter goes back to Parliament".
He continued:
"The only way we can make sure of that is to have a Speaker's conference, to which the Conservative Party is pledged".
You, Mr. Speaker, can confirm that the pledge of a Speaker's conference to be initiated by the Government has not been kept. The amazing fact is that people who were supposedly committed to devolution were urging their supporters to vote no in the referendum.
In the circumstances, it was surprising that the Labour Government won that referendum. Credit should go to several people on the Government side of the House. The hon. Member for Bute and North Ayrshire (Mr. Corrie) resigned his post as an Opposition Whip to vote for the
136
Scotland Bill 1978. Imagine my surprise yesterday when I received a letter from the hon. Gentleman saying that he would oppose precisely the same provisions in a ten-minute Bill five years later.
What became of all those Tory pledges on devolution? In the event, the Government moved with indecent haste to repeal the 1978 Act. despite the referendum result. Since then, there has been a series of limited and fundamentally cosmetic experiments with the Scottish Grand Committee.
The House has heard much about the West Lothian question. Will the House reflect on the East Lothian question? East Lothian and West Lothian have Labour district councils, a Labour Member of Parliament and a majority of Labour regional councils. Despite the democratically expressed wishes of the people of East Lothian and of Scotland, where 49 out of the 71 constituencies returned Members opposed to the Government, Scotland has a Tory Secretary of State who administers the devolved powers of the Scottish Office as though he were a colonial governor. He can do what he wishes in East Lothian as long as the Government: Whips can deliver the hon. Members for East Grinstead (Sir G. Johnson Smith) and Eastbourne (Mr. Gow) and all points south into the division Lobbies.
I do not wish to make exaggerated claims about what the Scottish assembly could have done against the background of the present demented Government in Whitehall. I shall leave exaggeration to the Scottish National party. A Scottish assembly would have adopted different policies in housing, education, transport, and development that might have protected standards in some of those sectors. The Labour party would not squander educational resources on the assisted places scheme. An Assembly would probably have done away with two-tier local government in Scotland, which should be applauded by almost everybody. Those are some of the valuable benefits and safeguards that Scotland would have had, had it not been cheated out of its assembly.
Apart from such short-term political considerations, we could have begun to come to grips with some of the underlying constitutional problems that are inherent in the present position, where administrative and executive devolution are in the hands of the Scottish Office but no democratic devolution goes with it. How many people realise that Scottish Members of Parliament have 10 times less opportunity to put oral questions to the Ministers responsible for Scottish affairs than other hon. Members have to question their Ministers? Scottish Members of Parliament face the farce of competing in the wee sma' hours for time to deal with Scottish legislation in the House.
Sooner or later, Scotland will achieve the home rule that it needs and deserves within the United Kingdom. That is Labour party policy and it will be a priority for the next Labour Government. The Labour party in Scotland and the STUC agreed last year on a document that committed the entire movement to campaign for devolution as a major priority irrespective of which party is in office. There has been some interesting speculation in the press about what that might mean. There has been some fanciful stuff about boycotting the House. The Labour party in Scotland will not play into the hands of its opponents or neglect its duty to the people that it represents by boycotting anything.

137
I can visualise circumstances in which hon. Members would have to make more use of the procedures of the House than might otherwise be necessary to persuade a Government of the importance and high merit of some home rule for Scotland. The people of Scotland have had their say and the case for democratic devolution is overwhelming. One way or another, Scotland will get its assembly. The House could save itself some time and aggravation in future years if it passed without further ado the Bill that I seek leave to introduce.
3.46 pm
Mr. John Corrie: I oppose the Bill. The hon. Member for Berwick and East Lothian (Mr. Home Robertson) chided me for being a supporter of devolution, but I oppose the Bill. I remind the hon. Gentleman that on Second Reading of the original Scotland Bill, I voted for the principle of devolution. On Third Reading I voted against the Bill. I have no conscience—[Interruption.]—about opposing this Bill. I should have thought that he would have learnt that, by not delivering last time, he could not deliver on this occasion. The message that should go from the House today is that the Labour party wishes to increase government and taxation in Scotland by having an assembly with tax-raising powers. That is a recipe, as it was before, for confusion and confrontation. A Labour-dominated assembly—that would probably be the case—would dole out money to the regions and districts and then come cap in hand to Westminster to a Conservative Government asking for more. That is bound to be a recipe for disaster not only for Scotland but for the rest of the United Kingdom.
Only last week, some Labour Members suggested that there would be non-co-operation in the House if the Government, as they will, win the next election. I am glad to know that whoever said that agrees that the Conservative party will win the next election. However, if there was a directly elected assembly in Edinburgh with a Labour majority there would be more confrontation if its members decided not to co-operate with the Westminster Government. It would guarantee a great drive in Scotland for independence, because the people would be frustrated about what was happening.
Why did the hon. Gentleman introduce the Bill today? He is not naive enough to imagine that the House would allow a ten-minute Bill to go through on a major constitutional issue without a Division. To suggest that a ten-minute Bill can get anywhere in the House at this time in the Session is to deceive the Scottish people. Tomorrow's headlines would have read "Westminster gives unopposed Second Reading to home rule Bill with tax-raising powers". I am determined that that will not be the case.
If the Labour party ever wins another election, it cannot pass that legislation because there is insufficient agreement within any party in the House or among the parties to fulfil such a promise. What has happened to the great plan brought forward by the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull, East (Mr. Prescott) to examine English regions and to try to decentralise power? Has that been dropped in favour of the home rule Bill?
What will the SDP and the Liberal Members do when the Division comes? Will they sit on their hands?
Mr. Dennis Canavan: Tell us about your plans.
Mr. Corrie: The hon. Gentleman said, "Tell us about your plans". I am glad that he agrees that the Conservative party will win the next election. I hope that when the time comes we do not have a plan. Does the declaration still stand for the SDP, or, as the Liberal party has said, is the SDP in danger of deceiving the electorate about its commitment to an assembly in Scotland? Have we learnt nothing from this fiasco for devolution for Scotland? How will Liberal Members vote today?
There is now only one choice for the Scottish people, and that is to stay part of the United Kingdom, with its Members in this House, or to have complete separation. The people of Scotland do not want separation. I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on introducing this Bill because it gives the House the opportunity to do what it did with the previous Bill—to consign it to the dustbin where it belongs. I ask hon. Members from all parties to join me in the Lobby in voting against this Bill.
Question put, pursuant to Standing Order No. 13 (Motions for leave to bring in Bills and nomination of Select Committees at commencement of public business):
The House divided: Ayes 147, Noes 185.

Division No. 81]

[3.50 pm

AYES

Alton, David

Freud, Clement

Anderson, Donald

Garrett, John (Norwich S)

Archer, Rt Hon Peter

Ginsburg, David

Ashton, Joe

Gourlay, Harry

Atkinson, H.(H'gey,)

Graham, Ted

Barnett, Guy (Greenwich)

Grimond, Rt Hon J.

Beith, A. J.

Hamilton, James (Bothwell)

Benn, Rt Hon Tony

Hardy, Peter

Bennett, Andrew(St'kp't N)

Harrison, Rt Hon Walter

Bidwell, Sydney

Hattersley, Rt Hon Roy

Booth, Rt Hon Albert

Haynes, Frank

Boothroyd, Miss Betty

Healey, Rt Hon Denis

Bradley, Tom

Home Robertson, John

Brown, Hugh D. (Provan)

Homewood, William

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

Hooley, Frank

Buchan, Norman

Howells, Geraint

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

Hoyle, Douglas

Campbell-Savours, Dale

Huckfield, Les

Canavan, Dennis

Hudson Davies, Gwilym E.

Carmichael, Neil

Hughes, Simon (Bermondsey)

Cartwright, John

Jay, Rt Hon Douglas

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

Jenkins, Rt Hon Roy (Hillh'd)

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

Johnson, James (Hull West)

Cohen, Stanley

Jones, Barry (East Flint)

Coleman, Donald

Kerr, Russell

Concannon, Rt Hon J. D.

Lambie, David

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

Leighton, Ronald

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

Lewis, Ron (Carlisle)

Cryer, Bob

Litherland, Robert

Cunliffe, Lawrence

Lyons, Edward (Bradf'd W)

Davis, Clinton (Hackney C)

McCartney, Hugh

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

McDonald, Dr Oonagh

Dewar, Donald

McElhone, Mrs Helen

Dobson, Frank

McGuire, Michael (Ince)

Dormand, Jack

McKay, Allen (Penistone)

Douglas, Dick

McKelvey, William

Dubs, Alfred

MacKenzie, Rt Hon Gregor

Duffy, A. E. P.

Maclennan, Robert

Eadie, Alex

McNally, Thomas

Eastham, Ken

McNamara, Kevin

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

McQuade, John

English, Michael

McTaggart, Robert

Faulds, Andrew

Marshall, D(G'gow S'ton)

Fitt, Gerard

Marshall, Dr Edmund (Goole)

Flannery, Martin

Maynard, Miss Joan

Foot, Rt Hon Michael

Meacher, Michael

Foster, Derek

Mikardo, Ian

Freeson, Rt Hon Reginald

Millan, Rt Hon Bruce

139

Miller, DrM S (E Kilbride)

Silkin, Rt Hon J. (Deptford)

Mitchell, Austin (Grimsby)

Silverman, Julius

Morris, Rt Hon A (W'shawe)

Skinner, Dennis

Morns, Rt Hon C (O'shaw)

Smith, Rt Hon J (N Lanark)

Morris, Rt Hon J (Aberavon)

Spellar, John Francis (B'ham)

Morton, George

Spriggs, Leslie

Mulley, Rt Hon Frederick

Steel, Rt Hon David

O'Halloran, Michael

Strang, Gavin

O'Neill, Martin

Straw, Jack

Park, George

Taylor, Mrs Ann (Bolton W)

Parry, Robert

Thomas, Dr R (Carmarthen)

Pavitt, Laurie

Thorne, Stan (Preston South)

Penhaligon, David

Torney, Tom

Pitt, William Henry

Varley, Rt Hon Eric G

Powell, Raymond (Ogmore)

Wainwright, E (Dearne V)

Race, Reg

Wainwright, R (Colne V)

Radice, Giles

Welsh, Michael

Rees, Rt Hon M (Leeds S)

Whitehead, Phillip

Richardson Jo

Whitlock, William

Roberts, Albert (Normanton)

Williams, Rt Hon Mrs(Crosby)

Roberts, Gwilym (Cannock)

Winnick, David

Robertson, George

Woolmer, Kenneth

Roper, John

Wrigglesworth, Ian

Ross, Ernest (Dundee West)

Sandelson, Neville

Tellers for the Ayes

Sheerman, Barry

Mr George Foulkes and

Sheldon, Rt Hon R

Mr John Maxton

Shore, Rt Hon Peter

NOES

Adley, Robert

Clegg, Sir Walter

Alexander, Richard

Cockeram, Eric

Alison, Rt Hon Michael

Cope, John

Ancram, Michael

Costain, Sir Albert

Arnold, Tom

Cranborne, Viscount

Atkins, Rt Hon H (S'thorne)

Critchley, Julian

Atkins, Robe n(Preston N)

Crouch, David

Atkinson, David (B'm th,E)

Dickens, Geoffrey

Baker, Kenneth(St M'bone)

Dorrell, Stephen

Baker, Nicholas (N Dorset)

Douglas-Hamilton, Lord J.

Bennett, Sir Frederic (T'bay)

Dover, Denshore

Benyon, W (Buckingham)

Durant, Tony

Berry Hon Anthony

Eggar, Tim

Biffen, Rt Hon John

Elliott, Sir William

Biggs-Davison, Sir John

Emery, Sir Peter

Blackburn, John

Eyre, Reginald

Blaker, Peter

Fairgneve, Sir Russell

Body, Richard

Faith, Mrs Sheila

Boscawen, Hon Robert

Farr, John

Bottomley, Peter (W'wich W)

Finsberg, Geoffrey

Braine, Sir Bernard

Fisher, Sir Nigel

Bnttan, Rt Hon Leon

Fletcher, A (Ed'nb'gh N)

Brooke, Hon Peter

Fletcher-Cooke, Sir Charles

Brown, Michael(Brigg & Sc'n)

Fookes, Miss Janet

Bruce-Gardyne, John

Forman, Nigel

Buck, Antony

Fowler, Rt Hon Norman

Budgen, Nick

Fraser, Rt Hon Sir Hugh

Butcher, John

Fraser, Peter (South Angus)

Carlisle, John (Luton West)

Gardiner, George (Reigate)

Carlisle, Kenneth (Lincoln)

Garel-Jones, Tristan

Chapman, Sydney

Glyn, Dr Alan

Clark, Hon A (Plym'th, S'n)

Goodhew, Sir Victor

Clark, Sir W (Croydon S)

Goodlad, Alastair

Clarke, Kenneth (Rushcliffe)

Gow, Ian

140

Grant, Sir Anthony

Murphy, Christopher

Gray, Rt Hon Hamish

Myles, David

Greenway, Harry

Neale, Gerrard

Grieve, Percy

Nelson, Anthony

Griffiths, Peter (Portsm'th N)

Neubert, Michael

Hamilton, Hon A.

Newton, Tony

Hamilton, Michael (Salisbury)

Onslow, Cranley

Hannam, John

Page, Richard (SW Herts)

Hawkins, Sir Paul

Pawsey, James

Hayhoe, Barney

Percival, Sir Ian

Heddle, John

Pollock, Alexander

Heseltine, Rt Hon Michael

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

Higgins, Rt Hon Terence L.

Rathbone, Tim

Hill, James

Renton, Tim

Hogg, Hon Douglas (Gr'th'm)

Rhodes James, Robert

Holland, Philip (Carlton)

Ridley, Hon Nicholas

Howe, Rt Hon Sir Geoffrey

Roberts, Wyn (Conway)

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

Rossi, Hugh

Howell, Ralph (N Norfolk)

Rost, Peter

Hunt, David (Wirral)

Rumbold, Mrs A. C. R.

Irving, Charles (Cheltenham)

Sainsbury, Hon Timothy

Jenkin, Rt Hon Patrick

Shaw, Giles (Pudsey)

Jessel, Toby

Shaw, Sir Michael (Scarb')

Jopling, Rt Hon Michael

Shepherd, Colin (Hereford)

Joseph, Rt Hon Sir Keith

Short, Mrs Renée

Kaberry, Sir Donald

Sims, Roger

Kershaw, Sir Anthony

Smith, Tim (Beaconsfield)

King, Rt Hon Tom

Speller, Tony

Knight, Mrs Jill

Spence, John

Lang, Ian

Sproat, Iain

Lawson, Rt Hon Nigel

Squire, Robin

Lee, John

Stanbrook, Ivor

Le Marchant, Spencer

Stanley, John

Lennox-Boyd, Hon Mark

Stevens, Martin

Lloyd, Peter (Fareham)

Stewart, A.(E Renfrewshire)

Luce, Richard

Stewart, Ian (Hitchin)

McCrindle, Robert

Taylor, Teddy (S'end E)

Macfarlane, Neil

Tebbit, Rt Hon Norman

MacGregor, John

Thatcher, Rt Hon Mrs M.

MacKay, John (Argyll)

Thompson, Donald

Macmillan, Rt Hon M.

Thornton, Malcolm

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

Townend, John (Bridlington)

McQuarrie, Albert

van Straubenzee, Sir W.

Major, John

Vaughan, Dr Gerard

Marland, Paul

Wakeham, John

Marlow, Antony

Walker, B. (Perth)

Marten, Rt Hon Neil

Waller, Gary

Mather, Carol

Warren, Kenneth

Mawby, Ray

Watson, John

Mayhew, Patrick

Wells, Bowen

Mellor, David

Wells, John (Maidstone)

Meyer, Sir Anthony

White, Frank R.

Miller, Hal (B'grove)

Whitelaw, Rt Hon William

Mills, Iain (Meriden)

Whitney, Raymond

Mills, Sir Peter (West Devon)

Wiggin, Jerry

Moate, Roger

Young, Sir George (Acton)

Monro, Sir Hector

Moore, John

Tellers for the Noes:

Morris, M. (N'hampton S)

Mr. John Corrie and

Morrison, Hon C. (Devizes)

Mr. Barry Henderson.

Mudd, David

Question accordingly negatived.

Parliamentary Boundary Commissions
Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Cope.]
4 pm
The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. William Whitelaw): The parliamentary Boundary Commissions are the subject of this afternoon's debate. Although the debate has been prompted by the recent recommendations which the four commissions have made for constituencies in the United Kingdom, those recommendations have already been or will shortly be the subject of detailed debate in the House. I do not therefore propose to discuss them on this occasion. Instead I propose to stand back and look at the commissions from a somewhat longer historical perspective.
As a background, I should like to begin by reminding the House first of the constitution of the four Boundary Commissions. The four permanent Boundary Commissions for England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland were established by the House of Commons (Redistribution of Seats) Act 1944. The deputy chairman of each commission is a High Court judge appointed by my right hon. and learned Friend the Lord Chancellor or, as the case may be, the Lord President of the Court of Session or the Lord Chief Justice of Northern Ireland. There are two other members. In the English commission one is appointed by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environemt and the other by me. In the Welsh commission one is appointed by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Wales and the other by me. Appointments to the Scottish and Northern Ireland commissions are made by the Secretaries of State concerned. In 1958 the Home Secretary, Mr. R. A. Butler, as he then was, gave the House an assurance that the ministerial appointments should in each case be made in agreement with the other political parties, and this assurance has been upheld by successive Governments ever since. Only one of the three ministerial appointments to the English commission, which is the one I know most about, has been made since the Government took office, but we consulted the Opposition about that appointment as they consulted us about the appointments they made in the past.
Apart from the members of each commission there are two assessors, the Registrar General for the relevant part of the United Kingdom and the Director General of the ordnance survey. The statutory framework for the redistribution of seats and the procedures laid down for the Boundary Commissions to perform their task are the result of a century or so's experience and are in virtually all respects—this is important—the product of all-party agreement. Your ex-officio chairmanship, Mr. Speaker, illustrates the complete political impartiality of the commission's work.
Before looking at the way in which the commissions operate I think we need to understand the historical processes which led to the present position.
During the 19th century, the practice was for periodic redistribution of seats to be proposed by the Government of the day. The great Reform Acts of 1832 and 1867 and Mr. Gladstone's redistribution Act of 1884 each effected a major change in the division of the electoral map, and each was the source of acute political controversy. By the time, at the beginning of the present century, that
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Parliament came to accept the principle that constituencies should so far as possible be of equal size, it had become clear that proposals for new boundaries should come from a more independent source. An all-party conference was set up under Mr. Speaker's chairmanship in 1917. It recommended that in future the distribution of seats should be based on the population of each constituency, and the Representation of the People Act 1918 gave effect to this recommendation by adopting the proposals for new boundaries of an independent Boundary Commission.
Both in 1918 and in 1948, when Parliament once again addressed itself to the redistribution of seats, the change was made through primary legislation, in the form of a schedule to Bills concerned with many other aspects of electoral law. This procedure enabled Parliament to scrutinise the commission's recommendations in considerable detail and, if necessary, to debate and vote on particular recommendations in isolation from the whole. But from other points of view the procedure had serious disadvantages. If the principle of a redistribution of seats at regular intervals were accepted, successive Governments would be committed to periodic redistribution Bills, which, as constitutional measures, could be expected to consume a great deal of parliamentary time. Furthermore, implementation through an Act of Parliament brought the recommendations of an impartial commission right into the political arena. There was always the chance that Parliament might decide to alter the commission's proposals to suit, not the electorate, but party advantage.
The problem was to devise a procedure which allowed a democratically elected Parliament to retain the ultimate control of the redistribution of seats without overwhelming the House with detail or endangering the independence of the Boundary Commission's recommendations. That problem was solved by Mr. Speaker's Conference of 1944, in which all the parties agreed that after an initial redistribution through statute effect should be given to periodic boundary changes through an order presented in draft to Parliament by the Home Secretary of the day and approved by the affirmative resolution of each House.
The Speaker's Conference recommendations were implemented in the House of Commons (Redistribution of Seats) Act 1944. The Act was subsequently amended and then consolidated in the 1949 Act, which, with further modifications made in 1958, provides the statutory framework within which the commissions still operate. This legislation requires the commissions to submit their proposals for the redistribution of seats every 10 to 15 years, lays down the rules with which the commissions are required to comply and describes the procedures to be followed by the commissions in formulating their recommendations.
Between 1832 and 1948 seats were redistributed every 30 years or so. The longer the interval, the more radical the changes needed to arrive at a more equitable redistribution. By the 1940s there was a feeling in all parts of the House that boundary changes ought to be put on both a more regular and a more frequent basis. The 1944 Speaker's Conference accordingly recommended that the permanent Boundary Commissions should be required to submit their reports every three to seven years, thus ensuring that boundaries kept pace quite closely with population movements and that changes should on average be made once during the lifetime of each Parliament.

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The 1954 changes were the first and only boundaries introduced under this procedure. Although, compared with the 1948 redistribution, the changes effected in 1954 were only minor, this made them no less controversial. If the object of the 1944 Act had been to take the redistribution of seats outside the area of political dispute, the objective was clearly not achieved. When the 1954 order was debated, hon. Members put much emphasis on the deleterious effect on constituency life of too, frequent boundary changes, and it was agreed that changes should be made less often than the 1944 Speaker's Conference had proposed. Accordingly, the 1958 Act extended the interval between reviews to the present 10 to 15 years.
Mr. W. Benyon: Does my right hon. Friend accept that because, according to the report, the period of 10 to 15 years runs from the date of the report on the last general review, the longer the delay in submitting each report the longer the whole process is delayed?
Mr. Whitelaw: That is perfectly true and I know that my hon. Friend has had experience of that. On the other hand, after 1954 Parliament decided that too frequent boundary changes caused serious problems for constituency life. Every effort has been made to achieve a balance. Sometimes, as in my hon. Friend's case, it has not proved entirely satisfactory, but I shall return to that aspect later.
The 1958 Act extended the interval between reviews to the present 10 to 15 years, and the commissions submitted their second periodical report in 1969. The Northern Ireland commission submitted its third periodical report last year and the three other commissions submitted theirs earlier this year.
Ten or 15 years between reviews at a time of rapid social change means that each report is sure to contain proposals for major changes in constituency arrangements. Since 1969, we have to remember that the reorganisation of local government 10 years ago makes quite radical changes inevitable. I shall say no more about that, however, as we shall have a full opportunity to debate it when we discuss the English commission's recommendations tomorrow.
The rules set out in the second schedule to the 1949 Act, as amended, lay down how the commissions should set about their task. I think that it is fair to say that it is this aspect of the redistribution arrangements which has caused Parliament the most difficulty in recent years, because it is here that a balance has to be struck between the need to ensure equality of representation and the need to respect natural communities.
Sir Peter Emery: Before going further into those details, does my right hon. Friend accept that there is a major problem in dealing with new reports when they have to put before Parliament recommendations based on electorates that are so far out of date? The present report for England is based on the electorate of 1976. Those recommendations will still operate in 1992, so they will be based on an electorate 15 to 17 years out of date. In considering any alteration, would it not be sensible to try to ensure that the electorates used are far more up to date at the date on which the Boundary Commission report is actually accepted?
Mr. Whitelaw: I am coming to that, but it impinges on what Parliament decided in the past. Parliament can,
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of course, decide to make changes. When Parliament decided to have more frequent changes it disliked the result of that decision very much. It therefore went back on it. Parliament must make up its mind. If it does not want more frequent changes, some of the problems to which my hon. Friend refers will arise. I shall, however, return to that later.
We still make a distinction in this House between borough constituencies and county constituencies. Although successive Representation of the People Acts have smoothed away most of the differences, the distinction reminds us that at one time it was generally believed that quite different rules, and a quite different franchise, should govern elections in rural and urban constituencies. Implicit in any system of redistributing seats, however, is the idea that a vote should be worth just as much in one sort of constituency as in another, and each redistribution has tended to iron out the differences between urban seats and rural seats.
At the same time, we have never entirely lost hold of the idea that constituency boundaries should so far as possible reflect those of natural communities. In entrusting an independent commission with the task of drawing up new boundaries, Parliament has repeatedly taken steps to ensure that fair and equal representation is considered alongside local ties. That has been a decision of Parliament.
When, in 1917, the Speaker's Conference first laid down rules for ensuring a full mathematical equality of constituency representation, it was quickly realised that strict rules made the system inoperable and Parliament had to relax them. It was decided that a variation of 30 per cent. below and 70 per cent. above the electoral quota was acceptable. Much the same thing happened when Parliament returned to the problem 30 years later. Under the recommendation of the 1944 Speaker's Conference and the ensuing House of Commons (Redistribution of Seats) Act it was proposed that a much smaller 25 per cent. tolerance would be the maximum acceptable. In 1946, however, the then Home Secretary, Mr. Chuter Ede, had to tell the House that the 25 per cent. formula had forced the commissions to recommend the complete dismemberment of many united communities, and the idea of attempting to enforce strict mathematical equality between evenly distributed broad limits was abandoned.
Even so, the 1954 boundary changes highlighted some remaining difficulties in the redistribution rules In their amended form, the rules contained a presumption that the most important feature of redistribution was adherence to the electoral quota. In the words of Mr. R. A. Butler, as he then was, this meant that the commissions were
"obliged, in many cases, to recommend changes which would produce greater mathematical equality between constituencies even though the electorates of the existing constituencies …are not abnormal."—[Official Report, 11 February 1958; Vol. 582, c. 230.]
The rigid application of the electoral quota in 1954 and the unnecessary changes that it produced caused protests from all quarters of the House. As a result, and following a suggestion of the Boundary Commission itself, an additional rule was added in 1958 requiring the commissions
"to take account … of the inconveniences attendant on alterations of constituencies … and of any local ties which would be broken by such alterations".
Finally, the English commission was given even more freedom to balance these conflicting principles when the

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opportunity was taken in the Local Government Act 1972 to reduce the number of local government boundaries that the commission was in general prevented from crossing.
I turn now to the way in which the commissions are required to go about their work of drawing up proposals for new constituencies.
Mr. Anthony Nelson: I hope I am not anticipating what my right hon. Friend is going to say but on quotas there is a very serious issue: whether the second schedule of the 1949 Act is still applicable and the extent to which the commission should work to a figure of 65,700 electors. Is a constituency of this size still appropriate, given the view of many people that there are perhaps already too many Members and too many constituencies? Although it is the law, and none of us denies that, would my right hon. Friend care to share with us his views on whether there is a case for making constituencies much larger?
Mr. Whitelaw: I should be very unwise—even more unwise perhaps than I normally am—if I were to reply to such a proposal. There are many arguments and Parliament must decide what it wants. It would be unwise for the Home Secretary of the day to prescribe a situation in which a great many Members would have no seat at the time of a subsequent general election. I do not wish to cast myself in that role. It is a matter entirely for Parliament itself to decide. If in its wisdom Parliament were to decide it wanted many fewer Members, it could perfectly well do so in future. I can only hazard a guess—I doubt that I shall be here to see it, because it will be a long time in the future—that Parliament will not come to that conclusion. However, it is a matter for Parliament.
The commissions have power to base their proposals only on the electorate during the year—a point raised by one of my hon. Friends—in which they began their reviews; otherwise the commissions would always be waiting for, or pressed to wait for, more up-to-date electoral figures and would never complete their work. This makes it important that effect should be given to their proposals not too many years after the reviews begin. At the same time, the commissions need to ensure that during the preparation of their proposals full account is taken of local feelings and local knowledge.
An essential feature of the 1944 Act was the commissions' power to hold local inquiries at which provisional proposals could be discussed and representations made before final recommendations were made. At the time of the 1954 changes there was a feeling that this power had been insufficiently used, and Parliament decided in 1958 that during future reviews the commissions should be obliged to hold a local inquiry if they received objections from any local authority, or at least 100 electors, affected by their provisional recommendations. The effect of this measure can be judged by comparing the number of local inquiries held during the English commission's first review with those held during their third. Before the 1954 changes there had been seven local inquiries; in the most recent round there were 95. If the commissions decide to revise their proposals in the light of a local inquiry, representations must again be invited on their revised recommendations, and so on until the commissions decide not to alter their last published recommendations.
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I do not think there can be any doubt that the requirement to hold local inquiries has immensely strengthened the redistribution process. It brings the commissions right down into the reality of local issues and local ties. As the English commission says in its most recent report, many representations are, of course, politically motivated, designed to give advantage to one party or another; and the commission quite properly emphasises that
"this has never been a permissible consideration".
Similarly, the volume of representations made does not necessarily mean that a commission's proposals are ill-conceived or universally repugnant to local opinion. As the English commission again observes:
"it is apparent that people show greater willingness to make representations opposing proposals than they do supporting proposals."
No one who has been a Member of this House for any length of time will doubt the wisdom of that remark. Often it is only after provisional proposals have been revised that representations supporting them are received for the first time.
As a background to this debate, I have given the House an outline of the commissions' task and have attempted to explain how Parliament came to decide that things should be as they are. I felt that that was a duty that I, as the Home Secretary of the day, owed the House.
At the beginning of my speech I emphasised the way our system of redistributing seats has evolved over the years against the background—I repeat it now—of all-party agreement. The nature of the agreement is roughly this. It is vital that Parliament should retain overall control of the machinery. As Mr. Herbert Morrison said when, as Home Secretary, he was introducing the provisions of the 1944 Act:
"at all stages of the procedure Parliament must be on top … Parliament will settle the principles, Parliament will deal with the recommendations of the Boundary Commissioners … and at no stage will there be any situation which is not entirely under Parliamentary control."—[Official Report, 10 October 1944; Vol. 403, c. 1614.]
At the same time Parliament has decided to put a certain distance between itself and the boundary changes themselves. Parliament has given the task to the Boundary Commission, Parliament has established the rules under which the commissions operate and, by deciding that changes should be implemented through Order in Council, Parliament has clearly said that it is not its business to interfere with the detail of the recommendations duly put forward under the statutory rules. I hope that this is something we shall all bear in mind tomorrow when we come to the English Commission's recommendations themselves.
4.29 pm
Mr. Roy Hattersley: A Boundary Commission debate offers the House an almost irresistible temptation to behave and speak with a wholly bogus and equally incredible air of purity and objectivity. If we are to have a serious debate on Boundary Commissions, their history and their work, I believe we ought all to begin with an admission. Most politicians' enthusiasm for or antipathy towards a Boundary Commission report is at least influenced by the effect that that report has on the prospects of his or her party. I cannot bring myself, at the beginning of this debate, to pretend anything different. I therefore declare an appropriate interest.

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I have never believed that the report that we are discussing in general terms today and will discuss in detail tomorrow will result in the net loss of seats to my party that some newspapers have suggested. But I do not pretend other than it swings the balance—I make no accusations, it is a matter of statistics—in the direction of the Conservative party. I look upon its proposals therefore with something less than affection. It is for exactly the same reason that the Home Secretary has viewed the recommendations with such enthusiasm. That is why he allotted extra staff to the preparatory work.
Mr. Whitelaw: Let me say that I do not view the proposals with enthusiasm. Certainly my speech was not intended to convey that impression.
Mr. Hattersley: I assure the Home Secretary that his speech conveyed no impression whatsoever. There is absolute unanimity about that.
The enthusiasm to which I referred is demonstrated by the allocation of extra staff to the preparatory work in the right hon. Gentleman's Department, his encouragement to the commission to surge ahead, his anticipation of the formal receipt of the report, his ignoring of the court's enjoinder and his decision to send the report to the printers before he had lawfully received it and before the House of Lords had decided whether it was right for him to receive it. I make no allegations or accusations about the Home Secretary. He and I are joined by the mutual attitude of politicians in that we are inclined to look at the Boundary Commission's reports according to whether in our judgment they assist or work to the detriment of our parties. That is our partisan reaction. It is a natural and perhaps proper reaction. I make that admission at once because I believe that if the debate is to have any purpose, it should be honest and serious. It cannot be serious unless it is honest. The honest point is the political bias of all of us as we discuss the report.
Notwithstanding that political bias, objective things ought to be said about the way in which the Boundary Commission operates, its procedures and therefore the conclusions that will be debated in detail by the House tomorrow. Those are criticisms not of the Boundary Commission, certainly not of its individual members, but of the procedures. They are criticisms of procedures which, if the Home Secretary wants a further admission from me, I accept at once have been instituted and operated by successive Governments. I understand that the purpose of today's debate is to look at the merits of the proposals that are now the guiding principles of the Boundary Commission.
The principal task of the Boundary Commission is to equalise the size of constituencies or, to be more precise, to equalise the size of the electorates within constituencies. That is an essential requirement of our form of democracy, because if there is a gross discrepancy between the size of one constituency and another, individual votes do not have equal importance. We all agree that it was wrong for 10 men to elect a Member of Parliament in the 19th century in one constituency when it took 2,000 men to elect a Member of Parliament in another. The unacceptability of that inequity in a less extreme form applies today in the 20th century if one constituency has 57,995 electors, while another, within a mile of its boundaries, has 84,401 electors. That is the case with Finchley and Wood Green, two adjacent seats, one of which, by coincidence is
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represented by the Prime Minister and has a conveniently small electorate. Within a mile of that constituency there is a parliamentary division with voters who number almost 30 per cent. more than in the Finchley division. I cannot justify that in terms of the democracy on which our representative Government is based and neither can the rules that govern the behaviour of the Boundary Commission.
Rule 5 of the Boundary Commission is the most important of all the statutory criteria by which the Boundary Commission is governed. It requires the commission to redistribute seats in a way that produces constituencies of a size that is as close to what is called the electoral quota as possible.
That quota is a pretty inadequate calculation. The rules differ for Scotland and Wales from those for England. That is one of the problems that we have to discuss in the United Kingdom Parliament. For England, the quota is determined by dividing the number of electors on a seven-year-old register by the number of existing constituencies, which is already acknowledged to be wrong and which the Boundary Commission is required to change. The quota of constituency numbers is determined by dividing one admittedly inadequate number into a second inadequate number because it is outdated. As the result of that strange process, the commission came to the conclusion that the figure for the ideal constituency in England, the mean constituency, the magic number, was 65,753.
I say again, out of respect to you, Mr. Speaker, as chairman of the commission and all hon. Members who have served under you, that in coming to that strange calculation the commission was abiding by the requirements laid down by law. However, that is a strange way to begin. The law requires the commission to proceed in a way that many of us regard as equally strange. For England the commission was required to produce constituencies as near to that magic number as possible. That was the aim. I describe it as an aim because as well as aiming at that size of constituency it was required to observe other criteria. I shall describe the other criteria as the commission describes them. It describes one of those criteria in its report as follows:
"Rule 4 requires that so far as practicable constituencies are to be contained within the areas of counties or London boroughs."
Added to that criterion enshrined in the schedule to the 1958 Act there is what has now become a convention, not the law, which also circumscribes the commission's behaviour that wherever possible constituencies shall contain wards that are not divided between one constituency and another. A local government ward shall be wholly and entirely within one constituency.
Every Boundary Commission since the war—I fear it is particularly so with this Boundary Commission—has had great difficulty in deciding the order of precedence that is to be attributed to its conflicting rules, for the hard fact of the matter is that obtaining constituencies of the median or mean size of 65,753 voters, which would give equal weight to every voter in England and therefore produce the democratic outcome that the Act intended, obliges constituencies to go across existing constituency, and county, boundaries. This Boundary Commission was by no means sure, because I fear that the Act does not give it clear advice, whether numbers are more important than boundaries or boundaries more important than numbers. The advice that is at its disposal makes it clear that

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numbers have a certain primacy and that the aim of 65,000 is the most important objective. However, the rules do not make it anything like clear how important that objective is and whether it must be held paramount when the Boundary Commission comes to its conclusions.
Mr. Gary Waller: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that because of that problem the Boundary Commission considered whether it should cross London borough boundaries, and that the unanimous view of all parties, including the Labour party, was that it should not, although that was the one way in which the disparities about which he spoke could be avoided? As the Labour party took that view, is it not surprising that it should come forward with a different view when that situation could have been avoided previously? Perhaps the timing is significant.
Mr. Hattersley: I struggle to avoid those little party points, but as the hon. Gentleman wants to make them, I shall refer to the Yorkshire Labour party, which in the Barnsley, Rotherham, Sheffield and Doncaster area wanted to cross the borough boundaries, but was prevented from doing so. Leeds and Wakefield wanted to cross the borough boundaries and were allowed to do so. It would not be inconsistent with my view of history to suggest that the judgment of the London Labour party was superior to that of Sheffield, Barnsley, Doncaster and Rotherham Labour party.
The truth is that individual parties, like individual Members of Parliament, will take different views on those matters according to their party allegiance and their judgment of party fortunes. The House should consider today the merits and benefits for genuine democracy. It is my conclusion and the conclusion of my right hon. Friends that the overwhelming merit for genuine democracy is to have constituencies that are as near to the mean size as possible, although that involves crossing county boundaries.
Of course, if the crossing of county borders can be avoided and if wards can be contained entire and intact within constituencies, that is a bonus, but it is nothing like the advantage that is to be obtained from being able to say to every individual voter that his vote is of equal weight to all other votes, whether it is in London, Yorkshire, Birmingham, Devon or any other part of England.
This Boundary Commission has singularly failed to achieve equality of weight or equalisation of numbers. It has strayed more from the mean figure, the figure at which it is bound by law to aim, than any Boundary Commission since the war. That is its right and entitlement under the criteria laid down by the Act, but those of us who want to see the proper balance and weight must regret that the commission has strayed in that way. We must consider how in future Boundary Commissions can be prevented from doing so.
Mr. Sydney Chapman: I have much sympathy with the point the right hon. Gentleman is making. He has talked about having the same number of electors in a constituency, whether it be in Birmingham, Yorkshire or London. Would he extend that to any constituency in England as compared with any constituency in Scotland or Wales? Further, would he not
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agree on reflection that this Boundary Commission has got nearer to the mean average in more constituencies than any previous Boundary Commission?
Mr. Hattersley: No, quite the opposite, in answer to the second question. On the first point, since we are discussing representation in the United Kingdom Parliament, there ought to be an equation if not of numbers then of procedures within the entire United Kingdom. My regret is that that view is not shared by the Boundary Commission, at least in its recommendations that are to be debated tomorrow. For a United Kingdom Parliament the weight of each vote, and therefore the size of each constituency, should be as equal as possible. I admit that that aim cannot be perfectly achieved.
Let me give a further example, one which will no doubt be duplicated, repeated and added to in this debate and in the debate on the report tomorrow. If a psephologist were to drive north up Finchley road, he would find that on his right all the constituencies contained 67,000 or more electors and that on his left all the constituencies contained 60,000 or fewer electors. That is palpable nonsense if we are trying to get equality between the strength of individual votes. It is nonsense that in that area there is a 20 per cent. difference from the average; in some cases there is a 30 per cent. difference from the average and very large discrepancies can be pointed out all over England, and, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow, Craigton (Mr. Millan) will explain, if he catches your eye at the end of the debate, Mr. Speaker, those discrepancies are repeated throughout Scotland as well as in other parts of the United Kingdom.
The desire, the need and the obligation for the Boundary Commission to provide a report that is wholly consistent is enhanced by the inability of the House effectively to change the Boundary Commission's recommendations once they are presented to us. One of the things that I found most wearisome in those newspapers which suggested that objection to the details of the Boundary Commission's recommendations was misplaced because the ultimate judgment resided in the House of Commons was the simple fact that this is not the case.
Let me put it in simple and direct terms. I am greatly satisfied by the proposals made by the Boundary Commission for Birmingham, the city which I represent in part. But I am wholly dissatisfied by the proposals for the city in which I was born and brought up, Sheffield. I have no way of expressing my disapproval of the Sheffield recommendations unless I pretend that I am equally at odds with and against what is proposed for Birmingham.
I am not suggesting that Parliament should be given the opportunity to put forward amendments to individual pages and paragraphs of the report which we shall debate tomorrow. Were that to happen, we would sit through June, July, August and September, with day after day of amendment and debate. But if the House of Commons, as necessity requires, is simply offered a take-it-or-leave-it vote on the recommendations of the Boundary Commission, there is a special obligation on the commission to behave in a way that is consistent for the entire United Kingdom. It is not required under the law to do that. I fear that it has not done so, as my hon. and right hon. Friends will explain when we come to the details tomorrow.
In the general debate I should like to give some examples of what I mean. There are discrepancies in size

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of 17·22 per cent. above the national average and 6·01 per cent. below the national average in adjoining constituencies. There are discrepancies of 15,278 electors in adjoining constituencies. That should not be acceptable to the House. Nor ought we to accept the discrepancies between England and Wales and the discrepancies in procedures between England and Scotland when the Boundary Commissions undertake their deliberations and prepare their reports. I say again, as I said to the hon. Member for Chipping Barnet (Mr. Chapman), that for the United Kingdom Parliament all constituencies should have the same weight, the same number of electors, the same importance and the same influence; they do not. The differences stem largely from the differences in procedures that were employed as the Boundary Commissions examine different areas. They stem particularly from the different attitudes of the inspectors who examined individual appeals and presided over individual inquiries.
Let me explain what I mean, dealing again with a point I have already made in passing but which I shall now cover in more detail. I make the point again because it demonstrates the total failure of the Boundary Commissions to co-ordinate the response of different inspectors who made judgments on appeals against various decisions. On the Labour side of the House we regard the equating of numbers as far more important than avoiding the crossing of boundaries. From the evidence it seems that some inspectors shared that view but others did not.
In south Yorkshire, Sheffield, Rotherham, Barnsley and Doncaster were considered individually, and proposed appeals that all south Yorkshire should be considered together, thus equating sizes and numbers, were rendered impossible because individual inspectors were appointed for each of the boroughs and none of the inspectors was able, or prepared, to consider appeals that went outside his terms of reference. However, in west Yorkshire one inspector was appointed for the Leeds and Wakefield inquiry. When the Labour party urged that a boundary should be crossed so as to obtain better numbers, that inspector was prepared to concede the point and a constituency that straddled Leeds and Wakefield was in consequence created. It seems wholly unreasonable that in south Yorkshire one rule should prevail but in west Yorkshire different criteria should be used for the judgment.
Mr. Mark Carlisle: The right hon. Gentleman has made the point again that it is the view of the Labour party that the need to have equality of number is more important than the crossing of county or borough boundaries. When my hon. Friend the Member for Brighouse and Spenborough (Mr. Waller) told him that the Labour party had earlier expressed the opposite view, he said that some Labour parties expressed one view and some another. Perhaps he would look at paragraph 14 of the report, where the Boundary Commission said about constituencies crossing county boundaries:
"We discussed the situation with the representatives of the political parties. They were of the unanimous opinion that none of the constituencies in London should cross a borough boundary, … they were opposed in all circumstances to the crossing of any county boundary."
Does that not mean the Labour party as a whole, rather than any individual branch of it?
Mr. Hattersley: My information is that it does not. The right hon. and learned Gentleman must learn, as I
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have learnt over the last 30 years, that the Labour party is a many-splendoured thing; it will have different attitudes on the matter in different areas.
I believe—I say this with as little as pomposity as I can manage—that our task today is not to worry about whether the London Labour party or the Yorkshire Labour party was right, but to worry about what produces the most democratic result. Even though it may require me to run contrary to the judgment of the London Labour party—this I must say to the right hon. and learned Gentleman who has another party point to make—I believe that equality of numbers is of overwhelming importance.
Mr. Mark Carlisle: I am not making a party point. I want to establish the facts. The report refers to meetings with the political parties in general. I understood that to mean that it was the view of the major political parties, on a country basis, that they were opposed to crossing boundaries. Is the right hon. Gentleman saying that I am wrong to read the report in that way and that the Labour party never expressed such views and that they were merely the views of part of the Labour party?
Mr. Hattersley: It is my understanding that the right hon. and learned Gentleman is not correct. My judgment is that even were it to be correct, it is not important. There are differences within parties on all these matters. The right hon. and learned Gentleman personifies the differences within his party.
Today's debate, which is not politically polarised and is not leading to a vote, is an attempt to find a more democratic way of running the Boundary Commission. Irrespective of whether I am offending part of the Labour party or even its National Executive, my judgment is that the best way to achieve a democratic solution is to equate the number of constituencies far more rigorously and precisely than they have been equated in the report. Because inspectors were appointed differently and took different views, a different outcome was achieved for areas within comparatively close proximity. Anyone who looks at the way inspectors behaved throughout the country will discover that the variations in result are due largely to the attitude taken by different inspectors and the utter failure of the Boundary Commission to co-ordinate the inspectors' work.
I shall give an example from Birmingham, which is an area where the outcome is wholly to my liking. However, that outcome was produced in the most extraordinary way. The initial report was submitted. It showed evidence that a child had been given a piece of chalk and been invited to scribble on the map of Birmingham. The result was so unsatisfactory to all the participants that some Birmingham politicians sat down and decided that they could produce a redistribution which conformed more with the criteria than the Boundary Commission's initial recommendations.
We appealed to the Boundary Commission. There were a few fringe criticisms. The chairman of the Sutton Coldfield Conservative association said that she would support any proposal that did not call Sutton Coldfield, Sutton Coldfield—Birmingham and would support no proposal that did. The hon. Member for Birmingham, Yardley (Mr. Bevan) gave evidence and said that his constituency:
"had been delineated by dikes in the middle ages and ought to be so delineated in the future."

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Putting those criticisms aside, the Boundary Commission accepted entirely a scheme that had been drawn up in a Birmingham front room and which conformed more with the Boundary Commission's regulations than the scheme it had originally submitted.
That is fine for Birmingham. My worry is where the inspector was not so open-minded, flexible and prepared to think again. The House will find during the next two days that example after example will be given of where the first proposal is as with the child with the chalk on the map, as in Birmingham, and the inspector, unlike in Birmingham, not being prepared to accept second thoughts and better solutions provided by others.
The important subject that we should discuss today is how to avoid these inadequacies and what rules we can lay down which do not involve party balance, and which I cannot assail or assess in terms of party balance, but which would avoid the troubles, the suspicions, the uncertainty and the lack of confidence which the Boundary Commission has created.
I offer three or four suggestions as to what should be done. First, the obligation to have a common-sized constituency, as compared and contrasted with the duty not to cross county boundaries or the obligation to achieve an appropriate number compared with the calculation of the number of seats throughout the United Kingdom, should be given a clear priority.
I believe that a new Boundary Commission Act should begin by saying that the first and paramount obligation of the Boundary Commission is to have the numbers as equal as possible. Of course, for Members of Parliament, their agents and parties, there will be some inconvenience, as I once experienced, when one fights a constituency called Sutton Coldfield and discovers that part of it is in the city of Birmingham. That inconvenience was multitudinous and continued for four years. It resulted in the remarkable achievement of my having fought the constituency hard for three years and succeeded in increasing the Conservative majority from 17,000 to 22,000. Similar things will happen to all types of constituencies and Members of Parliament. However, they pale into insignificance compared with the democratic duty to have constituencies of about the same electoral size.
Mr. Harry Greenway: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that in Ealing, the commissioner said that he would accept a proposal on the basis of its simplicity rather than on the basis of geographical or community or numerical considerations? Does not that take us into a wholly new and extraordinary area?
Mr. Hattersley: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. If I may say so without prejudicing his position, I am grateful also for his constant nods throughout much of my criticism of the Boundary Commission. He demonstrates another of the complexities and variable elements in the Boundary Commisssion's work.
I hope that either today or tomorrow we shall develop a point that I am trying to make, and which the hon. Gentleman will make no doubt with clarity, that by operating according to different criteria in different places on different occasions, the result is confusion and discrepancy. We avoid that by giving paramount
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importance to equality of numbers. It will be achieved only if we back that obligation by a second duty placed on the Boundary Commission.
The next Boundary Commission must be required not simply to draw lines, but to give reasons why it drew the lines where it did. The Boundary Commission is enabled to operate in a way that seems preposterous to many people because it is not required to explain why it came to its decisions. It should be obliged to add a note to its report saying, "This boundary runs along this road, or cuts across this stream," or, "This wall is divided," or, "These numbers are unequal for this reason." It will concentrate the inspectors' minds in coming to a reasonable conclusion which they can justify. There is nothing more likely to allow men and women to come to an unjustifiable conclusion than the knowledge that they do not have to justify it publicly. The request for an explanation is an elementary and reasonable obligation to place on them.
Thirdly, I believe that much of what the Home Secretary said about the history of the Boundary Commissions is right, not in terms of the historical fact, which goes without saying, but in the terms of the implication which he added. We want to change at a time and with a frequency that causes the minimum disturbance to constituencies and Members of Parliament. We want to do it in a way which, if possible, avoids the allegation of political bias and the uncertainty that comes from the feeling that one side has been treated badly and another has benefited unreasonably.
I do not suggest that the Boundary Commission, collectively or individually, has behaved in any biased or improper way. I beleve that the present rules allow it to behave capriciously and in a way that affects one area differently from another. That is not good for democracy, and I hope that the Home Secretary and I can agree that in the years ahead we must clear up the obvious mistakes of the present Boundary Commission report before we have another.
5 pm
Mr. Charles Morrison: The Home Secretary was entirely right to open the debate by giving us a history lesson on the Boundary Commissions because in doing so he reminded us not only of the pitfalls that have existed but of the pitfalls that have been corrected and those that have been created. That is what today's debate is concerned with. I agree with the plea of the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Sparkbrook (Mr. Hattersley) for attempts to create a more genuine democracy. There was little in what the right hon. Gentleman said with which I disagreed. I shall make some suggestions that might help to improve the operations of the Boundary Commissions. In effect, I make a brief plea for a little more sanity.
I do not blame the Home Secretary for what I consider to be an extraordinary report of the Boundary Commission for England—nor do I blame the Boundary Commission. I agree with the right hon. Member for Sparkbrook that it has had to act within difficult rules and a difficult system. I do not blame Mr. Speaker as ex officio chairman; it is important to make that point, or I might not be called in another debate. I do not blame any of these eminent bodies or persons, but rather the system and the rules under which the parliamentary boundary reviews are taken and with which the commission is yoked, and the amazing consequences with which we are left.

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Those consequences make "Alice in Wonderland" look like excessive normality. That is barely surprising when a report comes out in 1983 that is based on the world in 1976. The consequence is that the final report is much more to do with make-believe than with reality, as I shall try to show with reference to my county of Wiltshire, against the background of the commission's principles. I apologise for the fact that I shall quote a number of statistics.
In particular, as we have been reminded, the commission states that the electoral quota in 1976 is 65,753. In that year in Wiltshire there was an average electorate for each of the five constituencies of 71,461 voters. That effectively was the equivalent of 5·3 seats under the Boundary Commission's criteria. The commission, when referring to Wiltshire on page 144, paragraph 455, stated:
"We realised that the county was, in terms of population and new building, a rapidly expanding area which was expected to continue to grow. We considered, however, that the theoretical entitlement justified an allocation of no more than five seats."
In other words the commission said that it recognised the growth trend in the county, but could do nothing about it despite rule 5, to which the right hon. Member for Sparkbrook has already referred.
Nevertheless, the report continued in paragraph 456:
"The electorates of the existing constituencies ranged from 64,999 (Swindon) to 80,233 (Devizes) and we considered the disparity was too large for them to remain unchanged."
Therefore, recommendations were made for boundary changes which included a reduction in the maximum disparity within the county between those two constituencies from about 15,000 to about 7,700. That is slightly more democratic, but it was not very good.
In any case, on the basis of the recommendations, objections were made. The local commissioner at the local inquiry concluded that, nevertheless, Wiltshire should continue to have only five seats. The maximum disparity, however, in view of the objections based on 1976 was, as a result of that inquiry, increased again, albeit for good reasons, so that the disparity between Swindon and Devizes was increased from the original 7,700 to about 10,000.
However, all this is fairly irrelevant as, by the time of the publication of the new registers in 1983, the average for each of the five Wiltshire constituencies had grown, by 16 February 1983, to 79,094 with a total electorate in the county of 395,472. I checked these figures with the district councils concerned and I hope that they are correct, but I cannot guarantee it because there seems to be a little uncertainty. I add that it is proposed that the Devizes constituency in 1983, but after redistribution, should have over 84,000 electors. After seven years' work, the Devizes constituency will be bigger than it has ever been in its history. [AN HON. MEMBER: "It is so well represented."] My hon. Friend the Member for Chichester (Mr. Nelson) may have a point in his intervention earlier. Perhaps the constituency should have been bigger, but only on the basis that others should have been likewis.
On the basis of the 1976 quota, the total electorate for Wiltshire now has enough not for five seats, but for 6·01 seats. Given that the Boundary Commission has recognised the continuing growth trend in the county, even if it were now given seven seats—two extra—to take account of continuing growth, the average constituency would be over 56,000, more than for a considerable
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number of other new constituencies. Again, I agree with the right hon. Member for Sparkbrook that that does not say very much for democracy nationwide.
All this means that, although the commission has proposed the removal of many anomalous constituencies, many new anomalies are being created. Why? Above all, because it has taken seven years to complete the review. What can be done about it? Perhaps there should be a running review to take greater account of population changes sooner than 10 to 15 years after the last review, and perhaps on the basis that there should be an automatic review after a change in the population of 10 or 15 per cent. since the previous review.
For choice, I should like to see the review completed in one or two years. That would also help to remove the nonsense which, even after seven years, can occur as between my constituency and the Swindon constituency represented by the hon. Member for Swindon (Mr. Stoddart), concerning which he has put down an amendment that I support and to which no doubt he will refer if he should be fortunate enough to catch your eye, Mr. Deputy Speaker.
One has to ask whether a review can be carried out in a year. The answer is that it can. Most of the unease that many of us feel about the report would and could have been avoided had the commission gone about its task using the tools of the last quarter of the 20th century rather than those of the 19th century.
There is now available the whole range of scientific, technological and engineering disciplines and techniques used in information handling, collectively known as information technology. The Government constantly tell us that they wish to give high priority to that. Had the commission been encouraged or allowed to make full use of what is available, we should now be debating a report based, not on 1976 figures, but almost certainly on those for 1981.
Computer programmes are now available that can automatically produce constituency boundaries that take full account not only of population figures but of the other factors to which the commission is required to have regard, including county boundaries, features of terrain, community ties, and so forth. Having been fed with the initial data, computers can do their calculations in minutes instead of years, and without the need for teams of clerks, all paid for by the taxpayer.
Viscount Cranborne: I have listened to my hon. Friend with close attention and considerable sympathy, but I wonder whether he and the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Sparkbrook (Mr. Hattersley) would be altogether wise in agreeing explicitly and implicitly with what seems to me to be the complete tyranny of numbers—the 65,700 figure. How happy would my hon. Friend be, were circumstances different, if he were to represent a constituency partly in Wiltshire and partly in Dorset, or how happy would I be to represent a constituency that was partly in Dorset and partly in Wiltshire? Does he not feel that the pulls of local loyalty have a part to play, of which computers take no account?
Mr. Morrison: My hon. Friend raises an important point, but I am advised that he is incorrect. Computers are such remarkable animals that they can do precisely what one wishes. In any case, I was not suggesting that we should cross county boundaries. I was not suggesting that

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there should be precise equality between one constituency and another. I accept, given the geographical make-up of the whole of the United Kingdom, that that would be impossible. I suggest that there would be greater equality than we are now likely to have. It is surprising, after seven years, that there can be a constituency of almost 85,000, on the one hand, and constituencies of 55,000, on the other. So I do not believe that my hon. Friend need worry unduly about the use of computers.
In any case, I do not advocate the substitution of the computer for human judgment. Nor do I suggest the elimination, or even the limiting, of the scope of local inquiries. I am sure that such inquiries are an important feature of the process of drawing up new boundaries, as they allow electors to comment on proposals. However, even in the inquiry process, a computer could be of immense assistance. I am advised that, by locating a computer terminal at each inquiry, it would be possible for all those who attend an inquiry to examine instantaneously any proposal made at it, in terms of its implications for neighbouring constituencies—that is, the so-called knock-on effect. At the moment, the effects of the proposals have to be analysed by hand by the staff of the commission. That takes time, and often means that a second inquiry is necessary. The use of computers would enable those second bites of the cherry to be taken within minutes of the first.
Before hon. Members accuse me of talking simplistic science fiction nonsense, I refer them to an article that has been drawn to my attention in the June 1982 issue of the Journal of the Operations Research Society, which I am sure is nightly reading of my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary. The article reports on the use of such computer mapping techniques to draw up local government electoral areas or polling districts. Hon. Members may be surprised to know that this successful application of modern technology to the problems of devising acceptable electoral boundaries occurred, not in the silicon valley of California, but in Scotland. It means that a two-year review is quite possible. Furthermore, I have no doubt that my proposals would cut the costs of the Boundary Commission. By this means, sanity could be restored to its activities and to its proposals.
5.14 pm
Dr. Edmund Marshall: Having listened to the hon. Member for Devizes (Mr. Morrison), I look forward to seeing him in the No Lobby tomorrow evening, but I hope that he will forgive me if I do not follow the arguments that he put forward concerning his part of the country. I am sure that my hon. Friend the Member for Swindon (Mr. Stoddart), if he captures your eye, Mr. Deputy Speaker, will take up those arguments.
I take as my starting point the Prime Minister's words at Question Time on 17 February, when she said in answer to a question from the hon. Member for Romford (Mr. Neubert):
"I agree that the Boundary Commission's decisions are independent",
and then, after an intervention,
"The testing through the courts was independent".—[Official Report, 17 February 1983; Vol. 37, c. 446.]
I want to examine in some detail the validity of those claims by the Prime Minister.
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First, I want to ask how far the Boundary Commission is independent. Who are the Boundary Commissions? As the Home Secretary said, the chairman ex officio of all four Boundary Commissions is Mr. Speaker. That chairmanship adds dignity and weight to the standing of the Boundary Commissions. However, it should not go without saying that Mr. Speaker's chairmanship for each of the commissions is entirely a formality. It is purely titular. He plays no practical part in the working of the commissions. It has long been the established practice for the Speaker not to intervene in the work and decisions. So none of my remarks—some of them may be seem to be strictures against the commissions—is in any way directed at Mr. Speaker.
As the Home Secretary correctly said, the other members of the Boundary Commission—from this point on, I shall refer only to the English Boundary Commission—are appointed in accordance with statute by various Ministers. This has happened once during the lifetime of this Government. To find out the other three members of the Boundary Commission for England I went back to the announcement of their appointment, which was made in a written answer by the right hon. Gentleman on 10 March 1980. At c. 397–8 one can read that the members of the Boundary Commission for England are the deputy chairman, the hon. Mr. Justice Walton, Mr. J. H. R. Newey, appointed by the Home Secretary, and Mr. W. W. Ruff, appointed by the Secretary of State for the Environment.
The statute also requires, in paragraph 8 of part I of schedule 1 of the 1949 Act, that
"A member of any Commission appointed by the Secretary of State or Minister of Health shall hold his appointment for such term and on such conditions as may be determined before his appointment by the Secretary of State or Minister of Health, as the case may be".
The Minister for Health has been superseded by the Secretary of State for the Environment.
Therefore, when the announcement of the appointments of the Boundary Commissions was made on 10 March 1980 the dates were also listed. In columns 397 and 398 of Hansard of that date it says clearly:
"The appointment of Mr. Ruff will expire on 31 December 1982."—[Official Report, 10 March 1980; Vol. 980, c. 397–8.]
I have looked closely through all the columns of Hansard and other announcements made by Ministers in the last few months but I have found no evidence of any reappointment of Mr. William Willis Ruff as a member of the Boundary Commission for England. Therefore, I must come to the conclusion that Mr. Ruff, legally and technically, ceased to be a member of the Commission on 31 December 1982. Yet Mr. Ruff's signature appears on the Boundary Commission's report dated 1 February 1983—over a month after 31 December 1982. I can only assume that the legality of that signature is in some doubt.
One must also question whether Mr. Ruff's activities as a member of the Boundary Commission for England since 1 January have been in any way legal. Did he take part in the final meetings of the commission which determined the contents of its report? Certainly there is no provision in the statute for the back dating of his reappointment. There is no way in which the Government can now say that he carried on after the expiration of his appointment on 31 December. I suggest that one of the signatures on the report of the Boundary Commission for England carries some dubiety.

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That leaves two signatures, and two out of four members are a bare quorum for the commission. They are both judges, both pillars of the Establishment. I assume that they would count it as a compliment to be described in that way. The deputy chairman is Mr. Justice Walton, or Sir Raymond Walton. I have looked him up and it is interesting to see that he was a Liberal candidate for North Lambeth in 1945. He did not do anything like as well as the Liberal candidate for Bermondsey who has come victoriously to the House today. Sir Raymond Walton, or Captain Walton as he was in 1945, lost his deposit as the Liberal candidate for North Lambeth.
The other member of the Boundary Commission for England is Judge John Newey—Mr. J. H. R. Newey. As soon as I found that he had been appointed a member of the Boundary Commission for England I looked him up in "Who's Who", and I found that he had also been a parliamentary candidate. He was the Conservative and Liberal candidate for Cannock in 1955 and, even later than that, he was the chairman of the Sevenoaks Conservative association between 1965 and 1968.
Thus, we have three signatures on a report of the Boundary Commission for England. One is the signature of a former Liberal candidate—a long time ago. The second is the signature of a former Tory candidate and, more recently, an active member of the Conservative party. The third is the signature of a former member of the—
Mr. Whitelaw: I am sure the right hon. Member for Leeds, South (Mr. Rees) will confirm that the last Labour Government objected to one member of the Boundary Commission because they felt that he had undertaken a political engagement on behalf of the Opposition. He was removed, understandably, and I accepted that at the time. I then had to appoint somebody in his place and in appointing Judge Newey I approached the right hon. Gentleman and the Opposition and they agreed to his appointment. That is the historical position.
Dr. Marshall: That does nothing to alter the fact that Judge Newey has been an active member of the Conservative party. I also see from "Who's Who" that Judge Newey was a special legal adviser to the Home Secretary just before that appointment.
We come to the position where the credibility and the much vaunted independence of the three-man commission is somewhat in doubt.
Mr. Tim Rathbone: Nonsense.
Mr. David Stoddart: What about Labour candidates?
Dr. Marshall: It would be unthinkable to have a former Labour candidate as a member of the Boundary Commission. We must exclude consideration of Mr. Speaker in his formal capacity as chairman of the commission.
I move on to the assistant commissioners who are listed in the report at page 260, appendix H. When one looks at that list one is blindingly struck by the fact that they are all lawyers—all Queen's counsel or banisters-at-law. As they have gone around the country conducting their local inquiries we have had the veritable rule of judges and lawyers. There has been nothing quite like it since the days of Joshua in the Old Testament. The judges are effectively
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determining what happens with the Boundary Commission and that has great influence on the future composition of the House.
There is widespread dissatisfaction with the way in which various assistant commissioners have gone about their work. My right hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Sparkbrook (Mr. Hattersley) was comet when he said that there has been a capricious approach in the way in which different assistant commissioners have interpreted the rules of redistribution in different ways in different localities.
One assistant commissioner went to conduct the local public inquiry into the Boundary Commission's provisional recommendations for the London borough of Ealing. There was clearly much dissatisfaction with the way in which he went about that inquiry and that prompted the hon. Member for Ealing, North (Mr. Greenway) to send a letter to The Times on 18 December 1981. I am glad to see that he is in his place today. I understand that he is happy that I should quote from his letter. He said:
"In the one experience I have had of the commission at work I was appalled at the autocratic nature of the assistant commissioner who conducted the enquiry. It was a thoroughly legal matter to him, it appeared, and if ordinary people could not handle it in this way, then bad luck! The result was that the lawyers were upheld and, having been given no idea of when they might be called to give their evidence (questions were not allowed), they left for work or the care of their homes and families and a whole side of the case was thus unsupported by witnesses."
Those cogent remarks prompted a response from the assistant commissioner concerned, Mr. B. A. Marder, a few days later. He wrote a short and stuffy letter to The Times, which was excessively legalistic, proving the point made by the hon. Member for Ealing, North in his letter.
Mr. Greenway: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way. He kindly gave me notice that he would raise this point, and what he said is absolutely right. The assistant commissioner concerned has hidden behind the fact that I thanked him for the courteous way he conducted the procedures on the day simply as a formality and no more. I underline that he was autocratic by the fact that I received a legal letter from his solicitors after I wrote my letter to The Times, saying that if I did not retract I would be taken to law. [HON. MEMBERS: "Disgraceful".] It was disgraceful. I wrote to The Times following strong letters from my constituents who were there, and oral objections to the way the assistant commissioner had behaved. I was therefore doing my job in representing my constituents, and I had to endure that. It was disgraceful.
Dr. Marshall: The House will be grateful to the hon. Member for Ealing, North for showing that what l have been saying about the widespread disquiet with regard to the way the assistant commissioners conducted their task is correct.
Conservative Members have also expressed doubts about the way in which the Commission has gone about its work. I shall quote from Hansard of 18 November 1982 when, during Question Time, following an answer given by the Minister of State, Home Office, the hon. Member for Eastleigh (Sir D. Price) said that
"the secretary of the Boundary Commission, in refusing to give me or the people of Hampshire any reason for its more eccentric proposals, tells me that it"—
the Boundary Commission—
"is answerable only to the Home Secretary."
He then asked whether the

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"Boundary Commission is, in the technical sense of the word, an irresponsible quango?"
What was interesting about that was the way in which the hon. Gentleman quoted the Boundary Commission as saying that it was
"answerable only to the Home Secretary."
One wonders what degree of independence that implies. Lower down in the same column the hon. Member for Grantham (Mr. Hogg), who has recently been elevated to the Government Front Bench as an assistant Whip, asked the Minister of State, Home Office:
"Will my hon. and learned Friend accept that it is confusing for a village or other local community, whose representations to an inquiry have been accepted, to find that the commission refuses to accept the conclusions of the commissioners"—
that is the assistant commissioner—
"as a result of the inquiry? Would it not be helpful if the commission were obliged to state its reasons for not accepting such recommendations?"—[Official Report, 18 November 1982; Vol. 32, c. 401.]
The only change that the hon. Gentleman received in answer to that question was that he might be able to gather such reasons when the report of the Boundary Commission finally emerged.
I checked with particular care whether the Boundary Commission report tells us very much about the difficulties of the hon. Gentleman's constituents in the villages of Skellingthorpe and Waddington. One finds very little that will comfort the good people of those villages.
Moving on from the way the assistant commissioners went about their tasks, I examined also the way in which the staff and the secretariats of the Boundary Commission are appointed. Great difficulty arises because the joint secretaries, and possibly other staff, of the Boundary Commission are in post on secondment from the Home Office. The Prime Minister's claim that the Boundary Commission is independent of the Home Office seems strange when there seems to be an overlapping and a going to and fro of staff between the two Departments. We have further evidence of that today as yet again we see at least one of the secretaries of the Boundary Commission present with Home Office civil servants to advise Ministers on the nature of the debate.
Mr. Whitelaw: I should like to clear up this matter. With regard to the hon. Gentleman's second point, we are following exactly the precedent followed by the Government in 1969 of which he was a supporter. It is exactly the precedent—[Interruption.] In my time, the Opposition Chief Whip did not intervene from a sedentary position, but if he wishes to do so now he is quite entitled to. It is perfectly reasonable that that precedent should be followed on the principle that the person who knows all the facts and details should be available to advise Ministers who have to reply to questions from hon. Members. That is reasonable. While I am on my feet, perhaps I should also reply to another point that the hon. Gentleman made. Mr. Ruff was reappointed on 2 September 1982 by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment to continue his appointment until 30 April 1983.
Dr. Marshall: I can only say in answer to the right hon. Gentleman's last point that it was therefore strange that the usual consultation upon which the Home Secretary himself laid such stress in opening the debate did not take place with regard to the reappointment of Mr. Ruff.
Mr. Mark Carlisle: Is it not a fact that the report was ready and would have been presented to my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary but for the action that was masterminded by the hon. Member for Goole (Dr. Marshall) and was started in the courts, which prevented its being produced at that time? It seems to have been perfectly reasonable to extend Mr. Ruff's period until that action had been completed.
Dr. Marshall: I take it as a compliment that I should be described as the mastermind of anything. I would not wish to be in the glow of such praise. However, it seems to me strange that, if there is a usual practice that appointments to the Boundary Commission are always the subject of consultation between all parties, it did not take place on this occasion. Nor, apparently, was any announcement of the reappointment made in the columns of Hansard.
I move on to examine other ways in which there has been a close working relationship between the Home office and the Boundary Commission. First, as is readily and openly admitted in the report of the Boundary Commission in page 3, paragraph 17, press notices issued by the Boundary Commission were often issued through the Home Office public relations department. Furthermore, on pages 8 and 39 of the report, it is clear that the Boundary Commission received guidance, in the form of a letter from a Home Office Minister as to the way in which it should interpret the rules governing its procedures. It is strange that the Boundary Commission should consider accepting such guidance. The commissioners are bound only by the wording of the rules as laid down by statute. There is no need, and it is quite improper for Ministers, to give further guidance to the Boundary Commission about how those rules are to be interpreted.
Arrangements were made to print the report, but I shall not cover that ground as it has already been covered by my right hon. Friend the Member for Sparkbrook. However, I feel that it is important to quote the written reply that I received from the Home Secretary on 18 February, when he said:
"A printing demand for both the report and the maps was sent to Her Majesty's Stationery Office on 21 December 1982 enabling printed proofs of the report to be supplied to the Boundary Commission.
After a final proof of the report had been signed by the Commission on 1 February, HMSO was authorised to print and warehouse final copies."—[Official Report, 18 February 1982; Vol. 37, c. 275.]
It is, therefore, all the more surprising that the Home Secretary in a written reply to me on 14 February, said
"I received the third periodical report of the Parliamentary Boundary Commission for England on 11 February and presented it to Parliament today."—[Official Report, 14 February 1983; Vol. 37, c. 12.]
It is strange that printing took place long before the Home Secretary received the report. There is far too intimate and incestuous a working relationship between the Boundary Commission and the Home Office for the commission to be described as in any way independent of the Government. The links between the two organisations have been oiled and have worked satisfactorily for the two of them during the past three and a half years.
Mr. Whitelaw: Will the hon. Gentleman confirm that he is not alleging that either of my statements in answer

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to his questions were untrue? If he is, rather than make insinuations he should say that what I said was untrue. If that is what he wants to do, he had better do it.
Dr. Marshall: I simply read the right hon. Gentleman's answers to me. If he wishes to draw any conclusions from them, he can do so. Other people may also draw their conclusion.
Mr. Whitelaw: That is an insinuation.
Dr. Marshall: The right hon. Gentleman can sort that out in the appropriate quarters.
The second part of the Prime Minister's statement referred to the independent testing of the Boundary Commission's proposals before the courts. That statement was based on a misunderstanding of the nature of the litigation between my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition and others and the Boundary Commission for England. The court action was not brought—nor could it have been brought—under the procedures available to test whether the Commission's proposals were the best that could be devised under the rules. All that was possible in that action was for an application to the court for a judicial review of the commission's work in accordance with the rules. All that the courts determined at the end of the day was that there were insufficient grounds for such a judicial review.
The tests for judicial review are extremely stringent, and especially so in relation to the rules governing redistribution. When the petition was heard in another place on 11 February, Lord Scarman—one of the appeal committee—said that the courts could intervene for judicial review of the commission's work only if it proposed a new constituency such as Old Sarum. That was the only scope available for judicial review.
It is interesting to note that during the court proceedings, counsel for the Boundary Commission—Mr. Simon Brown—said in the divisional court on 9 December that the Boundary Commission
"readily accept that in a number of instances, usually affecting a number of constituencies through a ripple or shunting effect, the Boundary Commission could have produced a smaller degree of disparity from the electoral quota

(a) by making different use of wards as building blocks within counties and within London boroughs,

(b) by wholly disregarding Metropolitan District boundaries.

We will suggest that the Boundary Commission's decisions on these matters and consequent recommendations in all cases are amply capable of reasonable explanation and justification consistent with their having acted within the proper limits of their discretion."
In other words, the Boundary Commission was not required to make as good a job as it could have done on recommending new constituencies to the Home Secretary and, through him, to the House.
The rules give the commission far too much discretion in these matters, so that it can justify all sorts of less-than-the-best proposals because of the exercise of that discretion. The rules governing the distribution in the 1949 and 1958 Acts are convoluted, ambiguous and imprecise. It was possible for the court of appeal to make the following two statements in its judgment. It was the judgment of the Master of the Rolls and Lord Justices Slade and Gobb about section 2(2) that:
"The practical effect is that a strict application of the rules ceases to be mandatory so that the rules, while remaining very important indeed, are reduced to the status of guidelines."
That is a serious statement coming, as it does, from the Master of the Rolls and the court of appeal. They said that
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the rules laid down by Parliament to guide and to place obligations upon the Boundary Commission were no more than guidelines. It is no small wonder that the Commission has produced some strange proposals.
Page 43 of that same judgment states:
"First, as we have already pointed out, the guidelines designed to achieve the broad equality of electorates, which are to be found in the opening limb of Rule 5, have been deliberately expressed by the legislature in such manner as to render them subordinate to the guidelines given by Rule 4, designed to prevent the crossing of boundaries and not vice versa."
Those last three words are clearly underlined in the court of appeal's judgment.
As my right hon. Friend the Member for Sparkbrook said, the present rules that govern the operation of the Boundary Commission are just not good enough. We need new legislation to revise those rules, to make them mandatory, to tighten up the statutory obligations imposed on the Boundary Commission and to make achieving as near equal size of electorates as possible the paramount factor which the Boundary Commission should set out to secure.
Furthermore, the deputy chairman of the English commission pointed out in paragraph 3 of the appendix that rule 1 of the rules of redistribution is somewhat singular in respect of its effect on England. The rule lays down that in Scotland there should be not less than 71 seats and that there should be not less than 35 seats in Wales. It also lays down that there should not be substantially more or less than 613 seats in Great Britain. There is a clear rule for Scotland and a clear rule for Wales, but England is lumped together with Scotland and Wales as part of Great Britain. In paragraph 3, the deputy chairman of the English commission shows what difficulties that causes when the English commission goes about its work. If the proposals that will be presented to the House tomorrow are implemented, there will be 633 seats in Great Britain. That exceeds by 20 the 613 seats prescribed in the rules. One wonders when the excess becomes substantially greater in the terms of the rules.
I have said enough to show that the Boundary Commission has altogether too cosy a relationship with the Government in present circumstances, and that the rules of redistribution allow the Boundary Commission far too wide a discretion for the Boundary Commission's report to have anything like the credibility and independent standing that the Prime Minister claimed for it last month. We shall come to the details of the English proposals tomorrow but I hope that we shall do so in the light of the general considerations that I have outlined today.
5.53 pm
Sir Anthony Grant: Unlike the hon. Member for Goole (Dr. Marshall) who made an uncharacteristic speech of inordinate length, I do not cast any aspersions on the integrity of the Boundary Commission. As my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary said, I believe that it is entirely independent, tries to be unbiased and tries to do its best. I submit, however, that its best has not been good enough in some cases. I agreed with the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Sparkbrook (Mr. Hattersley) when he said that some of its decisions have been capricious. I shall illustrate that point by using the example of the Greater London borough of Harrow.
In 1948, when the electorate was approximately the same size as it is today, the Boundary Commission decided that two constituencies were inadequate. All hon.

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Members will agree that the pressures on Members of Parliament then were considerably less then than they are today. It was decided then to form three constituencies. In 1976, the local government Boundary Commission tried to even out the slight discrepancies in the size of constituencies by altering ward boundaries. Had those ward boundaries been followed in the latest Boundary Commission report, the size of the electorate in each of the three constituencies would have been roughly equal.
However, in 1979, the Boundary Commission decided without of course, giving any reason, that there should be only two constituencies, one of which should have 72,000 electors and the other of which should have nearly 80,000 electors. It is accepted that par for the course is a little more than 65,000 electors. It is well understood that figures are not holy writ. The statistical case is only one side of the argument—the natural affinities and characteristics of constituencies must also be regarded.
Mr. John Page: Does my hon. Friend propose to mention that, uniquely for London boroughs, the distinguished assistant commissioner who helped the inquiry suggested that the Boundary Commission's recommendations be overruled and that Harrow be allowed to retain three constituencies? Does he also propose to mention the fact that was the overwhelming wish of everyone who gave evidence?
Sir Anthony Grant: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for pointing that out. I had intended to make that point.
The result of the Boundary Commission's first decision was to have one constituency of nearly 80,000 electors and rising as compared with a 65,000 par for the course. One must admit that, against that, the local authority proposed that the averge, seat comprise about 51,000 or 52,000 electors if three constituencies were retained. There is, therefore, not much to choose between them and, give or take a little, the numbers game can be argued either way.
The size of constituencies must be compared with the rest of London, as opposed to the country. As a result of the Boundary Commission's proposals, Harrow and Hounslow will have far and away the largest electorate—an average of some 77,200. That should be compared with about 50,000 in other areas. The numbers game, therefore, does not apply equally throughout London.
That factor, combined with the break-up of natural affinities and characteristics of the constituencies, has caused a considerable outcry in Harrow. As a result of public pressure, a public inquiry was arranged. The inquiry took place over two days, under a distinguished Queen's counsel, Mr. David Sullivan. Unlike the hon. Member for Goole I believe that people with judicial experience are best equipped to conduct such inquiries. There have been no complaints from either side of the argument about the way in which Mr. Sullivan conducted that inquiry. He did it admirably. The inquiry took place on 7 and 8 July 1980 and Mr. Sullivan took nearly three months to consider the evidence. After going through all the evidence carefully—I shall not go through it all, but suffice it to say that his report represents 14 closely-argued pages—Mr. Sullivan firmly concluded that the Boundary Commission was wrong. He argued that numbers were not the sole criterion but that, give or take a little, it was even. He said that Harrow had special characteristics. It is
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tedious to take the time of the House by repeating my maiden speech of 18 years ago, in praise of my constituency. Instead I shall quote from paragraph 36 of that report which states:
"Evidence was given that since its inception in 1948/1949 Harrow Central, and particularly recently under MP Mr. Grant, has developed an identity of its own".
Mr. Sullivan went on to say in his conclusions:
"I think that Harrow should be allowed to retain three constituencies … I do not think it would be satisfactory that two Boundary Commissions"—
that is to say, the present one and the 1948 one—
"should produce results which do not cohere".
That report was greeted with considerable delight by the majority of Harrow citizens. Despite that, the Boundary Commission, without giving reasons, stated that it would not change its opinion, but that it would consider further evidence in writing that showed differences since the time of that inquiry. The borough council—not the political parties—took up that offer. On 10 March 1982 it submitted a series of careful representations to the Boundary Commission. It explained, among other things, that opinions were moving in favour of the three-constituency argument and against the two-constituency argument. That was a closely reasoned argument. The borough council drew attention to the Boundary Commission's words:
"The Commission expressly state in para 15 of 'The Review of Parliamentary Constituencies' that such a refinement"—in terms of statistical equality—"could not overcome the desirability of preserving local and historic ties."
It was argued that Harrow would be out of line with other constituencies in the Greater London area if the Boundary Commission's proposals were followed.
All that resulted was a letter of acknowledgment from the Boundary Commission. Great uncertainty was caused to everybody, and attempts were made to discover the decision of the commission. Nothing was heard until the recent publication of the report, in which the Boundary Commission totally disregarded not only the position in 1948–49—the report then followed a two-day hearing by its commissioner—the representations made by two of the political parties, and many organisations, but the further evidence submitted by the borough council one year ago. Not only is the decision of the Boundary Commission capricious and wrong but it is highly discourteous. It has not only caused intense worry to the three Members of Parliament—we must put up with that—but, more importantly, great uncertainty among the people and citizens of the borough of Harrow who have not known where they stand. They have not had the courtesy of an immediate response from the Boundary Commission and are suddenly confronted in this manner at the 11th hour.
Although I accept the independence of the Boundary Commission, its integrity and that it has tried to be unbiased, in this case it has not done its job properly. It has disregarded the facts and it has been discourteous in the way in which it has conducted its affairs. The way in which this matter has been conducted is deplorable.
6.5 pm
Mr. David Alton: I understand and share some of the feelings of the hon. Member for Harrow, Central (Sir Anthony Grant). The dilemma that

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three into two will not go is shared by many hon. Members on both sides of the House as a result of the findings of the Boundary Commission.
The right hon. Member for Birmingham, Sparkbrook (Mr. Hattersley), spelt out the inevitable political subjectivity of some people because of the political implications to their party as a result of the findings of the Boundary Commission. The hon. Member for Harrow, Central stated some of the personal dilemmas that result from the upheaval of boundaries.
The hon. Member for Goole (Dr. Marshall), said that other factors were involved. It was as though there were gremlins at work in the Boundary Commissions who, to suit their own political purposes, had acted almost in a subversive way. If what he said is true, it suggests a conspiracy almost of Watergate proportions. I find that difficult to believe. Although I understand the personal problems of some hon. Members and the political factors which the right hon. Member for Sparkbrook mentioned, it would be wrong to attribute to the Boundary Commissions the motive mentioned by the hon. Member for Goole. One cannot say that because someone was a Liberal candidate in 1945, he is subversive. The hon. Member for Goole was once a Liberal candidate. No hon. Member on the Liberal Bench would dream of suggesting that the hon. Gentleman is a Member of the Liberal tendency within the Labour party and trying to undermine it.
Dr. Edmund Marshall: First, I am not a Member of the parliamentary Boundary Commission for England, and secondly, I managed to save my deposit.
Mr. Alton: I am delighted that the hon. Gentleman saved his deposit—I hope, when he was a Liberal candidate. In the most recent by-election test in Bermondsey the roles were reversed, and I hope that it is an omen. That is a matter for the electors when the time comes and not a matter for politicians in determining boundaries.
Several points can be made as a result of the personal factors that have influenced many hon. Members in their constituencies and in their experience of Boundary Commissions. There has not been fair treatment throughout the United Kingdom. If we are to continue with the crazy first-past-the-post system in our present constituencies, hon. Members should sort things out so that constituencies throughout the United Kingdom are treated in the same way. It is not right that one constituency in one part of the United Kingdom can have an electorate of less than 40,000, while in another part of the country the electorate can be about 80,000. I can give examples of those discrepancies in my party and they can be seen on both sides of the House. That is not good enough.
I am concerned about the indecent haste with which the Boundary Commission proposals appear to have been pushed through. It is clear that other arguments and reasons are continuing outside the Chamber about the timing of the next general election. That has had much to do with the way in which the proposals have been brought to the House. Many of the arguments and points that have been fairly raised by Members, such as the hon. Member for Harrow, Central, have not been properly examined.
There is a problem in some parts of the country in loss of representation. I know that the hon. Member for
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Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Heffer), if he catches your eye, Mr. Speaker, will mention this point. To reduce the representation of Liverpool from eight to six seats in one fell swoop purely because of a loss of population is not good enough. I accept that Liverpool must lose, by anybody's calculations, one parliamentary seat. Given the nature and depth of the problems in that city—the Boundary Commission recommends the creation of the new seat of Riverside of approximately 74,000 voters, which contains the existing Scotland Exchange and Toxteth constituencies—and given the facts of 40 per cent. unemployment, massive social problems and the enormous caseload of an MP—the Boundary Commission is not required to take that into account at the moment—surely Parliament should tell it that in future those are factors that it should take into account, as it is told to take into account constituencies that are geographically far flung and sparsely populated, and the problems of Members who serve such constituencies. Depopulation in the inner cities causes many problems for hon. Members. The hon. Member for Walton and I have experienced the problems of factories closing, hospitals closing because the number of patients has fallen, schools closing because the number of children has diminished and all services declining.
People are like a shifting cargo in many of our cities. There is little enough to bind them together now, and the destruction of the familiar achieves very little. What sense does it make to ditch the names of familiar constituencies to create a new constituency that means little or nothing to those who live in it? My constituency has existed since the first world war. It boasts the world's oldest railway station still in use, and it was from there about 150 years ago that Stephenson's Rocket started its journey to Manchester, which the people in Liverpool have always regarded as one of our better-class suburbs. Two famous by-elections occurred there and there have been distinguished Members of Parliament. The first Member was William Watson Rutherford in 1918, who was followed by Jack Hayes, the Labour Member from 1923 to 1931, about whom people still talk.
I do not see the point of abolishing the name of that constituency and creating a new constituency called Mossley Hill, which absorbs most of the Edge Hill seat. The adjacent seat of Wavertree will be part of the new Broadgreen constituency. Wavertree was mentioned in the Domesday Book. Its town hall still stands, although it is used for other activities now. It is a clearly identifiable area with which hon. Members and those who live in Liverpool are familiar. Why should a commissioner come from London, draw a line on a map and, for the sake of convenience, create a new seat that bears no relationship to history, tradition or local social circumstances? Even if we cannot learn the lessons this time—I made personal representations to the Home Secretary, as did the local authority, the borough Labour party and the borough Liberal party—I hope that next time such factors will be considered.
I hope that we shall not continue to tinker with the system in the way that the Boundary Commission has, and that we shall find a better way of organising our democratic affairs. The present electoral system is fraudulent, corrupt and phoney. If the hon. Member for Goole wishes to complain about anything, he should attack the way in which our electoral system works. How can

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Governments be elected with only one in three of British people's votes yet have a majority in the House and be able to steamroller through their proposals?
The Liberal and Social Democratic parties believe in the reform of the electoral system, and we hope that the next time a Boundary Commission sits, it will create multi-Member seats with a single transferable vote. Such a commission would not cause the same upheaval because it would mean that a constituency representing the entire city of Liverpool would be an easily definable area and that people would be able to relate to it as well as having a fair electoral system. It will also mean that electors would be given much more choice. They could choose the hon. Member for Walton, who is now regarded as a moderate in Liverpool compared with some of his friends in the Militant Tendency. The good people of Liverpool could give the hon. Gentleman one of their votes to ensure that he will stay in the House for many years.
People can exercise choice in their parties, and we might see more of the under-represented groups in the House. For example, there may be more women MPs. Some say that there is one lady too many on the Conservative Benches, but when one considers that there are fewer women here now than at any time since 1945, a fair and reformed electoral system might do something about that. It might also ensure that groups could exercise some choice, so that we might see some black and brown faces in the House.
A reformed electoral system would ensure that the adversarial cockpit that the House so often is would give way, not to parties owning each other, but to co-operation between parties. The Liberal and Social Democratic parties want such root and branch reform and we hope that we shall not continue to tinker. We would link it to other constitutional changes, such as regional government, county council reform, freedom of information and reform of the House of Lords. It is a mere 150 years since the great Reform Act, as it is known, was passed. It is time that the House began to consider the major constitutional reforms required to give us an updated and modern democracy rather than just arguing about Boundary Commission proposals.
6.15 pm
Mr. Tim Rathbone: I shall not follow the arguments of the hon. Member for Liverpool, Edge Hill (Mr. Alton) on the quantified aspects of our debate. He seemed to be arguing at one stage for equalisation of the size of constituencies, yet a few words later he asked for unequal treatment of Liverpool.
We are debating the quantitative arrangements for voting. It is not in the brief of the Boundary Commissions to consider the qualitative aspects of voting, but, as the hon. Member for Edge Hill said, we should pay a little attention to them. To meet the qualitative aspects of voting, we must consider the method of voting and how to make each person better and more proportionately represented in our legislature, in this House and perhaps in another place. However, that is a matter for another day and another place. I hope that that day will come quickly.
The present system of first-past-the-post voting in single-Member constituencies means that constituency boundaries must be redrawn regularly if gross distortions are to be avoided in equality of representation. The
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Boundary Commission for England has operated to achieve that. Contrary to the implications of the hon. Member for Goole (Dr. Marshall), the commission's consideration has been unbiased, comprehensive and professional, against the background of its brief.
As my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary said, it must be accepted that it is widely appreciated that the commission is essentially non-partisan. However, the commission is non-partisan in the sense that it is unpredictable which party it will favour. It is partisan in that there is no guarantee that its conclusions will not lead to a biased vote, as we saw in the elections to the House of Commons in February 1974. Perhaps, instead of a nonpartisan commission, we should consider a bi-partisan or multi-partisan commission to ensure better and closer representation of the majority of political support and of minority groups. The idea may be thought peculiar by some hon. Members, but it worked successfully when we were planning the democratic practices of the evolving colonies during the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s.
Despite what my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary said in answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Chichester (Mr. Nelson), I shall take a tentative step down the path that my right hon. Friend understandably did not wish to travel, to consider the reform, which could be dealt with in a special Speaker's Conference, of the assessment of the ideal number of voters for each constituency—the so-called electoral quota. As the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Sparkbrook (Mr. Hattersley) said, the electoral quota for Great Britain varies from a high of 65,753 for England to a low of 53,649 for Scotland.
The right hon. Member for Sparkbrook was advocating equality of size of constituency. I wonder whether he would wish all the constituencies in Scotland to be the same size as all the constituencies in England. I believe that that would be running in the face of the party political advantage to which he so openly committed himself at the start of his speech. I wonder whether he would argue, within the Scottish context as regards the newly redeemed constituency of Glasgow, Queens Park—which was about to be done away with and which the late Member for that constituency, Mr. Frank McElhone, argued about with the Boundary Commission and saved—against the anticipated electorate in that constituency of about 52,000, which is considerably under the Scottish norm.
It would be interesting to hear whether Government Members will commit themselves one way or the other on these questions.
It is interesting to note that a guideline of 70,000 electors to each constituency was established as early as 1917 or 1918. To decrease that number since then at exactly the moment when communications and all methods of maintaining contact with constituencies are continually improving seems to be flying in the face of good sense. All this has meant is that the number of hon. Members in the House has increased each time the boundaries have been redrawn, even though it was stated categorically by a commission in 1944 that the number should remain the same as it was at that time.
This is not to say that each vote should be based on absolute numerical equality, but it is to say that groupings of those numbers should be larger than they are. It has to be accepted that there will always be many different ways in which an electorate can be divided up into voting districts or constituencies and that with the single majority system different election results will occur with differently

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drawn constituencies, even if the underlying pattern of volume of votes remains the same. But since the likelihood of aberrations in voting results increases as the number of constituencies increases, we should consider whether the time has not arrived—indeed, is not long overdue—when we should work towards fewer and larger constituencies rather than always move towards more and more constituencies of approximately the same size.
Other hon. Members have mentioned their own constituencies and I should like to make a brief mention of mine. I find absolutely no difficulty in looking after a constituency of about 74,000. I see no reason at all why I should lose the four parishes of Hailsham, Hellingly, Chiddingly and East Hoathly from the Lewes constituency purely to balance the figures. I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Eastbourne (Mr. Gow) is equally sour about the idea of losing some of the nicest areas which he represents in East Dean, Friston and Jevington—whose people wish to continue to relate not only to the constituency of Eastbourne but also to the town itself.
I believe that we can look to the United States for an example. It may be interesting for the House to be reminded that, as far back as 1792, the congressional districts within the United States were set at 33,000. Those were almost doubled to 70,680 in 1842. In 1911 membership of the House of Representatives was set at 435, which still stands today, because of a recognition then that it would otherwise become absolutely unmanageable in the very near future. Much though we may dislike the fact, many people outside the House feel that the size of the House contributes to its lack of manageability today.
The average number of voters for a Congressman is about 500,000. That covers quite large variations between different parts of the United States, but it is laid down categorically in the law that there must be not more than a 15 per cent. variation between congressional districts in any one state.
As our boundaries are at present drawn they operate against the Labour party in county constituencies, they operate against the Conservative party in city constituencies and they operate against other national parties in one way or another almost everywhere. These effects are unintentional. This is not something that the Boundary Commissions have fed into their thinking, but they are none the less the consequence of our present redrawing process. So far as these effects are beneficial or the opposite, surely the Boundary Commissions should be directed to take them into consideration. They should not just happen. That job of considering the boundaries in the future will be easier if constituencies are made larger.
6.26 pm
Mr. David Stoddart: I will not follow the hon. Member for Lewes (Mr. Rathbone) too far, but I would say to him that if there is a reduction in the number of elected representatives there is always a danger of the growth of bureaucracy. I also remind him that in the United States, although they may have fewer representatives, those representatives have a huge support staff. Is that what he is suggesting for this country and for this House? He may very well have to make a choice between the two. But, as his right hon. Friend the Home Secretary said, this is perhaps not a matter for this debate but for some future debate—I hope the very distant future.
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My right hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Sparkbrook (Mr. Hattersley) described the recommendations of the Boundary Commissions as capricious, and indeed they are capricious as regards many parts of the country. As the hon. Member for Devizes (Mr. Morrison) pointed out, they are capricious in respect of Wiltshire. As a Wiltshire Member, I very much resent the way this capriciousness has affected his constituents and mine, and those in the rest of Wiltshire.
I must emphasise that the undue haste with which this report has been presented and the order laid has increased the difficulties and the anomalies, which could have been ironed out had the Home Secretary not required the report to be presented to him so quickly. I have an amendment on the Order Paper, indeed, and I shall talk about that at a later stage. Because he laid the order so quickly after receiving the report the Home Secretary has not been able to take into account some of the very serious anomalies which exist and to which every hon. Member who has spoken so far in this debate has referred. I think that is unfortunate, and that is why I have sought to speak on the order today rather than tomorrow in the hope that even at this late stage, having heard what has been said in the debate by myself and others, he will withdraw the order and try to put this right. [Interruption.]
Hon. Gentlemen laugh, but surely that is a reasonable request to make to the Home Secretary when serious anomalies are pointed out not only from the Opposition Benches but from the Government Benches. I should have thought that we want to get this right, or at least as near right as possible. If hon. Members laugh at the suggestion that even at this late stage the Home Secretary should reconsider this and withdraw the order, to put things right, I do not know what we are coming to. If we cannot put forward our views and draw attention to anomalies, what is the purpose of the debate?
I understand and have understood for a long time that orders are not amendable. Therefore, the amendment that I have tabled and which the hon. Member for Devizes has been good enough to support will not even be called for debate. It is there simply as an expression of opinion and of protest. As it cannot be called, nothing that I or the hon. Member for Devizes, or indeed anyone else, may say will have any effect at all. That is thoroughly bad and it is disgraceful that the House should be treated in this way.
There were a number of objections to the commission's original proposals. For example, it was proposed that two wards should be transferred from the Devizes constituency to the Swindon constituency and two wards of almost exactly the same size should be transferred from the Swindon constituency to the Devizes constituency. Numerically, the proposal made no difference but it was a geographical absurdity. Moreover, in each case the two wards had always been closely associated with the constituency of which they were part. No one could understand why on earth the proposal had been made and it undermined local confidence in the commissioners' ability to make realistic and reasonable proposals for the area.
In the event, after touring the area, the commissioner recognised the good sense of the argument made at the local inquiry and reversed the decision so that the four wards remained in the constituencies with which they had always been associated. That was a great victory. Unfortunately, however, not all the anomalies or even the most serious anomalies in the area have been ironed out.

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The arguments of objectors who suggested that there should be six seats for Wiltshire were swept aside, as was my argument that the county boundary should be crossed due to the disparities between Wiltshire and Oxfordshire. The commission had proposed that Wiltshire, with a total electorate of 357,305 in 1976 should have five parliamentary seats with an average electorate of 71,461 and that Oxfordshire with a total electorate of 361,686 in 1976 should have six parliamentary seats with an average electorate of 60,281. The difference in average electorate between adjoining counties is thus 11,180 or 18.5 per cent. As I pointed out to the commissioner, that disparity is excessive and unfair to Wiltshire electors.
Thamesdown borough council objected on the same lines. It also took the view that there should be six constituencies in Wiltshire, but the commission did not take that into account. Nor did it take into account my representations relating again to crossing the Wiltshire-Oxfordshire border. I pointed out that in 1976 the electorate of the Devizes constituency was 76,533 compared with an electorate in the proposed new Wantage constituency of only 58,262—a whacking disparity of 31·4 per cent. The commissioner was interested in my argument and asked me to make proposals. In my view, it was not for me to make proposals at that stage. The commissioner was most courteous and conducted the inquiry to everyone's satisfaction, but in view of the great disparities between the two counties it was the duty of the commission to re-examine the whole matter and to produce a better and more equitable solution, even if it involved crossing county boundaries.
The hon. Member for Devizes compared the figures for 1976 with those for 1983. I shall be less extreme and work on the basis of the commission's own report, giving the figures for 1976 and for 1982. In 1976, the electorate in the Wantage constituency in Oxfordshire was 58,262, in Devizes 77,717 and in Swindon 67,686. In 1982, however, the electorate in Wantage had increased by 5,788 to 64,040, in Devizes by 5,118 to 82,835 and in Swindon by 9,041 to 76,727. In 1976, the electorate in Wiltshire was 357,305 and in Oxfordshire 361,686—a difference of only 4,379. Those 4,379 votes apparently entitled Oxfordshire to one more seat than Wiltshire. That is one of the grave disparities in this report, and it is one which is grossly unfair to electors in Wiltshire.
Did the hon. Member for Honiton (Sir P. Emery) wish to intervene? I thought I heard him say something. He has been very gay this afternoon. If he wants to intervene—I am sorry, I meant that in the strictest sense of the word.
In 1982 in Wiltshire the electorate was 388,507 and in Oxfordshire 391,910. The difference is reduced to 3,303. In Wiltshire the electorate has grown by 31,202; in Oxfordshire it has grown by only 30,224. The fact is that Wiltshire is growing faster than Oxfordshire but the Boundary Commission saw fit to allocate only five seats to Wiltshire and six to Oxfordshire.
If the Wiltshire/Oxfordshire border had been crossed and eleven seats allocated overall, on the basis of the 1976 figures the average constituency in the two counties would have contained 65,300 electors, virtually at the norm set by the Boundary Commission itself. As it is, because of the way the commission has allocated seats—six to Oxfordshire and only five to Wiltshire—this has resulted in an electorate in the Oxfordshire constituencies of only
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60,337 and in Wiltshire of 71,461. I submit that Wiltshire has been treated extremely badly in this regard. A grave anomaly has arisen which will become more glaring as Wiltshire expands faster than Oxfordshire. Wiltshire, in particular north-east Wiltshire, is the fastest growing area in the United Kingdom, if not in the whole of Europe. The enormous planned growth in Wiltshire as a whole and in the north-east of the county in particular should have been taken into account when the Boundary Commission formulated its proposals. Because it was not, we have the perpetuation of a gravely unjust situation for at least 10 years and possibly 15.
This is why the proposals made by the hon. Member for Devizes should be taken seriously. It may well be that in such circumstances as these there should be a trigger mechanism which would bring about an automatic review of boundaries. That is a suggestion that is worthy of consideration and I hope that all concerned will consider it. The hon. Member is also right in saying that the inordinate length of time taken by this procedure must make the whole process, not completely valueless, but certainly much less valuable than it would otherwise be. We are basing these constituencies on 1976 figures. It is now 1983, seven years later. We may have an election this year or we may not. We may go into 1984. If we do we shall be fighting an election on the basis of constituencies that are already eight years out of date. The hon. Member for Devizes is perfectly right to say that there ought, in this computer age, to be a better way of doing these things while at the same time maintaining the democratic right of people to express a view or to make objections when the first proposals come out. I hope the suggestions he made will be considered.
I come now to my amendment on the Order Paper, which reads:
"at end add 'but considers that the boundary between the"— [HON. MEMBERS: "Order."]
I am merely drawing attention to it. This is an Adjournment debate and, as I understand it, in an Adjournment debate one can say just about anything, and one can quote an amendment which should not, perhaps, be mentioned until tomorrow. I am quite sure, Mr. Deputy Speaker, that you will rule me out of order if I am out of order, but I do not believe I am.
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bernard Weatherill): I will stop the hon. Member there and say that, while he may certainly draw attention to the amendment, I hope that he is not seeking to move it. Indeed, he cannot.
Mr. Stoddart: No, I know that to move it would be quite useless, because you would not call it. If I may, as you say, draw attention to it, it reads as follows: line 2, at end add
"but considers that the boundary between the proposed Devizes constituency and Swindon constituency should be re-aligned with the new ward boundaries created by the Thamesdown (Parishes) Order 1982.".
That sounds very parochial and perhaps very complicated but I would first like to draw the attention of the House to the report of the Boundary Commission, page 8, paragraph 18, where it refers to wards. It says:
"Any division of wards between constituencies was likely to break local ties, disrupt political party organisation and be confusing to electors."
In particular reference to the Swindon constituency and that of Devizes on page 146 of the report, paragraph 464 says:

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"The Thamesdown (Parishes) Order 1982 was not made in time for us to publish modified recommendations for Wiltshire before the completion of this report. Had there been sufficient time"—
I emphasise that—
"we would have recommended changes to realign the boundary between the proposed Devizes constituency and Swindon constituency with the new ward boundaries. This has not been possible but the Secretary of State for the Home Department may wish to consider whether to make the necessary modifications to our final recommendations to take account of the changes to the local government boundaries in Thamesdown. The number of electors involved would have been 33 in 1976, increasing to 769 in 1982."
Thus the Boundary Commission itself confirms what I said earlier, that had it not had to present this report so quickly it would have made the alteration itself. Having presented the report, however, the commission suggests that the Home Secretary might make the modification before presenting his order to Parliament.
We have referred to all sorts of absurdities—
Mr. Charles Morrison: The hon. Gentleman has not referred to the fact that the anomaly is even greater than he has already described. As a result of the order which comes up tomorrow, some of the people living in this ward will vote in the Devizes constituency in parliamentary elections but will vote with other people in that same ward in district elections. So there is an anomaly between parliamentary and district elections. It may be all very well for them to have to put up with me rather than endure the hon. Gentleman parliamentarily but we will have a very silly situation when there is a difference between parliamentary and district elections.
Mr. Stoddart: Yes, I am just coming to that. When the Thamesdown borough council noted this anomaly and realised that nothing was going to be done about it, it immediately wrote to me and, I think, to the hon. Gentleman. I wrote to the Home Secretary on 23 February—it had to be done quickly—drawing his attention to the absurd anomalies that would exist in the Swindon constituency because the Boundary Commission was unable to alter its report and could not take account of the changes in the parish boundaries which would come into operation in April 1983.
As a result Toothill ward as it is now constituted will, for parliamentary purposes, be divided between the Swindon and Devizes contituencies with 6,937 electors voting in the Swindon constituency and 1,187 electors voting in the Devises constituency. For district purposes they all vote in Thamesdown—it is a unified ward. However, under these proposals, which are supposed to bring things up to date and which will last 10 or 15 years, there is a divided ward with some of the voters voting in Swindon and others voting in Devizes.
That will be confusing and frustrating for electors in Toothill as 1,187 of them will find that, although for district council elections they will vote in the same electoral area as their fellow residents in Toothill, for parliamentary elections they will vote in a different constituency. That is the height of absurdity. Apart from inconvenience to the electors, the situation for political organisations will be nightmarish as different local parties or assocations will be responsible for elections at local and national level. All hon. Members will recognise the difficulties of that. It is absurd that we should pass an order that introduces such an anomaly.
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I sent the Home Secretary a map that showed the triangle that was being created in the ward. The boundary line under the draft order will divide adjacent properties at three separate points. In Worsley road, for example, numbers 35 to 69 and numbers 2 to 66 will vote in the Devizes constituency and numbers 1 to 33 in the Swindon constituency while in Crawford close numbers 1 to 141 and numbers 2 to 70 will vote in the Devizes constituency and numbers 143 to 207 and numbers 72 to 136 in the Swindon constituency. Voters living next door to each other will be voting in different constituencies.
The point is well made by the chief executive that local political party organisations are based on district wards. Those wards often represent a community with interests in common, and any division of district wards between constituencies is likely to break local ties, disrupt political party organisation and be confusing to the electorate.
Mr. John Home RobertsonI hope that my hon. Friend's area is a good Labour area.
Mr. Stoddart: Does my hon. Friend want to intervene? [Interruption.] I shall take my time as this is an important matter for Swindon and Devizes. I heard ray hon. Friend's comment. I have not canvassed the area so I do not know whether there is a majority of Labour supporters. However, the proposals are inconvenient to my people in Swindon and to people in Devizes. The draft order could be amended. There is plenty of time to do so if the Home Secretary merely had the will.
In case hon. Members think that that is only my view and the view of the hon. Member for Devizes, I shall quote the editorial from my local newspaper. The Evening Advertiser is an old-established and well-respected local newspaper, by no means a Labour newspaper. It is very fair. Therefore, what is said in its editorial should be noted by the House. In any event I shall read it as it is so good and puts so well and succinctly matters that we should know about in Westminster. The headline is "Out on the boundary". The editorial states:
"The wheels of bureaucracy grind exceeding slow but there is no excuse for the almost indecent haste"—
those are not my words, but the words of the editorial—
"with which the Government is pushing through the present changes in constituency boundaries.
The changes envisaged by the Boundaries Commission in its latest review are recorded to be worth 20 seats to the Conservatives at the next election.
It would deny the existence of human frailty to suggest this fact played no part in the speed at which the operation has been carried out. And it must be noted that the Labour Party is acting with more than a little self-interest in its attempts to block this long-overdue measure.
However, in the long run both sides must look at the purpose of the review.
With the depopulation of many inner-city areas, there has grown up an enormous disparity between the number of voters represented by one MP. In Cirencester and Tewkesbury, for instance, there are well over 90,000 voters compared with not much more than half this figure in a few constituencies in the great conurbations like London and Birmingham.
But in trying to equalise this situation, it is important that stupid anomalies like the one likely to arise in Toothill, where 15 per cent. of residents will he in Devizes constituency and 85 per cent. in Swindon, should be eliminated before they arise.
Otherwise a totally confusing and frustrating situation will persist for another decade and more until the next review.
We hope the Home Secretary will set his face against the short-term possible gain to his party of getting the job done quickly in favour of a better long-term prospect for dernocmcy".
I can say no better than that.
Several hon. Members rose—
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Before I call the next speaker, I remind the House that there is great pressure to take part in the debate and that 30-minute speeches will make it difficult to call everyone who wishes to speak.
6.57 pm
Mr. Mark Carlisle: I am grateful to be called. My constituency disappears under the boundary changes. Unlike the hon. Member for Swindon (Mr. Stoddart) I do not propose to talk about the details of my constituency, but I shall try to stick to the general principles behind the review.
I am sorry that the hon. Member for Goole (Dr. Marshall) is not here. He made an uncharacteristically sour speech. His attempt to smear the integrity and independence of the members of the Boundary Commission fell flat. It was beneath him to suggest that because one of them, a High Court judge, had been a Liberal candidate 40 years ago, and another judge had been a Conservative chairman in a constituency some years ago, that affected their impartiality, particularly when he said that he would not suggest that the impartiality of someone such as Mr. Speaker would be affected by his previous position as a constituency Member of Parliament.
The right hon. Member for Birmingham, Sparkbrook (Mr. Hattersley) was critical of the report of the Boundary Commission for England. It contains anomalies, but it was hard on the Boundary Commission to accuse it of being capricious when I think that it did its best to follow the rules that we set down in the House for it. Whereas those rules may not be appropriate, and accepting the anomalies that the right hon. Gentleman mentioned, when one looks at the report and recognises the variations in numbers that eventually arise in the size of constituencies, one cannot claim for a moment that the commission has not made an impartial and fair attempt to meet the rules by which it is guided.
As to whether it is right that the rules should be changed, of course it is easy for the right hon. Member for Sparkbrook to say that the paramount consideration should be the need to have equality of numbers between various constituencies and that every other rule should be subjugated to that main aim. I wonder whether that is right.
Surely the one justification of the system by which individual Members are elected on a first-past-the-post basis is that each constituency is in itself a geographical entity. If that is so, then, in deciding what those constituencies should be, account must be taken of other considerations than merely the size of the constituencies. Therefore the House is right to say, as the rules say, that where possible county boundaries, metropolitan district boundaries and London borough boundaries should not be crossed. If county boundaries are crossed, the effect inevitably must be that the geographical entity of a constituency, one of the strengths of the present system, is lost.
The right hon. Member for Sparkbrook was unfair in basing the whole of his attack and criticisms of the Boundary Commission on the supposition that it had failed to cross county and borough boundaries when this might have been done to reach more equality in electorates, because it is clear from the report that the commission discussed this issue with the representatives of the political
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parties who requested unanimously that the conunission should not cross the boundaries of either London boroughs or counties.
Mr. Ian Wrigglesworth: Would the right hon. and learned Gentleman not agree that the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Sparkbrook (Mr. Hattersley) would no doubt take an entirely different view and would want the Boundary Commission to make its judgment on the basis of communities, were that in the interests of the Labour party?
Mr. Carlisle: No doubt that is so, but I was avoiding that sort of remark; I was sticking to his arguments about the outcome of the report.
I find it unbelievable that when the Boundary Commission refers to the views of the parties it is, as he suggested, merely the view of one branch of the Labour party, and that the Sheffield branch was giving one view while the London branch was giving another. I remind the House again of what the report said about crossing boundaries:
"We discussed the situation with the representatives of the political parties. They were of the unanimous opinion that none of the constituencies in London should cross a borough boundary, despite the disparities which currently resulted from this arrangement. Similarly they were opposed in all circumstances to the crossing of any county boundary. We were asked to give an assurance that we would only recommend a constituency which crossed a county or London borough boundary in the most exceptional circumstances."
I cannot read that as meaning anything but that the commission was asked to give an assurance by the national party representatives of the political parties with whom the matter was discussed. I question the real motive of the right hon. Member for Sparkbrook in attacking the Boundary Commission when it is clear that it was at the request of all the political parties that the commission attempted to retain county boundaries and London borough wards within constituencies.
I was the Minister in the Home Office responsible for electoral matters when the local government boundary changes were made. Everyone may say, as my hon. Friend the Member for Devizes (Mr. Morrison) said, that the report appears to be unfair in one particular or another. It is not realistic for the House to attempt to approach the report in that way. We must look at it as a pack of cards which stands or falls together. If the House starts to change one piece and knocks 5,000 off one electorate, it must put those 5,000 somewhere else. If the Home Office tried to interfere with the report of the Boundary Commission or if the House attempted to change it piecemeal, we would be in far greater danger of being accused of interfering with the impartiality of the Boundary Commission than if we were to accept the report, with its discrepancies.
Mr. John Maxton: To make it clear that there is a difference, we should remember that the Home Secretary can interfere with the report but the House cannot. That is the difference.
Mr. Carlisle: The hon. Gentleman is right. I meant that it would be wrong for the Home Office to interfere. This arose at the time of the local government review when there was a lot of pressure on the Home Office to change the report. We took the view, first, that if we changed it, we should be accused of gerrymandering; secondly, that if one starts changing a pack of cards, it results in many difficulties in other parts of the building, if that is not too much of a mixed metaphor.

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In regard to the rules, it would be impossible to get complete numerical equality, as the hon. Member for Liverpool, Edge Hill (Mr. Alton) said, under the present system of elections. Although I may be out of order, I had sympathy with some of his general remarks. It is right to stick to county boundaries and to London borough boundaries to provide the geographical entity that is required.
I am concerned that we appear to be getting steadily larger as a House, as was said by my hon. Friend the Member for Lewes (Mr. Rathbone). The Boundary Commission explained that this was inevitable under the rules under which it was operating. We are getting to the stage where we should ask ourselves whether 633 is significantly greater than 613, the figure to which the Boundary Commission had to work. If the rules are to be examined, we should consider whether there should be a fixed number of Members to which the Boundary Commission should work instead of having each time a slight increase in the size of the Chamber.
I take it from what the right hon. Member for Sparkbrook said about weighting that he does not like the differentiations within the English constituencies, nor the differentiations with Scotland on the one hand and Wales on the other. However, they become less relevant as time goes by. According to the report of the Boundary Commission, many hon. Members argued that inner city areas ought to have higher weighting because of the problems of inner cities, as the hon. Member for Edge Hill mentioned. Equally, other people argued that country areas ought to have extra weighting because of the size of the constituencies. There is not a case for individual weighting. One ought to try to provide constituencies of similar size, subject to the argument about geographical empathy.
That leads me to the greatest problem faced by a Boundary Commission—that what we are discussing is many years out of date. That is not the fault of the Boundary Commission. It had to take the size of the electorate in 1976 as the basis for finding the average constituency size; it was prevented from taking into account any predicted future growth in population, even for areas such as new towns. I do not know the answer.
It would not be right to go back to reviewing boundaries every three to seven years because the upheaval of changing constituencies is such that if they are to mean anything they should remain the same for at least two elections. It is probably right that a general review should take place only every 10 to 15 years.
Like my hon. Friend the Member for Devizes, I should have thought that in the age of the calculator and the computer some means could be found of providing more up-to-date figures on which Boundary Commissions could work so that they could complete their review in a shorter time than has been taken in this case. It would have made no difference had the Boundary Commissions reported in 1979 instead of 1983 because the report does not take effect until the following election.
I believe that we should think about whether it is right to allow for the gradual growth of the size of the House and whether we can do anything to have the review nearer the end of the 15-year period, so that when it is published the report takes more account of the size of the constituencies at that time rather than what they were five years earlier.
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I believe that Cheshire, which includes my constituency, has been gravely changed by the Boundary Commission for England. However, it is inevitable and I believe that the Boundary Commission has done its best. It is bound to take account of the changes in population that have taken place over the years.
The hon. Member for Edge Hill said that he believed that Liverpool had been hard done by. I notice that even in five of the six seats—a reduction from eight—the electorate is still lower than the national average, whereas in Cheshire seven of the ten new seats are to be above the national average. Such discrepancies are inevitable.
Of course one regrets breaking ties with a constituency that one has represented for 18 years. During that time one has become attached to all the constituency and knows that, whatever happens, one will not represent it all at the next election. However, if we are to retain, as I believe we must, the confidence of the public in the belief that we can treat boundary changes impartially and fairly there is no alternative to accepting the impartial recommendations of the impartial Boundary Commissions. Therefore, if I may presume into tomorrow's debate, I hope that the order to be discussed then will go through even though it has grave effects on my constituency.
7.12 pm
Mr. Eric S. Heffer: So that Conservative Members do not gain the impression that I have left the Shadow Cabinet, or anything of that kind, because I am not on the Front Bench, I point out that have as it were, been let off the leash on this matter because it is not strictly a party political issue but rather a House of Commons issue. It is right that Opposition Members should be allowed to participate freely from either the Front or Back Benches, according to their taste.
The point that the hon. Member for Liverpool, Edge Hill (Mr. Alton) made, and that I shall make, is not that we want weighting in favour of the inner cities, but that we want it understood that if there is to be an average, Liverpool should be somewhere on the lower and not the higher side, because inner cities have special problems. For example, the areas of Liverpool that we represent have terrible unemployment problems, some of the worst housing in the country, despite all the efforts that have been made over the years, and poverty of a type, particularly with the high levels of unemployment, unknown elsewhere in the country.
There is a dreadful case load for Members of Parliament who represent inner city areas such as those in Liverpool. Our surgeries are important because masses of people come to see us. They need looking after, and if the numbers of people in a constituency are increased, the work load becomes worse. We do not have the type of staff that they have in the United States of America. I should not want that, but all these matters should be taken into consideration when we discuss inner city problems and the size of inner city electorates.
I believe that the case made by my party and the Liberal party for a reduction from eight to seven seats was unanswerable and should have been acceded to. It is wrong that the number of seats should have been reduced from eight to six in one fell swoop when we have the problems that we have discussed. Page 19 of the report of the Boundary Commission for England shows that Beckenham will have 59,295, Chislehurst 54,024, Orpington 56,883 and Ravensbourne 58,256 constituents.

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That should be compared with the Liverpool seats none of which are below 60,000 and one of which reaches 74,000. It is ridiculous to have that type of anomaly in inner city areas. Areas with a lower electorate do not have the same problems as cities such as Liverpool.
I did not intervene during the inquiry. I left it to my party, because I did not want people to say, "There is old Heffer creeping along, doing his best to safeguard his electorate." I am sure that my actions would have been interpreted in that way, and that every newspaper in my area would have said, "There you are, that is what is going on. They are looking after their own interests." However, I now have the opportunity to say that a great mistake has been made.
I want to make one or two points only, because I do not think that it is right to abuse the fact that I have come on to the Back Benches to discuss this matter. I disagree with what the hon. Member for Edge Hill said about proportional representation. However, I understand why the point was made. We should continue with our present electoral system—the hon. Member for Edge Hill must know this as well as anyone because over a period he has built up a relationship with his constituents, as I have with mine. If we were to change our electoral system that type of relationship would go. Those of us who meet European parliamentarians know that most of them, not all, do not have the same relationships with their electorate as we have with our constituents. Sometimes they do not even know who their electorate are in the strict sense of the term. Our people, quite rightly, can come to see us in our constituencies and in the House, and that is important.
There is another important point that we should take into consideration. In most other European countries—France was recently the exception that proved the rule—there are coalition Governments, which usually move on the basis of the slowest ship in the convoy. They cannot get done the things that we can do, rightly or wrongly. I believe that the policies of this Government are deplorable. What they do on privatisation and their failure to deal with unemployment in the way that it should be dealt with is deplorable, but at least they have a majority and can get something done. When the Labour party has a majority and moves to the Government Benches we shall be able to do the things that we think are right, and we can make progress. If there is a coalition people cannot move forward as they wish, and all the time are looking over their shoulder to see what their coalition partners might do. At a critical moment, the latter could walk out and the whole thing would collapse. Those are the basic reasons why we should not move towards the system suggested by the hon. Member for Edge Hill.
I conclude as I started, with my main point that we have not got the best possible deal for the people of Liverpool. I agree with the hon. Member for Edge Hill about names. Why change traditional names every time? I do not know. We have lost the name—it is not even included in something else—of the Scotland division. In the House we had two hon. Members from the Scotland division for nearly a century. There was Davy Logan, a marvellous Member, and before him T. P. O'Connor, both of whom were Irish nationalists. The Scotland division was something that everyone on Merseyside and in Liverpool knew and understood. Now it is the Riverside division, when the river is in decline. It would have been a good idea
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to have at least kept the old name, as it was something that was worth keeping. A great mistake has been made and I can do nothing else except vote against that. I fear that it will not make much difference, but I shall do so, nevertheless.
7.22 pm
Mr. W. Benyon: I agree with the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Heffer) that this is a House of Commons matter. It is right and proper for hon. Members to go into the details of their constituencies. We are talking about the legislation that covers the operation of the Boundary Commissions. I want to change the rules, the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Sparkbrook (Mr. Hattersley) wants to change the rules and many hon. Members who have spoken today want to change the rules.
I take as my starting point a quotation on page 9, in paragraph 23 of the report. It says:
"We have consistently taken the view that we are neither required nor empowered by the Rules to take into account the number and distribution of the electorate subsequent to the review date in 1976, even in cases where such projections appear reliable."
My constituency has an electorate, as from 15 February, of 126,000. Just to get this in perspective, it is twice the English mean and over six times the size of the present smallest English constituency—that is England, let alone Scotland and Wales.
The Boundary Commission for England says on page 85, in paragraph 57:
"However, the assistant Commissioner considered that the electorate of the borough would not be large enough to comprise two whole constituencies for many years and that it would exceed the electoral quota by a substantial margin until such time as any further review was undertaken."
The Boundary Commission has proposed that this seat should be cut in half. That sounds fair enough until one notices the facts. On page 85, paragraph 54, the two successive constituencies of Buckingham and Milton Keynes are shown as having electorates of 55,000 and 50,000 repectively. Those are the 1976 figures. However, on 15 February this year the new Milton Keynes constituency had already reached a figure of 80,000 electors—a yearly increase of 5,000.
If this rate of growth is continued over the next 10 years—there is a strong chance that the rate could be greater—at the end of that 10 years this seat, whoever represents it, will have an electorate of between 130,000 and 140,000. People will ask, "So what? This has happened in the past and will happen again—one just has to grin and bear it." I am a supporter of electoral reform, as are a number of other hon. Members who have spoken today, but if I were a supporter of the first-past-the-post system that we now have, I should be extremely worried by the existence of such glaring injustices. It is a negation of democracy, and it is unnecessary.
I first raised this matter when I came to the House in 1970, with the Government of my right hon. Friend the Member for Bexley (Mr. Heath). The Boundary Commission for England told me then that it could not make an interim report, because it would mean altering all the seats in Buckinghamshire and there was no general agreement that this should happen. I went to the Minister and he sided with the Boundary Commission. During the last Labour Administration, I raised the matter again. This time, the reply was that a general review had started and therefore an interim review would be pointless as it would anticipate the general review.

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If we turn to appendix D—this was the point of my intervention to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State—we find that the rules governing the English commission's final recommendations must be made
"between 10 and 15 years from the date of the report on their last general review. That was submitted on 21 April 1969, and so the next report must be made between April 1979 and April 1984."
But look what is happening. The previous review was based on the position in 1965, but was implemented in 1970 when it should have been implemented in 1969, 14 years after the previous revision. The figures for this revision are based on those in 1976 and we are implementing them in 1983—a gap of 17 years.
If this progression continues, the next gap could be even longer. It could be 18 years, and the effect on areas with rapidly growing populations is obvious. In any event, the lag will continue and the only way to change it—this was a point touched on by my hon. Friend the Member for Devizes (Mr. Morrison)—is to make the Boundary Commission report more quickly, or at least to start it in 1986 and not, as would presently be the case, in 1995.
However, the rapidly growing areas are relatively few. The vast majority of constituencies do not change very much between elections. I can spell this out in greater detail, but I do not wish to bore the House with the statistics, which are on page 2, paragraph 10. They show what the position was in 1976 and how many seats had an electorate above a certain figure and how many below.
The solution that I offer to the House and the Government is simple. When a county or metropolitan area electorate rises or falls by the electoral quota the commission should have a statutory duty to review that area. In Buckinghamshire, for example, the electorate in 1976 was 359,000. In fact, we got six seats, so one must multiply the quota by six, and that is the starting point. When that figure rises by 65,753 it should trigger an interim review.
Perhaps I can deal with some of the arguments that I know will be made against this step. The first argument is that the electoral quota is too low a tripwire. I do not accept that, and I believe that this can be proved statistically. If that is really the stumbling block, let us not have the electoral quota—let us have one and a half times the electoral quota—but a tripwire there must be.
The second argument is that, in practice, it may mean disturbing all the constituencies in a county or metropolitan area. I know that this is where the strongest opposition comes from colleagues in this House. I understand hon. Members' reluctance to have their constituencies altered. It should be remembered that it was a Tory Government who produced the longer period between elections, and that that was done because hon. Members did not like having their constituencies altered. Frankly, if this is the only way to avoid such appalling anomalies, it is a sacrifice that should be made. However, I appreciate that a metropolitan area may be too big, and that it may be more satisfactory to operate on the basis of a borough or group of boroughs.
The third argument is that this arrangement could mean an interim increase in the number of Members of this House. If the electorate stayed the same, that would be only temporary. An increase in one constituency would be counterbalanced by a decrease in another. If, on the other hand, the electorate is rising, as it is at present, a decision has to be taken on the future size of the electoral quota.
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I agree with hon. Members who have said today that this House is getting too big. In my opinion, it should be reduced. The easiest way to do that is gradually to reduce the electoral quota as each boundary revision takes place. However, that in no way detracts from my central argument, which is simply concerned with removing the inequalities occasioned by rapid movements of population.
Finally, only the Government can do something about this matter. In his speech today, the Home Secretary kept saying that this was a matter for Parliament. It is, of course, in the last resort, but the only people who can initiate legislation are the Government. Of course, it could be done by a private Member's Bill, but that would be unlikely to succeed. I hope that today I shall be given a more encouraging reply than has been my lot from the previous two Governments. Very few seats are affected, and those affected to the extent experienced by my constituency are even fewer. All Governments, without exception, pay attention to numbers, so exceptions to the general rule are inconvenient, but to allow such an injustice to continue is a complete negation of democracy and an affront to justice and equity.
7.33 pm
Mr. Ian Wrigglesworth: First, I shall deal with a number of points that have been raised by hon. Members and with which I agree, before I come to my major argument about Boundary Commissions in general.
What was said by the right hon. and learned Member for Runcorn (Mr. Carlisle) and other hon. Members about the out-of-date nature of the data on which the Boundary Commissions work is something with which I am sure every hon. Member who has gone through this process will have great sympathy. It seems remarkable that the commissions should deal with data that are some years old, taking no account of the movements of population that they, we and the local authorities know will take place in the very near future. Thus, even before the boundaries come into operation, we know that they will be inappropriate in a short time, if not by the time that they come into operation. In this day of electronic information technology, I should have thought that it was possible to take into account much more up-to-date figures and shifts of population about which there is some certainty.
What has been said about the impartiality of the Boundary Commissions should be taken, in some instances, with a pinch of salt. It is unwise—I put it no higher—to appoint to the Boundary Commissions people who have been active in politics. There is validity in the criticism that it is not sensible to appoint to highly sensitive positions in which it is necessary to be impartial people who have been involved in politics. I do not rule that out completely, but it would not be a very wise move. I have no reason to doubt the impartiality of the commissions, and the attempts that have been made to smear them, suggesting that they have been partisan in drawing up the boundaries, are very wide of the mark and unworthy of the people who have made them.
Inevitably, there are disappointments and antipathy towards some of the recommendations. No doubt those hon. Members whose constituencies are being replaced will, in a few years' time, witness their successors defending the constituencies now proposed in the same sentimental way as they defend theirs today. That is an

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inevitable consequence of the system that we have. I want to say a few words about what I see as the main deficiency of the present system.
The right hon. Member for Birmingham, Sparkbrook (Mr. Hattersley) said that we must avoid the glaring anomalies that would arise if we did not have regular boundary reviews. All hon. Members who have spoken have said the same thing. The right hon. Gentleman went further. He said that he wanted to base the commissions' reports almost entirely on the principle of getting the numbers as equal as possible. I entirely agree with that, and I think that other hon. Members agree with it as a principle but if the right hon. Gentleman believes that, he will have to ignore many of the things that his colleagues and other hon. Gentlemen, including the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Heffer), have said about the need to relate the boundaries to the community that the Member represents. There is an inherent conflict in trying to find a mathematical equality for constituencies and trying to draw boundaries around natural communities with which people can identify.
I view with great cynicism the attachment of the right hon. Member for Sparkbrook to the great principle of equal numbers as far as possible. In view of the High Court action taken by some of his right hon. Friends, and in view of what he said today, it is clear that if it suited his book and his party's book to go for another basis for the Boundary Commissions to work on he would praise that to the rooftops. Equality of representation, based on the principle that there should be equal voting rights, with each vote having equal representation, as far as possible, in this House, cannot be achieved under the present system. On the basis of the present first-past-the-post system and single-Member constituencies, it is simply not possible for each vote to obtain equal representation in the House.
Over recent years, there has been increasing disillusionment with our system because of the changing pattern of voting in Britain over the past 30 years. In 1951, 97 per cent. of those voting voted for either the Conservative of the Labour party and those two parties obtained 98 per cent. of the seats in the House. By October, 1974 only 75 per cent. of the electorate voted for the Labour and Conservative parties but nevertheless they still had 94 per cent. of the representation in the House. Now, because of the decline in support for the Labour and Conservative parties and the unfair voting system we simply do not have a system in which each vote, as far as possible, commands equal representation in the House.
If hon. Members believe in that principle, they must agree with the proposal that I and my hon. Friends in the Social Democratic and Liberal parties have put forward. That would solve the problems to which many hon. Members have referred during the debate. We have called that proposal community proportional representation and I hope hon. Members will study it with care. It means that we would have multi-Member constituencies. Large and cohesive communities such as Sheffield and Leeds would have a single constituency with several members representing it. This is not the time to pursue the argument, but that means that there would still be the present attachment to the community. We should not have
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arbitrary boundaries dividing a community, with two sides of a road represented by different Members but with the same community interest.
If there is an issue affecting ICI or British Steel on Teeside, my constituents, although those plants are not in my constituency, are just as much affected as those in the arbitrary constituencies in which those plants are situated. It is much better from everyone's point of view if the constituents and their Members have an identity of interest with the boundaries going round natural communities. If at the same time we can achieve that basic principle which, during the debate, hon. Members have said that they want to achieve—that each vote shall as far as possible command equal representation in the House—it could be achieved through having a proportional representation system in a multi-Member constituency. That would retain the link between the community and the Member with proper proportional representation.
In February 1974, the Ulster Unionists, on the basis of 1·3 per cent. of the United Kingdom vote, obtained 11 seats in the House. In October 1974, the Scottish Nationalist party obtained 11 seats with only 2·9 per cent. of the United Kingdom vote. In contrast the Liberal party, which had 18 or 19 per cent. of the vote, obtained only about 14 per cent. of the representation here. There are many other examples of the disparities that exist as a result of our single-Member constituency and voting system.
In February 1974, the Labour and Conservative Members in the House were elected by an average of only 39,000 people. By comparison, on average, each Liberal had to obtain 430,000 votes in order to obtain representation in the House. That is hardly a situation in which each vote commands equal representation in the House. That is a gross anomaly which, with the changing political situation in Britain, will become more and more intolerable and might become intolerable to Labour and Conservative Members if their vote should decline below that threshold under which they would obtain the sort of representation that they have had in recent times in the House. Perhaps then the light will dawn upon some hon. Members.
I hope that in future we shall have a Speaker's Conference that will determine boundaries based upon communities and a new voting system that will overcome the gross anomalies that presently exist and stop debates such as this in which dissatisfied Members want to reject the Boundary Commission's proposals, but cannot do so because of the basic inequality and unsatisfactory nature of the system with which the boundary commissioners are having to operate.
7.44 pm
Sir Charles Fletcher-Cooke: I have a suspicion that even when that tremendous day comes and the new boundaries and new large constituencies are produced, there will still be considerable dissatisfaction. There always is dissatisfaction because a boundary draws a line that somebody does not like. Therefore, when I hear of all the dreadful ways in which the boundary commissioners have operated the rules on this occasion, I say to myself that if they had operated them differently there would have been equal if not more dissatisfaction, although perhaps coming from different mouths.
Mr. Tom Ellis: May I draw attention to the fact that under the multi-Member system, once having

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established the boundaries, there is no further need to change them? One need only alter the number of Members.
Sir Charles Fletcher-Cooke: I should have thought that there was a need to change them in many circumstances but I do not want to deal with the future at the moment because we have quite enough to do with the present.
The present position of single-Member constituencies is such that there is always criticism of the boundary commissioners. Given the rather muddled rules that the boundary commissioners have been given by the House, they have done as well as possible. The chief criticism that has emerged from the debate—one that was eloquently deployed by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Runcorn (Mr. Carlisle) and by my hon. Friend the Member for Buckingham (Mr. Benyon)—is that the Boundary Commission takes much too long. It started its work in 1976 and it reported in 1983. Apart from my hon. Friend the Member for Devizes (Mr. Morrison), who suggested the use of computers, nobody has made any suggestions. I dare say that computers would help, but a much better suggestion for reducing the period from six to two years without any loss of time for inquiries, criticisms and the rest, is to make the Boundary Commission full-time. If the Boundary Commission did not consist of three distinguished gentlemen all of whom have a full day's work to do elsewhere, instead of taking six years it could easily take two years. I am not saying that I would disapprove of a High Court judge as chairman. I welcome that. Whether he be a Liberal candidate or not he is an admirable chairman. However, I do not see why he cannot be taken off judicial duties to do a rather more speedy job on the Boundary Commission. I do not see why his assistants cannot be taken off their duties in order to do a quicker job. In almost every other country where the job is farmed out to an independent commission its members are full-time and they can report in as short a time as six months in some places. That is where the great criticism comes. By the time the Boundary Commission reports, the figures have already begun to look ludicrous in many cases. The example of my hon. Friend the Member for Buckingham is not ludicrous but horrifying. Therefore, why not have a full-time commission? That is my suggestion for the solution or partial solution of the problem. I do not mean that a full-time commission should sit all the time; I mean a full-time commission each time one is necessary. It could do the job in two years or less.
Mr. John Maxton: With more staff.
Sir Charles Fletcher-Cooke: Perhaps with more staff, but I am not sure whether that is necessary. However, if more staff are necessary, so be it. It would, in many ways, be cheaper in the end.
As is known, I have an interest to declare, and that is that my constituency is being chopped into four parts and the four bleeding chunks have been thrown to the neighbours, one of whom is my hon. and learned Friend the Minister of State. That is a cause of great sorrow to me and to my constituency. The constituency is almost exactly 100 years old. The first Member was the great-grandfather of my hon. Friend the Member for Dorset, South (Viscount Cranborne) who won by five votes. Ever since then it has had a distinguished career. It has produced a great sense of identity and the numbers are such that there
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is no reason why it should disappear. At present, the constituency has about 75,000 electors, of whom about 15,000 will inevitably go into greater Manchester because it straddles the county boundary. That leaves 60,000 electors in the county of Lancashire—just about the quota.
Why is the constituency not being retained? It is one of the caprices of this situation that it cannot be retained because it has to be used as a pool to make up other constituencies. No argument about legitimacy, time or sense of community makes any difference. The reason is that the commissioners started in the north of the county and worked their way down to the south. By the time they came to the south, to my constituency, there was nothing else they could do except use it as a pool or a reservoir. If they had started in the south and worked their way up to the north, or even started in the east and worked their way to the west, this would never have happened. Of course, they had to start somewhere. At the end of the day, a constituency had to be used as a pool or reservoir and it is too bad that it happened to be the Darwen division of Lancashire. I believe that there is a good deal of strength in that argument. That would have happened whichever way the commissioners had worked.
It is a capricious result. The caprice should be taken on board. I do not blame the commissioners for doing this. There was nothing else that they could do. They had to start somewhere and, when they came to the end of their work, they had to find a reservoir. To the great sorrow of this century-old constituency, which had a feeling that it was losing its identity every time a change was made in the boundaries, it is the sufferer. All I can do is say that it is a very great shame.
7.52 pm
Sir Peter Emery: I will be brief, Mr. Deputy Speaker, because I know that other colleagues wish to catch your eye. I shall attempt not to enter into any special pleading about my constituency as there has already been a certain amount of that, which I fully understand. I will lose 12,000 of my electors. I am sorry to see them go. I have enjoyed being able to represent that part of my constituency which is now to be handed on as a pool to another constituency, but that is the way of the world with Boundary Commissions.
I wish to say two things in general and then make three specific points. First, I think it is right that someone should take to task the remarks of the hon. Member for Goole (Dr. Marshall) who seemed to be implying an unpleasant and unreasonable criticism of my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary. It seemed to me to be very uncharacteristic of him and, I thought, most unfair. When, in fact, challenged by my right hon. Friend, the hon. Gentleman seemed to try to slide out of it and yet still leave the slur. I should like to nail that slur which, I believe, was unjustified and wrong. That should be said.
Secondly, I am somewhat worried, although I do not know whether it is part of the Boundary Commission debate, about the number of hon. Members who seemed to have slipped in advocacy of a proportional system of voting. I wish to say to them that, on the whole, they have a vested interest in it. When the hon. Member for Thornaby (Mr. Wrigglesworth) said that he thought that every vote should have an equal value in this House, I wondered whether he had cast his mind back to those who

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had voted for him at the general election. I do not think that any of them voted for him to be an SDP Member, so I am not certain how he was able to calm his conscience.
Mr. Tom Ellis: I wish only to draw the attention of the hon. Member for Honiton (Sir P. Emery) to the fact that when my hon. Friend the Member for Thornaby (Mr. Wrigglesworth) was a member of the Labour party, he was a member of the Labour Campaign for Electoral Reform.
Sir Peter Emery: I do not mind that at all. It does not make any difference. I say to those who wish to tinker with the British constitution and our parliamentary system that they should point out another parliamentary democratic structure in the world that works better than Westminster. When they can do so, I will begin to think about changing our present system. Until they can do that, for goodness' sake let us keep what we have and not tinker around with it, since that would be likely to make it worse than it is at present.
I wish to make three specific points. No hon. Member speaking today has done other than sweep under the carpet the completely illogical representation of Wales and Scotland in the House. I think it right that that position should be put forward. Perhaps some people can justify it, but it should not be hidden. The electoral quota for England is 65,963. The electoral quota for Wales is 55,660 and for Scotland, 52,904. Therefore, if one uses the English electoral quota for Wales, instead of having an increase of two to 38 Members, Wales would have 31½ Members—let us be generous and say 32 Members. Wales will thus have six Members more than it would normally qualify for. If Scotland used the English electoral quota, it would have 58 seats and not the 72 seats including the one extra that it is being given. Thus, Scotland has 14 seats more than would be the case if the same electoral quota as applies to England were used. If one puts that into percentages—percentages are a nice way of making the matter appear easier—Wales has 18 per cent. more seats than is justified and Scotland 24 per cent. more seats than is justified. Perhaps some people will turn back to the Act of Union 1706 to justify that position. I find that to be historically a long way off and I wonder how long we have to keep on with it.
The second specific matter to which I wish to refer is the problem of the organisational structure. Many Members have talked about this, not least my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Darwen (Sir C. Fletcher-Cooke), my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Runcorn (Mr. Carlisle) and my hon. Friend the Member for Buckingham (Mr. Benyon). There really is something wrong when we are to pass tomorrow an order which is 1,435,000 electors out of date. That is because we are having to use the 1976 register when we already know that the 1982 register, let alone the 1983 register, would have increased the numbers of electors by 1·4 million.
The interesting fact, which has not been pointed out, is that that has had a specific effect. If one has examined, as I have, the three different types of constituency, and the increase and decrease of the electorate within those constituencies, one finds that of the London constituencies, 32 increase their electorate but 52 experience a decrease in electorate. Eighty metropolitan constituencies have increased electorates, but 49 have decreased electorates. In the county seats, 288 have increased
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electorates, some of which are major increases. A number of them have increased by 10,000 or even 15,000—for example, South-West Cambridgeshire by 9,000, Peterborough by 15,000, Warrington, South by 14,000, Billericay by 10,000, Basingstoke by 11,000, East Hampshire by 11,000, The Wrekin by 11,000 and Horsham by 12,000.
Sir David Price: Eastleigh has increased by 14,000.
Sir Peter Emery: I knew that my hon. Friend intended to speak and I did not wish to steal his thunder. Only 22 county seats show a decrease. Most of them are urban, such as the two Bristol seats. That means that, even before we introduce the new Boundary Commission proposals, we shall favour the urban rather than the county areas. Once again, county districts will find themselves underrepresented while urban areas will be over-represented.
Should we not do something to ensure that when we adopt a Boundary Commission report we do not do so on figures that are seven or eight years out of date? My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Darwen suggested, and Parliament must insist, that when another Boundary Commission is appointed it must report within two years of being set up.
One suggestion is that we establish a full-time Boundary Commission. The use of computers and computer sciences should considerably assist that. The drawing of graphs and boundaries that can now be done on a computer could not have happened 10 or 15 years ago. Has anyone considered a statutory rolling commission that would deal with one part of the country at a time, within a one-year or two-year period, and then move on to another part? That would mean a permanent uprating, which would be better than the delays of perhaps 18 or 20 years that can happen with the figures that are being applied to the recommendations.
I agree—although I do not like doing so—with the view expressed by a number of Opposition Members, especially the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Sparkbrook (Mr. Hattersley) to the effect that, in giving our directions to the boundary commissioners, we should ask them to come much nearer to the arithmetical average than they have done in the present recommendations. There are six or eight seats with under 40,000 electors, with an equal number with more than 80,000 or 85,000 electors. There must be something wrong with our structure.
Surely it is not so terrible to hop across county boundaries when putting together a constituency. As the hon. Member for Honiton, I once represented not only east Devon but a large ward of Exeter. That was taken away in the last review. It made Exeter a rather safer Conservative seat. However, it would have been more a part of community representation for me to have represented part of the west side of Dorset, which has a greater community factor within my constituency, than part of Exeter and east Devon. Why is it so strange to cross county boundaries provided that the community structure of a constituency is seriously considered? We must reconsider our thinking about the directions given about crossing county boundaries only as a last resort. Indeed, I understand that that has not happened at all in these recommendations.
I hope that the Home Secretary and his Department will ensure that the recommendations and views put forward in

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the debate are seriously considered before any major steps are taken to establish another Boundary Commission. That is important, and if it happens, the debate will have been of some use.
8.6 pm
Mr. John Maxton: It is good for a Scottish Member to follow the hon. Member for Honiton (Sir P. Emery). There is a certain anomaly between his pleading that Scotland is over-represented while also saying that because of the population changes since 1966, urban areas in England are over-represented compared with county areas. That is one—although not the only—reason why Scotland has over-representation. It has large, remote rural areas that are sparsely populated and are, of necessity, seats of low population.
I have not studied the proposals of the Boundary Commission for England, but the smallest seats in Scotland are Orkney and Shetland and the Western Isles, with electorates of 22,000 and 24,000 respectively. They are the smallest constituencies in Britain. I do not think that any hon. Member would argue that they should not each have an individual Member of Parliament to represent them. They are unique as a geographical part of our nation. It would be impossible for any hon. Member to represent one of the large mainland areas—for example, Inverness—and also the Western Isles, or to represent Caithness and Sutherland and also Orkney and Shetland. That is one reason why the Boundary Commission for Scotland is separate. It must take account of the large, remote, sparsely populated areas that require separate representation.
We are all indulging in special pleading for our seats. The hon. Member for Honiton instinctively expects rural areas to be Tory and urban areas to be Labour. In Scotland, the smaller seats are not so represented—for example, the Border area is represented by the Liberals, Caithness and Sutherland by the SDP, Orkney and Shetland by the Liberals and the Western Isles by the SNP. None of the small rural seats are represented by Conservatives. But nearer to the mainland and the main centres of population, rural areas are represented by Tories. Scotland shows a different picture from the remainder of the United Kingdom.
I do not wish to delve into the history of the Act of Union. Conservative Members should remember that, although it was called the Act of Union, it was a treaty of union between two separate sovereign Parliaments. The Scottish people agreed to give up their rights to a separate Parliament and come to this place on the basis of a certain representation and on retaining some separate identity both in this place and in Scotland.
Therefore, while we have a separate Scottish Office, separate Scottish legislation and a separate Scottish group in Parliament and in the United Kingdom, Scotland must have its own Boundary Commission and its own way of working out the number of Members of Parliament who will represent it in this House. If the hon. Member for Honiton (Sir P. Emery) is prepared to demolish the Scottish Boundary Commission, he has to go the rest of the way and demolish the Scottish Office, absorb the Scottish Departments into the United Kingdom ones and watch his own party being wiped out for ever in Scotland. It is entirely up to him.
Although the two winding-up speeches will be given by Scottish Members of Parliament, I am the only Scot to
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have spoken in the debate so far. I should like to make it clear that, although I have been affected detrimentally by the way in which the boundaries have been allocated in Glasgow, I believe that the Scottish Boundary Commission has done an excellent job.
The original proposals for Glasgow were utterly wrong. It was proposed to have 10 rather than 11 seats. That was changed because of the, representations made. I compliment the assistant commissioner who was appointed to conduct the local inquiry in Glasgow—Mr. Prosser—on the job that he did. He listened to the representations and the legal case that we made.
The legal basis of our case was that the population of Glasgow, although declining, was not a factor that could be taken into account. We said that it was not possible to make 10 seats in Glasgow on the basis of population figures for 1989 rather than 1979. The boundary commissioners must work on the basis of the figures when they start their investigations, not on the basis of some future population trend. They accepted that argument and re-allocated the seats in Glasgow so that there are now 11. They include the three Strathclyde regional seats. That is much fairer.
It so happens that the commission did not accept my suggested 11 seats for Glasgow. That does not matter. The fact remains that the commissioners listened to the representations, gave us a fair hearing and, in the end, came down on the side of justice. I might lose marginally, but I shall still win the revised seat of Glasgow, Cathcart. at the next general election.
There have been criticisms of the English Boundary Commission. I want to make it clear that, on the whole, the Scottish Boundary Commission has done a good job. However, that does not mean that there are no points of principle that should be raised.
The Home Secretary raised one such point. He said that the House should have no right to amend the details, of what the Boundary Commission does. I do not disagree, but it should not still be provided by statute that the Home Secretary, the Secretary of State for Wales and the Secretary of State for Scotland can in theory—they may not in practice—amend Boundary Commission reports. I do not know whether the Minister disagrees. I know that in practice it is highly unlikely that they will do that, but it is wrong that they have the right to do so. They are political animals and part and parcel of the political structure. If it is wrong for the House to have the power to amend Boundary Commission reports, it is equally wrong for members of the Government to have that power.
We should explore how to make Boundary Commissions organs of the House rather than organs of the Home Office, the Secretary of State for Scotland and the Secretary of State for Wales. They should be appointed by the House, obviously on the nomination of Ministers, and report to the House. Perhaps senior Back Benchers, who have served in Government, who are respected on both sides of the House and who are given jobs in the House, could be used in a Boundary Commission role so that the commissions are taken out of the direct political control of the Government. I do not know whether that view will be widely accepted, but we should bear it in mind.
I should like to link my point about Boundary Commissions' time scale with the way in which Boundary Commissions work. One of the problems that the Boundary Commission for Scotland faces is that the local government Boundary Commissions meet and make

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decisions before the parliamentary Boundary Commission starts work. I do not know enough about England to say that that is true for England as well. That system is the wrong way round.
The hands of the Scottish parliamentary Boundary Commission were tied. It rightly set itself the rule of operating as far as possible within local government boundaries. It found that because the local government Boundary Commission had already made its decisions, it was forced to work on the basis of those decisions. The parliamentary Boundary Commission should not operate in that way.
There should be one Boundary Commission. It should be full time and have a full-time staff that is much larger than that which it now has. It should examine the totality of government at all levels and decide the boundaries accordingly. It could then work within the three tiers in Scotland—the districts, the regions and the parliamentary constituencies. In Scotland, the regions were dealt with first. The districts were sorted out second and the parliamentary constituencies were decided last. That process has distorted everything.
There is also a small anomaly with regard to population changes that makes some impact on my argument about having one Boundary Commission. On examination of the rules, it emerges that local boundary commissioners are allowed to take population trends into account. They are allowed to examine forecasts and use forecasters. Although parliamentary boundary commissioners do so as well, they are prevented from doing so by statute. One of the arguments in Glasgow was that commissioners do not have the right to make forecasts they must take account of the population as it is when they start work.
Because local government boundary commissioners are allowed to make forecasts and parliamentary boundary commissioners are not, although they are tied to the findings of the local government boundary commissioners, the anomaly gets even worse. There is, therefore, a good case for creating one Boundary Commission that covers all areas. It should be a full-time job with a full-time staff that draws people from the local areas concerned.
Everyone in Scotland knows that the establishment that deals with these matters is Edinburgh-based and that most Edinburgh people know damn all about Glasgow. Boundary commissioners tend to be Edinburgh people, who do not know the localities or how people operate in Glasgow. We put that point to the inquiry and it agreed with us. People from local government who know local areas should be seconded to the Boundary Commission to work full-time on that subject for two or three years.
The operations of the Boundary Commission are another example of the lip service this country pays to democracy. We want it on the cheap. We expect the Boundary Commission to do its job on the cheap, like everybody else. That is not the way to do it.
In theory, the commission's reports could be through the House this week and through the other place within a fortnight and the Prime Minister could call an election on those boundaries three weeks later. As political organisations are part and parcel of democratic life, that is not right. Opposition Members are suspicious that the boundary reports are being pushed through the House with undue haste to clear the ground so that there can be an
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election in June. My view is that there will not be a general election in June, but the Government have control over the matter. When it comes to the boundaries and the way in which Parliament operates, the Government should not have that control. Parliament should write it into statute that once the Boundary Commission reports are passed by both Houses there should be a three or six-month period—it is open to discussion how long it should be—before its recommendations can be implemented so that local government, returning officers and political parties can become organised.
We tend to ignore political parties in our constitution but they are part and parcel of our life. The Government should not be given the power to manipulate boundary commission changes for their own purposes. The House should seriously consider whether a time lag can be established between the Boundary Commission reports being passed by the House and their being implemented.
I have deliberately not strayed far into the details of my constituency changes, which are not to my benefit. However, I congratulate the Scottish Boundary Commission on the job that it has done, even if English Members believe that it is wrong. We believe that it is right, although it is not to the benefit of the Labour party. All parties will probably finish at much the same level as now.
8.24 pm
Sir David Price: I apologise to the House for not having been present for the opening speeches. I was on the Select Committee on Transport interrogating Sir David Serpell and his colleagues on his well-known report. As about 4,000 of my constituents depend on the future of British Rail, the House will understand that I have had a double duty to-day. Further, it is St. David's day, so I shall be generous to the House by being brief.
It is clear—this has emerged in all the speeches that I have heard—that arithmetic and equity require that there should be periodic reviews of the size of constituencies. It is equally right that such review should be conducted by people outside of the hurly burly of day-to-day political life. I was interested in some of the proposals of the hon. Member for Glasgow, Cathcart (Mr. Maxton). Such reviews should not be conducted too frequently. Equally, there should not be a long lapse of years between them, because of the continuous alteration in the distribution of our population. Those guiding principles are at the heart of our current legislation. That is why I shall have no difficulty in supporting the motions tomorrow and Thursday to implement the reviews.
However, I have several criticisms and suggestions to make. The first criticism is that under this review the number of parliamentary seats within the United Kingdom is to be increased from 635 to 650, as my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Runcorn (Mr. Carlisle) said. There are too many hon. Members here already, but not in constituency terms. Many constituencies are too big. However, in terms of the life of the House there are too many hon. Members. That is reflected in motions on the Order Paper about shortage of accommodation, in the frustration of hon. Members who are unable to get called to speak in debates and by the many hon. Members who have oral questions on the paper that are never reached.
How we reduce our numbers is a different matter. Implicit in the report of the Boundary Commission is an

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increase in the membership. That is the ratchet effect well described on page 6 of the English report. I will not quote it because hon. Members are aware of it.
Dr. Edmund Marshall: Am I not right in thinking that in centuries past the membership of the House of Commons was far greater than it is now?
Sir David Price: The Library gave me a stack of figures as to the variation in the membership of the House over many years. Possibly in the days to which the hon. Member for Goole (Dr. Marshall) is referring, membership was not regarded as conscientiously as it is today. There is a conflict between the number of hon. Members who make this a good working House on the one hand, and the number of constituents that it is reasonable to ask a Member to represent. I believe that in England we could survive with constituencies of 80,000. I represent 96,000 electors. I am happy to continue doing so. The fact is that the Boundary Commission will not let me do it, which I resent.
My second criticism is the length of time the review takes. Seven years is far too long. Every hon. Member who has spoken has referred to this fact, and something must be done about it. The electorate in my constituency has increased by 14,000 over the past seven years—20 per cent. Under the new arrangements, my electorate will be 84,000.
My third criticism is the inadequate attention given in the rules to the expected growth of population.
My fourth criticism is the obsession of the English Commission with the pure numbers game. I disagree with the Labour Front Bench Members on the basis of their unsuccessful legal action. It is the community which matters, not sheer numbers. I point to the Boundary Commission's sensible proposals to leave the Isle of Wight with an over-large electorate—it is not large enough to warrant two constituencies—rather than carving a bit off the island and sticking it on to something on the mainland.
Some of the commission's more eccentric proposals lie in the procedures that it follows. It does not give reasons for its findings in public inquiries, which is wrong. The hon. Member for Cathcart referred to the inadequacy of our in-house parliamentary procedures for dealing with the commission's reports. The fact that the commission's proposals cannot be altered makes no sense. I accept that the Government should have no power to make such alterations, but the House as a whole should be able to do so.
In the next Parliament—we do not have time to do it now—a Select Committee should be invited to study the workings of the Boundary Commission and the underlying legislation, and to make to the House recommendations for improvement. Many of the proposals made during this debate could be raw material for that Select Committee. Meanwhile, we must live with the eccentricities of the Commission's proposals. I hope that the voters who feel electorally disoriented by those eccentricities will take comfort from the words of the late A. G. Macdonell:
"Those whose lives are occupied in combating the eccentricities of God regard as very small beer the eccentricities of man."
8.30 pm
Mr. Tom Ellis: I apologise to the House for not having been here until an hour ago, but, with the hon. Member for Eastleigh (Sir D. Price), I have been in Committee.
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The hon. Gentleman spoke about the eccentricities in the findings of the Boundary Commission. However, they are far fewer than I expected because the boundary commissioners of England, Scotland and Wales were given an impossible task—to devise a fair and accurate system of representation—which cannot be carried out in the present system. Therefore, I sympathise with them in their task, and I am surprised that many more eccentricities have not resulted from their attempts to square the circle.
The hon. Member for Honiton (Sir P. Emery) said that our constitution was probably the finest in the world, and he is entitled to that view. However, many British people would say that our constitution, at least compared with the constitutions of the leading western industrialised nations, is probably one of the least satisfactory because of its representation arrangements. Many consequences flow from the lack of proper representation. I refer to both the unfairnesses and the statistics, which are important, and to the political consequences of that representation, which are profound.
We are proud of our unwritten constitution. It is a gentleman's agreement that is denied to lesser breeds. It is built on the solid foundation of the sovereignty of Parliament, which can do anything. We can turn man into woman and black into white. What Parliament says goes. We are unconstrained because we have no written constitution, no supreme court, no federal structure, no separation of powers, and not even delegates to a purely representative assembly. For that to be justified. it is important that society feels that it is truly represented in the House of Commons, which has become the dominant part of Parliament.
If society does not feel that it is truly represented in the House, the system begins to crumble. The most obvious feature of that crumbling is that the House ha become dichotomised. On one side there are angels, who wear haloes and can do no wrong, and on the other side are devils, who have horns and can do no right. Whatever one side does, the other side will undo when it is in power. That principle stems from the lack of proper representation.
An example was given by the right hon. Member for Roxburgh, Selkirk and Peebles (Mr. Steel) a few weeks ago. He looked at the constituencies in this country and the rate of unemployment in each constituency. He took the best 100 and the worst 100, the 100 with the least unemployment and the 100 with the most unemployment. In the best constituencies there were four Labour MPs; the rest were Conservatives. In the worst constituencies there was one Conservative MP
To me it seems quite clear that representation in this Chamber is profoundly wrong. The right hon. Gentleman's exercise, I should have thought, showed that the country is becoming two nations territorially in a way that Disraeli would never have thought of. In the half of the country south of a line from Bristol drawn due east, leaving out Greater London, all but 11 of the 154 seats are held by Conservatives. In the north, the reverse applies. That is a classic example of the consequences of the electoral system.
The boundary commissioners are given the task of trying somehow to devise an arrangement of constituencies among the electorate to correct those trends, and the plain fact of the matter is that it is impossible. When, for example, a Conservative voter in the Rhondda valley or a Labour voter in Bournemouth casts a vote, he or she

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knows that as far as representation is concerned it is a waste of time. It is simply a registration of the fact that in the Rhondda valley there is a Conservative voter and in Bournemouth there is a Labour voter. For the representation of Bournemouth and the Rhondda valley, the whole thing is a nonsense.
I have taken advantage of an opportunity that presented itself to me on coming into the House when it was not very full, and I will be brief. I plead with the House to begin to get to grips seriously with the British constitution, starting with the key to reform, which would lead to all kinds of consequential reforms. That, quite clearly, is the electoral system. When we talk about the Boundary Commissions we should be talking much more fundamentally about the system rather than the nuts and bolts that the commissioners are having to tighten up to try to make the whole machine work.
8.38 pm
Mr. Anthony Nelson: The hon. Member for Wrexham (Mr. Ellis), like his hon. Friends, has deployed arguments which are, perhaps, more in favour of reform of the electoral system than of reform of the system of deciding what the boundaries of constituencies should be. I believe that the issues can be and should be looked at quite separately. If we were to add political criteria to those that the Boundary Commissions have to take into account we would end up with some very subjective and undersirable results indeed.
I am perhaps one of the few Members contributing to this debate who is entirely unaffected by the boundary report. I hope, therefore, that my comments will be taken as being fairly objective. My constituency of Chichester is bounded on the whole of the western side and across the north by county borders and can clearly not be enlarged in those areas without transgressing county borders. Indeed, although my electorate is substantial—in 1976 it was over 72,000 and on the latest electorate basis it is over 77,000—my boundaries are to stay the same. I am very pleased about this, particularly as my constituency is contiguous with the boundaries of the local authority.
I would like to argue, however, and I hope the House will find my arguments telling, that my electorate should be even larger, that constituencies should be significantly larger and the number of MPs consequently fewer. I believe that there is a compelling case for amending the rules provided for in the House of Commons (Redistribution of Seats) Act 1949 to ensure that the quota which is applied in deciding the size and number of constituencies is increased significantly. I shall set out the reasons why I think this is necessary in a minute.
The electoral population of England is just under 34 million. That figure divided by 516, the present number of constituencies, gives the much-quoted average of 65,753. I believe that that is now too low and that we could all manage and represent significantly larger constituencies.
It is undesirable that successive boundary reviews should result in an increase in the number of Members of Parliament. Indeed, it seems to be one of the few growth businesses in this country. I believe that the electorate is over-represented in terms of the number of Members. As my hon. Friend the Member for Eastleigh (Sir D. Price) pointed out, there are structural and physical constraints
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on the extent to which Members can be accommodated and the facilities provided here for them properly to represent their constituents.
Application of the quota rule has led to an undesirable increase in the number of seats. Some of the reasons for that are set out in the report and the commission admits that the rules may produce an inbuilt tendency to increase the number of seats. First, rule 6 allows more seats than the straight quota basis would provide to be established for geographical reasons. We all accept that, but as the increased number of seats is then used in subsequent reviews as the basis for deciding the quota, there is an inbuilt compounding of the increase in successive reviews. Secondly, under rule 5, the number of seats in an area is not rounded up but is chosen to keep as close to the quota as possible. That again results in a natural tendency for the number of seats to increase.
Insufficient attention has been given to the reason why a figure was laid down in the 1949 Act as the desirable number of seats in the House of Commons. We do not consider carefully enough whether that is the right number in the light of changing conditions. I believe that it should be substantially smaller. In determining the number of parliamentary seats we should adopt the criterion of the smallest number consistent with the present quality of representation.
The finest attribute of this House and the one of which I am most proud is the ability of any Member to take up an issue affecting the lowliest of his constituents with the highest authority in the land, be it the Prime Minister or a Secretary of State, receive a reply signed by that authority in a very short time and send it back with comments to the constituents concerned. Few countries can boast such an up-to-down system of democracy and representation in which the person at the bottom can obtain a detailed reply from the person at the top on a specific issue. That, above all, is a quality that we should preserve, and I believe that we can preserve it even if the average size of constituencies is substantially increased.
In my view, it would be desirable to adopt a quota of perhaps 100,000 rather than just over 57,000. Certainly, I believe that many Members would find a quota of 80,000 appropriate. Many constituencies, including my own, already have that number of electors and some, such as the Isle of Wight, will have more than 94,000, even under the present proposals. As constituencies with that number of electors are already proposed, it is not beyond the bounds of practicability to adopt the quota that I suggest and, for reasons that I shall explain, I believe that that would be positively desirable. If one were, however, to work to a figure of about 80,000 as the quota, being the number of constituents which a Member of Parliament could reasonably be expected to represent adequately, responsibly, carefully and to their satisfaction, as I believe happens in many constituencies throughout the country, then we would have a much smaller, much more efficient and much more productive legislature.
It is possible to re-assess the quota and substantially to reduce the number of Members of Parliament because improvements in modern technology make this much more feasible than when the matter was considered in 1949. The improved efficiency of telephones, higher standards of literacy throughout the country and efficiency and availability of transport mean that people are much better able to put their views succinctly and quickly to Members of Parliament who are, in their turn, much more able to

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respond to them than was the case in the past. More modern inventions such as word processors and the much used photocopier mean that we are and should be able to deal with substantially higher numbers of constituents than was the case 40 years ago.
Such a change would be welcome because it would increase productivity, something that is very much in line with what the Government want. It would be self-financing because for every Member whose job was lost the salary and support system given to him would be available for those who remained. It would result in less legislation, less filling of the Order Paper and lower overall costs—all desirable objectives.
I do not see this in isolation. It would be possible for such a restructuring of quotas to reduce significantly the number of Members only if we were at the same time to improve the quality and availability of assistance to them. Every Member should have one first-class secretary, one first-class research assistant and half an administrator. I do not believe we should have more than that, but were we to have that we could adequately represent the size of constituency that I propose and the expense could easily be met by significant reductions in the number of hon. Members and their associated costs.
Mr. Keith Best: Does my hon. Friend not think it a great shame that many of us who agree with him that we should have these minimum facilities have at present to rely on American research assistants simply because they come to us free? Would it not be better if we were able to employ British people and to pay them to do a full-time job as research assistants?
Mr. Nelson: It is patently absurd, and I entirely agree with my hon. Friend. The answer lies in our hands and I hope that we will act on it sooner rather than later. I do not wish, however, to stray too far down that path.
A reduction in the number of constituencies would result in the advantage of fewer cross-county constituencies. The problem would arise less often because there would be fewer constituencies. Where the county boundaries were crossed, the problem might be larger in the sense that the constituency would be larger but I do not think that would necessarily create more problems for individual Members than is the case at the moment, where there are many more constituencies which will cross county borders. There are, too, the physical constraints, the extent to which we can accommodate in the Houses of Parliament an ever-increasing number of representatives.
There would be, of course, personal disadvantages with which the public would have less sympathy than might Members of Parliament. The "dog eat dog" attitude towards the prospect of a reduction in the number of seats would be unedifying and would no doubt create some difficulties were such a change to be introduced. That is a personal difficulty for Members of Parliament which we ought to be able to suffer if it is decided overall that it is in the interests of the country not to have an ever-increasing number of constituencies.
I also accept the valid point made by the hon. Member for Glasgow, Cathcart (Mr. Maxton) that certain parts of the country, such as the north of Scotland, vary geographically and that such a proposal as mine might result in quite unacceptable sizes of constituency. I am therefore prepared to accept that there is a case for certain.
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variations on a geographical basis. They are already provided for under the existing rules and can be taken into account by the commission.
I strongly believe that the present rules are greatly outdated, that there are already too many Members of Parliament, and that we should improve our productivity, reduce the cost of the legislature and seek to increase the size of constituencies because we are well able, with modern technology, so to do. There should at the earliest opportunity be a Speaker's Conference to consider this. We have had enough opportunities in debates on the issue over the years to say that the time has come for a change and that we hope that as soon as possible a Speaker's Conference will come forward with a larger quota and therefore a smaller number of proposed seats for the House of Commons. That would do both the legislature and the electorate a great service.
8.50 pm
Mr. Peter Hardy: I intended to detain the House for only a few moments, but the Hon. Member for Chichester (Mr. Nelson) may have extended my speech. He half convinced me of his case. There are grounds for a Speaker's Conference to add a new rule. It would not be a new rule which the hon. Gentleman had in mind, but his speech suggested that it may be worth considering. It is that, in addition to the consideration o physical boundaries and population in determining the size of a constituency, intensity of need should be taken into account. Given the hon. Gentleman's dissertation, the south of England does not seem to need so many Members of Parliament as the north.
My constituency has well over 100,000 electors. The hon. Member for Brighouse and Spenborough (Mr, Waller) contested my constituency twice in 1974, so he will appreciate my remarks. It is a large constituency with an enormous electorate. It has severe problems, which have multiplied enormously since 1979. We are riot part of the affluent belt of southern England where Members of Parliament can be part-timers pursuing business or legal interests for much of the working day. We in south Yorkshire have to be full-time Members of Parliament.
If we allow constituencies to experience 30 per cent. unemployment, industrial dereliction and the wasting of our local economy, we should ensure that Meml5ers of Parliament have the staffing to which the hon. Member for Chichester referred. I entirely agree with the hon. Member for Anglesey (Mr. Best), who suggested that we should not rely on American assistants. I make'it clear that I have not had one and do not want one. It would be unfair on my constituents, given 30 per cent. unemployment, if some of the work were farmed out to an unpaid American researcher. That matter should be seriously examined by the House.
I do not suggest that the boundary commissioners have not acted properly with regard to the county of south Yorkshire. They have looked at the matter carefully. If all hearings were conducted with such careful and considerate cordiality as one I attended in Rotherham, the country would be well served. While the boundaries for south Yorkshire county were scrupulously and properly observed, other county boundaries were not. Thal factor should be borne in mind in any future consideration.
My main concern is that, while the commissioners have acted properly, the Government, as my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow, Cathcart (Mr. Maxton) suggested,

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seem to have acted with unseemly haste. Before the words of the court had finished echoing, the papers were already printed and available in the Vote Office and constituencies are being changed. Mine is being changed dramatically. My large constituency is being made into the whole of one adequately sized constituency and the greater part of another. That will mean the termination of relationships. The Government seem to be completely insensitive to the fact that politics in Britain is as much about relationships as about anything else. The relationships within politics in many constituencies in south Yorkshire will be hurriedly scrapped and made redundant or changed. Little time is being given for new relationships to be forged.
I am not speaking only about people in my own party. I am thinking of people such as the Conservative agent in the Rother Valley constituency, Mrs. Matthews, whom the hon. Member for Brighouse and Spenborough will recall with respect and affection; she has given a lifetime of service to the constituency and suddenly she will have to pick up the pieces of two constituencies. I am thinking, too, of my own agent, Councillor Cooper, whom the hon. Member will also recall. Councillor Cooper has given legendary service to politics in south Yorkshire. He will have the task of building new relationships within a very short time. He will have to try to achieve in weeks the sort of organisation which it has taken him 27 or 28 years to build up.
The Government have acted with terrible insensitivity. It is the same sort of insensitivity which the hon. Member for Chichester displayed in playing a slide rule game to suggest that we dispose of large numbers of Members of Parliament. If many Members are disposed of in the north of England there will be much regret. Constituents find it difficult to get work; what would happen if large numbers of Members of Parliament entered the labour market, heaven only knows. Certainly they would not wish to join the hon. Member for Chichester in the more affluent parts of the south of England which he can represent part-time.
Mr. Nelson: I cannot let the hon. Gentleman get away with that. I think he will accept that I am a full-time Member of Parliament.
Mr. Hardy: I am delighted to hear it. I only wish that many of the hon. Gentleman's colleagues on the Conservative Benches could say the same.
It is regrettable that the change in parliamentary constituencies is taking place so hurriedly. I recognise that change is necessary. I could not have expected the work of my devoted secretary or the enormous diligence of my wife to continue permanently in a constituency the size of that which I now serve, with its unemployment and economic problems. Change is necessary in the larger constituencies of the industrial north. Even with the burdens we face, it would have been acceptable for all hon. Members to have a little more time to build new relationships and to construct the new constituency structures on a non-partisan basis. I am talking about all the political life in such constituencies. We are not being given enough time. The haste is unseemly and sensitivity has been lacking.
8.57 pm
Mr. Gary Waller: I am delighted to follow the hon. Member for Rother Valley
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(Mr. Hardy), for whom I have had great respect ever since I fought him at the two general elections in 1974 to which he referred.
The system for reviewing parliamentary boundaries in the United Kingdom is infinitely preferable to that in other countries. Anyone who doubts this should compare our approach, which involves commissioners who, so far as I know, have not been accused, in England at least, of favouring one party to the detriment of another, to that which applies in the United States, where the redistribution process is in the hands of the state legislatures. Elections which take place in the states before redistribution have a special significance because the state legislatures, depending on their political control, can exercise enormous influence. The charge of gerrymandering can often be laid at the door of American parties. This is not the case with our commissioners. There are not many institutions that we often shout about. Perhaps we ought to do so more often. We have a system of which we can be proud, although improvements can and should be devised.
The commissioners expected to take at least three years over the review. In the event they took seven, a period which is described in chapter 1, paragraph 13, of the report as
"much longer than we had anticipated".
This raises the question whether the procedure does not have too many inherent delays built into it. Those who suspect that this is the case should read the excellent pamphlet entitled "The Great Boundaries Scandal" which was written by Mr. Ian Clarke and published in 1979. He proposed that there should be reviews after every general election, which should be limited to local authority areas where parliamentary entitlement had changed, and would be mandatory only in areas which contained also at least one seat 25 per cent. bigger or smaller than average. A number of hon. Members have made similar suggestions.
The present review for England reveals the undesirable effect of long-drawn-out reviews. The table on page 147 of the report for England shows that of the new constituencies only 45 were 10 per cent. or more above the electoral quota based on the 1976 figures, but that on 1982 figures the number had risen to 60. It is an enormous improvement on the position relating to the existing constituencies, where the equivalent figure is 159, but it is not as good as it might be.
If one considers the new constituencies which are below the electoral quota for one reason or another, whereas 12 varied by 20 per cent. or more from the ideal in 1976, that figure was already 21 by 1982. Thus we see how demographic changes date the work of redistribution. In that light, the proposals by Mr. Clarke in the pamphlet to which I have referred deserve serious consideration even though we should recognise that they have disadvantages as well as advantages.
Most of the publicity relating to the changes has centred on the Labour party's legal challenges to them. It seems to me that the courts rightly established that no case had been made out that the commission's recommendations should be rejected because they offended against the rules under which the commission is required to operate. The Labour party's intention was clearly to delay the implementation of the changes until after the next general election in the hope of party advantage.
Nevertheless, the fact that the intention was not one that everyone would describe as honourable, should not

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prevent us from examining the criticisms. As it happens, some of my conclusions were not dissimilar. In particular, it seems unsatisfactory that London is over-represented by having 84 seats instead of its entitlement of 80.
One might ask how that came about. It came about because the commissioners for England stuck to their rule, as stated in their explanatory booklet and reproduced on page 157 of their report:
"So far as is practicable, a recommended constituency must not fall across the boundary of a county or London Borough."
Many of the London boroughs are relatively small and are entitled only to two seats. It is clear that the smaller the unit to be divided into constituencies, the greater the likelihood that constituencies will vary substantially from the electoral quota. Thus, we have a borough such as Kingston upon Thames which on 1976 figures had an electorate of about 105,000 and a theoretical entitlement to 1·6 seats necessitating the creation of two constituencies of less than average size. The commissioners recommended two constituencies—Kingston upon Thames with a 1976 electorate of 59,000 and Surbiton, with 46,000 only. It is interesting to note that in this case the Labour party did not object following publication of the provisional recommendations. It makes one somewhat cynical about its late attempt at a legal block, specifically objecting to the small size of the Surbiton constituency.
The rule that London borough boundaries should not be crossed resulted in a number of similar cases. London ended up eventually with a few more constituencies than it was entitled to, even though each borough received its correct entitlement. The commissioners note that they discussed this with the party organisations. It is interesting that party representatives were of the unanimous opinion that none of the London constituencies should cross borough boundaries. Why was the rule, although flexible, formulated in that way when the effects were likely to be unsatisfactory? The rule that county boundaries should not be crossed in the absence of overwhelming reasons seems sensible, but hardly any counties have fewer than half a dozen constituencies, so there is no need, in relation to the size of the electorate, to depart radically from the electoral quotas.
Presumably, when it came to London, Parliament decided that Greater London was too big a unit to consider as a whole—it had about 90 constituencies at the time—and therefore Parliament chose the only other available unit, which was the London borough. It seems now that London boroughs are too small to consider as separate units. The problem of disparities and overrepresentation of London, because of the decline in population, is likely to become even more serious in the next review unless something is done in the meantime.
However, I suggest that there are reasonable grounds for crossing borough boundaries in London where necessary. In the metropolitan district of Tyne and Wear, the commissioners found adequate reasons to cross the River Tyne and create the constituency of Tyne Bridge, linking the centres of Newcastle and Gateshead, which are two separate communities. If we consider as an example the two adjoining London boroughs of Fulham and Hammersmith, and Kensington and Chelsea, we find recommendations for four constituencies that are all under-size in terms of their 1976 electorates. If we look at the 1982 electorates, the figures are even further removed from the quota. None of them has more than 55,000 electors and one, Hammersmith, has less than
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50,000. Chelsea has had one of the biggest drops in the size of its electorate, from 63,000 in 1976 to 53,000 in 1982. Even if the decline in the electorates in these two boroughs continues at its present rate, they may still just be entitled to two under-size constituencies each at the time of the next review rather than one very large one.
Taking the two boroughs together, even now they would be entitled to only three constituencies between them. Can we say that, while it is satisfactory to join the two communities of Newcastle and Gateshead, separated by the river Tyne and in different metropolitan districts, there are overwhelming objections to linking Chelsea and Fulham or Kensington and Hammersmith?
The decision to create the new Tyne Bridge constituency is one that I find it difficult to defend. Accepting that quota considerations made it desirable to have one constituency crossing the river border between the two districts, I cannot believe that it would not have been possible to create a much better solution that would have respected local differences and left the two city centres to themselves. This is one exception, because the Boundary Commission for England did a fairly good job in creating boundaries and achieved much better results than did its predecessor, which perhaps did not have access to adequate information. Here, I defend my hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet (Mr. Chapman) who was attacked when he made this point earlier.
One of the outcomes of the review that is particularly unsatisfactory is the increase in the number of constituencies within the United Kingdom from 635 to 650. Parliament intended that there should be five extra constituencies in Northern Ireland, but there has also been an unintended increase of 10 constituencies, seven of which are in England. As many of my hon. Friends have already said, the number of hon. Members is already too big. I will not repeat the reasons that my hon. Friends have given, but I substantially agree with them. However, I find it difficult to imagine that the House will ever decide to reduce the number of hon. Members.
The deputy chairman of the English commission presented a helpful paper, reproduced in appendix B, which explains why rule 7, which defines the terms used, when taken in conjunction with other rules
"inevitably leads, and must inevitably lead (in practical terms) to a steady, though gradual increase in the number of seats in England at each review."
This cannot be allowed to continue and something must be done before the next review takes place.
The deputy chairman also pointed to the unsatisfactory way in which the House of Commons (Redistribution of Seats) Act 1949 laid down the minimum number of constituencies in Scotland and Wales, while setting an overall ideal number in Britain as a whole. Without any formal machinery connecting the commissions, their separate statutory requirements may be incompatible with one another.
Another look also needs to be taken at the way in which the number of seats in Scotland and Wales is established. Even allowing for the fact that the two countries should have extra representation, one notes that the electorate in Scotland has declined as a proportion of the total for Great Britain. The electoral quota in Scotland was 84 per cent. of that for England in 1954, but by 1978 it was only 80·8 per cent. Fairness demands that the matter should be reconsidered.

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Although the commission has to abide by certain rules, it imposed other rules on itself. One was to avoid the division of wards. There were reasonable grounds for this, not least the fact that the political parties are organised in wards, but the rule had some implications that may not have been fully considered. These implications were clearly much more of a factor in Greater London and the metropolitan counties, where the wards are very much bigger than in the shire counties. Using bigger building blocks obviously leaves less flexibility in completing the structure.
Using local authority wards as a basis means that one is entirely dependent on the local government Boundary Commission to provide the building blocks. Unfortunately, the local government Boundary Commission does not appear to have anything like the resources that the parliamentary Boundary Commission has. It therefore has to operate in a very different way. Instead of initiating proposals, it is entirely dependent on local authorities, party organisations and other bodies to submit proposals, which it either accepts or rejects. I want to dwell for a moment on the local government Boundary Commission, and then relate my conclusions to the parliamentary commissioners.
Only today, I received from the local government Boundary Commission for England draft proposals for the metropolitan county of west Yorkshire. Although these proposals are for county electoral divisions, the principle is exactly the same as that for district wards. In this case, the local government commission has accepted the proposals of the county council, which happens to be Labour-controlled, except that in Bradford it made one or two changes that were proposed by the Bradford city council, in Kirklees it adopted a suggestion of the Kirklees district council, and in Wakefield one suggestion from the Wakefield city council, one from a local Labour party, and one from a local community council. In other words, no proposal was initiated at the instigation of the commission. They all came from other bodies, notably political bodies.
The parliamentary Boundary Commissions are above suspicion based on party bias, but if they have to use building blocks that are susceptible to party bias, it is inevitable that that purity will not be unsullied in some cases. Indeed, it would be quite feasible for local parties to devise ward structures that were designed to lead inevitably to certain parliamentary boundaries. I do not point the finger at any instance of this phenomenon, but in Kirklees one was prevented from suggesting what might have been an ideal parliamentary scheme, incorporated in the recreation of the former Spen Valley constituency, by the fact that a small strip of relatively unpopulated land cut off one ward from the other five, which would together have formed such a new constituency.
The English commissioners record in chapter 4, paragraph 5, that in some constituencies adherence to their settled policy of respecting the integrity of wards in metropolitan counties led to some disparities. A particular example is Crosby, which has over 80,000 electors based on the 1976 electorate. I do not necessarily suggest that the commissioners should have decided to split wards. However, I am convinced that the local government Boundary Commission needs strengthening, partly
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because of the requirements of local democracy, but also because of the possible implications for parliamentary constituencies.
One or two other relatively minor points deserve comment. Before local government reorganisation, there was an obvious distinction between county and borough constituencies. That distinction no longer applies. The commissioners found that very often they were making decisions on fairly marginal grounds, related to the significance of rural areas in a particular constituency. This matter is important only because the formula for election expenses differs between county and borough constituencies.
The distinction is really an artificial one. In Scotland, the same distinction exists between country and burgh seats. The Scottish commission said that it found this anomalous, and it specifically recommended that the nomenclature be altered. I suggest that we could go further that that, and consider getting rid of the distinction altogether. If it is thought necessary to retain a variable limit for election expenses, surely a fairer system would be to devise a formula relating the limit to the size of the electorate and the area of the constituency in each case.
I also want to mention the rules of procedure at inquiries. The commission states that it is welcome that some informality exists, and that assistant commissioners can run proceedings in the way that they choose. I entirely agree. Rigidity would be a grave disadvantage, because situations vary from one area to another. Nevertheless, some information should be given in advance to those who have submitted evidence as to what the procedure to be followed should be. I know of cases where those who have given evidence have turned up with lawyers prepared to cross-examine others giving evidence, only to discover that cross-examination is not permitted, as it is in inquiries taking place in other areas. Surely some advice needs to be given beforehand in each case.
It is also notable that assistant commissioners follow variable practices in preparing their reports following inquiries. The fact that there is no consistency in the physical format used—for instance, page size—is perhaps not important but it gives the impression of amateurishness. The way in which the reports are laid out also varies greatly and is more unsatisfactory.
One is bound to say that some of the assistant commissioners appear to be better at carrying out their duties than others. That they each carry out only one or two inquiries means that they remain inexperienced and some of their statements are naive in the extreme. That only one assistant commissioner presides in each case means that some quirks or eccentricities are bound to surface and are not always ironed out by the commission. There is a strong case for having three assistant commissioners for each inquiry. If the number of assistant commissioners were not increased there would be the additional benefit that they would sit more often, and gain the experience which is often necessary in dealing with politically motivated persons attempting to pass off political advantage as a community gain. Much greater consistency would almost certainly ensure.
That mention of consistency brings me to the subject of constituency names. In no other area is the lack of consistency so apparent. We may ask, first, whether constituency names are at all important. My answer is an unashamed yes. People need a sense of identity; of place. If that were not important we would no doubt adopt the

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United States practice and call our constituencies for instance the 14th or 23rd district of Greater London. I do not believe that we would wish to move in that direction. I am afraid that the Boundary Commission made a real pig's ear of some of the constituency names. It made decisions which will cause annoyance and inconvenience for a long time to come.
The failure to apply clear thinking to nomenclature hits one straight away if one reads part of chapter two, paragraph 28, of the report for England. The commission says:
"We had thought that the names of districts which emerged at the time of local government reorganisation in 1973, would command general acceptance when applied to a constituency which wholly or mainly corresponded with the area of a district. However, we found strong preference in some cases for the perpetuation of the name of the present constituency, even though there were to be changes in its area. We were not disposed to be dogmatic and if a name commended itself to local opinion we were usually prepared to recommend it."
Surprise, surprise—the commissioners discovered something that we have all known for a long time, that the names, as well as the existence, of many of the new artificial authorities created in 1972 and brought alive in 1974, are unpopular.
I want to mention one or two of the ludicrous inconsistencies. In the new county of Avon the commission has relied almost exclusively on district names and has frankly taken some quite mad decisions. The practicalities will be nightmarish for the Members of Parliament for the seats concerned, who will for ever be writing back to electors to tell them that they are not their constituents although they live in a district of that name.
I agree with those hon. Members who have said that we need a Speaker's Conference to review the many issues, particularly constituency names, which I believe are important and which have been ignored in a very big way in this review.
9.17 pm
Mr. Bruce Milan: In many ways, we have had an interesting although not particularly well attended debate on a matter which is of considerable concern to every hon. Member. I wish to pick out some of the general themes without going too much into the detail. Some of the themes that have featured in hon. Members' speeches are applicable to England, Scotland and Wales, but there are some respects in which the approach of the various Boundary Commissions has been different and in some respects those differences are rather disturbing or perhaps I should say that it is difficult to justify the differences of approach in several different areas.
Naturally, in a debate such as this, a great deal of dissatisfaction has been expressed, particularly about the recommendations of the Boundary Commission for England. However, those will be dealt with in greater detail tomorrow. There has also been some more general dissatisfaction with the procedures, rules and so on of the commission. However, as I said, it is to the general issues that I want to turn.
The first and obvious point to make about the rules is that they are extremely difficult to understand or at least to interpret. In some respects they may even be contradictory. They are not the clearest rules to follow. To some extent, some of the criticism is perhaps a little unfair because we are giving the commissioners difficult rules to interpret.
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My second point is that the rules are basically the same for all parts of Great Britain—Scotland, Wales and England. There is, of course, particular provision in the rules about the number of seats for Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and England. The provision in the rules about the way in which they should be applied to local authority boundaries is rather different in the Scottish case from that in the English case. Indeed, it is a rather looser expression for Scotland than for England. In Scotland, the commissioners must simply have regard to the boundaries of local authority areas. Rule 4, with regard to England and Wales, is rather more precise. In practice, however, I am not sure that that has made a great deal of difference.
Much of the debate has been taken up with the respective importance of rule 4, which deals with local authority boundaries, and rule 5, which deals with achieving equality of numbers, so far as is practicable, between one constituency and another. I state at once that rule 5, which provides that so far as is practicable. having regard to a number of qualifying considerations, constituencies within respective parts of the United Kingdom should have equality of numbers, should be dominant. It is very difficult to understand why we should have a system of boundary review unless it is principally to reduce the disparities in electorates that tend to build up during the year. Why have all the disturbance that these boundary reviews inevitably create, unless it is to achieve a greater equality of electorate between one constituency and another? Local authority boundaries are not drawn up for the sake of parliamentary convenience. Therefore, to try to fit parliamentary seats into local authority boundaries is in many cases difficult and rather unfair and produces inequitable results.
I believe that if one has to make a choice as to which rule should be dominant, it should be rule 5, which requires the greatest possible equity of numbers between one area and another. Rule 5 should have precedence over rule 4. I understand from what the Law Lords have decided on the legal action on the English boundary recommendations that the legal position is that rule 4 has precedence over rule 5. It is not a question of taking them in tandem and giving equal weight to rule 4 and rule 5—the legal position is that rule 4 has precedence over rule 5.
I do not believe that the rules under which we are operating at present are right. They need adjustment. If the legal position is that rule 4 has precedence over rule 5, we should change the legal position. That can be done only by changing the rules. It cannot be done by giving further guidance to the Boundary Commission, as a number of hon. Members suggested. While hon. Members and, indeed, Ministers can say certain things to commissioners, they cannot tell the commissioners to ignore and contradict what we now understand to be the legal position on the interpretation of the rules. If the House wishes there to be greater equality of votes between constituencies, there needs to be a change in the rules. Certainly, the Opposition take that view.
Another disturbing aspect of the reason for the Law Lords decision is one to which my hon. Friend the Member for Goole (Dr. Marshall) drew attention. The Law Lords said that the rules are now so complicated and, in some respects, internally contradictory, that they hardly deserve to be described as rules. They have become guidelines for the Boundary Commissions. That was not intended by the House when the rules were passed in the 1949 Act, and

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amended in the 1958 Act. Quite apart from the merits of the recent legal action, into which I do not wish to delve this evening, the rules must be examined from that aspect.
If the Boundary Commissions had given greater emphasis to rule 5 rather than to rule 4, the result would have been more equitable than that which we are debating today, and which we shall debate in greater detail later this week. If there had not been such a great dominance of the local authority boundary rule, there would have been a more equitable distribution of constituencies. Therefore, we must examine the rules again.
Another matter that has interested and disturbed me relates to the introductory passages of the three reports for Scotland, England and Wales. Although the commissions were dealing with basically the same rules—and, in some instances, exactly the same rules—they applied different interpretations. Any hon. Member who cares to read all three reports, or at least their introductory passages, will understand that.
I do not wish to discuss the merits of what the total numbers should be in respective countries. That is a matter for Parliament, rather than for Boundary Commission interpretation. As was mentioned by a number of hon. Members today, the English approach to the total numbers has a built-in tendency to increase the numbers at each successive Boundary Commission review. The hon. Member for Chichester (Mr. Nelson) made that point well. It is partly because of mathematics and the way in which that commission interprets the equality rule in England, and partly because, once the number has been increased, it becomes the base for each successive review. The result is that the implied figure for England of 506 in the 1949 rules will, under the present recommendation, rise from 516 to 523. The Boundary Commission for England said that the figures will continue to increase with each successive review. Whether or not that is the correct interpretation of the rules, it is not the interpretation of either the Welsh or Scottish commissions.
The Welsh approach appears to be pragmatic. The commission did not begin with any preconceived ideas of fancy arithmetic, but waited to find a figure at the end of the day. I do not say that in any disparaging manner. The Scottish approach was to decide in advance what the number would be—which was that it would not be changed at all. The decision was made on general grounds of equity, comparing Scotland with England and Wales. Regardless of the merits of that approach, it is entirely different from the approach of the English commission, which has a ratcheting, increasing effect.
If the English report had been applied in Scotland, there would have been an increase of three seats, not one. One can argue the merits of whether, in equity, that is sensible or desirable. At the moment, I am not arguing the merits of the total numbers. The fact remains that there was a difference of approach between the Scottish commission and the English commission.
The ultimate increase in Scotland of one seat arose because the commission, having decided on one approach at the beginning of its review, had to change its mind in the middle because of arguments that some of us advanced in the Glasgow inquiry where an additional seat was recommended by the assistant commissioner. That extra seat was translated into an additional seat for Scotland.
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The commission's arguments in favour of an additional seat at the end of the review contradicted its argument for no additional seat at the beginning. I liked the argument at the end rather better than I liked the one at the beginning, but the point is essentially that the three commissions approached total numbers on a different basis. As they were applying the same rules, it is difficult to conclude that all of them must be equally right. I am not opposed to some flexibility, but there are contradictions in the approaches of the three commissions.
There are also contradictions in regard to the interpretation of rule 6, which deals with geographical considerations. The English commission interpreted it to mean that certain areas, for geographical reasons, should have genuinely additional representation. That is another reason for the ratchet approach to increased numbers on each review in England. The Welsh commission, however, decided on two additional seats partly for geographical reasons. It considered the possibility of reducing seats elsewhere but decided against it.
In Scotland, however, the commission took the view that areas such as the Western Isles, where geographical considerations were such that there had to be overrepresentation in numerical terms, would be compensated for by making reductions elsewhere to reach the number of seats that it had decided upon at the beginning of the review. In other words, it talked of a compensatory factor. I objected to the compensatory factor idea because I see nothing in the rules to say that if one gives greater representation to one area for geographical reasons, one must take something off another area. That cannot be a reasonable interpretation of the rule.
However, that is not my basic point. My argument is that the English commission took the view that geographical considerations add to the total number of seats, whereas the Scottish commission felt that geographical considerations involve an adjustment of representation between one part of the country and another. It is difficult to see how both those interpretations of exactly the same rule—rule 6—can possibly be right.
The Scottish commission also seemed to take the view that it was perfectly all right for the major cities to be under-represented. In Glasgow, for example, it argued that the city should have a rather higher average electorate than the electoral quota because the same would happen to Aberdeen, Edinburgh and Dundee. It felt that the four major cities should have a higher electorate than other constituencies.
There is nothing in the rules to say that there should be a general bias towards urban or rural areas, or that there should be a general interpretation of the rules which produces a given result for urban areas on the one hand and rural areas on the other. As far as I am aware, that argument was not used in England or Wales. That is another example of differences of interpretation.
I do not wish to argue which interpretation is correct, but either there is something wrong with the rules—they are not sufficiently precise—or there is something wrong with the procedures of the commissions in that they produce the different interpretations of the rules that I have described. There is a case for the House to re-examine the rules from that point of view, apart from any other consideration.
Several other matters have been raised in this debate that are worth considering, such as enumeration dates, or the dates on which the electoral quotas are decided.

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I have considerable sympathy with the argument of English hon. Members that it is absurd that the quota should have been decided on a date in 1976. What is interesting is that the Scottish quota was on the basis of the 1978 electorate. The Welsh quota was on the basis of the 1981 electorate. It is odd that hon. Members are deciding those matters simultaneously on the basis of dates that are so different as between one part of the United Kingdom and another. This matter must be examined and it is relevant to whether the commission should take account of movements of population. There is a difference of approach between the commissions. In Wales, the commission's approach was not especially important because the enumeration date was 1981.
As I understand paragraph 23 of the report, the English commission felt that it was "neither required nor empowered"—that is the significant word—to take into account later movements of population. In Scotland, the commission's reasons for its allocation of seats to Glasgow were based largely on the movements of population beyond the enumeration date of 1978. It quoted detailed figures of the 1982 population and tried to justify the number of seats on that basis. There are differences of interpretation and matters that require clarification.
In Glasgow, it was argued strongly that it was improper for the boundary commissioners to go beyond 1978 because that happened to suit our circumstances. We also believe that it was, legally, a better argument. As some of the small Scottish constituencies are occasionally quoted, of the 15 largest electorates in Scotland, 12 are held by Labour Members. It is not true to say that movements in population since the previous Boundary Commission report have been especially advantageous to the Labour party in Scotland. The House must speed up inquiries or do something about the enumeration dates for the electoral quotas.
As to procedures, it is unsatisfactory that there is no consultation before the commission produces its provisional proposals. The problem is that the commission does not wish to be subject to any political bias. Local authority boundary commissions normally consult local authorities, which ultimately means the councillors who will be affected by their recommendations. There is no such consultation with the Parliamentary commissions. That is unfortunate because in some cases daft provisional recommendations get published. Sometimes it is a devil of a job at the inquiries to overturn those foolish recommendations. Much time, effort and energy is wasted on recommendations that should never have been made in the first place. We should consider the procedures from that point of view.
A worse factor is the fact that no reasons are given for the provisional recommendations. In the Scottish procedures—I am not sure how far this applies in England—some reasons were given before the start of the inquiry. That is an absurd way to proceed. One receives the provisional recommendations with no reasons and one makes one's representations about them without knowing the basis on which they are drawn. One is working in the dark. Just before one comes to the inquiry the commission gives inadequate information about why it drew up the proposals in the first place. It would be much more satisfactory if the commission published its reasons along with the provisional recommendations. That way, anyone who wished to make representations would at least be able to answer the commission's case instead of making
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representations in the dark. It is absurd that we are not given rather more adequate reasons than we are given now when the provisional recommendations are published.
The inquiry in Glasgow was satisfactory, and not only for the fact that the assistant commissioner accepted all our representations. It was a model of courtesy and fairness to all, especially to those who, unlike some hon. Members, are not expert at putting their point of view. In view of what has been said by some hon. Members, guidance should be given to assistant commissioners about how to conduct such inquiries, because in some cases fairness and courtesy have not been as evident as they should have been.
The recommendations have caused considerable dissatisfaction in many areas. That is inevitable in such an exercise. However, the moral of the exercise and the general feeling of today's debate is that, whether individually or collectively we are satisfied with the results, we must reconsider the rules either in a Select Committee or in some other way next Session. The Opposition believe that the inadequacies of the rules relate to the dominance of the local authority boundary rule over the equity rule. That dominance should be reversed and must be our major objective. A revision of the rules is long overdue.
9.42 pm
The Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. Allan Stewart): I agree with the right hon. Member for Glasgow, Craigton (Mr. Millan) that it has been a useful. and interesting to have the debate after having considered. the reports of the Northern Ireland commission and, more recently, the report of the Welsh commission, but before we consider the reports from the English and Scottish commissions.
The debate has been illuminating if for no other reason than that the House has had the opportunity to have a debate, not on the detailed recommendations but on the general principles that underline the Boundary Commissions' reviews. It has been open to hon. Members to address the principles upon which the Boundary Commissions work, without regard to the detailed effects on their constituencies.
Hon. Members have generally addressed their remarks to the rules for the redistribution of seats, which are a matter for the House, although the right hon. Member for Craigton and my hon. Friend the Member for Brighouse and Spenborough (Mr. Waller) have also mentioned the method of operation of the commissions, which is a matter primarily for the commissions. Several hon. Members, especially my hon. Friends, spoke about the effect of the English commission's recommendations on their constituencies. My hon. Friend the Member for Devizes (Mr. Morrison) and the hon. Member for Swindon (Mr. Stoddart) spoke about the implications for Wiltshire. My hon. Friend the Member for Harrow, Central (Sir A. Grant) spoke about the criticisms of the recommendations for Harrow. The hon. Members for Liverpool, Edge Hill (Mr. Alton) and Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Heifer) spoke about Liverpool.
The House will have listened with particular sympathy to my hon. Friend the Member for Buckingham (Mr. Benyon), who talked about the growth of population there, and to my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Darwen (Sir C. Fletcher-Cooke), who spoke with great feeling about the history of the constituency of Darwen.

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Hon. Members have generally enphasised the importance of the impartiality of the Boundary Commissions and the importance of the fact that they are not only impartial but are seen by the people to be impartial. That is fundamental to the relationship between this House and the electorate.
The hon. Member for Goole (Dr. Marshall) made a number of allegations, which have been fully answered by my right hon. Friend and by my hon. Friend the Member for Honiton (Sir P. Emery). Perhaps I could answer him on one particular point, the question of guidance to the English commission from the Home Office—the guidance to which the commission refers on page 8. That guidance consisted in drawing the attention of the commission to a ministerial statement during the Committee stage of the Local Government Act 1972. It was in fulfilment of a commitment given to the House.
On this general point about the appointments to the commission, I cannot resist saying to the hon. Member for Glasgow, Cathcart (Mr. Maxton), who alleged that the Scottish Boundary Commission was a body biased in favour of Edinburgh, that the two members of the commission were, of course, appointed by his right hon. Friend the Member for Craigton and I would have thought that the hon. Gentleman might agree with me that Professor Gordon Cameron can hardly be accused of being ignorant of the needs of Glasgow.
Perhaps the most radical suggestion that has been put to the House was made by my hon. Friend the Member for Lewes (Mr. Rathbone) who suggested a multi-partisan system, and I think there were echoes of that in the speech by the hon. Member for Cathcart. I think that there are enormous problems in such an approach, which would leave to political parties the task of undertaking detailed investigations and painstaking work in order to make the difficult judgments that fall to the independent commissions. I believe that the House generally has taken the view—as it has always done in the past—that it is the essence of the boundary commission system that the commission should be independent and should be seen to be independent.
I come now to the points that hon. Members on both sides of the House have made concerning the rules on redistribution of seats. The right hon. Member for Birmingham, Sparkbrook (Mr. Hattersley) and the hon. Member for Cathcart have in particular raised the question of the relationship between rule 4 and the requirement to produce constituencies with electorates as near the electoral quota as possible—that is, rule 5. My hon. Friend the Member for Brighouse and Spenborough also referred to that.
I can confirm the right hon. Gentleman's point about the ruling in the Court of Appeal, which said:
"While the achievement of the electoral quota is certainly a very important objective, the framework of the rules of 1949 itself makes it plain that as a matter of general policy rule 5 was to be regarded as subordinate to rule 4, and not vice versa."
The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Sparkbrook then went on to say very strongly and firmly that the rule should be amended to give very clear primacy to rule 5. He said that all constituencies should have the same weight, the same representation; that there should be equal representation throughout the United Kingdom. The hon. Member for Goole took the same view.
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There are bound to be differing views on that proposition, particularly in the very strong way that the right hon. Gentleman put it to the House. It is certainly not the view that his right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition took on a previous occasion when he referred to the duty of the House to draw
"the proper balance between the requirements of mathematical equality and the requirements of retaining the association between a Member of Parliament and his geographical constituency."—[Official Report, 14 July 1969; Vol. 787, c. 118.]
That point was also made by my hon. Friend the Member for Dorset, South (Viscount Cranborne) who referred to the tyranny of numbers.
The House will have noted the comments of my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Runcorn (Mr. Carlisle) about the consultations that the English commission undertook with the political parties. As he said, the political parties were unanimous in their view that no constituency boundary should cross a London borough boundary, or indeed any county boundary despite the resulting disparities.
The argument so strongly advanced by the right hon. Member for Sparkbrook, that there should be equal representation throughout the United Kingdom, has serious implications for Scotland, as my hon. Friend the Member for Lewes pointed out. We had to wait for the contribution of my hon. Friend the Member for Honiton to consider the respective representation of the different countries, and my hon. Friend the Member for Brighouse and Spenborough also took up that theme. Hon. Members will doubtless have seen the article by Alan Watkins in The Observer entitled
"It's not fair to the poor English voter".
It is perhaps worth putting on record the reasons for the arithmetical over-representation of Scotland in this House. As the Scottish commission made clear, this favourable position was justified on three main grounds. First, like Wales, Scotland is a small nation which should have special treatment vis-a-vis its larger neighbours. Secondly, it has a disproportionate number of inaccessible and sparsely populated areas. Thirdly, in the past there was an absolute decline in electoral population, although that does not apply to the present review.
The hon. Member for Cathcart highlighted the point about sparsity of population in some parts of Scotland and I shall not add to what he said. It is worth putting on record, however, the arguments used by the Scottish commission to increase the number of seats from 71 to 72. Having considered the arithmetic, it initially took the view that there should be 71. It found it necessary, however, to recommend that there be 11 seats in the Glasgow city district and 33 in the Strathclyde region to achieve the closest practicable approximation to the electoral quota for each constituency without breaking rule 4, which requiries regard to be had to local authority boundaries. The commission concluded that it was not appropriate to make compensatory savings elsewhere. The general proposition of the right hon. Member for Sparkbrook about equality of numbers would inevitably have serious consequences for representation in Scotland, as was validly shown in other contributions.
The right hon. Member for Craigton referred to the differences between the commissions. Certainly there are differences in the rules. Rules 1 and 4 are different. Moreover, the commissions are independent and separate bodies.
Mr. Milan: The point is that the differences in interpretation do not arise out of differences in the rules. I was drawing attention to differences in interpretation of exactly the same rules.
Mr. Stewart: I understand completely the point the right hon. Gentleman is making but he will recognise that two of the rules are significantly different and he will also recognise that the commissions are separate and independent bodies.
My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Runcorn, my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Darwen, my hon. Friend the Member for Devizes, my hon. Friends the Members for Buckingham, for Honiton and for Eastleigh (Sir D. Price) all spoke on the general theme of the timing of the commission reports in relation to changes in population that have taken place before the date on which the electorates that provide the basis for the reports are formulated.
A number of suggestions have been made by my hon. Friends. My hon. Friend the Member for Devizes suggested a two-year running review. My hon. Friend the Member for Brighouse and Spenborough made a suggestion in the same area. The House should, however, recognise that when the 1954 order was debated, hon. Members took the view that there was too much emphasis on frequent boundary changes and that too frequent changes had deleterious effects. It was agreed then that changes should be made less often than the Speaker's Conference had originally proposed.
My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Darwen suggested that the Boundary Commission should be full-time and that this would meet the problem identified by a number of my hon. Friends with regard to the delay in the commissions' reports. I am not sure that my hon. Friend's suggestion would solve the problem. The present English review was delayed for a number of reasons. The commission had to interrupt its work to draw the European parliamentary constituencies and it had to await the outcome of legal proceedings against the local government boundary commission. These points should be borne in mind when we talk about delay in conclusions being reached by the commission.
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A number of hon. Members, particularly my hon. Friends, have pointed to the relationship between the rules and the inherent tendency of the number of seats in the House therefore to increase. My hon. Friends the Members for Eastleigh, for Chichester (Mr. Nelson) and for Brighouse and Spenborough described the ratchet effect which is set out in appendix B of the English commission's report. There is no doubt that there is an inbuilt tendency for the number of seats to increase. A number of my hon. Friends, particularly the hon. Member for Chichester, pointed out the disadvantages of that, although there were counter-arguments put by Opposition Members, including the hon. Member for Swindon and the hon. Member for Rother Valley (Mr. Hardy). The House should certainly take heed of the fact that there is a clear inbuilt tendency for the number of seats in the House to rise.
The right hon. Member for Sparkbrook and my hon. Friends the Members for Harrow, Central and Eastleigh referred to the need for the Boundary Commissions to explain their decisions at inquiries. There are counter-arguments to that. The commissions have pointed out that if they publicly argued for their provisional recommendations they might well appear to be biased in their favour and have their motives called into question when they reached their final decisions. Members of the commissions have, therefore, been content to let the provisional recommendations speak for themselves.
If one studies the extensive procedure that the commissions adopt and the meticulous care with which they examine the various arguments put to them, it is absolutely clear that the House is in their debt. In a debate such as this on the working of the commissions, which in effect prescribe the number of our seats and the areas that we represent, almost inevitably we may appear to be interested parties, particularly when the surgery has been so drastic. The immediate aftermath of such an operation is not the best time to decide on procedural changes. On constitutional and electoral matters affecting the House there is a need for consensus. We should not lightly alter accepted, impartial and effective methods, devised through the commissions, of maintaining a proper equality of representation in the House.
It being Ten o'clock, the motion for the Adjournment of the House lapsed, without Question put.

Military Bases
Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Major.]
10 pm
Mr. Alan Clark: May I first suggest to the Minister that in discussing this subject we agree on a moratorium, or perhaps I could say a zero option, in the deployment of phrases about NATO solidarity, the Soviet threat, the free world, the SS20 and so on?
As my hon. Friend the Minister knows full well, I am fully committed to the principle of the deterrent. I accept the self-evident fact that the Soviet Union will negotiate in a significant manner only when it is confronted by strength and resolution and that the best chance of forcing a reduction in Soviet theatre nuclear weapons is represented by a counter deployment, or a threat of so doing, by the West of an equivalent system.
I do have very grave reservations about the desirability of cruise as a weapons system for a number of reasons which, being technical, are not relevant to our debate this evening, but I accept the fact that in spite of its obvious defects the system does seem to be having the desired result of making the Soviet Union more amenable to concession. So my purpose this evening is simply to elicit for the House of Commons and the country as a whole a clearer understanding of what exactly are the existing arrangements that govern the use of foreign bases in this country in order that an informed judgment can be made as regards their effectiveness.
First I draw the attention of the House to the use of this curious word "arrangement". "Arrangement" is a very imprecise term. It appears in the original communiqué of 1952 and has been used often by the Secretary of State and my hon. Friend in his answers to questions in this place. The term "arrangement" is usually used to cover a situation where procedures and identities are not clearly laid down or set out. My hon. Friend, with his long experience of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, will be aware of this, as he will of the distinction between an "arrangement" or a treaty or protocol. In a treaty the relevant provisions are set out in detail after much discussion, preliminary scrutiny, rejection and acceptance of differing drafts. A treaty is signed by a Head of Government or his appropriate departmental colleague and binds the country concerned until it has either expired or been revoked.
An "arrangement", on the other hand, if it is a recognisable term in the vocabulary of diplomacy at all, is something very much more obscure. The term "arrangement" was used for example by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence on 1 February 1983 in successive answers to the hon. Member for Truro (Mr. Penhaligon), my hon. Friend the Member for Mid-Sussex (Mr. Renton) and myself. Although these arrangements have existed for over 30 years, as my right hon. Friend said to the hon. Member for Truro, there is virtually no substance to which one can refer in attempting to analyse them other than the celebrated communiqué that was issued in January 1952. That reads:
"Under 'arrangements' made for the common defence, the United States has the use of certain bases in the United Kingdom. We reaffirm the understanding that the use of these bases in an
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emergency would be a matter for joint decision by Her Majesty's Government and the United States Government in the light of circumstances at the time."
It is hard to understand from this almost minimal text of the communiqué which is the actual governing term, whether it is an arrangement or whether it is the understanding that is referred to. I am sure my right hon. Friend would agree that neither of these terms, "arrangement" or "understanding", is in any sense precise and that both are capable of differing interpretations by different parties who might at a moment of crisis choose to put differing interpretations upon them.
Here straight away we are faced with the principal objection to an arrangement—namely, that it is imprecise and therefore can be misinterpreted or, rather, subject to differing interpretations by the two parties to it. For example, in the interests of the common defence of the West, the United States has the use of certain bases in the United Kingdom. So far, so good, But reference is then made to the understanding that the use of these bases in an emergency would be a matter for joint decision. I take this to mean that under normal conditions the use of the bases takes place not so much as of right as under the tacit agreements latent in the arrangement.
An emergency, as those who drafted the communiqué plainly understood, could lead to such a use having very far-reaching results. For that reason, it would have to be a matter of joint decision by the two Governments. In answer to me today the Minister of State has said that no such emergency situation within the framework of that communiqué has arisen. In answer to a supplementary on 1 February, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State referred to
"experience of the arrangements … over a significant period of time and under Governments of both parties".—[Official Report, 1 February 1983; Vol. 36, c. 133.]
I hope that my hon. Friend will be able to tell the House of what this experience consists if it has not ever extended to being the sort of experience under which these arrangements might have to be invoked. It is not clear whether my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State was referring to the normal arrangements which have been in existence for over 30 years or whether there have from time to time been circumstances—I am thinking, for example, of the Cuban missile crisis or the threat by Mr. Bulganin in 1956 to deploy rockets against this country—of such a critical nature that the higher level of joint decision ought, one might think, to have been invoked.
In the communiqué there is nothing to indicate that nuclear bases are any different in quality from any other kind of bases, such as those dealing with supply, communications or restricted to the use of conventional arms. This is another and disquieting example of the very imprecise nature of the arrangements. This may be explained by the unsatisfactory and, indeed, subservient nature of the United Kingdom's relationship to the United States, which has deteriorated steadily since 1943 when the first of the arrangements relating to atomic weapons was concluded between Churchill and Roosevelt.
At that time there was an assumption that the atom bomb, which was a joint venture between the two countries, would be available to the armoury of both powers. Both powers agreed that it would not be used against third parties without each other's consent. However, the United States Congress, which is consistently suspicious and hostile to Britain, unlike

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United States Presidents whose attitude varies with their personality and the domestic political pressures that lie upon them, passed the McMahon Act prohibiting the disclosure of atomic energy to the United Kingdom, effectively revoking the presidential undertakings or arrangements that were concluded at Quebec. In 1948 Mr. Attlee surrendered the right of veto formally in return for an American promise to drop a clause in the Quebec agreement which had effectively given the United States control over the development of Great Britain's nuclear industry.
In fact, the United States never honoured this part of the deal properly and, as Professor Margaret Gowing, who is a pre-eminent historian of the arrangements, has written:
"The deal was scarcely a fair one."
In 1948 Attlee's negotiations were concluded in the form of a modus vivendi. It is another word which one might suggest is something slightly stronger than "arrangement" because it has some text to which reference can be made, but not so strong or binding as a formal treaty. However, in 1948 that was also overtaken by events—the decision by a small group of Labour Ministers to allow United States bombers to be based in Great Britain during the Berlin crisis of that year.
Apparently, the United States ambassador in London told the Foreign Secretary, orally, that the British would be consulted about any plans for the use of those bombers. There is no contemporary evidence that such an assurance was made, and three years later Herbert Morrison, who succeeded Bevin as Foreign Secretary, said in Washington that when Great Britain had agreed to provide the bomber bases at Upper Heyford the United States ambassador had said that we would be consulted about the use of the weapons. The House may feel that this is all very feeble and a long way from the equality of status that Churchill secured in 1943 but on which the Americans reneged after he ceased to be Prime Minister.
When Churchill was Prime Minister again and ready to visit Washington in January 1952, these oral assurances that were allegedly made by the United States ambassador in London were not even included in his brief of the subject by his permanent officials before he went to Washington. When Churchill was in Washington this communiqué on which we still rely as a sole source of textual data on this subject, was agreed. The communiqué, at all events, represented an improvement on the total absence of even a consultative veto to which the previous Labour Government had acceeded. Doubtless Churchill and his colleagues recalled the manner in which British bomber aircraft had been prevented by the French from taking off from French aerodromes in June 1940 by the gendarmerie and local infantry.
By now, the number of United States aerodromes in the United Kingdom had risen to three, but the problem of interdicting their use, had Her Majesty's Government felt this to be appropriate, was not insurmountable. However, by now we were moving into the missile age. In particular, there was looming the danger of Soviet nuclear ballistic missiles whose very high yield and explosive effect would compensate for their, at that time, limited accuracy. The prospects were bleaker, the dangers greater and the need to exclude uncertainty very much more imperative.
Mr. Macmillan was questioned in the House by both the Leader of the Labour party and the Leader of the Liberal party about the use of United States bases in Great Britain. Here it may be noted that the user which was causing the
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House anxiety was not by nuclear-carrying aircraft but by high-flying U2 reconnaissance aircraft. Macmillan in his reply said the he did not think that it was a question of "a written formal agreement". Here, in other words, was an admission that there is no secret protocol with clear areas of understanding that lies behind the somewhat mincated and imprecise text of the Churchill-Truman communiqué of 1952.
To his credit, Mr. Macmillan realised that the new generation of missiles, the Thor, presented a completely different kind of inventory, with different problems of control than the bombers with their freefall bombs and long runway requirements that had been accommodated for the previous decade. Consequently, Mr. Macmillan negotiated a proper dual key arrangement to cover the use of Thor.
Thor has now gone, and it was naturally hoped by the majority of people, and assumed by some optimists, that equivalent arrangements would be promulgated when a successor system was installed. However, the Government appear to have reverted to the text of the old Churchill-Truman communiqué, which was agreed in circumstances very different, and covered military equipment that is not in any way comparable.
In his answer to me on 1 February, the Secretary of State said:
"the arrangements governing the use of the bases would come into effect much sooner than the decisions to use the weapons … The decisions to use the bases would be at a much earlier and therefore much more important stage of the process".—[Official Report, 1 February 1983; Vol. 36, c. 134.]
My hon. Friend is shaking his head for some reason, but this is a matter of record. It is in my right hon. Friend's answer, given to me on 1 February.
I can see that it is possible to obstruct the bases where cruise missiles are stored in the same way that it was theoretically possible to block the runways at Upper Heyford, but surely, if cruise is to play its part in the deterrent role, dispersal from these bases at an early stage in a crisis is essential. Periods of crisis and tension can subsist for many days and even weeks, and once the missiles have left their bases and been dispersed, arrangements to use those bases are no longer relevant, and what we are talking about is the decision as to whether or not the missile should be fired.
On television, the Secretary of State attempted to allay fears on this subject by stating that the missiles would be accompanied by British personnel wherever they go. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and I had a further exchange of views on this subject this afternoon. My own feeling remains that this was a bit of an improvisation by the Secretary of State. My right hon. Friend said that British service men would be there to protect the missiles, but in the circumstances under which this admission was extracted from him, it was plain that the intention of the Secretary of State was that the service men would offer an additional guarantee against the missiles being used without the consent of the British Government.
The House may think that the fact that these missiles are to be accompanied by British service men is itself a form of admission that the British Government are not certain in their conviction that these arrangements will be properly honoured. Whether or not this is the case, to accompany 160 missiles with a contingent of British service men adequate to guarantee that in no circumstances would they be detonated without the consent of the British

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Government is a tall order. It is possible, but the minimum strength would have to be at least one section per missile, which is effectively a deployment of at least a brigade in strength in a dispersed condition, with all its supporting arms. The House may feel that if this is the direction in which the Government are moving it would be much more effectively and economically achieved by the installation of a dual key system.
If any thought had been given as to how the missiles are controlled once they have been dispersed, I suspect that that it is to rely on the same kind of imprecise arrangement that governs the use of the bases and requires a joint decision. I particularly ask my hon. Friend, what is there to stop the President of the United States rescinding these arrangements at any time after the dispersal of the missiles?
It is my belief that it is perfectly legitimate where national interests are involved, that is to say interests at a level affecting the life and death of enormous numbers of one's own people, to revoke treaties. However, there would be no need for the United States President to go that far. All that he would need to do is serve formal notice—or even informal; that is, over the hot-line telephone—that the background to these arrangements concluded 30 years ago has altered so drastically and urgently that he no longer regards them as binding.
I must say, in all candour, that I do not believe that there is any reason to credit the United States with a level of altruism that exceeds, or would militate against, the interests of its own people. I remind the House that when President Truman authorised the use of the atom bomb against the Japanese, one of his stated excuses was to save lives—but he meant American lives, not Japanese lives. Those considerations applied also to the defoliation of enormous tracts of neutral Cambodia, and the repeated use of napalm against predominantly civilian targets in Vietnam. I make no moral judgment: I simply assert its validity as an inescapable fact of realpolitik.
I shall not discomfit my hon. Friend by reminding him of the occasions since the second world war when the United States acted against narrow British national interests, or of the problems that he and his hon. Friend are facing in equipment co-operation and release of data, or of the manner in which Congress can overturn decisions of the Executive.
My purpose is simply to elicit a more precise definition of how exactly Her Majesty's Government propose to control the use of 150 separate nuclear missiles, located on our sovereign territory, but manned by and answerable to the command centres of a foreign power.
10.21 pm
The Minister of State for the Armed Forces (Mr. Peter Blaker): My hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Sutton (Mr. Clark) has raised an important issue, and it is a matter of regret to me that I do not have sufficient time in which to deal with his questions as I should have liked. I have only eight minutes left in which to speak.
My hon. Friend gave us an interesting and learned dissertation about the history of arrangements between the United States and the United Kingdom in connection with the use of bases in this country. If I may say so, he inclined to be rather legalistic at times. To answer one of his questions directly, the word "arrangements" is not
222
intended as a description of an inter-governmental agreement. Rather, it refers to the understanding between the two Governments that has been reaffirmed by each Administration ever since the original understanding was made. As we have said before, each head of Government on each side has examined the understanding and arrangements flowing from it, and has been satisfied ever since 1951.
The consequence of the arrangement enshrined in the communiqué means that the bases cannot be used in an emergency, except on the basis of a joint decision by both Governments. That, I think, answers many of the questions that my hon. Friend asked. The firing of cruise missiles in this country could result from nothing less than a deliberate political decision at the very highest level.
The missiles will remain at all times under total political control. That is why the Government believe, as successive Governments of both parties have believed in the past, that, whatever the practical arrangements for military command and control, it is essential to provide for joint decision between the Governments of the United Kingdom and the United States upon the use in an emergency of bases for United States' nuclear forces in the United Kingdom. That understanding on joint decision, which is summarised in the communiqué of 9 January 1952, applies today with the same force as it did when it was first concluded. I should stress that the understanding means exactly what it says—the use of bases in an emergency embraces any such use. As my right hon. Friend the Foreign and Commonwealth Secretary made clear in the House on 9 February:
"It is not possible for these weapons to be used without the agreement of both the Prime Minister and the President. That is what the joint decision means."—[Official Report, 9 February 1983; Vol. 36, c. 992.]
I should also make it clear that in the case of a system such as the cruise missile which is dispersed away from its main operating base in time of tension or war, the same understanding would apply. A joint decision would still be required. That arrangement has been reaffirmed as recently as two years ago.
I urge hon. Members to be cautious in attaching too much credence to statements that have appeared recently in the press which attempt to discredit the joint decision understanding. That applies in particular to a letter in The Guardian some 10 days ago when the vice-chairman of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament quoted from what he said was a report to the United States Senate. However, that did not have the status that he claimed.
I remind my hon. Friend that our right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has carefully reviewed the arrangements for joint decision and reaffirmed their effectiveness. She has dealt with this on several occasions in the House. Most recently, on 25 January, she stated:
"I am aware that concern has been expressed about the effectiveness of the arrangements and I have satisfied myself that they are effective."—[Official Report, 25 January 1983; Vol. 35, c. 789.]
I am sure that my hon. Friend does not doubt the value that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister places on the preservation of our national security and our sovereignty, nor question her judgment of the effectiveness of the current arrangements.
My hon. Friend and others have asked why we have not sought a form of physical control mechanism on the operation of cruise missile systems. I have explained that whatever the arrangements for military command and

223
control the Government, like successive Governments, have regarded the provision of the joint decision understanding between Governments as being of primary importance if our national interests are to be safeguarded. The Government have made it clear that there is no point of principle here as far as military command and control are concerned. However, there has been no case in which a dual key has existed except where the country allied to the United States has owned and paid for the launcher. We could have chosen to acquire the cruise missile system, with the exception of the warheads, and operated it ourselves. That method of dual key control is employed for the Lance missile and the nuclear-capable artillery deployed with the British Army of the Rhine.
The arrangements under the 1952 communiqué are for dual control. The cost to the United Kingdom of providing a force of 160 ground launch cruise missiles over a period of 10 years under a dual key system is estimated to be about £1 billion, as my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence told the House today. We decided not to choose that system since, because of our confidence in the dual control arrangements, such expenditure did not seem to be a sensible use of limited defence resources and service manpower. Our allies in other countries who are due to provide bases for cruise or Pershing II missiles reached a similar conclusion.
NATO's strategy of deterrence has ensured more than 30 years of peace in Europe. If there is a threat to peace in Europe I need not remind my hon. Friend where it comes from. In the catastrophic event of a major nuclear confrontation, the United Kingdom and the United States would, as befits powerful allies in a relationship of
224
friendship and mutual trust, consult closely before any use of nuclear weapons anywhere. In the context of British bases to which United States nuclear forces are and will be deployed, that trust is embodied in an unequivocal agreement on the joint control of the relevant systems. Cruise missiles will be deployed to two Royal Air Force bases, each with a senior RAF commander and guarded by Ministry of Defence police. The security force that will accompany the missiles both on and off the base will be a fully integrated force of United States and British service personnel.
Given the history of our relationship, especially hi defence, given that we have had nuclear-capable United States forces in Britain for several decades perfectly satisfactorily, given the physical arrangements that I have described and given that the United States cruise missiles will be coming here at our request if there is no satisfactory agreement with the Russians, I find wholly unconvincing any suggestion that the United States might attempt to use the bases in a manner contrary to the arrangements for joint decision that have lasted for so many years and that have been so often renewed after careful consideration.
If there is one lesson to be drawn from the current debate on dual control it is that the United Kingdom and the United States share an identity of interest for the defence of freedom. My hon. Friend has sought an assurance that the United States forces would be based in Britain only under conditions where our supreme national interests and sovereignty are protected and I am pleased to give him that assurance.
Question put and agreed to.
Adjourned accordingly at half-past Ten o'clock.

WALES
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Preamble
The House met at half-past two of the clock: The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
Prayers—Read by the Lord Bishop of Derby.

Royal Assent
The Lord Chancellor (Lord Hailsham of Saint Marylebone): My Lords, I have to notify the House, in accordance with the Royal Assent Act 1967, that the Queen has signified her Royal Assent to the following Acts:
Agricultural Marketing Act,
Pig Industry Levy Act.

TV Channel 4: Programme Content
2.37 p.m.
Lord Gridley: 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 are satisfied that the tone and quality of the programmes broadcast on Channel 4 comply with Section 4 of the Independent Broadcasting Authority Act 1973.
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, Section 4 of the Broadcasting Act 1981—which has replaced Section 4 of the Independent Broadcasting Authority Act 1973—places a duty on the IBA to satisfy itself that its programmes comply, so far as possible, with certain specified requirements. It is a long standing principle that the broadcasting authorities should be independent in the conduct of their affairs and entirely responsible, subject to the law and to their specific obligations, for their programme decisions. It would, therefore, be inappropriate for me to express views on the quality of the programmes broadcast on Channel 4.
Lord Gridley: My Lords, I thank my noble friend for that Answer. May I ask him whether he saw a programme which was broadcast on Channel 4 on 26th February? If he did, I wonder whether he would agree that a programme, which alleged that those seeking entry to Parliament were moved only by their own self-interest and nothing else, needed correction? Is not a broadcast of this nature irresponsible and unbalanced? Is it not an accepted principle—and this was omitted—that in a democracy those elected give service to their constituents and also to the Crown?
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, I am afraid that I did not see the broadcast to which my noble friend referred. Therefore, I cannot even form a view about it. However, I am sure that the members of the Independent Broadcasting Authority will take note of his views.
Lord Nugent of Guildford: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that this is only one of a number of programmes which has caused a great deal of offence? Will my noble friend consider asking the chairman whether he would be good enough to attend on the Home Secretary to explain what are his difficulties in conforming with the very specific terms of the Act with regard to standards of decency?
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, in the course of a debate in your Lordships' House on 30th November last about the BBC and the IBA annual reports, some of your Lordships expressed concern about the content of some of the programmes shown on Channel 4. My right honourable friend the Home Secretary subsequently wrote to the chairman of the IBA drawing his attention to the concern that had been expressed; and the chairman, in reply, referred to the importance attached by the authority to ensuring that acceptable standards should be properly maintained.
Lord Bruce of Donington: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that those who are looking at and listening to Channel 4 comprise a very wide range of age groups and occupations, and of course tastes vary? Is he further aware that there was a very excellent programme on Channel 4 concerning the activities of your Lordships' House, which won almost universal acclamation?
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, I think that that programme is about the only one that I myself have actually seen on Channel 4. But so far as the noble Lord's views are concerned, I think the best way to approach the problem is for all of those who feel strongly about matters that are on Channel 4 to write to the IBA and express their views. The alternative, if they do not like a programme, is, quite honestly, to switch it off.
Lord Orr-Ewing: My Lords, did my noble friend, by any chance, see the programme, in regard to which the IBA are responsible for balance, on the independent channel last night called "The Truth Game"? That was full of half-truths and lies. Are we going to get the other side of the story so that a balance is produced by the IBA?
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, I really think that what I have just said to the noble Lord, Lord Bruce, applies to my noble friend. He should write to the IBA on this matter.
Lord Nugent of Guildford: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that we have been informed that the new cable television, when it comes into operation, will be safeguarded—this is the Government's term—by a similar safeguard for standards of decency there? But is he aware that the position is so often unsatisfactory with the existing media that we really need something a good deal stronger if cable television, with all its possibilities, has nothing better to offer than that?
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, cable television is another matter altogether and it is already subject to the preparation of a White Paper.
Lord Hatch of Lusby: My Lords, will the noble Lord reaffirm what either he or one of his noble friends on the Front Bench said recently, that the question of balance in programming extends over a series of programmes and should not be attached to a single programme? Further, is he aware that it was announced in the programme shown last night, which was referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Orr-Ewing, that there would be another point of view put by a specific broadcaster in about eight weeks' time?
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, the broadcasting authorities will, I am sure, take note of what the noble Lord has said.
Lord Auckland: My Lords, while there may have been some dereliction of quality on Channel 4, may I ask whether my noble friend agrees that opera in particular has been very well presented—for example, their recent presentation of Aida—and that if complaints are to be made to the chairman of the authority, credit should be given for the excellent quality of the arts programmes shown on Channel 4?
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, I quite agree with my noble friend.

Metropolitan Police: Increased Manpower
Baroness Sharples: 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 has been the increase in the strength of the Metropolitan Police since 1979.
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, between 1st January 1979 and 31st December 1982 the strength of the Metropolitan Police increased by 4,310, or almost 20 per cent., to 26,271. The force is expected to reach its establishment of 26,615 by the end of this month.
Baroness Sharples: My Lords, I thank my noble friend for his very satisfactory Answer. Could he please confirm that the police have been making very strenuous efforts to enrol members of the ethnic minorities but without the success they hoped for? Could my noble friend also tell me how many graduates have joined the police in this period?
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, on 31st December 1982 there were 183 members of the ethnic minorities in the Metropolitan Police. Of these, 65 were recruited in 1982. I can assure my noble friend that every effort is being made to recruit members from the ethnic minorities, but I must agree with her that it has not always been possible to recruit as many as we should like. So far as graduates are concerned, the number recruited to the Metropolitan Police in 1982 was 162. This represents rather more than one-fifth of the national total which was 621.
Lord Avebury: My Lords, would the Minister agree that what matters to the public is not the numbers of
1032
police officers but the detection rate of crime? Measured by this standard, the performance of the Metropolitan Police has deteriorated since the beginning of 1979. Would the noble Lord agree not that the Home Office should investigate very carefully the reasons why, during a period when the numbers of police have increased, their effectiveness has gone down?
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, a thorough review of police manpower is currently in progress. This will be pursued in the light of the priorities and objectives set by the commissioner in his recent report to my right honourable friend the Home Secretary.
Lord Gisborough: My Lords, could my noble friend say whether the increase in staff is all at the recruit grade or whether some of it is due to the recall of senior officers who had left the force in earlier years because of poor pay? If the former, could my noble friend say whether the police force is becoming bottom heavy with recruits, without sufficient people in the senior ranks?
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, pay has been hugely improved during the Government's tenure of office. I am afraid I do not know the answer to the specific point raised by my noble friend, but I shall find out and let him know.
Lord Bruce of Donington: My Lords, could the noble Lord say whether it is proposed to increase the strength of the fraud squad? Is the noble Lord aware that the fraud squad is grossly understaffed and quite incapable of dealing with commercial crime, which, unfortunately, is very much on the increase and which has been on the increase during the past two or three years?
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, the primary aim of the commissioner is to reduce crime levels, with the help of the community. The emphasis is on crime prevention measures, the deployment of more officers on street duties, improving the detection rates by focusing on known criminals and the need to use existing resources to the maximum effect to meet the new priorities. So far as fraud is concerned, I do not have a specific answer, but I shall make sure that the commissioner is made aware of the noble Lord's views.
Lord Plant: My Lords, in view of my noble friend Lord Avebury's question, has Sir Kenneth Newman made any approach to the Government to the effect that the authorised complement of the Metropolitan Police should be increased?
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, as I believe I said in my original Answer, the authorised establishment is 26,615. My right honourable friend the Home Secretary has indicated to the commissioner that he will be able to count on building up Metropolitan Police manpower by the end of the financial year 1983–84 to a total establishment of nearly 27,000—about another 400. As I have said, however, a major manpower review is in hand and my right honourable friend welcomes the commissioner's decision to review the deployment of the force.
Lord Hunt: My Lords, would the Minister agree that the most important single need in containing crime in London is to get more officers—men and women—on the beat? Would the Minister also agree that this postulates the justified increase which he indicated in his Answer to the original Question? Is not probably the most important point to contain crime; and does he not agree that Sir Kenneth Newman's plans in this regard are warmly to be commended?
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, I do agree with the noble Lord, Lord Hunt. It has been the policy of successive commissioners to increase the number of police officers on the beat. In recent years, as a result of the review of the force structure, almost 1,000 officers have been redeployed to street duties; and the commissioner has indicated in his report that he proposes to make available, by savings in other areas of operation, an additional 650 officers for this purpose.

Richmond Terrace, Whitehall
2.50 p.m.
Lord Sandys: 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 when the reconstruction of Richmond Terrace, Whitehall, will be completed.
Lord Skelmersdale: My Lords, the current stabilisation work on the terrace is due for completion in July. In his press announcement of 12th August 1982 my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for the Environment said that the main development of the Richmond Yard site, which includes the restoration of Richmond Terrace, will commence in 1983. The Property Services Agency is considering arrangements for the handling of the development with a view to completing it no later than 1987. The restoration of the facades will be put in hand early in the programme.
Lord Sandys: My Lords, while thanking my noble friend for his reply, may I ask whether he is aware that this contract was originally put on the stocks in 1970? Does he not consider this an excessively long time, despite the facts and notwithstanding the considerable difficulties, and will he assure the House that the fixtures and fittings are receiving suitable attention in store meanwhile?
Lord Skelmersdale: My Lords, my noble friend is not quite right. Although this matter does have a very long history, and goes back to 1970 under a Labour Government who put in hand the Willis Inquiry to consider what should be done with the site, a contract was not agreed to be let until as late as 1979. So far as the removable fixtures and fittings are concerned—if that is not a contradiction in terms—I can confirm that these were surveyed and that the important items which will be relevant to the history of the house have been put in store and are being properly looked after.
Viscount St. Davids: My Lords, in asking a supplementary question on this matter may I declare an interest in that I believe I am the only Member of your Lordships' House who was actually born there? Is there any way in which Members of this House can see over the building as it stands or see any of the artefacts which have been preserved? Can the noble Lord write to me and explain how it might be possible to look over the old home, so to speak?
Lord Skelmersdale: My Lords, looking over the old home might be more appropriate when it is completely restored and rebuilt. However, I shall certainly look into the matter and advise the noble Viscount. So far as viewing the artefacts is concerned, if the noble Viscount wishes to burrow into packing cases in the South Midlands, I am sure that can be arranged.

Civil Defence: New Regulations
2.58 p.m.
Lord Mottistone: My Lords, I have been asked by my noble friend Lord Renton to ask his Question as he cannot be here. I beg leave to ask the Question standing in the name of my noble friend on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government when they intend to lay new civil defence regulations before Parliament for approval.
The Lord Privy Seal (Baroness Young): My Lords, consultations with the local authority associations are still in progress. My right honourable friend the Home Secretary hopes to lay the new regulations in draft form as soon as consultations are completed.
Lord Mottistone: My Lords, I am very grateful to my noble friend for that Answer. May I ask whether it is not a fact that at the beginning of last month in another place, her honourable friend said that it was hoped that the facts will be put together by the end of March? Is it not unfortunate that she cannot repeat that statement now?
Baroness Young: My Lords, the timetable has always been quite clear. The consultation paper setting out the new regulations was issued early in October, and on 3rd December the draft of the general regulations became available, and comments were asked for by 31st January. These comments are still being considered and Ministers agreed to receive deputations from the local authority associations about the regulations. I hope that it will not be too long before the regulations themselves can be laid.
Lord Leatherland: My Lords, if more money is to be spent on civil defence, is it not proper that it should be a national charge on national taxation and that no portion of it should fall on the rates of local authorities?
Baroness Young: My Lords, one of the purposes of the regulations will be to increase grant aid from 75 per

1035
cent. to 100 per cent. in certain specific instances. The view which the Government have taken is that civil defence must necessarily be a local authority responsibility because in any emergency it will be the responsibility of local people. It is therefore right that they should have a financial contribution to make to the cost of the service. But the Government are giving a 75 per cent. grant on these new proposals.
Lord Leatherland: My Lords, may I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Young, for that reply? May I ask whether it is fair that an area vulnerable to enemy attack such as London should have to pay only the same amount as a place which is not vulnerable, such as the Highlands of Scotland?
Baroness Young: My Lords, I believe it is difficult for anybody in your Lordships' House to speculate on what areas might or might not be subject to some future emergency. What is important is that every area of Great Britain should have plans for civil defence, and the new regulations will build on those plans.
Lord Glenkinglas: My Lords, will my noble friend Lady Young remind the House that the Highlands of Scotland are extremely vulnerable because almost all of the Polaris submarine bases are there?
Baroness Young: My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend. I am sure that the Highlands are not only vulnerable but are also important.
Lord Paget of Northampton: My Lords, is the noble Baroness, Lady Young, aware of the theory which seems to be current in London that one can save oneself this nonsense expenditure by declaring oneself a nuclear-free zone?
Baroness Young: Yes, my Lords, and I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Paget of Northampton, will pass on that view to some of his colleagues. The Government hope very much that local authorities will implement the regulations: it will be very unfortunate indeed if any of them are thought to be breaking the law.

Business
Lord Denham: My Lords, it may be for the convenience of the House if I announce that dinner will be available at the usual time this evening. The Committee stage of the Transport Bill will be adjourned for a short period at approximately 7.30 p.m. During this adjournment, the Committee stage of the Marriage Bill will be taken.
It may also be for the convenience of your Lordships to know that dinner will not now be available on Thursday of this week, 3rd March.

Gaming (Amendment) Bill [H.L.]
Lord Harmar-Nicholls: My Lords, I beg to introduce a Bill to amend the Gaming Act 1968 to enable the playing in combination of games of bingo at
1036
different bingo club premises with aggregated stake money and overall winners and to regulate such games.
I beg to move that this Bill be now read a first time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read a first time.—(Lord Harmar-Nicholls.)
On Question, Bill read a first time, and to be printed.

Transport Bill
2.59 p.m.
The Minister of State, Department of the Environment (Lord Bellwin): My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now again resolve itself into Committee on this Bill.
Moved, That the House do now again resolve itself into Committee.—(Lord Bellwin.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly.
[The EARL OF LISTOWEL in the Chair.]
Clause 4 [Approval of financial plans and determination of revenue grants]:
Lord Underhill Lord Underhill moved Amendment No. 26:
Page 4, line 26, leave out from ("shall") to end of line 27 and insert ("include among the matters to which they shall have regard").
The noble Lord said: It may be for the convenience of the Committee if, as well as speaking to Amendment No. 26, I speak also to Amendment No. 27. Although these deal with different issues, I believe that it will be advisable to discuss them together, although one is not dependent on the other.
Subsection (3) of Clause 4 provides that when determining whether to approve a plan which would involve the making of revenue grants the authority shall have "particular regard" to matters listed in paragraphs (a), (b) and (c). The phrase "particular regard" could exclude other matters—traffic management, and all the other related responsibilities which impinge on the duties of a passenger transport authority—many of which have been debated on previous amendments. As has been mentioned time and time again in our debates, there are important duties placed upon both passenger transport authorities and passenger transport executives by the 1968 and 1969 Acts.
The issue was considered at Report stage in another place, when an amendment was proposed to leave out the word "particular" so as to leave merely the word "regard". At that stage the Under-Secretary of State said that if the word "particular" were omitted it would enable the clause to be interpreted as meaning that only the matters in the three paragraphs could be considered, and other matters would be excluded. To meet the concern of the Government as expressed by the Under-Secretary, my noble friends and I are now tabling Amendment No. 26, which would remove the words "have particular regard" and replace them by "include among the matters to which they shall have regard". After reading again what the Under-Secretary

1037
of State said—it is at columns 246 and 247 on 1st February—it seemed that this amendment would fit in with what the Government want; we have tried to accommodate the Government's view.
The second amendment, No. 27, would leave paragraphs (a), (b) and (c) as matters to which the authority shall have regard, but will add that when considering the plan the passenger transport authority shall have regard to the general duty of the PTA and the PTE under the specified sections of both the 1968 and 1969 Acts as the case may be. Hitherto, the duty to provide a transport system to meet the needs of the area, which of course is laid down in the 1968 and 1969 Acts, has been considered absolutely paramount. That must remain, and that is the purpose of the second amendment. The present wording of the clause would subordinate this duty to the other items in paragraphs (a), (b) and (c), to which I have referred. To include the reference to the general duty under the respective Acts would again be in keeping with the views expressed by the Under-Secretary of State. Therefore, although the two amendments need not be tied together they should be considered together. I beg to move.
Lord Bellwin: Clause 4(3) sets out the matters to which the authority is to have particular regard in assessing the executive's plan. These are: (a) the cost of provision of services and facilities, the level of demand and benefit to users; (b) and advice given by the Secretary of State to the executive on the appropriate amount of revenue support, on methods of determining benefits derived from revenue support, on the form and content of the plan and on the methods of determining costs, levels of demand and benefits to potential users; (c) the need to achieve a proper balance between the interests of ratepayers and users. These are important issues, and we are concerned that authorities should pay special attention to them, although they can, of course, have regard to other issues if they wish to do so.
The problem with this amendment, and the reason why we are not able to accept it, is that it weakens the specific requirement of the Bill as drafted to have "particular regard" to these matters. Authorities would still be required to have regard to these factors, but would be free to give them a low importance, along with a whole host of other factors. This is not what we want. We are concerned that particular emphasis should be given to the issues listed; and the word "particular" has been used quite deliberately.
Furthermore, Amendment No. 27, which requires authorities also to have regard to their and the executives' general duties under Sections 9(3) of the 1968 Act and Sections 1 or 5(1) of the 1969 Act is. I submit unnecessary. These provisions have not been repealed by this Bill. The general duties still apply, and authorities and executives are still required to have regard to them when carrying out their duties under this Bill, particularly when preparing their plan. Indeed, this is emphasised by the requirement imposed on the Secretary of State under Clause 4(6), when giving guidance to authorities, to have regard to these general duties. In view of that explanation, I wonder whether the noble Lord will feel able not to press this amendment.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: The difficulty with the statement of the noble Lord the Minister is that the general duties under the 1968 and 1969 Acts are still on the statute book, and they are still, therefore, incumbent upon the passenger transport authorities and the Greater London Council. The noble Lord referred to the importance, in particular, of paragraph (a), and there is no attempt whatever on the part of those who support the amendments to remove that. It is a proper decision of government to say that the authorities should have regard to these matters.
But what we are saying is that there is potentially—probably more than potentially; it is very likely to be happening already—a conflict between the general duties under the Acts, which have, as rate precepts are now being taken into consideration, the support of the Divisional Court and the support of the court under Mr. Justice Woolf, and the particular duties which are now being imposed on the authorities. The question is, as Humpty Dumpty said, which is to be master?—and the noble Lord has not answered that.
Lord Campbell of Alloway: I wonder whether my noble friend the Minister might possibly give consideration to Amendment No. 27. It has merit. It provides an enforceable measure of protection to the subject if proceedings arise on judicial review. It is not just, so to speak, an amendment which carries nothing with it. From a legal point of view it carries, or could carry, a great deal, without in any way doing violence to the spirit of this clause, and could operate in favour of the liberty of the subject. I merely ask my noble friend if he could possibly keep an open mind, and at least consider that aspect.
Lord Tordoff: I think we are grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Alloway, for that intervention. This was the line which I was proposing to take. We have heard frequently in this Committee stage that the object of the Bill is to give certainty to local authorities up to the level of the amount of grant which the Secretary of State is going to authorise. Surely, it is beyond that point that the local authorities need to look for some sort of guidelines as to what is permissible and what is not permissible. If the Government's attitude is that under no circumstances should any local authority ever go beyond those guidelines, that is somewhat at variance with some of the messages that have been coming from the Government Front Bench during this Committee stage. If at some stage these things are to be tested in the courts, it seems to me that the guidelines ought to be within the terms of the 1968 and 1969 Acts.
Lord Bellwin: I wonder whether I could return the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, to the reference he made to columns 246 and 247 of the proceedings in another place. In fact there is no inconsistency between the words of the Under-Secretary of State on that occasion and what I am saying now. It will save the noble Lord from looking if I read out exactly what he said:
"In response to a question asked by the honourable Member for Rotherham, I should add that the word 'particular' is important for two reasons. First, the matters listed are those to which the authority should pay special regard. Secondly, 'particular' makes it clear that if the authority wishes to have regard to other matters, it is free to

1039
do so. The omission of the word 'particular' could mean that the authority was excluded from considering other matters. For those reasons, the amendment must be resisted." [Official Report, Commons, 1/2/83; cols. 246–7.]
That is what I was saying, and why I still feel, certainly as far as Amendment No. 26 is concerned, that that is as far as we are willing to go.
I was interested in what my noble friend Lord Campbell of Alloway said, and certainly would want to consider that. As the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, will know, and indeed I am sure my noble friend will accept, today I can make no commitment or go further. But I certainly want to talk about it and, as far as Amendment No. 27 goes, that I am prepared to do if it is of help to the noble Lord.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: I take the liberty of returning to one particular point still not made clear. In a conciliatory speech yesterday, in response to an amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Teviot, the Minister was good enough to say that he recognised the limitations of restricting the analysis of benefits to potential users. Yet, in what he said today, he spelled out what the clause says, unamended. It refers back to subsections (4) and (5) of Clause 3 and to the additional paragraph. There must be a simpler way of saying that.
In all of the guidelines, objectives and criteria which the Minister set out there is reference only to the interests of the ratepayers and potential users of public transport. There is no reference at any stage to the interests of the public as a whole, the others who share road space with public transport services or, indeed, to the necessity for taking into account the economy of the metropolitan areas, the environment of the metropolitan areas and all the other aspects of public transport which we on this side and, I understand, the noble Lord, Lord Teviot, as well, believe should be taken into account in assessing the plans of public transport authorities. How, with the wording he has if he successfully resists this amendment, will the Minister achieve the concessions which he hinted might be made to the noble Lord, Lord Teviot, only yesterday?
Lord Bellwin: If the record needs to be put straight, and I do not think it does, I am sure my noble friend Lord Teviot will confirm, not least because of his very great knowledge in this whole field, that I feel obliged, as I do with most of your Lordships with special know-how, if I may use that term, on matters of this kind, to take note of what he said and to look carefully in case there might be something we ought to be doing. After all, the main purpose of your Lordships' House is to revise, to look at and get the best Bill that we can. That is what I said I will do, and I will. If, in referring to those who were affected by the Bill, I did not mention every category I would have assumed that it was implied. I referred to the interests of the ratepayers and users and of course, this includes others who are affected by the Bill. I think that is implied in what I say all along. If the noble Lord wishes me to. I will gladly reel off a lengthy list each time I refer to these in the remaining stages of the Bill.
I stand by what I said. There is an importance here in line with what my honourable friend said in another
1040
place so far as Amendment No. 26 is concerned. I said that I would look at Amendment No. 27 in view of what had been said, and that I am still prepared to do.
Lord Teviot: Before the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, replies, I have been more or less driven to my feet. I stand by what I said yesterday. Like the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, and the noble Baroness, Lady Fisher, I also went to Tyne and Wear. I think it is this part of the Bill dealing with the plans with which they are particularly concerned. I do not wish to make a Second Reading speech on that particular point or to be particularly regional, but if my noble friend can look into it that will be splendid.
Lord Underhill: I am sorry that the Minister adheres to his original remarks because his reference to the columns in the Commons Hansard, to which I referred, and the Under-Secretary of State's statement, does not go much further beyond what I said. What the Under-Secretary of State said is that to take out the word "particular" just leaves "regard," and that could exclude other issues. But we have not done that. We have gone beyond that. We have taken out the word "particular" and put in:
"include among the matters to which they, shall have regard".
That makes it perfectly clear that one can look at other issues. I was rather disappointed that the Minister said that paragraphs (a), (b) and (c) are important, and we are not challenging that they are important issues; but then he said that the word "particular" is used because other issues would be of lower importance. I believe that is more or less what he said, although I am paraphrasing it. But the other isues to which we want consideration given are not of lower importance. They may be of equal importance to paragraphs (a), (b) and (c), but they are certainly not of lower importance. Therefore, we want these other issues properly considered at that particular stage.
The Minister said that under subsection (6) reference is made to the issues which he said he would look at; that is, the provisions of the 1968 and 1969 Acts. But I must draw your Lordships' attention to the fact that subsection (6) contains the matters which the Secretary of State must consider when he is giving guidance about the plan. The amendment which we have tabled is what the authority must consider when it is approving the plan given to it by the executive. That is totally different. The authority—that is, the Passenger Transport Authority—has to approve the plan and must have freedom to consider all the important issues: the duties under the 1968 or 1969 Acts, as the case may be, and the type of important issues to which my noble friend Lord McIntosh of Haringey referred. That is why we wish to have the amendment.
I am very pleased that the Minister is going to look at Amendment No. 27, but in looking at that amendment I hope he will do so in the context of where we want it to be put in: that is, at the stage when the authority has to approve the plan. The authority should have to take into consideration its own duty laid down under the Act, which the Minister has made clear is not repealed by the provisions of the Bill now before us. That is where we want the amendment to go in.

1041
I should like to ask the Minister once again why he considers that our widening phrase,
"include among the matters to which they shall have regard",
is not a good amendment? It is not sufficient to say that we are denigrating paragraphs (a), (b) and (c). We are not. We are saying leave them in and do not interfere with them, but make it quite clear that there are other issues which the authority should also look at, bearing in mind that at a later stage, under subsection (6), the Minister has the authority to consider the plan. Even under subsection (5) he has the authority to consider modifications to the plan. Therefore, what we are talking about is the important stage at which the authority considers the plan from the executive, and whether or not it is to approve it.
Yesterday we were told time and again by the Minister that the final decision rests with the authority. If the final decision rests with the authority, put in our words and let it have the authority to consider not only paragraphs (a), (b) and (c) but other issues which it considers to be of vital importance, including the provisions we suggest in Amendment No. 27. Before I take any further action, could the Minister say whether he will look at the words which we have used as well as looking at the points in Amendment No. 27?
Lord Bellwin: Certainly the authority can, and indeed hopefully will, look at everything, and as widely as possible, but we want, as is written into the Bill at the moment, the emphasis to be on the use of the word "particular", because that directs the authority towards these issues, which we again say that we particularly want them to do. That does not prevent them from looking at other things as well. That is up to them. But certainly one could not write into the Bill such a wide generality. We are concerned in the Bill to have the word that directs them particularly to these factors. That is really why we do not want to change the drafting of the Bill.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: May I ask a very simple question of the Minister? I will not allow myself to concede that there might be a conflict between the advice or guidance given by this Government and the duties laid upon local authorities by the 1968 or 1969 Acts. I am sure that they are far too conscious of their responsibilities. We have heard from the noble Lord the Minister over and over again of his concern for the independence of local government, and we take him at his word. Therefore, from this Government there can be no conflict, but from a possible future Government there might be conflict. In these circumstances, may I repeat the question: which is to be master? Is the particular regard which is to be paid to these provisions in this Bill to take precedence over the general duties under the 1968 and 1969 Acts or not?
Lord Bellwin: I am glad to hear the confidence that the noble Lord shows. He shows confidence in the present Administration—we will have no problems with that. I assume, therefore, that he would certainly not expect to have problems with another Administration which might perhaps be closer to his heart. Either way he has to win. He has it covered both ways. I only want to say again that it is not a question of a restriction on the authority; it is a question of the
1042
emphasis and why we want the wording to refer to the use particularly in this way. I really cannot go further than that.
Lord Sefton of Garston: I do not want to bother the noble Lord, Lord Bellwin. I only want to ask him a simple question—the one that I asked yesterday. Is he yet in a position to answer me as to whether or not consultations took place with the executives on this matter, and whether any meetings took place with the executives at all, of which the local authorities were not notified?
Lord Bellwin: I have made no further inquiries since 10 o'clock last night along the lines that the noble Lord mentions. But I repeat that, to the best of my knowledge, there were in fact consultations in so far as the Government were able to have them, but the noble Lord knows as well as I do that the local authority associations as such, who have a great deal of expertise and input in these matters, chose for whatever reason not to be involved at that stage. I understand that now there will be consultations before the Bill is passed, and hopefully even at later stages.
Lord Sefton of Garston: More for the sake of brevity, may I assume that the Minister will write to me and tell me about the meetings with the executives?
Lord Bellwin: The noble Lord knows that I always delight in writing to him.
Lord Underhill: I am very sorry that the Minister will not move on this. As my noble friend Lord McIntosh inferred—I think he actually said—this shows a lack of confidence in the authority. I must emphasise that it is the authority that is elected, it is the authority that has to approve the plan, and it is the authority which the Minister says has the last word. He told us this time and time again. Therefore, why not use the words that we are suggesting:
"among the matters to which they shall have regard"
shall be these three matters? We are not deleting those three matters. The authority then would know that it must look at those three matters but can look at any other issue which it considers important. That seems common sense to me.
I am sorry that the Minister will not move on this. I am delighted that he is going to have a look at Amendment No. 27. But we believe that we ought to show our confidence in the elected local government bodies which are the county councils acting as the PTAs. Therefore, I would like the Committee to give its expression as to whether it supports confidence in the PTA or has the suspicions which the Government have on this matter. I beg to ask the Committee to divide on Amendment No. 26.
3.23 p.m.
On Question, Whether the said amendment (No. 26) shall be agreed to?
Their Lordships divided: Contents, 69; Not-Contents, 111.

DIVISION NO. 1

CONTENTS

Airedale, L.

Kilbracken, L.

Amherst, E.

Kilmarnock, L.

Amulree, L.

Leatherland, L.

Ardwick, L.

Listowel, L.

Aylestone, L.

Llewelyn-Davies of Hastoe, B.

Banks, L.

Beaumont of Whitley, L.

McIntosh of Haringey, L.

Beswick, L.

Mackie of Benshie, L.

Bishopston, L.

Milford, L.

Brooks of Tremorfa, L.

Mishcon, L.

Bruce of Donington, L.

Nicol, B.

Cledwyn of Penrhos, L.

Oram, L.

Collison, L.

Pitt of Hampstead, L.

Cooper of Stockton Heath, L.

Plant, L.

Ponsonby of Shulbrede, L.

Crook, L.

Prys-Davies, L.

David, B. [Teller.]

Rathcreedan, L.

Davies of Leek, L.

Roberthall, L.

Davies of Penrhys, L.

Ross of Marnock, L.

Denington, B.

Sefton of Garston, L.

Diamond, L.

Serota, B.

Elwyn-Jones, L.

Simon, V.

Ewart-Biggs, B.

Stedman, B.

Fisher of Rednal, B.

Stewart of Alvechurch, B.

Gaitskell, B.

Stewart of Fulham, L.

Gladwyn, L.

Stone, L.

Grey, E.

Taylor of Blackburn, L.

Hanworth, V.

Tordoff, L. [Teller.]

Hatch of Lusby, L.

Underhill, L.

Houghton of Sowerby, L.

Wallace of Coslany, L.

Hunt, L.

Wells-Pestell, L.

Ingleby, V.

Whaddon, L.

Jacques, L.

White, B.

Jeger, B.

Winterbottom, L.

Kearton, L.

Wootton of Abinger, B.

Kennet, L.

NOT-CONTENTS

Airey of Abingdon, B.

Gisborough, L.

Atholl, D.

Glanusk, L.

Auckland, L.

Glasgow, E.

Avon, E.

Glenkinglas, L.

Belhaven and Stenton, L.

Gridley, L.

Bellwin, L.

Hailsham of Saint Marylebone, L.

Beloff, L.

Belstead, L.

Halsbury, E.

Berkeley, B.

Harvington, L.

Boyd-Carpenter, L.

Hayter, L.

Campbell of Alloway, L.

Hives, L.

Campbell of Croy, L.

Home of the Hirsel, L.

Carnegy of Lour, B.

Hornsby-Smith, B.

Cathcart, E.

Hunter of Newington, L.

Clancarty, E.

Hylton-Foster, B.

Clifford of Chudleigh, L.

Kemsley, V.

Cottesloe, L.

Killearn, L.

Crawford and Balcarres, E.

Kilmany, L.

Cullen of Ashbourne, L.

Kinloss, Ly.

Daventry, V.

Lane-Fox, B.

Davidson, V.

Lauderdale, E.

De Freyne, L.

Lawrence, L.

Denham, L. [Teller.]

Long, V.

Derwent, L.

Lucas of Chilworth, L.

Drumalbyn, L.

Luke, L.

Duncan-Sandys, L.

Lyell, L.

Ebbisham, L.

Mackay of Clashfern, L.

Ellenborough, L.

Macleod of Borve, B.

Elliot of Harwood, B.

Mancroft, L.

Enniskillen, E.

Mansfield, E.

Ferrers, E.

Margadale, L.

Ferrier, L.

Marley, L.

Forbes, L.

Merrivale, L.

Fortescue, E.

Mersey, L.

Fraser of Kilmorack, L.

Milverton, L.

Gainford, L.

Molson, L.

1044

Montagu of Beaulieu, L.

Seebohm, L.

Morris, L.

Selborne, E.

Mottistone, L.

Selkirk, E.

Newall, L.

Sempill, Ly.

Northchurch, B.

Shaughnessy, L.

Nugent of Guildford, L.

Skelmersdale, L.

Onslow, E.

Somers, L.

Orkney, E.

Spens, L.

Orr-Ewing, L.

Swinton, E. [Teller.]

Porritt, L.

Taylor of Hadfield, L.

Portland, D.

Thomas of Swynnerton, L.

Rankeillour, L.

Thorneycroft, L.

Redesdale, L.

Tranmire, L.

Rochdale, V.

Trefgarne, L.

Rugby, L.

Trumpington, B.

St. Aldwyn, E.

Vaux of Harrowden, L.

St. Davids, V.

Vivian, L.

Saltoun, Ly.

Wakefield of Kendal, L.

Sandford, L.

Young, B.

Sandys, L.

Resolved in the negative, and amendment disagreed to accordingly.
[Amendments Nos. 27 and 28 not moved.]
The Deputy Chairman of Committees: Before I call Amendment No. 29, I should point out to the Committee that if this amendment is agreed to I cannot call Amendment No. 30.
3.30 p.m.
Lord Underhill Lord Underhill moved Amendment No. 29:
Page 4, line 42, leave out subsection (5) and insert—
(" (5) Where plans are submitted to the Secretary of State under subsection (4) above he may give guidance as to the general principles on which revenue grants shall be based having regard to general economic conditions.")
The noble Lord said: For the convenience of the Committee I suggest that with Amendment No. 29 I also speak on Amendment No. 33. May I again remind your Lordships that most of these amendments have wide cross-party support. That is not only because of the principles contained in the amendments, but I would remind the Committee that once we pass Clause 2 all the other clauses are those which had very limited consideration in the other place due to the operation of the guillotine machine, which I shall not comment upon—I am merely making a statement of fact. That is why it is so important that the amendments we are submitting to the Government are properly put forward and debated.
These amendments deal with the question of revenue grants and the guidance that the Secretary of State may give. I want to emphasise, though, that they do not deal with the general principle of fixing the revenue grants. That is an issue which we shall come to in a later amendment. But Clause 4(5) allows the Secretary of State to give guidance to an authority as to the maximum amount of revenue grant which, in his opinion, the authority should make in any year to the passenger transport executive, and to tell the authority of any modifications that the authority should make in its plan. The following subsection, subsection (6), sets out paragraphs (a), (b) and (c)—not the same paragraphs (a), (b) and (c) to which we referred in the previous amendment, but different paragraphs—by reference to which the guidance of the Secretary of State may be given. That is a narrowly drawn list.
The first concern arising from these two subsections is the theme running throughout the Bill to which noble Lords have referred time and time again, not only at Second Reading but in debates, as to the level of detail in which the Secretary of State seeks to involve himself in the affairs of the executives and the authority. That is evident in the clause we are debating at the moment. That concern was voiced, I would remind your Lordships, in the letter from the Chartered Institute of Transport, to which I referred yesterday and which I will not go over again. But the references to it, for those who did not hear the debate yesterday, are mentioned in our own Hansard report. For instance, paragraph (b) provides that the Secretary of State may give guidance by reference to his opinion—I emphasise "to his opinion"—as to what benefits should result from the making of such revenue grants to executives. His opinion will not be based on the opinions of the elected authority or people of the area.
Remember, in our very last debate last night on Amendment No. 22, when we listed in the amendment all the bodies which should be consulted, that the Minister said it was the duty of the authority to consult all these bodies, so it is after consultation with all these bodies that the authority will make its plans. Yet later the Secretary of State will come along and in giving his opinion, without any consultation with these bodies, ignoring all the consultations that the authority has had with these various bodies, will then say how the plan should be modified.
The second matter of concern is that subsection (5) contains that provision which allows the Secretary of State to prescribe the actual amount of the revenue grant, and I quote:
"which it would in his opinion be appropriate for the authority to make."
Amendment No. 29 seeks to move away from the prescription of a maximum figure of grant and interference in matters of detail. I do not think any noble Lord can deny that the measures in this clause and in the Bill generally would not mean interference in matters of detail. It is quite apparent that the Secretary of State cannot arrive at his decisions unless he does interfere in matters of detail. But the amendment would provide that the Secretary of State may give guidance. We are not saying that he should give guidance, but the amendment says that he should "give guidance on the general principles on which revenue grants shall be based", but those general principles should have regard to general economic conditions. To give guidance without any acknowledgment of the economic conditions at the time would be nonsense. We are not ruling out guidance, and the type of guidance which we are proposing in the amendment would, I think, be helpful and I believe would be welcomed by the authority: general guidance as to general principles which should have regard to the economic conditions prevailing.
To enable that principle to be followed, Amendment No. 33 would remove the references in paragraphs (a), (b) and (c) to the three specific matters. This is another amendment which attempts to be helpful in carrying out the Government's desire to give guidance, but we say it should be proper guidance, once again to restore the confidence that the
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authorities must have which, frankly, is being demolished by many of the provisions in the Bill.
Lord Bellwin: We have already debated under Amendment No. 19 and the related amendments the effects of removing the Secretary of State's power to give guidance to the authorities as to the maximum amount he considers appropriate for revenue support. I do not wish to repeat all those arguments again, but Amendment No. 29 would, in essence, have the same effect. It would limit the Secretary of State's guidance simply to the broad economic principles on which revenue support should be based, leaving authorities to determine the levels of revenue support by reference to any other factors they choose. The Government cannot accept this proposal.
As regards Amendment No. 33, one of the principal tasks for any Secretary of State must be to exercise his functions with due regard to the national resources available for items of expenditure. It is proper that he should take such a view, both in relation to his direct functions and in relation to his role in influencing the policies and expenditure of other bodies, such as local authorities. As I have said in the past, the level of subsidy by the metropolitan authorities for passenger transport has increased very rapidly in the last three years from £200 million to £400 million. Forecasts last summer were showing £700 million for 1983–84. With the ever-increasing burden of funding these subsidies being met by taxpayers and ratepayers, the Secretary of State must take a view, as successive Governments have done.
Equally, with such large sums of taxpayers' and ratepayers' money involved, surely it is only right and proper that an overall view should be taken by the Secretary of State of the benefits which result from the use of their money. There is some evidence to suggest that the higher the subsidy, the more inefficient the transport undertaking becomes. As I said on Second Reading, the fact is that since 1970 the costs in real terms have increased by over 50 per cent. and I repeat that that is the increase in real terms. Many would want to know where the benefit is received for the extra cost of the 50 per cent. That is why it is essential that we ensure that this money is put to good use and that taxpayers and ratepayers get good value for their money. That is why the Bill refers to the benefits of subsidy.
The reference to the past and present levels of authorities' expenditure on revenue support is also an important factor for the Secretary of State to consider when setting his guidance. This will ensure that, in the light of their past policies, authorities are not given guidance figures which could require major and unrealistic change to their fare and service levels. Wild fluctuations in policies would simply disrupt the transport undertakings and benefit nobody and that is not what any one wants to see. Therefore, we recognise that changes cannot be made overnight so, in the interest of stability, past policies must be taken into account. Removing this provision would not, I suggest, be in the authorities' best interests.
The amendment would leave matters so that the Secretary of State had to have regard to the general duty of the authority and the executive, while leaving out the matters set out in Clause 4(6)(a), (b) and (c).

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These are all important issues to consider when the guidance figures are set. I just do not think that the interests of the authorities, the transport users or the ratepayers and taxpayers would be best served by these amendments, and I would hope that the noble Lord may, on reflection, agree with me.
3.44 p.m.
Lord Sefton of Garston: I do not think that the noble Lord, Lord Bellwin, has done himself a service by reading some of the briefs that have been given to him. It would be better for democracy as a whole if the noble Lord, Lord Bellwin, stuck to his first statement this afternoon—namely, that he will not repeat the arguments that he used on other occasions. Indeed, he really should not do so. The justification that the noble Lord, Lord Bellwin, and all the speakers on the Government Front Bench put forward was that these subsidies were of such a proportion that they were endangering the proper running of our economy. I hold second fiddle to no one as regards that principle. As a member of a local authority for many years I always subscribed to the view that the national economy—macro-economics—was a matter for central Government. Even though it may be taken as a criticism of some local authorities at the moment, I still adhere to that view. The Government have a right to say what is the maximum, but the brief which has just been read and which was closely followed by other noble Lords, goes further than that.
If we look at the Bill we see that it is not a question of central Government defending the economy. The figures that were given for total subsidies to transport are not the effective figures. The effective figures, in so far as they may have any consequences on the national economy, are the difference between the protected expenditure level and the total subsidy that may be given, and that would be less than the figures quoted by the noble Lord, Lord Bellwin. If we examine those figures we find that they come nowhere near the expenditure that this nation incurred on the Falklands exercise which the Chancellor of the Exchequer said that he could pick up quite easily in the scope of our economy. He said that he really would not have to adjust his Budget to deal with that massive expenditure. Yet we are being told that this matter of subsidy is having such an effect on our national economy that the Government should step in and prevent local authorities from doing it.
That was the argument put forward right at the beginning as a justification for the Government's taking these powers and I did not disagree with it. But what do we get now?—the brief talks about other things. Let us go to the Bill and see what it says. If a local authority does not comply with the limits and exceeds the expenditure which, in the opinion of the Secretary of State, would be appropriate
"for the Authority to make in the year in question, and if the amount proposed by them would be greater than that amount, he may indicate"
what a gentle word
"to the Authority the respects in which the plan or any modification proposed by them would need to be altered to take account of his guidance".
What on earth does that mean? It means in the case of Merseyside that the Minister is to become involved
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in the question of transportation costs between the Wirral and the north bank of the Mersey. It means that the Minister is to become involved in the question of whether a subsidy should be paid in greater proportion to people travelling from the older areas of Liverpool and the newer areas of Liverpool where most of the unemployed are to be found. It means that the Minister will be involved in the question of how much subsidy should be given to the people in Kirkby and other districts entirely different from Liverpool in order that they can maintain necessary social and economic contacts with the place where they were born. That is what it means if it means anything at all.
I can tell the Minister from my experience in Merseyside that no transportation plan was ever drawn up in Merseyside that did not have at its very root the consequences of that plan upon the social life of Merseyside. As I said on Second Reading, Liverpool was once the council that operated the transport undertakings for Merseyside. It did not stop at Liverpool's boundary; it went through Bootle and into Lancashire and into Widnes. The Liverpool transport undertaking served all of those areas. We were compelled to move our population into some of those areas because of the terrible congestion that existed in the centre. Liverpool as a local authority then deliberately embarked upon the step of subsidising people in other districts because they realised that even if local government boundaries were well out of date as regards matching the economic and social needs of an area, they did not have to be out of date with their thinking.
The Minister must take all those factors into account under this clause if he is to deal with any modifications in the plan. I submit again, as I submitted on Second Reading, that it is criminal lunacy to expect that anyone in Whitehall can possibly settle those questions. The amendment moved by my noble friend Lord Underhill is clear and explicit. It agrees with what the noble Lord, Lord Bellwin, has always held to be a tenet of good government—that in fact the job of central Government is to look at the picture as a whole and to declare a limit and to give reasons.
There is one other factor. I would like to know from the Minister when he does give his reasons and when he does decide between the local authority and Whitehall—because what it boils down to in the end is the Minister deciding between the local authority and some moguls in Whitehall—whether he will give that information to the House of Commons? Will he give it to this House? Will the democratic machinery on a national level—we shall already have eliminated the local level—be taken into consideration and will he give his reasons to the House of Commons and to this Chamber when he takes that decision?
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: I will go along this far with the noble Lord the Minister; that, although he did not observe his own self-denying ordinance, it would be undesirable to repeat the arguments which we had yesterday. Therefore, I shall not concentrate on that part of the amendment which refers to the guidance which it is proposed that the Secretary of State should give on acceptable levels of revenue grant.
Lord Bellwin: In case it will help the noble Lord, I had thought that it might be helpful to the Committee in response to the noble Lord, Lord Sefton, if I were to go over those points again. So the noble Lord may wish to refer to them.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: By all means. What I wanted to do—and I am sure that the Minister will be able to respond to both points at the same time—was to refer to the last few lines of the subsection which it is proposed should be replaced by the words in the amendment. I would remind the Committee of them. The Secretary of State shall indicate to the authority:
"the respects in which the plan or any modification proposed by them would need to be altered to take account of his guidance."
We know what those words mean. They do not simply mean that the Secretary of State will write a sentence or two saying, "We think you are a bit above here or there", or, "There is something funny about your reasoning somewhere else".
What it means—and it has been made quite clear already—is that the Secretary of State and his civil servants will take a very detailed look indeed at the operations of each passenger transport executive. Indeed, they say so quite explicitly, because one of the five points of information which will be required from the executive is explicitly a disaggregated analysis of the performance of particular groups of services. That is spelt out as saying that it could provide an analysis of financial performance by time of day, peak, off-peak and evening, between weekday, Saturday and Sunday services, giving details of the percentage of revenue support going to each service group, the percentage of passenger miles and vehicle miles which they represented, and their revenue cost ratios. It might also provide a similar analysis for, say, the 10 per cent. of services which have the highest and lowest revenue cost ratios.
These are perfectly proper things for someone to investigate. They are certainly matters which the passenger transport executive ought to be responsible for producing. They are also matters which it is right that the authority should take into consideration when considering its revenue grant. But surely it cannot be right for three different groups of people to analyse all these disaggregated data: for us to have the executive, the authority and the Department of Transport all making the same analyses in parallel.
As my noble friend Lady Denington will remember, in the Greater London Council in the mid-1970s we had about 20 people involved in transportation planning, of whom I think six were specifically dedicated to the consideration of plans, estimates, capital proposals and so on of London Transport. That was a modest figure. I hope that the figure has not increased since then. In contrast, the London Transport Executive itself had a very much larger traffic planning department, or whatever its name was. Indeed, it was so large that in County Hall we used to call it the Congolese Army.
What is now proposed, if the Bill is accepted unamended, is that we shall have a third large group of people doing the same job over in Marsham Street. I suspect that if the Government persist in rejecting this amendment and amendments of this kind, they will come under the very critical scrutiny of the successor
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of the noble Lord, Lord Rayner, because inevitably they will employ more civil servants to duplicate the work which is being done—and being done quite properly—by the executives and by the authorities.
I appeal to the Government in self-defence, if they are to escape the censure of the Civil Service Department and of the Prime Minister's Office, will they not reconsider the extent of the detail which they are now proposing both in administrative letters to the executives and in what is permitted by this Bill—that is, the amount of information which they will be demanding of these other authorities?
Lord Boyd-Carpenter: The noble Lord, Lord McIntosh of Haringey, carries a certain amount of conviction, with me at any rate, when he talks about the danger of accumulating excessive staffs at different levels. But to my mind he spoilt that argument when he said that the job was at present being done perfectly properly by the authorities and the executives. If that were really so, there would have been no need for this Bill. It is because of the failure of those authorities and executives to keep their demands on the ratepayers down to a reasonable level that the Government have thought fit—and in my view very rightly, and perhaps even a little belatedly, thought fit—to bring forward this Bill to introduce a measure of control. It is because of the failure of the local authorities properly so to control.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: I wonder whether the noble Lord would recognise a distinction between the analysis, about which I was talking, and the political decisions resulting from that analysis. He is, of course, at liberty to criticise the political decisions, but surely he is not advocating a duplication of the analysis?
Lord Boyd-Carpenter: The authorities to which the noble Lord refers are the bodies that take the political decisions as well as making the analysis, if indeed, from looking at some of them, they make any analysis at all and do not simply rely on political decisions, which may be an unworthy but I am not sure is a necessarily unjustified suspicion. I am afraid that we cannot get away from the fact that he said to your Lordships that this work was being done properly at the moment. It is quite clear that the work of analysis must be done now by people, not necessarily responsible to the authorities, not liable to be told what to do by them, but responsible to central Government. If his concern about the accumulations of staff is real (as I am sure it is) I would suggest that the sensible thing would be to reduce those staffs at local level. Perhaps I might make one general observation.
Lord Tordoff: If the noble Lord will allow me—
Lord Boyd-Carpenter: Perhaps I may just finish this sentence. Unless, indeed, local authorities make reductions in their staffs overall, the burden of the rates will be very excessive indeed. If the noble Lord, Lord Tordoff, is becoming excited, I will gladly give way to him.
Lord Tordoff: I am grateful to the noble Lord. Did I hear the noble Lord aright when he suggested that we should actually demolish the staff of the local

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authorities and centralise them in the Department of Transport? I thought that that was what I heard him say.
Lord Boyd-Carpenter: I did not use the word "demolish"; even on a Liberal interpretation of what I said, that word cannot be intruded. But what I would say, and certainly in reply to the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh of Haringey, is that I see no reason for transport staffs to be in the Greater London Council at all. I would far rather that, as under the system which I administered many years ago, London Transport was answerable directly to the Department of Transport, thereby obviating—and I hope that I carry the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, with me—any need or, indeed, excuse for the Greater London Council to have transport staffs at all.
In that sense, in reply to the noble Lord, Lord Tordoff, I would see the abolition of a local authority transport staff and, in the case of Greater London—let us be quite clear that this is what I am talking about—I would see that controlled from the central Government department by the same staffs as manage and look after the other forms of transport, such as the railways, with which London Transport competes. Indeed, the noble Lord is tempting me to open up on a line to which I have given some thought in recent years, but I must resist that temptation because its relevance to this amendment appears to be slightly tenuous, which is always the danger when responding to a Liberal intervention, as you are almost always enticed into irrelevance. But I hope that I have reassured the noble Lord.
To return to the amendment, the second amendment, No. 33, seeks to take out of the Bill words which seem to me to be absolutely vital, that is, considerations as to what the national economy will stand, which noble Lords opposite associated with local government always seem to brush aside. The noble Lord, Lord Sefton, does not seem to think that they are important at all. He brushes them aside: if people cannot get in from Kirkby, or wherever it is, comfortably, then the money has to be found anyhow. He entirely disregards the fact that all these resources compete with other demands for a limited level of national wealth. It is that which the central Government must defend, even if in so doing it diminishes the convenience of travel in various areas.
I should like to follow that a little further. It seems to be treated as axiomatic that large subsidy will produce better services. I express grave doubt as to whether that is so. Few things are more demoralising to anybody running an organisation, be it a transport organisation or anything else, than the knowledge that it does not matter how much you lose because somebody will come along and make up the difference by subsidy. That would demoralise the best of us.
If I may draw on my own experience in another form of transport, civil aviation, it is interesting to see how British Airways for years has been considerably overmanned until this was tackled, as it is being tackled most courageously, by Sir John King at the moment, because it had ultimately in one way or another the support of the British Government behind it, whereas its competitor, British Caledonian, which
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had no subsidy, has relied entirely on its own efforts, cut its staff heavily during the depression of 1973 when oil prices rose and, as a result, restored itself to full prosperity and has continued even in these difficult days for aviation to make a profit. There is an example there. It is dangerously easy thinking to believe that subsidy, and ever increasing subsidy, is a guarantee of efficiency. There is a considerable body of evidence to the contrary.
I am sure that my noble friend the Minister will not let me down on this. I very much hope that he will resist these two amendments, however agreeably and tactfully they have been put forward, as they always are by the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, who always moves his amendments in a way that suggests that involved is a trifling improvement which will make the Bill a bit better without affecting its main purpose. I hope your Lordships will have in mind that I am not exaggerating that the acceptance of these amendments would tear some of the guts out of the Bill.
4.3 p.m.
Lord Sefton of Garston: I am completely amazed, every time the noble Lord, Lord Boyd-Carpenter, speaks in this Committee, as to how he can develop a speech by making a false assumption first and then building a whole edifice on that false assumption.
Lord Boyd-Carpenter: Will the noble Lord allow me? I learned that from the noble Lord.
Lord Sefton of Garston: I did not quite hear that. At any rate, it was not important to what I am about to say. The false assumption about which the noble Lord on the Front Bench will disabuse your mind was that in some way I attach no importance to central Government deciding total figures. I said exactly that, and I am glad to see that the noble Lord agreed, because sometimes I have doubts whether the noble Lord, Lord Boyd-Carpenter, can understand Scouse. I said I agree with you. But the logic of your argument, if one listened to it, is that you should be moving an amendment to this Bill to exclude London from the contents of the Bill. All you have addressed yourself to is what the position was with you and London years ago.
There are six other metropolitan authorities. You got dangerously near agreeing with the Liberal spokesman by saying that he was right when he suggested that what you were talking about was the abolition of the section of the executive that dealt with planning in local transport, and you would want to leave it to Whitehall.
Lord Boyd-Carpenter: Would the noble Lord allow me again? He is always courteous. I would remind the noble Lord, if he is chiding me with not putting down an amendment to remove London from this Bill—and I doubt whether it would be within the scope of the Bill—that if he would be good enough to read the report of the Second Reading, he would see that on Second Reading I devoted at least a third of my speech to expressing my great disappointment that my noble friend had not included the removal of London Transport from the Greater London Council. I thought that I got a not wholly unsympathetic reply from my noble friend.
Lord Sefton of Garston: I agree with you. I disagree with you that you cannot move an amendment. There is nothing to prevent you moving an amendment.
Lord Boyd-Carpenter: It is outside the scope.
Lord Sefton of Garston: Perhaps we could have a conversation with somebody who knows more about Parliament than either you or I. I am assured that it would be possible to delete from the provisions of this Bill a place like London.
Lord Boyd-Carpenter: Well, move it.
Lord Sefton of Garston: You move it. You said logically that that is what you wanted. Let me come back to the other point about you wishing that the planning section of the executive in London should not be there and it should be done by central Government; in other words, by Whitehall. If you apply that argument to the other authorities included in the Bill, would you then wish that the section of their planning in the executive should be done by Whitehall? I am quite willing to give way if you would like to reply. You do not want to reply? I must imply that that means that you would not want—
Lord Boyd-Carpenter: The noble Lord must not tempt me, because he knows I always yield to temptation. As Oscar Wilde put it, I can resist anything except temptation. My argument was directed to Greater London. I have made no argument on the point of the provincial authorities, although I am quite happy to be persuaded by the noble Lord—and I think he is rather having that effect on me—that we should go further. My advocacy, however, at the moment relates to London.
Lord Sefton of Garston: I wonder whether your advocacy in regard to London is not also apparent in the Government's mind about the rest of the transportation authorities. I believe it very much is. On the point about whether or not that should be done at Whitehall, I do not know, and I am not prepared to get into an argument about London; but I know that it would be criminally wrong to take away from local authorities in the northern parts of this country the ability to plan.
You implied that I was not sympathetic to the approach that the Government should be in control of the overall figure. I have established that you were wrong in that. You then went on to say that that was the purpose of the Bill. You seem to have read the amendment, because in fact what you were doing was putting forward the case for the amendment. You were saying in no mistaken terms that that is the job of the Government; that you agreed that it was the job of the Government to discuss the effects on the national economy, and you went no further than that. That is what you said. Yet in fact the amendment says that it is the job of the Government to put forward figures on a global figure; but the Bill says that the Government may indicate to the authority the respects in which the plan, or any modification proposed by them, would need to be altered. That is minutiae. It is the details of planning in the other authorities. I would like to hear
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you say whether or not you agree that those details should be determined in Whitehall.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: I was directly challenged by the noble Lord, Lord Boyd-Carpenter, to say whether I went along with him in his assertion that it would be right to avoid duplication, or triplication, of analytical work, and that this should be taken away from the local authorities and the executives. The answer is that I do not go along with him. If he is suggesting that, I hope he will be repudiated by the Government Front Bench. What he is proposing is an incitement to illegal action by the Greater London Council and the metropolitan authorities, as I think he very well knows. It is the duty of the authorities to consider, and take into account, all the factors which are put forward by the executive for the proper running of a public transport system. It is then their duty to take into account the other things which are within their remit—the issues of road policy, of other transportation expenditure, and so on—and to come to a conclusion about it in terms of the revenue grant that they propose to make.
The noble Lord may not like the conclusions they come to; that is his privilege. But if he is suggesting that, in a choice between who does the work, that it should be done by central Government rather than by local government, I hope that not only this side of the Committee but also the Government Front Bench and other members of the Conservative Party will firmly repudiate that extreme centralist dogma.
Lord Bellwin: I suggest that the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, considering the authority from which he comes, should not be talking too much about extreme political dogma. And when he talks about incitement by my noble friend to the GLC in respect of illegalities—well, need I say more?
I listened with interest to the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Sefton, and his comments about matters receiving long consideration. I am sure my noble friend Lord Boyd-Carpenter will agree that it should be central Government who decide the overall parameters. The noble Lord was a staunch advocate of that on many occasions when I was with him in years gone by. I am sure nothing has changed that, and therefore I make that observation without hesitation.
While accepting that the noble Lord, Lord Sefton, always make his observations—and he made some fervent ones today—with a sincerity which I respect, I wonder whether he always gives the same respect to those who feel equally fervently but who hold an opposite point of view. I say that because we must ask why we are in the present situation and why are we talking about subsidies. The answer is that, as with so many things, some local authorities have not been prepared in the slightest to take into account the overall parameters suggested to them by the Government. Some have not been concerned in the slightest to maintain a balance of reasonableness as between what people should pay and what they can afford to pay for using the service.
When I hear people talking about local autonomy and democracy, I sometimes feel sad because of some of the things that are happening in local government today—the extremes to which many authorities are

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going and which are leading to the very factors which, in the end, compel central Government to come in and take steps to protect those who otherwise cannot be protected. Therefore, it is no good complaining and tirading against the Government for being compelled to do things as a result of certain actions by some; and I say that with the same conviction as the noble Lord, Lord Sefton, makes his comments.
Having said that, I wish immediately to reassure my noble friend that I shall not let him down in relation to the Government's attitude to the amendment. However, it might be helpful—perhaps I should have done this yesterday—if I were to spell out in rather more detail, if the Committee will bear with me, the bases, factors and criteria which will be applied. I feel that I should spell those out carefully so that they are in Hansard and then my remarks can be read, quoted and used in any other way your Lordships may wish.
The basic point about the provisional figures in the White Paper is that they are provisional. The Secretary of State has no power to set figures before the Bill is enacted. When the AMA came to see him last autumn, they pressed for advance indications to help them in preparing their budgets, and that is what he gave them. But he made it clear that he was ready to consider any relevant material supplied by authorities before he set the actual figures. How those will be set will be governed by the Bill, in particular the considerations in Clause 4(6), besides the national considerations he envisaged, taking into account the type of information suggested in the two planning documents which have been circulated widely to authorities for their comments. I doubt if those contain any surprises for authorities; it is material they need in order to reach judgments themselves about fares, services, cost savings and subsidies.
Hitherto, the main provision of data for proposed subsidies has been set out in authorities' transport policy and programme documents. As a basis for indicating provisional figures, my right honourable friend studied those documents and the other information that authorities and executives provided about their proposals for public transport provision to meet the needs of their areas. That enabled the Secretary of State to take account of the position in each authority; the level of subsidy being paid, the specific benefits expected to result, the present level of fares and the history of recent changes, together with such factors as the demand for services, the level of services provided, the cost of providing them and the actual income derived from fares.
The other part of the equation is the national subsidy picture and, within that—given that resources are not unlimited—how effectively each authority is using those resources. One tool which the department has been developing for some time—and is anxious to share with local authorities—is a set of techniques for assessing the benefits of subsidy. These can be used, first, to suggest what combination of fare and service levels would present the most appropriate use of subsidy in each area. Secondly, they can be used to suggest how a given level of resources at the national level could be distributed between the different authorities so as to provide comparable value for money in each case. Details of the cost benefit analysis method
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on which we are working have already been sent to local authorities, and we hope to develop that further in collaboration with those working in the field.
Useful though they are, what techniques of that kind cannot do is provide an automatic answer as to what level of subsidy is right in each case. They cannot, of themselves, take account of all the relevant factors relating to the individual circumstances of each area, a point to which I have referred. For example, the actual position in which each authority finds itself today will inevitably affect the pace at which adjustments can be made, and that will have to be reflected when the Secretary of State gives his guidance.
The context of that process must be how much is appropriate within the total national resources, for which there are a myriad competing claims. The Government could not endorse the kind of plans that the local authorities were putting forward. I have already said that we have been talking about subsidies which have doubled in the past three years; and it was being proposed that they should be put up to £700 million. That, clearly, would be out of all proportion.
The provisional guidance figures published in the White Paper represent a reasonable balance between the value for money that can be achieved for the use of transport subsidies in our major cities and the many competing demands on the national economy. The proposed PELs total £436 million, including £95 million for depreciation and renewal for London Transport. That is considerably in excess of the £330 million which corresponds to the level of expenditure accepted for TSG in 1982–83.
I hope the Committee feels it was useful for me to have given that information, and I hope I have set the position out clearly. I suppose that to some extent the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, will be entitled to say that we have moved away from parts of the amendment, but I do not think that is the case from the point of view of the principle of the matter. We have had a long debate on this amendment. If nothing else, that has brought out the great concern everyone has about the whole matter. However. I must say again that there are views other than those expressed by noble Lords opposite, however sincerely they express them—as I know they do—but the fact remains that the Government cannot accept the amendment because there must now be a greater clarification of the issues and steps to bring the whole situation back to reasonableness.
4.18 p.m.
Baroness Fisher of Rednal: It is rather worrying for some of us that we should constantly be debating London Transport services. They are only one of the undertakings in this country and it is unfortunate that they are always used as an example. I come from the West Midlands and we have nothing to hide. Indeed, it might be well for the noble Lord, Lord Boyd-Carpenter, to come to Birmingham and the West Midlands to see what goes on with an intergrated service.
The Monopolies and Mergers Commission was asked to look at the provision of services by the West Midlands Passenger Transport Executive, and the commission was reported to have said, among other things, in its findings:

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"The executive did not operate its position of monopoly provision against the public interest. It was criticised, however, for being overzealous in the changes it was bringing about in the lines of communication, with a faster response to operational problems and with a better service being provided".
In other words, they were criticised for being over-efficient, and even that was just a passing remark. There was certainly no suggestion that the West Midlands executive was operating against the public interest.
I should like to follow up what the noble Lord the Minister has just said about concern. Of course there is concern—and again I refer to the West Midlands figures. I asked for this information during the Second Reading. The figures in the White Paper show that the estimate for the West Midlands is £28 million, which is equivalent to £11 per head. The average amount that the Secretary of State is giving to metropolitan counties outside London—that is, every metropolitan county except the West Midlands—is £19 per head of the population. Is an executive that has been praised by the Monopolies and Mergers Commission to be penalised by receiving less because it has been proved efficient? Therefore, as the noble Lord the Minister said, there is concern about the figures that are in the White Paper, and I would say on behalf of the West Midlands that that concern is very great.
There has been discussion about cost analysis and people in Whitehall going into the details. Is it necessary for people in Whitehall to ask about the intervals of time between each bus on a particular route, especially when eventually, about four buses converge on the same route? Is it important for them to ask at what time of the day most of the fares are collected, when in fact the majority of passengers use cards which they buy and which enable them to get cheap fares for periods of a month, three months, or six months? Is it important that the people in Whitehall should know the shift patterns of each individual bus crew? Is it important for the civil servants to know such things? Are they going to dissect every ticket thrown on to the floor of the bus as passengers get off? If those are the kind of questions that are now being asked, we are getting into a ridiculous situation; and I have been given that information. Thus there is concern.
In conclusion, I would say that in the Bill let us concentrate on transport undertakings. Let us bear in mind Tyne and Wear, where there is an excellent integrated transport system. I know full well about the West Midlands, and I realise that the noble Lord, Lord Sefton of Garston, would say that the transport undertaking in his part of the world is competent. So let us concentrate upon the great number of transport executives and the authorities that are doing a good job of work, and make quite sure that the Bill fits those bodies.
Lord Mishcon: I would not have intervened on what I suppose is really a Second Reading point had the noble Lord the Minister and the noble Lord, Lord Boyd-Carpenter, not seen fit to make to the Committee speeches which attacked and wounded, but which did not have sufficient courage to carry through their reasoning to any logical conclusion. I assure your Lordships' Committee that were it not for that, I would not have intervened. But it is an extraordinary
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Government and, bearing in mind his courage, it is an extraordinary Lord Boyd-Carpenter.
On this side of the Chamber we have said that local government, its dignity and powers, are being strangled by central government. The noble Lord the Minister gets up and says, "Oh well, there are certain authorities that have brought this upon themselves", and presumably the good ones have to suffer for the bad. One answers the noble Lord the Minister by saying, "Democracy—a precious, wonderful flower of this country—is something that is nurtured at the elections which are held". The Minister then says, "Ah! but you see this is not true, because there are so many people who pay rates"—and apparently rates are an iniquitous way of raising the money. "We are dealing with rates here, not tax. When people go over the limit, it is all wrong. Some ratepayers do not have a vote".
In a manifesto years and years ago the Conservative Party stated: "Abolish rates—that is what we will do". Yet here we are in 1983 and rates have not been abolished. But the Government are abolishing local authorities' powers and dignity. They say that the wrong people are voting for local authority representatives. There is no commercial vote. Do not the Government have time for this in their legislative programme, bearing in mind that in this Session and the last Session so many fiddling Bills—I ask your Lordships' Committee to forgive me for putting it that way—have gone through? What about a Bill—let us see whether the country would wear it—in which the commercial vote is given? The Government have the right to do it.
The extraordinary cowardice and inertia of the Government are exemplified by the noble Lord, Lord Boyd-Carpenter. He is an absolute expert on legislation—and I mean that with respect. There is not a note of sarcasm in my voice—and I hesitate only because I am lost for words, and not for any dramatic effect. The noble Lord knows how important is the wording of the Long Title of the Bill—and I had better read it out:
"An Act to make further provision which respect to the finances and management of certain Transport Executives".
There was nothing—and I say this having received certain advice—to stop the Government, and there was nothing to stop the noble Lord, Lord Boyd-Carpenter, had he had the courage, to put down an amendment, providing that the management, financial control and all the rest of it in regard to transport in London should be taken away from the GLC. There was nothing to stop the noble Lord putting down such an amendment. There was nothing to stop the Government providing for that in the Bill. Why did they not do it? They did not do it because they have been told—and this is the one bit of very good advice that has been given by their administration and those whom I know serve them loyally as their civil servants—"For heaven's sake! don't touch London Transport. It is a financial burden. It has terrible problems. Leave it to the Greater London Council, and bash the Greater London Council".
As I said, I would not have intervened, but it is such a sad sight to see so many gallant people lacking in courage, except in the use of words during a debate at the Committee stage of the Bill.
4.29 p.m.
Lord Bellwin: I have to smile when the noble Lord accuses us of indulging in Second Reading debating points. Yes, we sometimes rise to the bait. The noble Lord, Lord Sefton of Garston, smiles unapologetically for making such points all the time, and I certainly do not object to them, so long as we recognise them for what they are; and, I suppose, why not make them on a Bill of this kind which concerns people so deeply? For myself I make no real complaint as to that, provided that I am not criticised when in return I respond in like kind.
The noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, always puts his points so eloquently. When he talks about rates and rate reform, I say, "You have to have patience". We are still in 1983, and perhaps I should say no more than that. otherwise I shall be in very big trouble. The noble Lord spoke about people saying, "Bash the Greater London Council". My goodness! there art many more people apart from those of us on this side of the Chamber who would like to do that in more ways than one, and in regard to more than one subject. The noble Lord also spoke about people saying, "Why not take transport away from the GLC?" Again he tempted us so greatly, but all I can say is that we shall have to wait and see as to that.
The fact is that the Bill has been drawn up for specific purposes that are clearly laid down. It is to do with restoring some kind of sense in terms of subsidy. It is there to provide a greater clarity than at present exists. None of your Lordships opposite has said other than that there is a need for clarification and clarity and a level beyond which there will be no legal challenge. I should have thought that that was a great plus for everybody concerned. If to arrive at that point means getting into the nuts and bolts in a way that, on the one hand, noble Lords seem to like and, on the other, some seem not to like, then so be it. The fact is that, if I dare bring the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, back to the amendment after one hour, I would have to repeat what I said at the beginning: that the Government have to resist the amendment.
Lord Sefton of Garston: Is it the intention of the Government, under Clause 4(5), when they have finalised their decision, to report that decision to Parliament?
Lord Bellwin: I should be rather astonished if the Government has to bring back to Parliament every note of guidance to every authority. I should have thought not. Should it be otherwise, I will tell the noble Lord.
Lord Underhill: I do not think that the noble Lord the Minister has to tempt me to get back to the amendment, because no one can complain that I have given a Second Reading speech in the course of dealing with any of the amendments I have moved. The hour's debate that we have had has been very valuable—not just on these amendments but in showing a difference of outlook between those of us who believe in transport for the community and those who have other outlooks on it; and also, frankly, (despite all the words that have been used) for the outlook upon confidence in local bodies to take local decisions. Running
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through this Bill and through what has been said this afternoon—and I do not want to tempt Lord Boyd-Carpenter to speak again, but he as good as said it—is that these bodies should no longer continue the analysis of transport issues. Take it away from them—that is what he said. It is no good the Minister tut-tutting—
Lord Boyd-Carpenter: The noble Lord has tempted me because he has misrepresented me. I answered a question from one of his noble friends explicitly to say that I favour taking away transport from the Greater London Council. I very much hope that my noble friend and the Government in due course will take action to do that. Precise methods of doing it are a matter of judgment and tactics. I expressly said that I did not include in that hope the other metropolitan authorities. If the noble Lord will look at Hansard tomorrow he will see that that is the case.
Lord Underhill: If I have misquoted the noble Lord, I shall apologise. He said that if the authorities were doing their job there would be no need for the Bill. That was in the plural and not the singular. I accept what he has said about not knowing about the other areas. The only trouble is that this Bill does concern other areas. It concerns Tyne and Wear, West Yorkshire, South Yorkshire, West Midlands, Merseyside and Greater Manchester. These are vast areas. Frankly, if we are not going to take them into consideration, then we ought to have had a separate Bill dealing only with London and leaving the other areas alone. Otherwise, frankly—and I am not going to tempt Lord Boyd-Carpenter again—one should be very careful about coming to any amendment to this Bill without the prefacing words: "I am talking only about Greater London". Otherwise, noble Lords will get a false impression of what Members are saying.
As my noble friend Lord Sefton has said, we are not challenging the right of central Government to fix the national grant for any service. In this case, it fixes it under TSG. We are not arguing that at all. What we are arguing is that when a local body responds to the pressures from its own people, when it responds to the needs of its own people, and says, "We must do this and we will pay for it", the Government start interfering. Some interesting things were said in this debate. Higher subsidies mean more inefficient undertakings. You can toss that off as a phrase; but it is said. But I want proof; I want evidence. My noble friend Lady Fisher quoted the West Midlands. Later on upon another amendment we shall tell you of the consultations which some of the PTEs and PTAs have carried out into their own workings. They are not just spending money for the sake of it. Let us remember that all these people are themselves ratepayers.
Some of the things that have been said disregard the need for some of the services. I will give one figure, and one figure only, off the top of my head. I believe that we were told that at Tyne and Wear 40 per cent. of the people have to use public transport to go to work—that is, those who are working. That affects the employers. In London prices could affect London weighting and the cost of salaries and wages in London. Transport, therefore, is not something just quoted in the sky. It affects ordinary people's lives,

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industry and commerce. That is why the various PTAs and PTEs feel it necessary to respond to the needs of their people. That is what we are arguing about.
I listened very carefully to the noble Lord the Minister outlining the criteria. I prefer to read in Hansard what he has said, but I have a pretty good idea that he said what he said at Second Reading. If they are merely going to interfere in the plan after all the discussions the authority would have had and are going to propose modifications, then we propose taking that part out of the Bill. I come back to the question of how the Secretary of State is going to interfere and say, "You must change the plan this way or that way". Local details. Local information. No PTE is going to run services for the sake of running services—with nobody on them. I have heard comments in this Committee suggesting that because a bus is only one-third full, it should be taken off. What do people do? Do they walk for four, five or six miles? No service is to be provided. That is what the PTEs and the PTAs are doing. We have had an interesting debate and some disclosures on the Government side which may be very helpful in looking at other proposals in the Bill, but I would prefer to read what has been said. I think that the best service I can do is to beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
4.38 p.m.
Lord Underhill Lord Underhill moved Amendment No. 30:
Page 5, line 2, leave out from ("question") to end of line 5.
The noble Lord said: I will not continue with the previous arguments. We are proposing to delete certain words from Clause 4. We emphasise that there is nothing in the Bill which prevents a PTA from exceeding the guidance figures but, as we have heard in the previous debate, Clause 4(5) provides that when the PTA submits its three-year plan to the Secretary of State, he shall give his guidance figure for the first year of the plan; and if the proposals in the first year of the plan involve a figure of revenue support greater than the guidance figure then the Secretary of State can tell the PTA in what respect the plan,
"needs to be altered to take account of his guidance".
As I said in the last debate, this power may be used for very detailed interference in the plan. It still gives more encouragement to challenge any determination in excess of guidance. Let us remember that, while we have had assurance after assurance given that the decisions are to be taken locally by the authorities, there is always the threat—and the threat is made as completely as you want in the Government's White Paper, on which there was no consultation and which was issued at the same time as the Bill—that if an authority does not accept the guidance it lays itself open to court action. That is quite clear. There is encouragement after encouragement given in the Bill for people to take that action.
If there is this encouragement for a determination in the courts in excess of the guidance, it further indicates the reality that—while it is a plan to be worked out solely by the PTE in the first instance and then given to the PTA for approval—the Secretary of State at the end of the day is to have powers to tell a PTA to
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change its plan. That is what the Bill says. The clause reads:
"any modification proposed by them would need to be altered to take account of his guidance."
That brings in all the detailed points to which my noble friend Lady Fisher referred.
The amendment leaves the provision that, when the plan is presented to the Secretary of State, he may give guidance on the maximum amount of revenue grant. The amendment would delete that part of subsection (5) under which he can indicate to the PTA where the plan should be modified. And, make no mistake about it, it is clear from the Bill that, if a PTA did not take notice of his suggestions to change this or that, it could be held as an excess of its power, and it could be challenged in the courts and have action taken against it, or even, as the White Paper states, a surcharge on councillors.
Therefore, the Secretary of State has this power. I hope that the Minister will tell us quite clearly, if the Secretary of State is to retain this power in the subsection to indicate where modifications should be made in the plan, how he will do the things which my noble friend Lady Fisher raised? How is he to say that things should be changed? How is he to say: "You should not run this number of services?" That is what it means. How is he to say that services are being run too frequently?
I hope that the Minister will not say that all this will be talked about on a later clause, when we discuss more efficiency. He can say to the PTA what modifications there can be in their plan. I should like to know how he will do this, how he will collect the information, how many civil servants there will be to analyse this and how decisions will be taken without regard to the needs of people in the locality. I beg to move.
Lord Bellwin: I do not think that this amendment is in the best interests of the authorities, and I am sure that it stems from a misapprehension as to the Secretary of State's power in Clause 4(5) to suggest modifications to the plan. The purpose of that power is to enable the Secretary of State, where his guidance differs from the levels of subsidy which the authority propose in their plan, to suggest to the authority ways in which their plan might be changed in order to comply with his guidance. But, just as the authority can ignore the guidance, so, too, can they ignore these suggested amendments to their plan. The authority are not bound to the modifications suggested. Because the provision appears near the end of the clause, your Lordships might feel that it is the last step in the proceedings. This is not so. The last step occurs, in fact, under the provisions of subsection (1), where the authority are left free to decide the plan and the level of subsidy.
Having said that, it must be helpful to authorities to know the views of the Secretary of State on their plans, and his view of the ways in which they might be adapted to accord with his guidance. How else can they decide whether or not to keep within that guidance? They may, nevertheless, decide to keep within the guidance, but not to adopt the Secretary of State's modifications; they are able to make alternative changes of their own. So the authorities are left with

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complete freedom to decide matters under Clause 4(1). The amendment would not serve a useful purpose. Worse, it would leave authorities unclear about the Secretary of State's view on the way in which the plan might be adopted to accord with his guidance. Indeed, I think the amendment would be a hindrance to the authorities and that is why we cannot accept it.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: I have noted that, in his speeches on the last amendment and in his reply to my noble friend on this amendment, the noble Lord the Minister has not made any attempt to deny the allegations made by my noble friend Lady Fisher. If the Committee will remember, she gave examples of the kind of inquiries which are already being demanded of passenger transport executives—inquiries about lead times and about routes. She even talked about examining the stubs of bus tickets. If that is not the case, and if the civil servants are not getting into that sort of detail, surely it is incumbent on the Government to deny it and to give some convincing evidence that these allegations are untrue. As it is, I am afraid that the Minister's response to this amendment is quite unsatisfactory, and it is not any good pretending that it is in the interests of the authorities that these words should remain. If it is really the intention of the Government to fulfil their proper responsibilities with regard to the control of central Government expenditure on public transport, then we must accept that there is a limit to central Government subsidy which is to be devoted to that purpose.
I have to say, again, that that is not what this Bill is about. This Bill is about the level of revenue grants given by local authorities, and not about the level of subsidy given by central Government. If it is the intention—and I would not accept that that was reasonable—to control the level of revenue grants to local authorities, on the grounds that it is alleged that some authorities have been extravagant in their revenue grants, no matter that they are making their grants after submitting themselves to election by the people of their area, then it is proper that the Government should give some guidance as to the maximum amount of the grant.
What cannot be proper, and what does not follow in any way from the arguments that have been made so far, is that the Government should intervene in the detailed running of the executive, and should give detailed indications to the authority on the respects to which the plan, or modification proposed by them, would need to be altered to take account of his guidance. That is saying, again, that the civil servants will do these detailed jobs about local transport planning, which ought to be done by the professionals and which ought to be controlled by the politicians, who are responsible in their own area. There should not be a single civil servant in Marsham Street concerning himself, or herself, with these matters. Until the Government are able to give us the assurance that there will not be that sort of detailed intervention, that sort of detailed sloughing around in matters of local responsibility. Otherwise they will not carry conviction in their opposition to this amendment.
Lord Teviot: Before my noble friend replies, I should like to answer one or two points made by the noble
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Baroness, Lady Fisher, and the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh. I cannot see anything too terrible about the Ministry of Transport knowing details of passengers carried and so on. If they do not know the nuts and bolts, how on earth can they give an opinion at all? As regards central Government knowing about passengers carried, I think that the people, too, should know how many passengers are carried on certain routes, because people need to understand why certain things are done.
I know that people feel very strongly in certain areas where services are working well, such as the West Midlands and Tyne and Wear, which have integrated transport systems. What is wanted are very full services. We want people to travel on them. If central Government know the details, that does not mean that they will cut out buses on Sundays or in the early evenings, just for the sake of doing it. At the end of the day, the buses must carry more people, and it is better to maintain a service than to cut it out altogether. I do not think that this amendment would help the Bill at all. As regards counting the number of tickets on the floor, an authority will want to know the way in which drivers and conductors work. I do not see anything too upsetting about that. Everyone should know, and not only central Government.
Lord Sefton of Garston: Was the gist of the noble Lord's speech that central Government will not insist on getting these details and going into them?
Lord Teviot: No. I said that if central Government are to give an opinion they should know about everything that is going on. If they do not know what is going on, we might as well not have the Bill.
Lord Tordoff: This is a circular argument. If the Bill is to work there will have to be an enormous number of civil servants. It goes back to the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Boyd-Carpenter: the only way to get out of that is to demolish local government. That is the track we are going down.
Lord Bellwin: On the point which has been made about information, may I say that, rightly or wrongly, information is not being demanded of PTEs. My noble friend Lord Teviot made a good case as to why it is necessary to have certain information. I doubt whether many would quarrel with that argument. However, the fact is that a consultation document is in existence. It sets out proposals for the content of the plans. We are looking forward to receiving the views of the PTAs and the PTEs on it, which indicates that we want it to make sense to them as well as to the Government and to everybody else concerned.
Lord Sefton of Garston: I have in front of me a document which the Government Front Bench did not have before them yesterday. It is the Department of Transport's revenue support assessment model. This model will be used to determine the protected expenditure level. I should like the noble Lord to stop me if I am wrong. I have only just seen this document—the Government Front Bench did not get it until yesterday—so I may have it wrong. One of the questions they will ask—the noble Lord seems to know what they will ask—is:
"changes in fares, to the extent that this is not a simple transfer."

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Could the noble Lord explain to the Committee just what that means in relation to the information that the department is going to insist on?
Lord Bellwin: One of the great weaknesses throughout has been the refusal of the association even to talk about this matter. The noble Lord says that there has been no consultation on the White Paper. They did not respond to the wish for consultation. This document says quite clearly: "These are proposals. Come on, PTAs; come on, PTEs. We want your suggestions about what should be in the plan. Make your suggestions. Then let us talk about them and agree them together". That, to me, makes sense, and I am sure that it makes sense to the noble Lord, Lord Sefton of Garston.
Lord Sefton of Garston: What does it mean?
Lord Bellwin: That we should discuss it—"and if you do not like what it says, let us see what else you suggest." That is what it means.
Lord Sefton of Garston: But what does this mean?
Lord Bellwin: What is the noble Lord referring to?
Lord Sefton of Garston: I have just read it out:
"changes in fares, to the extent that this is not a simple transfer."
I take the noble Lord's point, that they will need information, but what does that particular information convey to the noble Lord or to them?
Lord Bellwin: Probably it conveys as much to me as it does to the noble Lord, Lord Sefton. But that is not going to help either him or me. It is there for discussion, and that is what I expect to take place.
Lord Underhill: The noble Lord has referred again to the AMA. He should not say that the AMA did not want consultation. They were not given a chance to consult on the White Paper. It was published on the same day as the Bill. They were not asked to support the framework of the Bill or to criticise it and put forward alternative suggestions. I was at the offices of the AMA when we collected copies of the Bill and the White Paper. They had no chance to consult. Until the Bill is passed, why should they discuss how it is going to be implemented? They were prepared to discuss the framework of the Bill and they had one meeting with the Secretary of State. I believe the noble Lord referred to that meeting earlier this afternoon. Therefore, they were prepared to meet him. And there was another meeting at which the Under-Secretary of State at the department was present.
Lord Mishcon: May I take the Committee down a different path? This is not because I do not follow the same path as my noble friends who have already participated in the debate: it is because I want to take a different route in recommending the amendment to the Committee.
The procedure we are discussing is that the Secretary of State fixes, on advice, an amount, and the authority fixes an amount which is above that fixed by the Secretary of State. The amendment we are dealing
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with relates to words in the Bill which provide that if that happens the Secretary of State may point out to the authority, no doubt in some detail, the way in which he considers they ought to modify their plan in order to get either to his figure or nearer to his figure. The amendment seeks to delete that provision from the Bill, since it is a power given to national Government at the centre to do just that. In concentrating upon the other path, the members of the Committee are omitting, in my view, the major path towards a decision as to whether or not this amendment should be agreed to.
The Minister has said throughout that in his view the Bill is unlikely to worsen the relationship between central and local government. If these words are in the Bill, there will be an official document, which everybody can read, which points out that central Government differ from the transport authority and have made recommendations to it (I put it no higher than that) to alter its plan and its budget. Perhaps noble Lords would take it for granted that the authority does not agree with central Government. From that, two things flow. First, because the document is issued by the Secretary of State and therefore carries that amount of weight, it is an open inducement to anybody with knowledge of that document to charge the transport authority with expenditure which has gone unreasonably above the limit. The evidence of the Secretary of State's own document will be used. It will be said that the authority was warned about excessive expenditure and acted unreasonably because it did not accept what had been advocated in order to bring down its budget, if I may use that loose phrase.
What happens? The ratepayer, so incited, or the political person who wants to damage the authority because he does not like its political complexion, thereupon takes the authority to court. What does the judge do then? The judge is presented with an argument on behalf of the disgruntled ratepayer or the individual about whom I have spoken. The advocate before the judge says, "You can see how unreasonable the authority is. Central Government advocated modifications to this plan, and did so under the Act". The authority then says to the court, "We think that the Government did not take into account the social, environmental and other local considerations. That is why we did not want to follow the Government's amendments". The Committee is inviting by these words a conflict or an argument—possibly even a battle, and most likely it would be that—between central Government and the local authority in our courts. I am not overstating this; I respectfully submit to the Committee that I am not overstating this point in any way at all.
Your Lordships may ask, "If this were not in the Bill, what would be the reasonable position? Must central Government be quiet and not say a word?" Not a bit of it. We have been having the relationships of central Government and local authorities for goodness knows how many years now. There are local authority associations, and there are ways of dealing with the matter at local government level, both generally and particularly. If this clause were not in the Bill, there would be informal discussions between central Government and local government. Some of

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us might object to that but obviously it would be perfectly proper to say, "You're wrong. There are ways of doing this otherwise."
This would be done in the normal, informal way without any evidence being produced and without any document of this kind, which could be used. I shall not say that the present Secretary of State would use it, and I hope that I am right in having that confidence in him. But another Secretary of State might use it. He could say, "Don't think I am playing politics here; I am carrying out a duty—certainly a permissive power—that was imposed upon me under this Bill. It is an official document."
I do not wish to exaggerate this point because, as I have said, I always feel that one loses strength if one exaggerates. But I do ask the Committee to pause and consider this matter. I have made this point before, and we have our allies in various parts of the Committee. I am not on the point now of the complete independence of wild and woolly authorities. I am referring to the point that we must not legislate so as to see that the very words we use—and these are the words we are trying to remove—would permit the Secretary of State to invite alternative plans to bring the amount up; and would even indicate that a Secretary of State was lacking in his duty if he did not take advantage of that provision. We are walking into the arena of the unreasonable amount spent; the unreasonable charge upon the ratepayer by the authority. We are setting central Government against local government, not in the open arena of politics but in the courts. Is that what we want?
On Question, amendment negatived.
5.3 p.m.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey Lord McIntosh of Haringey move Amendment No. 31:
Page 5, line 5, at end insert—
("( ) Any guidance given by the Secretary of State under this Act shall be given not later than the 31st December of the year preceding the first year of the relevant period")
The noble Lord said: By leave of my noble friend Lord Underhill, I am encouraged in moving this amendment by the words of the noble Lord the Minister when responding to Amendment No. 21 yesterday. Perhaps I may remind the Committee of that which the amendment sought and what it was that the noble Lord said. The amendment sought that any advice given by the Secretary of State in the preparation of a plan should be given not later than 31st March of the year preceding the first year of the relevant period; that is, the first year of the three-year period for which the plan is produced. Replying, the noble Lord, Lord Bellwin, said:
"While I cannot accept the amendment I offer the Committee the assurance that the Secretary of State will do his best to meet the time-table it would require. If there is concern that the executives, for example, may find themselves held up in carrying out their duty to prepare their plan by delay in the giving of advice by the Secretary of State, I would point out that they are required only to take into account any advice given. If advice is not given then they can proceed without it. If it is given very late in the day, then probably not much account can be taken of it".—[Official Report, 28/2/83; col. 10141]
That amendment referred to the period available to both the executive and the authority to consult
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together and prepare the plan, which they would then submit to the Secretary of State in order to secure his guidance. Presumably the words "advice" and "guidance" mean very different things, otherwise different words would not have been used in different parts of the Bill.
It was reasonably said by the noble Lord the Minister that there were matters in the preparation of the advice which could be out of the control of the Secretary of State, and that the Secretary of State could find himself in an impossible situation if he were obliged by statute to respond to a particular date. On that basis, and on the basis of the other statements made by the noble Lord, Amendment 21 was withdrawn.
The situation with regard to this amendment is rather different, because here we are asking that there should be a fixed date for the preparation and publication of guidance to the authority in order that the authority may set its precept for the following year. I do not need to remind the Committee that the time available between 31st December and the precept, and then the rate-setting time, is very short. There is a serious danger, if guidance arrived later than 31st December, that the authority may find itself giving inadequate consideration to the guidance; inadequate for the proper preparation of its precept in time that it may go to the district and borough councils for them to prepare their rates, and for it then to be promulgated in time for the rates to be collected from 1st April.
There are, therefore, extremely serious constraints on the time of the authorities after 31st December. Indeed, recent action by the courts has shown that unless authorities give the most detailed line by line, clause by clause, consideration to their budgets—can show that they have given them that degree of consideration—and can show that they have paid attention to all the legal advice which they are forced nowadays to take into consideration when preparing their budgets, then they are liable to have even the most reasonable budget overturned in the courts. It is ludicrous, but that is the case.
It is for that reason that the very least of the help that can be given by Government is to agree on the date of 31st December for final receipt of guidance from the Secretary of State. There is nothing very outlandish about that. After all, the transport support grant and other grant decisions are normally indicated before Christmas and, if possible, well before Christmas. Certainly the housing grants can be given and should be given as early as October. We are not asking for anything that is out of line with Government practice in other respects in their relationship with local authorities. This legislation represents the first occasion on which the new protected expenditure level will be enacted and will have to be taken into consideration by local authorities, and we are simply asking that local authorities shall be given the same opportunity and courtesy to act responsibly and within the law as they ought to be and are in respect of the transport supplementary and other grants.
There have been occasions when these other grants have been given late. There have even been occasions, not only under a Conservative Government, when the

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grants have been given after Christmas. It will be difficult for Government to comply with a statutory provision such as that proposed in this amendment; I accept that. But unless we have that degree of protection in the new circumstances in which the metropolitan authorities find themselves, then there is a serious risk that we shall be engaging in the kind of damaging and non-productive legislation to which my noble friend Lord Mishcon has just referred. I move this amendment in the hope that the Government will see it as something that is in keeping with the spirit of much of the rest of this Bill. I beg to move.
Lord Bellwin: May I say first of all, as I did when Amendment No. 21 was moved, that the Government are very sympathetic to the point the noble Lord is making. Indeed, we fully accept that the Secretary of State must issue his guidance in good time for authorities and executives to take account of it. My goodness! I have been in many situations myself when I needed that kind of guidance or decision far sooner than I was able to get it. So I certainly appreciate the point the noble Lord makes.
As a target the date is not at all unreasonable; it is a perfectly reasonable one that the noble Lord suggests. For 1983–84 the Secretary of State did issue his provisional guidance—and of course his guidance could be only provisional in advance of the passing of the legislation—but he did issue it on 5th November.
However, the amendment goes further than setting a target: it would create a statutory limit. Once again, that could be dangerous. Whatever the circumstances, the Secretary of State would be bound to issue his guidance, even if all concerned were agreed that it might be better, in some circumstances, for there to be a delay. For 1983–84, the amendment would prevent the Secretary of State from setting PELs at all, since he would have to have done so before the end of last year, before the legislation was even in effect.
I cannot accept the amendment, but I want again to offer your Lordships and the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, the assurance that the Secretary of State will of course do his utmost to meet the timetable required. We would normally expect that the guidance should be given in October or November; that is certainly the intention. But to have a statutory requirement for the unforeseen is further than one would want to go.
Lord Underhill: The Minister has had much experience of local government legislation in this House. May I ask him whether the House has passed legislation on matters where datelines of this kind have been inserted? Surely it is not wrong to have a statutory date, because then the Government know how they have to act and the local authorities know.
Lord Bellwin: The noble Lord asks me a very good question. I really cannot think offhand of an example; of course I may have egg on my face for saying that. I shall certainly check and I shall write to everybody who ought to know, not least because I am fascinated myself. I do not think there is such a case, but I shah certainly be in touch and let the noble Lord know.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: Even assuming the noble Lord's memory is correct, that there are no
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references to statutory dates in legislation so far as it affects the Government, I do not think he will deny that there are statutory limitations on what local authorities must do. They certainly have fixed dates by which—for administrative reasons, if not for legal reasons—they have to declare a precept and declare a rate in order that the business of local authorities may proceed.
The noble Lord also said that there might be occasions when all concerned might be agreed that delay beyond 31st December would be desirable. I frankly cannot conceive of such a situation, and I very much doubt whether the noble Lord can. It cannot conceivably be in the interests of local authorities to have guidance delayed, unless—I put it to the noble Lord that maybe he means this—it is intended that the guidance should arrive so late that it should not be, in accordance with his speech on Amendment No. 21, taken into account. I do not think he meant that; I think he meant that guidance should arrive in time to be taken into account. I do not think he can imagine a single circumstance in which the local authorities would wish for delay.
I really wonder whether he is not protecting the Secretary of State too much against possible delays within his own administrative machine, and whether the Secretary of State would not wish to have this statutory stick with which to ensure that those reporting to him do come up to scratch and produce the results on time. However, because the Minister has been so conciliatory about this, and in view of what he has said, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
5.14 p.m.
Lord Underhill Lord Underhill moved Amendment No. 32:
Page 5, line 5, at end insert—
("( ) When the Secretary of State gives any guidance under subsection (5) above he shall indicate to the Authority what maximum amounts of revenue grants it would in his opinion be appropriate for them to consider making to the Executive for the second and third years of the relevant period.").
The noble Lord said: We are still dealing with subsection (5) and the power of the Secretary of State to prescribe the maximum level of revenue grant which in his opinion is appropriate to be made in the year in question. This amendment seeks to provide that if the Secretary of State is to have this power it should not be confined just to the one year. I say that because under the Bill the Secretary of State will require the PTE to prepare each year a plan for a three-year period. That plan of course has to go to the PTA for approval. I suggest that there is little value in having a three-year plan if the decision on amount of revenue grant is to be given only for the first year. The Minister has emphasised that one of the features of this Bill is to achieve stability. If there is to be stability, it is reasonable to expect the Secretary of State to give an indication of what he is prepared to allow over the whole of the three-year period of the plan.
I know that the Minister may say that we cannot prejudge events. Of course, we have said that in regard to other amendments, and therefore we have asked for power to be able to increase the amount of revenue grant; we have also said that account should be taken of the economic conditions prevailing at the time. We

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recognise that a clear determination may be difficult. The amendment would require the Secretary of State to give an indication of the revenue support which a passenger transport authority may expect for the second and third year of the plan as well as for the first year. This seems so reasonable. If the authority has to produce a three-year plan, each year a rolling programme for the next three years, then the authority must have some indication of what is going to be the amount of revenue grant.
Having prepared a three-year plan and had it approved, if the Minister is to have the power to make modifications to that plan, and in the second or third year the revenue grant is slashed by 25 per cent., then the whole three-year plan is just useless, because it will mean a great deterioration of services. Therefore, this seems to me a commonsense proposal. We have not had one amendment accepted. I hope this may be such a sensible amendment that the Minister will feel he can accept it.
Lord Bellwin: I think that it would be true to say that the wording of the amendment bears two interpretations. One might be that when the Secretary of State gives his guidance as to the maximum amount of subsidy which would in his view be appropriate for the coming year under Clause 4(5), he should also give directly comparable guidance as to the amount of subsidy that would be appropriate for the two following years. I would hope that there was general acceptance that such an approach would import far too great an element of inflexibility into the planning process.
If the indication as to levels of subsidy for the second and third years were to stand firm and determine the level of protection to be afforded to such expenditure in those years, as the guidance given under Clause 4(5) determines it for the immediately following year, the Secretary of State would surely be placed in an impossible position. How can anyone in the circumstances of today hope to fix three years in advance a level of subsidy which would be able to weather all the vicissitudes of the developments of the national economy over that period? Clearly one needs to plan ahead. As the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, says, that is the whole essence of the Bill. But, equally clearly, one could not hope to set a figure which would have all the consequences of the guidance given under Clause 4(5) so far in advance.
I take it that what is really intended is that when the Secretary of State sets the PEL for the first year of the three-year planning cycle he should also give an indication of the kind of way in which he believes expenditure should move over the whole of the cycle. I have a great deal of sympathy for this proposition. But here again I believe the amendment, if interpreted in this way, would be too inflexible in its implications and might in the event have the effect of making things more difficult for the authorities and their executives rather than making life easier.
Clearly the Secretary of State has a duty to give advice on the kind of figures that they should take into account when compiling the plan. There is express provision for this in Clause 3(5). The question is: how specific should be this advice and what timescale should it cover? I believe that the amendment will
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leave too little scope in this respect for a flexible response to the actual needs of the situation. It may well be, for example, that advice given in the autumn, when the PEL for the following year is set, should relate only to the first two years of the planning cycle, leaving authorities and executives scope to put forward their own proposals for the third year, which could then be taken into account by the Secretary of State when deciding on his guidance in response to the plan. Alternatively, it might be appropriate for him to give more positive advice on later years of the cycle at a slightly later stage of the planning process.
In other words, a number of approaches are possible. However, I must say that in my opinion the amendment would foreclose those options in a way that would cause more problems than it solved. The noble Lord, Lord Underhill, always thinks carefully about such matters, but I wonder whether he would be inclined to agree with me that, if not the intention, that is the effect of the amendment.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: I confess to some puzzlement at the Minister's reply. He has constantly said, in defence of earlier clauses, that the words "advice", "guidance", and "indication", mean no more than that; that they are not compulsions and that the final decision rests with the authority. In particular, when I used the words "weasel words" in referring to guidance, he objected and thought that I was being unreasonable in reading into the words "advice" or "guidance" more than was intended. Yet here he is looking at similar words:
"indicate to the Authority … maximum amounts … it would in his opinion be appropriate".
There is no inflexibility in that, and no fixing in advance. All the amendment says is: "You, Secretary of State, have looked at our three-year plan. You have had all your detailed investigation which we have failed to object to"—that is, we on this side of the Committee have failed to object to—"so it is all there. All the inquiries have been made and all the figures have been disaggregated and aggregated again". The Secretary of State now knows as much about the local transport service as the locally elected representatives or the passenger transport executive, but the Minister is saying that he is not prepared to give an indication of his conclusion from all that detailed investigation. He is saying that he is not even prepared to indicate what amount in his opinion would be appropriate for the second and third years.
However, the whole tendency of local government has been to try to plan on a longer basis than one year. Indeed, the noble Lord has committed himself to higher financial horizons on more than one occasion and said that the proper planning of services which involve both capital and revenue expenditure should be longer than on a one-year basis. Why, then, are the Government not prepared to participate in this by giving an indication of the amount which, in the Secretary of State's opinion, would be appropriate? That, surely, is the least that an authority can ask if it is seeking to make sensible decisions about financial planning over a period of more than 12 months.
Lord Bellwin: I understand the thrust of the argument and obviously, from the authority's point of

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view, it would be very useful to have this. But, as the noble Lord knows himself, in so many other directions when it would be helpful—in fact, in capital matters it would be even more helpful, and some might say necessary—it is not possible to anticipate three years ahead because the figure that one gives by way of guidance is a figure to which there can be no legal challenge.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: If the Minister will forgive me, I refer back to the TPP and transport support grant. He referred to capital expenditure. It is true that the period for which capital expenditure is authorised has gone down from the five years when TPP was first introduced, but it is still a two-year period and still more than 12 months. If it is possible for TPP, why not under these procedures when it is only guidance and not a statutory requirement?
Lord Bellwin: I was about to continue and say that here we are dealing with something which would be a figure excluding the authority from legal challenge. So clearly it needs to be as close as it can be. No figure given could be taken lightly. It is a guidance figure but it is a very important figure. To try to put this two or three years ahead is something I doubt any Secretary of State, regardless of political complexion, would ever want to do. The noble Lord should put himself in that position. After all, who knows, the noble Lord may have the problem to decide one day. The noble Lord should think of himself in the position of a Secretary of State setting figures below which there can be no legal challenge and being asked to state those figures for two or three years ahead. I think that is a nonstarter.
I have said from the beginning that from the authority's point of view it would be useful to have this, and I accept that, but I do not think in practical terms that it is possible.
Lord Sefton of Garston: Will the Minister compromise a little? We designed a railway system on Merseyside. It is not quite complete. There is another branch to be completed to make it serve the whole of the Merseyside area properly. If we do that, and, everybody knows that there are fixed track kinds of transportation which need a specific subsidy in order to bed in, will the Minister go so far as to consider the question of the first year's figures being fixed and the second and third year figures being provisional?
Lord Bellwin: The noble Lord knows how tempted I always am by a suggested compromise. Clearly, we will look at what he says, but I think that we shall still come back to the basic problem I mentioned. What we actually intend is to give advice in the spring, under Clause 3(5), in relation to the plan and the amount of grant which, in the Secretary of State's view, is appropriate for the executive to determine as the basis for its plan. At that time we shall give any advice which we are prepared to give in relation to the second and third years. When the guidance is set in the autumn the authority and the executive will know of any such advice. Because I know how useful it would be I say what I do about it, but I think that in practical terms to give a figure in one year which, two years later, could be used when it comes to challenges or
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whatever (if that unhappily should turn out to be the case), is going further than anyone would be willing to do.
Lord Underhill: I appreciate the points which the Minister has made. I appreciate what he said in his opening speech. If the amendment can be read two ways obviously we must look at it again, because we must not leave a situation where it can be read two ways. However, what comes out from what the Minister said is that we cannot tie down the Secretary of State, and one can understand the arguments that he put forward. But the local authority, the PTA, when it works out its plan will cover three years. I know nothing about the actual detailed workings that the executive will have to carry through, but I suggest that it cannot do this on a year by year basis. It has to plan services and the whole of its resources.
What the Minister's reply does show is the weakness throughout this Bill. We had an amendment, which the Minister rejected, that this should take account of the economic circumstances at the time. If the Government, because of economic circumstances, have to deal with their own central grant the Bill will stop the local authority from doing what it ought to do to keep its three-year plan going, because it is liable to have legal penalties. The whole purpose of the Bill will destroy the three-year plan.
We shall have to look carefully at this amendment, but I hope that when we come to another amendment noble Lords will bear in mind what the Minister said in reply to this one and the comments I have just made. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendments Nos. 33 and 34 not moved.]
Clause 4 agreed to.
Clause 5 [Payment of revenue grants]:
5.30 p.m.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey Lord McIntosh of Haringey moved Amendment No. 35:
Page 5, line 19, leave out subsection (1) and insert—
("(1) An Authority may in any year increase the amount of any revenue grant determined under section 4(1) above at such time or times as they think fit having regard to their duties under this Act and the Act of 1968 or the Act of 1969.").
The noble Lord said: By leave of my noble friend, I rise to speak on this amendment. I will not claim that this is an insignificant amendment. I will not claim that its only intention is to clarify inconsistencies in the Bill. I will not claim that it does not have a wider implication than perhaps the Government might wish uncontentious amendments to have. I will claim, however, that this is an amendment which is in accordance with the best business principles and the best chance of running passenger transport services in our cities economically and effectively, as the passenger transport authorities are required by statute to do.
The Bill at the moment in Clause 5(1) says:
"An Authority shall not in any year make any revenue grant to an Executive except in accordance with a determination made by the Authority under section 4(1) above".

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That allows no flexibility whatsoever to an authority to deal with the unforeseen circumstances which arise in any business in the course of a twelve month.
Let nobody think that in passing this amendment we would be encouraging authorities to make additional grants, still less that we would be encouraging local authorities to raise supplementary precepts for the purpose. I have been involved in the raising of supplementary precepts. Your Lordships will know that there is nothing more unpopular in the world than a supplementary precept. Nobody would do it unless they absolutely had to in fulfilment of some previous commitment or in the face of some unanticipated disaster. Politically a supplementary precept is death, as was proved to the Greater London Council less than two years ago.
There is no temptation for authorities to raise supplementary precepts for the fun of it, but authorities do, in their consideration of all other services, have some flexibility about the amount of moneys which they allocate to a particular service. They have that flexibility in two ways. I am sorry to repeat what are very simple points but I think that they are necessary in view of the very inflexible terms of this clause.
Authorities are able to allocate more money to one service at the expense of another by virement within the terms of the local government Acts and they are able to do so by using contingency reserves, which can be revenue or capital, which they maintain for those purposes. In that way—for example, if there is a very hard winter and they have to spend 10 times as much on salt or on road clearing—they are able to protect the lives or safety of their citizens by keeping the roads clear in times of adverse weather. They do not always do that but that at least is possible to an efficient and flexible local authority, and there is nothing illegal about it.
Just as it is necessary to adapt to circumstances in the course of a year for one service, so it could well be necessary in the course of a year so far as the public transport service is concerned. The very example that I gave of bad weather, which costs the local authority more in keeping the roads clear, will also cost a public transport authority more. It will lose passengers and have greater difficulty in maintaining its services and service obligations, and it may find itself in financial difficulties as a result of a perfectly laudable attempt to continue services under severe conditions.
I hope that no authority would go as far as London Transport did once when I was involved with it, when it forgot to put anti-freeze in the bus engines and found itself with a large proportion of buses off the roads as a result of that and a considerable expenditure on repairing the engines. That is not the kind of emergency which we would hope to see, but nevertheless, there are genuine emergencies.
There are occasions when it will be necessary for a passenger transport executive to incur additional expenditure to meet its other obligations. The amendment which is proposed is that:
"An Authority may in any year increase the amount … determined under section 4(1) … at such time or times as they think fit having regard to their duties under this Act and the Act of 1968 or the Act of 1969".
That is not an open invitation to spend more money, because it is spelt out that there should be the limitation of it not only in terms of the Acts of 1968 and 1969—we are well aware that those Acts have been somewhat downgraded in the course of the last few months by the debates on this Bill—but also by the provisions of the Bill itself. In other words, every bit of financial control which the Government are claiming to bring into the public expenditure on the transport service will apply also under this clause.
There is under this amendment very strict legal constraint on the ability of authorities to make such extra grants and there is, as I have said, very severe political constraint. because no authority will do so unless it is absolutely forced to do so. But to deny a transport authority the same ability to use virement or contingency financing for genuinely unforeseen contingencies in order to meet their other obligations would be perverse.
I very much hope that, even if the exact wording of this amendment does not commend itself to the Government, the Minister will be able to say that the principle—one which is well accepted throughout local government—is agreeable to him and that he will find some way with us of including it in the Bill. I beg to move the amendment.
Lord Sefton of Garston: May I spend a few minutes supporting this amendment. We have a situation on Merseyside where the cross-river traffic is by private cars, the railways and, to a lesser extent, the ferries and we also use buses through the tunnel. We could have a situation where labour disputes, which are not unknown on Merseyside, could stop one of those forms of traffic. At that time it would be essential that the local transport authority should spend more money on providing an alternative. That is the kind of emergency that may well go on.
If this clause does anything it pinpoints the dilemma that the Government are in when they say, "We do not want to get into detail. We only want to look after the national economy. We do not want to bring any undue pressure on local authorities. We really want to leave them free. We are not even saying that they can only spend, in the case of Merseyside, say, £40 million. They can spend more if they want. All they have to do is to take a chance, go into court and pay the surcharge". That is what the Government are saying. This provision does not say that. This clause in the Bill puts a specific prohibition on the spending of any more money other than that agreed at the beginning of the year. It does not even leave the authority open to go to court and be summonsed to be surcharged.
I think that the noble Lord should, if he thinks about it, at least look at this clause again if he is not prepared to accept the amendment now. All that this amendment does is to give a local authority the possibility of finding a little more money in one year and even then taking a chance of surcharge.
Lord Bellwin: The problem here is that the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, is quite right when he says that this amendment would defeat a principal objective of the Bill to provide stable, efficient and cost-effective local transport. The amendment would enable an authority during the year to redetermine and increase

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the amount of revenue support to its executive. We designed the Bill to provide for only one grant determination each year quite intentionally, so that the determination is based on the three-year plan and is properly related to well-thought-out policies. Services can be planned and provided for on a stable and rational basis. But the amendment would enable an authority to provide further subsidy during the year, perhaps to finance proposals not provided for in the plan, and so the effect would be to bypass the certainty and stability of the planning procedure. An executive would be able, for example, to negotiate high wage settlements or, for whatever reason, increase its services, covering the cost by further subsidy from the authority rather than, say, by reducing costs elsewhere or financing or increasing fares. I think that is not good financial practice. It would certainly encourage inefficiency and poor financial control. It is deficit financing.
The noble Lords, Lord McIntosh of Haringey, and Lord Sefton of Garston, suggested—not unreasonably—that serious problems could arise if an authority was not able to provide additional revenue grant during the year to cover unforeseen circumstances, which would otherwise result in a deficit, because it was not practicable for the executive to adjust its revenues and make changes to meet its statutory duties to break even. Such a deficit could be covered either by the executive borrowing on the open market or from the authority or by the unplanned use of reserves. This would then be made good in the following year's plan by making an appropriate adjustment to the amount of revenue grant provided, by raising fares or, alternatively, by planned use of reserves which would then, by virtue of Clause 2(3), relieve them from the duty to break even so far as the deficit was covered by that planned use of reserves.
It is important that I assure your Lordships that there are remedies available to executives to cover unforeseen circumstances arising during the year without the need for increasing grant in that year. Our objection to the amendment is that it would enable an authority to increase its subsidy to finance proposals not provided for in the plan. That is the dilemma. I do not think I can help with this amendment. It is fundamental to the Bill and I fear I cannot go further with it.
5.43 p.m.
Lord Underhill: Before my noble friend replies, will the Minister take into consideration that the procedure by which the guidance grant is eventually reached is a long, protracted procedure? He will agree that it is very detailed. The whole possible timetable over a long period was set out by a member of the Standing Committee and the Minister who was handling the Bill in another place did not comment on or criticise the timetable which had been advanced—a very long procedure. Therefore it means that at the start of the procedure factors will not be dreamed of when the Government are considering the guidance at the various levels. We have this situation where, as we saw from the previous debate on the other amendment, we must not put the Secretary of State into an inflexible position; but now the authority will be put into that inflexible position.
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If the authority is faced with such a situation, what the Minister is saying to us is, irrespective of circumstances, "borrow". That may be considered by the council to be uneconomic. Alternatively, he is saying "Use the reserves" but the council may not have adequate reserves. Or he is saying "Cut your services". That is what he meant. I suggest that he is being inflexible and I wonder whether he would take into account the fact that the procedure goes over a long period before the eventual decision is taken.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: I fear that the Minister's reply has gone some way to shake my faith in his understanding of the running of an efficient business. I deliberately did not refer, when I moved the amendment, to the possibility of a local authority borrowing in order to meet unforeseen emergencies. I did not actually think that the Minister would be so unwise as to recommend that that is what an executive should do. It seemed to me to be self-evident that that would be an unbusinesslike procedure for most of the kinds of unforeseen emergencies which I envisaged when I moved the amendment. Yes, one might say that a hard winter is a one-off occasion and one might say that a borrowing in one year would be a proper way to deal with the additional expenditure incurred. One is taking the risk that there would be a mild winter next year; but let us take that risk and let us not have any new elaborate procedures for extra financing for that purpose.
However, that is not the only kind of unforeseen expenditure which may arise. In particular, there are certain kinds of unforeseen expenditure which are completely outwith the control of a passenger transport executive or a passenger transport authority. I refer to things which the noble Lord the Minister knows very well from his own time in local government. At the time when one is preparing the estimates one does not know what the settlement will be for local authority wages or salaries. For a transport undertaking the cost of fuel is a major element which cannot be well forecast in advance. There are years when it may appear that the cost of fuel may go down; but there have been far more years over the past 10 years when the cost of fuel has risen enormously. It surely would be extremely unbusinesslike to borrow to meet the additional costs of fuel in one year when it is known that in the following year the costs of fuel will still be high and the borrowing will have to be repaid. The Government will be unsympathetic, we assume (from the indications we have had from the Government) to any demands for additional revenue grants to meet that kind of cost.
The alternatives which the Minister has referred to are there. They are the short-term alternatives of raising fares and cutting services. If that is what the Government are recommending, the Government should say so because I believe that we are coming now to the nub, the very basis of the misunderstanding of the Government about the economics of public transport operation.
The point about the operation of public transport in this country is that it is and has been over the past 30 years working in an uneconomically favourable environment—the environment of increasing car ownership, of increasing difficulty in having some of

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the necessary services run economically. Yet, at the same time, there has been the social requirement for an effective public transport service; the requirement, which is not reflected in revenue receipts, of a public transport undertaking; the requirement, for example, to use our road space effectively and not spend more capital expenditure on roads by increasing the utilisation of public transport as opposed to private cars for certain kinds of journeys. These are factors which all public transport undertakings have to take into account, and there is no escape for any city in this country from that kind of problem.
That kind of problem is exacerbated if and when short-term decisions required by short-sighted and inflexible legislation, of the kind that this promises to be, are made to cut services or to increase fares. It is the experience of public transport undertakings that when services are cut in this way it is very difficult for them to re-establish themselves; it is very difficult to get the passengers back.
People go on to using cars and it is difficult to get them back to public transport again. That is the experience not just of the London Transport Executive but it is the experience, I am sure many noble Lords will agree, throughout the country. At the same time it is the experience over and over again that when fares increase beyond the rate of inflation—as they have been, despite what the Government have been saying over a number of years, including in London—passengers are lost and it is very difficult to get those passengers back.
A gallant attempt has been made in London to do this. I apologise to my noble friends who object to continual reference to London; they have their chance to widen the area of debate. But when passengers are lost in this way attempts can be made to get them back. The Fares Fair attempt did get some passengers back, but it is an extraordinarily difficult process. If the only alternative open to an undertaking in the course of one year is to raise fares or to cut services then it is in danger of taking decisions which are made necessary in the short term by the kinds of obligations, which no private business would accept, of making decisions which would be to the long-term damage of the undertaking.
It may be that the wording of my amendment does not meet the needs of the Government. They may feel it goes too far in some way, although I noticed that the noble Lord the Minister did not take up my remarks that the additional grants which are made possible are constrained by this legislation, by former Acts and also politically constrained by the undesirability, from a political point of view, of an authority making extra grants. He might like to refer to that again.
However, some way must be found of allowing public transport undertakings to run as a business in the way that any private business or other local authority service would run. It would not do any damage to the type of control which the Government seek to impose over the total amount of expenditure; on the contrary, it would increase the efficiency and economy of public transport undertakings which I understand to be one of the Government's objectives.
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I wonder whether the Minister can give us any undertaking, if the wording is not right, as to how he sees the type of business-like flexibility which is necessary, being achieved?
Lord Bellwin: There is not a lot that I want to add to what I said previously, but there are one or two points which are pretty fundamental to the debate on this amendment. The Secretary of State of course will take into account all representations before he sets PELs. The Bill specifically says that the financial duty is to break even, "so far as practicable". The special circumstances to which the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, refers might well result in a proposal for increased grant in the following year. In my view the Bill is in fact flexible when it says, "so far as practicable". There is a whole host of flexibility in that phrase and I am sure that the noble Lord will concede that point to me.
Anyway, the further point is that what the Bill proposes is precisely the same as applies to the National Bus Company operating outside the metropolitan areas at present. Many points are brought out in the various debates on these amendments: sometimes there is a philosophical difference, sometimes a political difference and sometimes a difference as to administration. All kinds of differences arise. But here we have one which should not be a cause for concern because there is included the phrase, "so far as practicable", which I did not mention when I first responded to the noble Lord but which perhaps I should have done. If something came up which could not have been taken into account, I should have thought that any reasonable Secretary of State in making the arrangements for the following year would certainly take that into account. So far as I am concerned, that really is an answer.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: I would be more convinced by that answer if the noble Lord had not insisted on defeating a previous amendment which enabled the next accounting period to be extended and to have a rather longer and more realistic financial horizon for the undertaking. However, I accept that there may be difficulties about the wording. We shall have to find some way of achieving the very essential objective of this amendment without arousing the fears which the Government have expressed as regards its implications. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment on that basis.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Baroness Wootton of Abinger): We now come to Amendments Nos. 36 and 37, which appear to be alternatives. The noble Lord will presumably speak to both and move whichever he prefers, but if either of these amendments is agreed to I shall not be able to call Amendments Nos. 38 or 39.
5.53 p.m.
Lord Underhill Lord Underhill moved Amendment No. 36:
Page 5, line 22, leave out subsection (2) and insert—
(" (2) In the event that the amount of revenue grants made in any year by an Authority in accordance with any such determination exceed the amount specified in guidance given by

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the Secretary of State under section 4(5) above in relation to that determination, the making of those grants shall, without prejudice to any other proper exercise of the power of the authority to make revenue grants, be regarded for all purposes as a proper exercise of that power where in the opinion of the Authority those grants were necessary for the discharge by the Authority and the Executive of their general duties under section 9(3) of the Act of 1968 or sections 1 and 5(1) of the Act of 1969, as the case may be.").
The noble Lord said: The intention was that I would move Amendment No. 36 and speak to Amendment No. 40 and then when we come to Amendment No. 37 we would take also Amendments Nos. 38 and 39 according to which way the voting goes. Therefore, I am dealing at present with Amendment No. 36 and speaking also to Amendment No. 40, which has somewhat the same principles within it.
We are moving now to Clause 5(2) which contains the provision that if an authority does not exceed the amount of revenue grant specified in the guidance given by the Secretary of State, the making of such grants shall be regarded as a proper exercise of the authority's power to make grants. That, as we have been told, is the real purpose behind the Bill. In fact, the amendment which we are now discussing is one of the most crucial amendments before us tonight. We have had a number of Second Reading speeches from various noble Lords but it is really upon this amendment that we ought to have the Second Reading speeches because it deals with the whole principle behind the Bill. What it really says is that, irrespective of how the Secretary of State arrives at his guidance, it will be considered lawful if observed by the Secretary of State. There is reference in the subsections to, "in his opinion" and "what appears to him". On that basis guidance is given and any breach of that guidance could put the authority in an unlawful position.
The Notes on Clauses put the situation quite clearly. They say that this subsection:
"puts beyond doubt the lawfulness of grants paid to an executive where they do not exceed the amount specified by the Secretary of State".
Therefore we know quite clearly the purpose of this subsection.
Amendment No. 36 replaces that subsection by a more reasonable one. It will provide protection from any challenge to a PTA which exceeds the Secretary of State's guidance on revenue grant provided it does so in the circumstances set out in the wording of the amendment. If the authority is of the opinion that the guidance of the Secretary of State has to be exceeded if it wants properly to discharge its general statutory duties, such payments will be regarded as a proper exercise of its power. An authority and an executive have their general duties—as we have been reminded time and time again by the Minister, by myself and by other noble Lords—defined under Section 9(3) of the 1968 Act or, in the case of London, by Sections 1 and 5(1) of the 1969 Act. The Minister has emphasised that these provisions are not repealed by the Bill.
The amendment would ensure that the appropriate revenue grant can be made to comply with those general duties without its being held to be unlawful. This is set out quite clearly in the wording of the latter part of the amendment. It says that revenue grants shall:
"be regarded…as a proper exercise of that power"—
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to make grants where they are made to carry out the general duties placed on the authority and the executive by the provisions of the 1968 and 1969 Acts to which I have referred.
I cannot see how the Minister can oppose this amendment and I must point out the reference in Clause 4(6) where, in giving guidance in the three-year plan, the Minister,
"shall have regard to the general duty"
under those same sections of the 1968 and 1969 Acts. Therefore, if the Minister, in giving his guidance on the plan, has to take regard of those two important sections, surely if the local PTA find it necessary to exceed the guidance grant to carry out those same principles, that should not make them unlawful? I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Alloway, who knows more about the law than I do, will see what, in my view, is the common sense of that particular point. If the Secretary of State has to have regard to those duties, then surely we ought to put the authority in the same position so that it would not be liable for action if it should exceed the guidance grant of the Secretary of State because it wants to carry out the statutory duties under those same provisions of which the Secretary of State must have note in giving his guidance.
Amendment No. 40 has just the same principles but it adds a similar provision to the end of subsection (2). However, it does not delete any part of that subsection. It stresses that should the authority find it necessary to incur the grant over and above the Secretary of State's guidance, regard must be paid to the general duty under the two Acts to which I have referred. The common sense and the reasonableness of trying to put the PTA in a position of being lawful when it is carrying out statutory duties is the purpose of the amendment and should be supported by the Committee.
Lord Bellwin: The only thing reasonable about this amendment is the way in which the noble Lord presented it. One of the main purposes of the Bill is to provide legal protection to a reasonable level of subsidy while leaving ratepayers with their present rights to challenge excessive levels of subsidy. It could be said that the Bill actually reduces the rights of ratepayers in relation to challenging levels of revenue grant at or below the guidance. This is what the present Clause 5(2) does, in the interests of providing stability and protection from challenge to authorities if they choose to keep within the protected expenditure level.
The amendment, on the other hand, would allow the authority to decide for itself on any level of grant, irrespective of the Secretary of State's guidance, and it would receive full protection for that amount of grant. This is absolutely fundamental to the Bill. This amendment totally wrecks the whole essence of the Bill. The only condition would be that the authority must believe that grant of that amount was necessary in order for the authority and executive to meet their general duties.
The amendment would indeed clarify the law, but at what a cost! The cost would be of protecting any level of subsidy from challenge. If this amendment were to be accepted, the GLC (dare I now mention them again?) could have implemented Fares Fair without

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ratepayers or auditors even having a right to challenge. Indeed, if this amendment were accepted, the GLC and the metropolitan counties could, after enactment, introduce fare levels as low as those in force in South Yorkshire, or indeed lower, and simply transfer the burden of cost from those who use the transport onto the shoulders of ratepayers and taxpayers, and they could do this with complete protection from challenge. This could throw an extra burden of cost onto ratepayers and taxpayers of £500 million or more a year. The amendment would allow the authority to spend whatever it chose and not be accountable to its ratepayers. It would provide a blank cheque to the authorities. Clearly, the Government cannot accept the amendment.
As regards Amendment No. 40, I do not think that this amendment would achieve the result intended. It would introduce the yardstick of the general duty by which authorities might justify expenditure over and above the Secretary of State's guidance. There is of course no need to justify expenditure below the protected expenditure level, since that would be protected from legal challenge. The Bill as drafted does not impose any yardstick by which the expenditure above the PEL is to be justified. Authorities can make up their own minds about the amounts of revenue support to provide. If the amount is greater than the PEL, they should be ready to justify the amount in court if challenged, on whatever basis they wish. While the Bill as drafted extends protection to grants up to the level of the Secretary of State's guidance, nonetheless the protection provided by Clause 5(2) does not prejudice any other proper exercise of the authority's power to make grants.
The amendment would require a court to have regard to the general duties of the GLC or metropolitan authority in considering the propriety of expenditure above the PEL. This amendment is unnecessary because Clause 5(2) shows quite clearly that the fact of protecting expenditure at or below the guidance level does not prejudice any other proper exercise of the power of the authority to make revenue grants. So the court would be able to take account of the general duties of the authority, and indeed of all the circumstances. For these reasons we cannot accept the amendments.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: I am very new in your Lordships' House, and I have not found my way around the Palace of Westminster as well as some other Members here. When I try to escape from the building I take different routes, and when I leave the Peers' entrance I go through a door, I find myself going past some dustbins and I land up in a court which is called Star Chamber Court. This brings back to me memories of the early 16th century, when it was possible for the sovereign to by-pass all the normal legal constraints which had been built up throughout the previous centuries and simply to say, "If I say this is illegal, it is illegal".
My ignorance of the Palace of Westminster is such that I have not learned enough about the Library to go and look up the appropriate references, but my memory of the Star Chamber Court is enough to convince me that what we have here is very much the
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same thing. What we have here (only we have it turned on its head, but it has the same effect) is that the Secretary of State can say to any authority attempting to act within the law—because all these passenger transport authorities, whatever Members may think about their political judgment, are attempting to act within the law; they may not always succeed, but they try—"Whatever I decide is proper is lawful. Therefore, whatever I do not decide is proper runs the risk of being unlawful".
If the Secretary of State were to say, and if the Bill were to say. "Whatever I decide is lawful and whatever I do not authorise is unlawful", we would at least know where we stand. We would know that, after nearly four years of attacks on local authorities, the Government were at last grasping the nettle and saying, "Anything you spend above a certain level will not only lose you grant, it will not only lose you the grant that you would have on the rest of your expenditure. but it will actually be forbidden by law". Therefore, presumably one would have to repeal various parts of the Local Government Acts 1933 and 1948 and the other enactments which control local government. That is not how it is expressed in this Bill, but that is the intention, and it is intended that that should be achieved by the back door.
Earlier on this afternoon the noble Lord the Minister said that if a local authority exceeded the guidance amount it would be "ill-advised" to do so. What did he mean? What is its ill-advice? What he meant was a threat, which he is not prepared to spell out, that he would be delivering that local authority into the hands of the litigious both in the area and elsewhere. He would be opening up to the courts a whole new area of litigation, which is litigation by default. It is not that you have done something wrong; it is that when you have been told in a totally arbitrary way—and all the evidence we have about the Secretary of State's advice and guidance is that it will be arbitrary—and when you have acted in this way, even though you have done your best to adhere to the statutory obligations upon you under the 1968 and 1969 Acts and, indeed, under other conditions of this Bill, you are still at risk legally.
That is not a serious attempt to remove litigation from local government and from the conduct of passenger transport undertakings. It is a back door attempt to increase the amount of litigation that will take place and it is an attempt to drive fear into the hearts of local councillors—those who have the responsibility of meeting their local obligations—without actually having the courage to say so openly. This is a Bill which is willing to wound but afraid to strike openly. It is abhorrent to all constitutional precedent in this country. This particular clause—and I apologise if I am making a speech which appears to be a Second Reading speech but I think we have come to the nub of the matter now—is the essence of that constitutional outrage. I commend the amendment to the Committee.
Lord Campbell of Alloway: As I was invited by the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, to give my support to this amendment, may I say with respect that I am wholly unable to do so because, although it is put forward in the worthy cause of clarification, nonetheless it does

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total violence to the principles of this Bill such as were accepted on Second Reading. I shall not detain your Lordships for long, but to suggest that this Bill is designed to create some new area of litigation is about as sterile a concept as to suggest that the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, has designed this amendment as a wrecking amendment. Of course he has not. It is an amendment put forward because of views sincerely held, but opposed owing to views equally sincerely held on this side of the Committee.
It is surely not desirable, in answer to the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, that I should repeat anything that I said on Second Reading about the charge, a false charge, that this is designed to create and encourage a new area of litigation. Repetition is rather boring. But to suggest, as has been suggested today, that there is something rather furtive about this Bill, that it is some sort of a back door attempt without the courage to strike, I wholly fail to understand. I should have thought that from the way in which the amendments have been put down it is plain that this Bill sets out openly to do what it proposes to do. Noble Lords on the Benches opposite and elsewhere can table amendments to meet the Bill at its face value. There is nothing furtive about it.
Neither is there anything unconstitutional. I fail to understand how it can be seriously suggested—apart from mere advocacy, which is really in the air, unrelated to any understanding of the constitution in this country—that this Bill is abhorrent to constitutional precedent. I oppose this amendment, and I would oppose the suggestion that there is anything furtive, despicable or objectionable about the principles that the Bill has already adopted.
6.13 p.m.
Lord Sefton of Garston: I have been attending this Chamber now for four years. I bow to the knowledge of my noble friend in regard to the Star Chamber. I did not even know there was one. I can well imagine the frustration of some people who appeared at the time of the Star Chamber in front of that body, because to some extent I feel it now. We get a statement from the noble Lord that he does not understand when people refer to the constitutional issues raised by this Bill. It is something that members of local authorities have felt for a long time. They have felt for a long time that constitutionally under our democratic system they had a right to take certain decisions subject, of course, to the fact that overriding all that was the question whether they had exercised their powers properly in relation to a certain Act of Parliament.
They see this Bill as an affront to that constitutional position. The noble Lord may disagree with their interpretation, but I think I have portrayed clearly enough how they feel. When the noble Lord, Lord Bellwin, was replying to the amendment he said that the situation from the Government point of view was that the Fares Fair policy could not have been challenged if this amendment had been in existence. I think I am interpreting him aright. This amendment restricts the powers of the local authorities, and gives them the right to exercise those powers under the Acts of 1968 and 1969. That is all it says. It does not mention any other Act. So if this amendment was carried into this Bill it would clearly give the local
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authorities powers to act under those two Acts of Parliament.
I seem to be right so far, because nobody is jumping up and saying that I am wrong. May I go forward on the assumption that I am right? Surely the challenge to the Fares Fair policy took place since those Acts of Parliament became law. If that is true, then this amendment repeats the same position, and they would be open to challenge.
On the question of whether or not the Government were furtive, local authorities have a point of view and the point of view is that the way this Bill was prepared so suddenly after the White Paper, which was prepared without any consultation, and the way it was thrown at them, and the way the Government want to fix the PEL for the first year, leads them to believe that the Government were not being open with them. Amazing as it may sound, I share that point of view. If somebody says that that is not a fair description of being furtive, well I think it is. The local authorities have that feeling.
It is going to be difficult to talk about this clause and not be accused of making a Second Reading speech, because my Second Reading speech dealt with this clause and I believe that this clause is the wicked part of the Bill. A noble Lord opposite referred to being "violent to the principles of the Bill". I am hard pressed to find where the principles of the Bill are. On the one hand we are told by Government that the Bill was introduced in order to establish some fairness between different taxpayers and ratepayers, and told that it is to look after the minority interests. That is a quotation—and I apologise—from a speech made at Second Reading by the noble Lord, Lord Bellwin. Who is going to look after these minorities?
If that is the principle, what it means is that all the constitutional rights of democratic elections in this country have been wrong, and that it is not good enough that a local authority should make its decision in regard to an Act that has stood the test of time, and in fact has been tested in the courts. In the case of Merseyside it was tested in the courts. I do not accept the argument that, just because it has not been appealed, we are not going to take any notice of it. It has been tested in the courts, and in the case of Merseyside the court said that Merseyside was right and was exercising its proper responsibilities under the Act of Parliament that existed then. This amendment merely puts us back to that situation.
The question that is facing us all on constitutional matters is whether or not we are really going to go forward and place the local authorities under the control of the courts of law. Some people say that we are not. A noble Lord over there thinks that we are exaggerating when we say that this will lead to a spate of legislation, and that it will produce uncertainty in local government circles because they will never know when they are going to have to prepare briefs, pay counsel, and go to the courts to defend a decision which for years and years historically they have been able to take in the proper exercise of their duties under the two Acts mentioned in this amendment.
There is no doubt that there are plenty of people who do not accept the democratic right of people to elect an authority and give it a job to do. There are

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hundreds of them in our community. They do not accept the right of local authorities to govern. If that becomes any more prevalent what will happen is that local government will go down and down in the estimation of people until, at the end of the day, we shall have a rump that is no good at all in our democratic system. What we shall have is a centralised governmental system which people in the northern parts of the country will consider is away, in isolation, in another country.
One of my noble friends suggested that a certain noble Lord opposite should visit the West Midlands to see what was going on there. I made an aside which, if it was not heard, I will repeat. I suggested with humility that it was no good asking him to go there because he would not know his way past Watford Gap. That is the sort of situation that exists. I do not object to London being discussed here; in fact, the more it is discussed the better because I believe the Fares Fair policy was right. It was a policy aimed not at subsidising passengers but at trying to get a correct balance of transport distribution in the capital city, thus leading to a proper organisation of transport in the city.
In the northern parts we have the same kind of problem. Time and again the Government have been telling me and local authorities that transportation would not be considered in isolation from the rest of the community; that it should be seen as a vehicle by which we can improve the environment and the economic circumstances of people and enable them to have a proper social life. Governments have been saying that all along. Am I now to take it that that policy has changed and that transport is to be seen only in the context of pounds, shillings and pence? When one reads the documents that are circulating between the Ministry and local authorities, one must come to that conclusion. One of the documents actually states that in considering the benefits of any transportation plan we should not include its effects on society, the environment and the economy of a particular area.
I repeat—I feel that I must, although it has been said ad nauseam, including in several Second Reading-type speeches that should not have been made at this stage—that it has been said that the Government are not taking away the powers of local authorities and that they are not forcing authorities into the law courts. In fact, they are. That will be the net result. The road to hell is paved with good intentions—and the road to hell is where Britain's transport undertakings, and their relationship with local government, are going on the vehicle of this Bill. If the Government really want to demonstrate that all they are concerned about is the handling of the national economy, then in the clause they should do what they say they want to do, which is to take away from the courts the power to determine an act of difference between a local authority and the Government on the figure fixed by the Government.
Lord Bellwin: The Bill is not only about the national economy. That is part of it. I wish, first, to comment on the remark of the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, that we are debating the nub of the Bill. The noble Lord, Lord Underhill, said it was just another amendment. It
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is absolutely the nub of the Bill, and I agree with Lord McIntosh about that. However, I could not agree with some of his observations when he spoke of a constitutional outrage. If anyone had to be concerned about an outrage in reference to local government, they do not have to look far from this building to be outraged at what is happening in local government. As my noble friend Lord Campbell rightly said, there is nothing "back door" about these provisions, and I do not think the noble Lord, Lord Sefton, suggested it was that.
The noble Lord spoke about four years of attacks on local authorities. I would remind him of the four years of attacks on local government by some of those practising local government. And as for the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Sefton, about no notice having been taken of what has been happening, I want to know who is taking notice now of what has been happening these past few years in local government. I assure him that I know the way north beyond Watford Gap—I go there all the time, as he knows. I know what is happening there, too, and I know the contempt with which many people there—people not of my political persuasion—look on what is being done today in the name of local government.
When noble Lords talk about fears for its future, I would say that it is things of that sort about which they should be concerned. They should be concerned about what is happening every day in some councils—again, not far from this building—and how they are turning on its head the whole of the reputation of local government.
Lord Sefton of Garston: May I ask the Minister—
Lord Bellwin: I did not once try to interrupt the noble Lord while he was speaking. Perhaps he will allow me to complete my argument, and then I am sure he will have his chance to comment. I feel every bit as passionately as he does, and as does his noble friend Lord McIntosh, about local government and its future. I am very anxious about what I see is happening, and nothing we are proposing openly in the Bill is in any way—I say this again—to the detriment of local government. On the contrary, it makes clear beyond doubt exactly where they will stand and what they may do. At present, it is not clear what they may and may not do.
It cannot be justified in this whole debate to ignore the fact that for the last few years there has been a blatant attempt, not just to ignore what Government have said should be done by way of subsidies but to ignore many of those people who live in the authorities concerned and who are affected by what happens. I challenge any noble Lord to justify keeping the same rate for fares for nine years and charging ratepayers and taxpayers within the authority the price for so doing. That is what has happened in South Yorkshire, and is happening today, and they were talking about a subsidy to them in the current year of £70 million.
I am entitled again to make the point that noble Lords must consider what that does to the districts within their authority. It takes away from those districts the democratic opportunity to charge a reasonable rate because the precept on them is based on the decision of those in the county authority that

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the subsidy goes to users of bus transport, and never mind all the other services. That, to them, is their major decision. One may reply, "They were elected to do that", and the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, commented, "It is not good enough to say that the people who pay are not the ones who vote", but I believe that is an important factor.
I prefer to come back to the basic philosophy, which I believe is right; namely, when you are the elected member of a local authority, you must represent everyone in that authority, not just one section. You must be concerned about the impact of your policies on everybody in that authority. And if you know that many of your policies are harming other people, you are obliged in all fairness to take account of that and to act accordingly. When local government moves away from that, as it is doing, there is need for concern about the future because, sooner or later, we must see what we are seeing today in this Bill. There was a revulsion to the extent that somebody had to do something, and that is exactly what we are proposing in the Bill.
Clearly, the two sides of the Committee are as much apart on this amendment as perhaps on any other. If the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, decides that the issue must be put to the Committee, that is up to him. He and I have done four Transport Bills together in this Parliament, if I may use the word "done" in this context. We went through most of those measures and, of course, we differed on many aspects of them. However, we generally agreed to differ; and I know that, for example, the noble Lord, Lord Sefton, is an adherent to the policy that the Government of the day must govern. The Government feel deeply that the Bill proposes the way that we should go. If we are debating the nub of the Bill—and I think we are—then clearly Lord Underhill will decide what action to take. I have made it clear why we could not possibly accept the amendment.
Lord Sefton of Garston: Perhaps I may be allowed to tell the Minister before he sits down that that speech was not a speech concerned primarily with this Bill, although it could well have been a Second Reading speech on the measure which carried out the last reform of local government. I do not think that consideration of this Transport Bill warrants an attack such as has just been made on the whole of local government. Under no circumstances should it warrant such an attack. But the attack has revealed quite clearly the real reason behind the Bill. As I said on Second Reading, the real reason behind the Bill is the Government's determination to show that body over the water who really rules. It was from that motive that the Bill sprung, it was from that motive that it originated, and that was when it got into the hands of bureaucracy.
On three occasions during the Committee stage I have revealed that the Government Front Bench did not know of some of the things that the ministry is doing in consultation with the executive. Noble Lords on the Front Bench did not even have some of the documents that we had received from the local government side. Bureaucracy had let them down. I admit that some things should never have been done, but I look for the reasons, because I am very jealous
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about preserving the basic foundation of our democratic government. That does not mean only local government; it also means central Government, all the bodies that Government set up, and the whole paraphernalia of our state. With 3½ million people on the streets those institutions are in danger.
Let me tell your Lordships' Committee what happened to local government. It is written across my whole being, because I fought like mad to prevent a Government from carrying out the reform of local government which in essence took away something that had been built up over countless years, even going back years before I was born. I defended to the death the aldermanic bench in local government. I am glad that the noble Lord nods his head. It was his party that abolished the aldermanic bench and threw into local government a completely new string of members, who had power thrust upon them.
In the case of Liverpool—I make no apologies for going along this lane; I am replying to the noble Lord, Lord Bellwin—there were, I think, 38 committees. In the 38 committees in the authority that was set up in Liverpool alter the reform of local government, which in the main was carried out by bureaucrats, at the instigation of the Tory Party—the Government of the day—there were only two members who had had previous experience of chairmanship of anything. That was the kind of government system that was created. What can one expect but that sometimes they will go to excess, that sometimes they will get in their heads an idea that subsidising transport systems is good not just for one section but for the whole community, because it affects the whole community? Of course they will get that kind of idea.
The danger is—and let me conclude on this point—that that lesson will not be learned, and in a transient period of local government there will be brought in a Bill such as the one before us that will destroy any hopes of local government regaining the expertise and experience that there used to be on the town hall benches. That expertise and experience enabled local authorities to work with central Government, even where one was opposed to the other, and to reach amicable solutions to problems that were affecting the life of the nation. That is the damage that the Bill is doing.
The trend that was started when all the expertise was got rid of, simply because central Government and bureaucracy would not listen to local government, and the damage that was then done, is being perpetuated and compounded by the Bill. The Bill is not bringing local government closer to central Government: it is forcing local government along the path that takes it further and further away from co-operation with central Government. As I have previously said, the result of that will be a highly concentrated form of government, which ultimately could lead to things of the kind that were experienced in other parts of Europe, and could well create the same type of sedition to which so many people object in Eastern European states.
Lord Tordoff: I do not think that I have made a Second Reading speech since 14th February, and I do not intend to begin another one now. I should like to return to the amendment, and make one or two simple

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points. From this side of the Chamber it seems clear that it is the Government's intention to take away from local authorities such protection as they had under the 1968 and 1969 Acts if there is any spending above the level determined by the Secretary of State. The Minister has several times talked about local authorities having the right to determine the level of grant to the executive. But there is no indication that he really means that—and I do not mean the noble Lord personally; I mean the Government's thinking behind the Bill. There is every indication that it is the Government's belief that the figure that the Secretary of State sets shall be the ceiling figure. If the Minister is serious in believing that there might be occasions when the authority would find it right and proper to go over that figure and be challenged in the courts, there should be some criteria relating to that position. It seems that to restore the position of the Acts that are still in existence in relation to cases of that kind is what the amendment is about.
Those Acts have now been tested in the courts. We have seen that the Greater London Council has been defeated in the courts. As the noble Lord, Lord Sefton of Garston, has said, we have seen that Merseyside has been upheld in the courts. So there is an area of understanding of what the Acts mean which perhaps did not exist two years ago. As I said in my Second Reading speech, local authorities are clear about it.
I am prepared to support the amendment because I believe that it gives the right degree of flexibility. The Government will get the Bill. The Secretary of State will be able to issue edicts to local government. But I believe that even in that case it is wise that in certain instances there should be a degree of flexibility within the duties laid down in the 1968 and 1969 Acts in which local authorities should be able to operate and be challenged in the courts if necessary, but where they know the degree of flexibility on the basis of the court rulings that have already been made. That is why I support the amendment.
Lord Underhill: I am certain that your Lordships' Committee would like this debate to be drawn to a conclusion. The discussion has revealed some very interesting points. The Minister said that he and I had been associated with four Transport Bills. He said that we had "done" Transport Bills, but in fact we have "done" public transport in Bill after Bill. Knowing the Minister's affection for local government, frankly, I was very surprised by some of the things that he said about certain local authorities and local government. I wonder whether, when he reads Hansard, he may regret some of the things he has said. I say that because it means that he has no faith in the electorate.
In debates on Monday night there were rather cynical references to the fact that we know what takes place at elections, as though it were being said, "Take no notice of them, because what you put before the electors does not really matter". But these authorities have put their transport service plans before the electors; they have had them approved. Not only that, but after running the services for a period the local authorities have gone back to the electors. They have not shilly-shallied about it. They have not tried to hide what they have been doing, or what they propose to
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do. They have openly put their plans before the electors, and the electors, rightly or wrongly, have approved them. Let us not develop a cynical belief that the decision of the electors does not matter, because that belief would attract comments and actions of the kind my noble friend spoke about in his last speech.
I should like to go into the question of the needs of public transport, but I do not think that time allows for that. There is a difference between this side of the Chamber—by which I mean practically everybody on this side—and the Government side about what are the needs of public transport. There is also a deep difference of view on how we should meet those needs. There must be effective transport services, but one has to pay for them. I completely agree with the Minister: there cannot be efficient services unless one pays for them. In many instances, if one does not pay for the services they will be inadequate, and indeed people will not have services.
I recall what my noble friend Lady Bacon said when she drew our attention to the fact that some metropolitan counties include vast rural areas. If they are treated purely on a pounds, shillings and pence basis, whole communities will have no transport at all, or they will have to wait hours for transport. One thing particularly impressed me when I visited Tyne and Wear last Tuesday. It was claimed that no one in Tyne and Wear country has to walk and wait for more than 15 minutes, and then they have public transport. Some people might ask: what right is there to provide a bus when only 10 or 12 people use it? That is a public service. You are not going to leave those 10 or 12 people to walk five or six miles. I would love to have a deep debate on the needs of public services and how to meet them—because this is what this amendment is about.
I do not know whether the Minister suggested that I introduced this in a very calm way. Perhaps I did; I do not know. But I said that this was the crucial issue before the Committee and I repeat it. Let us remember that the Secretary of State, when he gives guidance to the authority, has to have regard to the general duty of the provisions of the 1968 or 1969 Act. It is written into the Bill that the Secretary of State must have regard to those provisions.
We are saying in this amendment that the authority may find that the Secretary of State has made a mistake—and do not tell me that Ministers cannot make mistakes. Even departmental officials, as good as they may be, can make mistakes. It is because they do not have the local information, because they are not living there, do not know the needs of the people and do not work among them. If the PTA, in order to carry out its statutory duties, believes that the Secretary of State's guidance is not sufficient, then the amendment says that so long as they increase the grant in carrying out those statutory duties, they should not be regarded as unlawful. That seems to be an honest, straightforward case. That is what the amendment is saying. I believe that it is such a fundamental issue of fairness to the authority that I must ask the Committee to make known its view on this by a Division.
6.42 p.m.
On Question, Whether the said amendment (No. 36) shall be agreed to?
Their Lordships divided: Contents, 70; Not-Contents, 112.

DIVISION NO. 2

CONTENTS

Airedale, L.

Lloyd of Kilgerran, L.

Aylestone, L.

Lovell-Davis, L.

Beaumont of Whitley, L.

McGregor of Durris, L.

Beswick, L.

McIntosh of Haringey, L.

Birk, B.

Mackie of Benshie, L.

Bishopston, L.

McNair, L.

Boston of Faversham, L.

Masham of Ilton, B.

Brooks of Tremorfa, L.

Milner of Leeds, L.

Chitnis, L.

Mishcon, L.

Clifford of Chudleigh, L.

Molloy, L.

Collison, L.

Nicol, B.

David, B. [Teller.]

Northfield, L.

Davies of Penrhys, L.

Oram, L.

Denington, B.

Peart, L.

Diamond, L.

Phillips, B.

Elwyn-Jones, L.

Pitt of Hampstead, L.

Ewart-Biggs, B.

Ponsonby of Shulbrede, L.

Fisher of Rednal, B.

Prys-Davies, L.

Gladwyn, L.

Rochester, L.

Glenamara, L.

Ross of Marnock, L.

Gregson, L.

Seear, B.

Hall, V.

Sefton of Garston, L.

Hampton, L.

Serota, B.

Harris of Greenwich, [Teller.]

Stedman, B.

Hatch of Lusby, L.

Stewart of Alvechurch, B.

Hooson, L.

Stewart of Fulham, L.

Irving of Dartford, L.

Stone, L.

Jacques, L.

Taylor of Blackburn, L.

Jeger, B.

Tordoff, L.

John-Mackie, L.

Underhill, L.

Kennet, L.

Wade, L.

Kilmarnock, L.

Wallace of Coslany, L.

Kirkhill, L.

Wells-Pestell, L.

Lee of Newton, L.

Whaddon, L.

Llewelyn-Davies of Hastoe, B.

Wigoder, L.

NOT-CONTENTS

Abinger, L.

Ferrier, L.

Airey of Abingdon, B.

Fortescue, E.

Alexander of Tunis, E.

Fraser of Kilmorack, L.

Allerton, L.

Geoffrey-Lloyd, L.

Atholl, D.

Gisborough, L.

Avon, E.

Glanusk, L.

Belhaven and Stenton, L.

Glenarthur, L.

Bellwin, L.

Gridley, L.

Beloff, L.

Hailsham of Saint Marylebone, L.

Belstead, L.

Bessborough, E.

Harvington, L.

Boyd-Carpenter, L.

Hayter, L.

Brougham and Vaux, L.

Henley, L.

Caccia, L.

Hives, L.

Campbell of Alloway, L.

Home of the Hirsel, L.

Campbell of Croy, L.

Hornsby-Smith, B.

Carnegy of Lour, B.

Inglewood, L.

Cathcart, E.

Ingrew, L.

Chelwood, L.

Kemsley, V.

Coleraine, L.

Killearn, L.

Colwyn, L.

Kilmany, L.

Cork and Orrery, E.

Kinnaird, L.

Cottlesloe,L.

Kinnoull, E.

Cullen of Ashbourne, L.

Lane-Fox, B.

Davidson, V.

Lauderdale, E.

De La Warr, E.

Lindsey and Abingdon, E.

Denham, L. [Teller.]

Long, V.

Dilhorne, V.

Lucas of Chilworth, L.

Dormer, L.

Luke, L.

Drumalbyn, L.

Lyell, L.

Ellenborough, L.

McAlpine of Moffat, L.

Elliot of Harwood, B.

Mackay of Clashfern, L.

Enniskillen, E.

Mackintosh of Halifax, V.

Fairfax of Cameron, L.

Macleod of Borve, B.

Faithfull, B.

Mancroft, L.

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Mansfield, E.

St. Davids, V.

Margadale, L.

Saltoun, Ly.

Marley, L.

Sandford, L.

Merrivale, L.

Skelmersdale, L.

Mersey, V.

Soames, L.

Mills, V.

Somers, L.

Molson, L.

Spens, L.

Mottistone, L.

Stamp, L.

Mountevans, L.

Stradbroke, E.

Napier and Ettrick, L.

Swinfen, L.

Northchurch, B.

Swinton, E. [Teller.]

Nugent of Guildford, L.

Terrington, L.

Onslow, E.

Teviot, L.

Orkney, E.

Tranmire, L.

Orr-Ewing, L.

Trefgarne, L.

Portland, D.

Trumpington, B.

Radnor, E.

Vaux of Harrowden, L.

Rankeillour, L.

Vivian, L.

Reay, L.

Wakefield of Kendal, L.

Redesdale, L.

Wise, L.

Rochdale, V.

Young, B.

St. Aldwyn, E.

Resolved in the negative, and amendment disagreed to accordingly.
6.51 p.m.
Lord Underhill Lord Underhill moved Amendment No. 37:
Page 5, line 22, leave out subsection (2) and insert—
("(2) Without prejudice to any other powers under which an Authority may make grants to an Executive, the power to make revenue grants in pursuance of this Act shall, if exercised for the purpose of implementing proposals approved under section 4 above, be regarded for all purposes as being properly exercised.")
The noble Lord said: With the leave of the Committee, I should like to discuss Amendments Nos. 38 and 39 with this amendment. I do not want to repeat all the arguments on the previous amendments, but, in effect, this is a change from the amendments with which we have just dealt. What Amendment No. 37 proposes is to replace the same subsection (2) with a provision to the effect that a public transport authority will have protection from challenge in the courts, on the grounds that the grants were made in pursuance of any of the proposals included in the three-year plan.
Some noble Lords may ask, "Why waste our time putting forward this amendment, since the last one was defeated?" The last one had to do with whether the authority were carrying out their statutory duties. If we have a three-year plan which has gone through the whole process which the Minister has outlined to us—the executive has taken the plan to the authority; the authority has had guidance from the Secretary of State; the Secretary of State has even suggested modifications of the plan (in other words, he has gone into details) and eventually the plan is there and approved—but the authority then find it necessary to go beyond the guidance given by the Secretary of State, is it right that that authority should be held to have acted unlawfully?
It must never be forgotten—this arose on the previous amendment, too—that, at the end of the day, there is still the question of the fiduciary responsibility of a local authority to hold the balance between the ratepayers and the users of any service. That is always there, but the Government are not satisfied with that. What we are saying is that, if a plan is approved after considering the advice of the Secretary of State, that should be regarded as a proper exercise if the grants have to be increased in order to carry out that plan.
Amendments Nos. 38 and 39 are slightly different, in principle, but I think that they should be discussed at the same time, because Clauses 3 and 4 of the Bill lay down the procedural programme both for achieving the final plan and also for the determination of revenue grants. The effect of those amendments is that, so long as the final determination by the authority of the amount of revenue grant has been determined in accordance with the procedure set out in Clauses 3 and 4, it should be regarded as a proper exercise of the power given to the authority.
What we are trying to do by these amendments is to minimise the number of occasions on which an authority can be taken to court by a body of ratepayers, so long as the authority acts in a proper way, either in carrying through the procedures laid down in Clauses 3 and 4—which is the point of Amendments Nos. 38 and 39—or in carrying out, quite properly, the three-year plan which has been approved by the authority and which, at the end of the day, has really been approved also by the guidance of the Secretary of State. I beg to move.
Lord Bellwin: We have said that we introduced the Bill, in part, because of the legal challenge made to the authorities' powers to give revenue grants to their transport executives. Those challenges pointed up the differences and obscurities in the legislation governing the GLC and the metropolitan county councils. Subsection (2) of the existing Clause 5 at once removes that lack of clarity and puts the GLC and the metropolitan councils on a common footing. These amendments would seem to aim to achieve those same effects, but less clearly, and with one difference: they would provide legal protection to any level of subsidy determined by the authority in accordance with the planning process, rather than to expenditure up to the level of the Secretary of State's guidance. That is a very fundamental difference.
In other words, the authority could spend whatever amount of grant they determined and not be accountable to either ratepayers or auditor. That cannot be right. The new planning procedure is intended to increase the authority's accountability to ratepayer, taxpayer and user alike. Setting out the proposed services and facilities, and their likely benefits, will enable both the executives and the authorities to provide, with maximum efficiency, the best services possible within the resources available. The amendments would remove any constraint to efficiency or value for money, by sanctioning any expenditure determined by the authority.
Clause 5, as drafted, will ensure, first, that authorities follow the new planning procedure before determining the amount of revenue grant they give to their transport executives; and, secondly, that in providing subsidy up to the level advised by the Secretary of State, authorities are protected from legal challenge, by having such expenditure clearly defined as a proper exercise of their powers to give revenue grants to their transport executives. That seems to be pretty clear. I do not know whether the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, would say other than that, in a way, this is not dissimilar to the preceding amendment—not in its content, but in its attempt to
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go right to the root of what this Bill tries to do; and it highlights, again, the difference between the two sides.
Lord Mishcon: I believe that the main reason for this amendment, or any similar amendment, is not to drive a coach and quite a few horses through the principles of the Bill, but to try very hard to save the courts from being brought in to decide upon whether or not a local authority has behaved lawfully. The noble Lord the Minister has spoken in terms of this Bill clarifying the issue. I wonder whether I can best deal with that point by asking your Lordships' Committee to imagine for one moment that you are members of a transport authority.
You are independent people and are proud of the fact that you are endeavouring to carry out a public duty, for which you have been elected in that locality. Of course, you have a national conscience, but your whole purpose as a councillor is to look after your local people. You disagree with central Government, acting upon the advice of bureaucrats—I do not use that term offensively; we could not get on without them and we could not govern without them—but the policy decision is, obviously, vested in the Minister. What then happens is that you carry through a plan, which differs from what the Secretary of State has approved, and you have your own modifications.
The present position, which the noble Lord the Minister defines as unclear, is that if you know that you have properly carried out your fiduciary duties and held the balance, the clear judgment of the court—if you have taken into account all the things you should have done, have consulted properly and come to a conclusion, even though the public auditor or anybody else may decide that you have been a little extravagant—is that you cannot be brought before the courts on the same basis as the Greater London Council and another authority were brought before the courts. If you have consulted properly and have exercised proper consideration, you can then make your decision. You are not subject to the courts and to an open battle with central Government.
The amendment makes it perfectly clear that every litigant who wants to do so cannot bring the local transport authority before the courts merely because that local transport authority has exceeded the limit set down by the Minister. Far from making things certain, at present anybody can take the view that the transport authority has gone beyond the limit and that therefore he is entitled to challenge the transport authority in the courts. This amendment says that if you have properly carried out your duty regarding a programme which has been approved by the authority—obviously the auditor can deal with matters of extravagance, or whatever else it might be—you cannot be accused of acting unlawfully under the provisions of the Bill.
Your Lordships will forgive me if I quote again a magazine like the Economist. There was also an article in The Times along the same lines. They said that this Bill is inviting litigation. If the Minister had said that this amendment goes too wide, that he was prepared to take it back and at least consider whether or not there should be something in the Bill which did not leave a local authority naked, as it were, before litigants who might want to chase it into the courts—that there

1097
ought to be some provision in the Bill which meant that a local authority would not be left in the position of, prima facie, acting unlawfully if it went above the limit—a gesture along those lines would have been greatly admired. If he does not do so and the litigation which many of us forecast takes place, the noble Lord may regret the moment—and your Lordships may regret it, too—when this opportunity was allowed to slip by.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My noble friend invited your Lordships to imagine that they were members of local transport authorities. It is appropriate that I should rise immediately afterwards, having been until today a member of a transport authority and having resigned from that authority only this morning. Therefore I have a keen awareness of being and of not being a member of such an authority. I leave your Lordships to guess as to the complexity of my feelings at no longer being such a member.
I wish to say something about the statement of the noble Lord the Minister in reply to my noble friend Lord Underhill. There are similarities between the previous amendment and this one. Since we are dealing with the same clause of the Bill, the obvious intention is to do something to improve it. This is an attempt to do exactly that. In his reply the Minister said something which he had not said before: that the intention here is to clarify the law and to make life easier, legally, for passenger transport authorities. I suggest that the reverse is actually the case. Thanks to the decision of the Divisional Court in January of this year on the case put to it as between the Greater London Council and the London Transport Executive, the law is very clear. I shall return to that point. Thanks to the decision in the case of Great Universal Stores v. Merseyside County Council the law is pretty clear, although that case referred only to Merseyside, so far as the other metropolitan authorities are concerned.
If its purpose is to clarify the law, there is no need for the Bill. Indeed, the Bill takes us backwards rather than forwards. I have no particular knowledge of the Merseyside case, and I am sorry that my noble friend Lord Sefton of Garston is not here to explain it, but I have some knowledge of the case before the Divisional Court. Although it might be thought of as a friendly action between the Greater London Council and the London Transport Executive, I can assure your Lordships that that case had very profound implications, some of which I hope will survive the passing of this legislation, if it is passed. Those implications have cropped up over and over again as we have dealt with the Bill in Committee. Let me take one or two examples.
First, we have talked about the time available to the executive in preparing its plans and about the time available to the authority in considering those plans and reaching a conclusion. It was an important part of the case before the Divisional Court that the authority had taken adequate time to listen to the views of the executive and to consider the options put forward by the executive and that it had taken those options seriously in the light of its other responsibilities. In that sense, if I follow the argument which has been made on this side of the Committee on previous
1098
amendments, the Bill makes things worse and the protection given by the court is diminished.
Secondly, one of the issues before the court was that of proper consultation with all those affected. They included representatives of the passengers and of other operators, the authorities in the immediately surrounding counties, and so on. The amendments we have sought to make to the Bill have all attempted to write into it the kind of consultation which was taken seriously by the Divisional Court, but they have been rejected by the Government. In that sense, too, the Bill goes backwards from the clarity achieved by the Divisional Court in only January of this year.
Let us take the issue of the authority's other responsibilities. One of the issues before the Divisional Court was whether it was proper for the Greater London Council, when considering the options placed before it by the London Transport Executive, to take into account its other obligations under the 1969 Act: its obligations, for example, under the development plan. The wider benefits—the economic, social and other benefits, which do not relate just to passengers but to all the people of London—were an issue before the Divisional Court. The court decided in favour of the Greater London Council on those issues. The attempts which have been made to amend the Bill to reflect that decision have been rejected by the Government. In that sense, too, the Government have gone back and muddied the waters which were made clearer by the Divisional Court.
I shall not attempt to go over the whole debate, although I could go on to show that virtually every debate we have had on detailed items in the Bill—I include some of the debates we shall have later in Committee—contradicted the judgment of the Divisional Court, a judgment which has not been challenged. It is extant as being the legal situation as I, a non-lawyer, understand it to be. We are in fact doing the opposite of that mentioned by the noble Lord; we are making life more difficult for a local authority. As a member of the Greater London Council, I have over the past two months been very conscious of the lifting of a burden of insecurity and uncertainty which had been over us for a couple of years previously. This burden was lifted by the decision of the Divisional Court. The situation will be distinctly worse if this Bill is enacted unchanged, without this amendment. With this amendment, there is at least the start of recognition that the advances which have been made in the avoidance of litigation can be maintained.
Lord Boyd-Carpenter: If I may invite the Committee to return to the narrow question of the amendment itself, I can only urge upon my noble friend Lord Bellwin that if he were to accept this amendment he will be creating a loophole in the provisions of the Bill. How big or how small that loophole will be in practice is a matter on which there can no doubt be legitimate argument; but it would be a loosening of the controls on expenditure—rate-borne expenditure by way of subsidy—which the Bill proposes. For that reason, I must confess that I look upon it with a measure of suspicion.
It is all very well to say, as noble Lords opposite have said, "It is only expenditure following on the approval

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of an approved three-year plan". But those of us who have been in administration, central or local, know that where one has a three-year plan the amount of money actually spent under the plan can vary enormously. It can vary in the light of the degree of strictness of economy which one exercises or in the degree of laxity of control on expenditure which arises. Indeed, when I was at the Treasury under my noble friend Lord Home of the Hirsel, and charged by him with control of public expenditure, I remember that the rule we used was that with any proposed public expenditure spread over a number of years if one was really to assess the likely cost, one took the figure that the proposing department put forward and then trebled it. On the whole, experience showed that that was about right. But to say, as this amendment does, that as long as one is carrying out a scheme one is still protected from being taken to the courts by the ratepayers whom one has wronged—however much one may have spent additional to the guidance laid down by the Secretary of State—is very much to weaken one of the main and perhaps the most important provisions of this Bill.
It is all very well for the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, to say, with an expression of soulful solemnity, that his purpose is simply to reduce the amount of litigation. Coming from a most distinguished member of his profession, that remark carries, of course, enormous conviction with me. I share his view, perhaps even more enthusiastically than he does, that litigation is not to be promoted. There is surely one very simple way by which the local authority concerned in this measure can avoid being taken to the courts; and that is, to so control its expenditure that it keeps the amount of that expenditure within the figure laid down in the Secretary of State's guidance.
Lord Mishcon: Before the noble Lord, Lord Boyd-Carpenter, sits down, may I point out that the Committee has been listening to a distinguished member of the Bar. I am sure that he keeps the traditions of the Bar, as I do on my side of the profession, which is to keep people away from litigation wherever possible and to see whether one cannot achieve an amicable and sensible settlement of differences. This is what I, together with my noble friends, was trying to bring to this debate. Would the noble Lord care to say whether his advice, with regard to his previous experience in the Treasury, is that the Secretary of State should take the figure that his civil servants bring to him in respect of these grants and multiply it by three?
Lord Boyd-Carpenter: I am not quite sure what the proposition of the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, is, but I do say that the Secretary of State, in assessing the likely expenditure under any scheme, should approach the matter with the detached scepticism and cynical clarity of view which one would expect of a Minister in this present distinguished Administration.
On the noble Lord's other point, it is a matter for his profession and for mine to try to prevent unnecessary litigation. But when that litigation comes, it is equally our interest and our duty to win it. It seems to me that if one is to win a case such as this, one must have the
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law clear cut. There is nothing more clear cut than the position in this Bill, which the noble Lord is seeking to erode, that if one keeps within the figure in the Secretary of State's guidance one is covered—but if one goes outside it one does so at one's peril. That seems to me to be a clear cut provision under which no one but a fool would involve themselves in litigation accidentally.
7.17 p.m.
Lord Bellwin: It has been very fascinating listening to such eminent members of the legal profession, and it makes my own legal qualifications seem very humble. On the point of the law as it stands at present, following on that which was said by the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh of Haringey, the noble Lord was saying that the GLC's new proposals are legal. I must point out that in the recent action between the GLC and London Transport, the judges found that the GLC's proposals for a 25 per cent. fares reduction were a valid exercise of its powers; but the court did not explicitly decide whether the proposals struck a reasonable balance between the interests of transport users and the interests of ratepayers. Lord Justice Kerr said:
"Whether the balance has been struck at the best point, and even at a permissible point, is not a matter which this court can evaluate."
The judgment was very much in line with the approach adopted in this Bill, for this time the GLC had prepared a reasoned plan, exactly as we had urged them to do all last year. But there are still counties paying revenue subsidies with no proper demonstration of the benefits. The fact that the GLC has had to go to court twice in little over a year shows how much we need a Bill that will provide absolute protection from legal challenge to reasonable levels of subsidy.
The noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, seductively persuasive as very few people I have ever known can be, always tempts me. I almost have to tie myself to the mast every time he speaks to make sure that I do not go beyond. The fact is, as the noble Lord understands very clearly, this particular clause is at the nub of the Bill and I cannot agree to depart from it. I understand exactly what the noble Lord has said and the sincerity with which he said it, but I cannot accept this amendment, as it is now, in any way. Therefore, I have to say that I am sorry but on this occasion, even for the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, I have to say no.
Lord Underhill: It has been said that there is something of a similarity. The only similarity is that we are attempting to remove certain penalties which could be placed against a PTA. As my noble friend Lord McIntosh of Haringey has said, this amendment is attempting to improve the Bill. Also, on all these different matters we want to learn the Government's view, for the simple reason that these points were not fully debated in another place. Therefore, it is essential that we hear the Government's view on all these different variations, because that will enable us to shape our view for the next stage. I am very pleased that the Minister takes that view and does not take the view that we are wasting time; we are ventilating important issues.
The Minister said that if this amendment were carried it would give an authority power to spend

1101
whatever it wishes and not be accountable to the auditor. I bow to people who know better than I do, but surely no authority can act irresponsibly, neither can it act without due regard to its fiduciary responsibility towards the ratepayers and the users of the service. Also, we must remember that the authority is finally responsible to a very important body, and I do not regard that accountability as being cynical; it is accountable to the people who elected them; it has to go back to them.
If we do not accept that principle then we do not deserve to say that we believe in local government, because local government can only survive on going back to the electors. That is why, as I said in the debate the other day, I am one who believes in annual elections and not three-yearly or four-yearly elections. We agree on that. That gives an opportunity for accountability every year. So long as we believe in accountability, if an authority is acting irresponsibly it can be called to book. Therefore, there is that accountability to the important people, the electors, and that must be kept in mind in considering this amendment.
The noble Lord, Lord Bellwin, also said that the amendment would remove all constraints. But would it? Amendment No. 37 would mean that the authority would have to convince people that it had acted properly to carry out the principles of the three-year plan. It cannot be irresponsible about it; it has to carry out the principles of the three-year plan. On the other amendment it has to convince that it has acted fully in accordance with the procedure laid down for determining the level, the plan, et cetera. The noble Lord, Lord Boyd-Carpenter, said it would be creating a loophole. Well, I believe my noble friend Lord Mishcon dealt with that. If by a "loophole" he means that we are going to avoid a PTA, properly carrying out its statutory duties, not being irresponsible, being taken to court, surely that is not a loophole; it is providing proper justice to an authority which is trying to do its duty to the people who elected it.
The noble Lord referred to the necessity to keep expenditure down to the figure of the guidance. I come back to what I said on the previous debate; I must repeat this. If the guidance figure does not enable the authority fully to carry out the three-year plan which has been approved, and on which there might have been modification at the Secretary of State's request, surely it should have the right to proceed with a further grant.
The Minister also said that the purpose is to clarify the law. Who has asked for this legislation? Not one of the PTAs or PTEs have asked for this legislation. I can assure the noble Lord that the AMA, which represents all these bodies, has not asked for this legislation. I would remind noble Lords that they were not even asked to say what they thought about the White Paper, which I held up in a previous debate, because the Bill was published at the same time as the White Paper was issued. So they have not asked for this Bill.
I must stress what my noble friend Lord McIntosh said, first of all about the second GLC case. What we want to ensure is that if an authority can properly show a court that it has acted, as did the GLC on this occasion, to carry out its responsibility under its plan, then it should not be regarded as being unlawful.
1102
Remember the Merseyside case. I will not go into the details, but it made it quite clear that it did not automatically follow that the setting of fares at a level which resulted in a deficit was unlawful. That is what the Merseyside case decided. I can assure noble Lords that the metropolitan authorities outside London have been reasonably satisfied with the law as reflected by the Merseyside case; the judgment given by Mr. Justice Wolfe.
Therefore, they have not asked for this legislation. The legislation has come about because the Government believe they know best what is required; they are going to decide what are the benefits in the area and what are the needs in the area. I cannot ask the Committee to divide on this issue, but I do urge that the principles behind the amendment are correct, and I do not propose to withdraw it.
On Question, amendment negatived.
[Amendments Nos. 38 to 40 not moved.]
On Question, Whether Clause 5 shall be agreed to?
Lord Underhill: I am wondering whether we should speak on this Question before adjourning the Committee. We were intending to speak and divide on the Question whether Clause 5 shall stand part. In the face of the comment made by the noble Lord, we must ensure that the Committee fully discusses the whole of Clause 5.
Lord Denham: In view of the fact that it is Tuesday and there are slightly limited time facilities, perhaps we ought to adjourn for dinner before we discuss the Question that the clause stand part. I beg to move that the House do now resume.
Moved accordingly, and, on Question, Motion agreed to.
House resumed.
Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede: My Lords, before we take the next business, I wonder whether the noble Lord, Lord Denham, can give an indication of when we shall return to the business of the Transport Bill?
Lord Denham: My Lords, I am most grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby. We will not return to the Transport Bill before half past eight.

Marriage Bill [H.L.]
7.29 p.m.
Lord Glenarthur: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now resolve itself into Committee on this Bill.
Moved, That the House do now resolve itself into Committee.—(Lord Glenarthur)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly.
[The LORD WELLS-PESTELL in the Chair.]
Clause 1 [Marriages of house-bound and detained persons in England and Wales]:
On Question, Whether Clause 1 shall be agreed to?
Lord Mishcon: I think it may be appropriate if I address my remarks at this stage; namely, on the Question, Whether Clause 1 shall stand part of the Bill? If that is not convenient to the noble Lord opposite or for any other reason is not a suitable course, I shall obviously resume my seat on the slightest hint to that effect. Clause 1 deals with the enabling powers for a marriage to take place where someone is in prison or is otherwise detained in a hospital or similar establishment.
On the Second Reading of the Bill, I ventured to express a fear, and that fear did not relate to the fact of the marriage but to what would be the position of the marriage certificate, as we commonly call it, knowing as one does that the place of abode of the party to the marriage has to be put on the marriage certificate—as does, in fact, the place where the ceremony takes place.
The position up to the passing of this Bill,of course, is that the present procedure is at least open to the parties who want to get married; namely, that someone detained in prison—and that is the case I am trying to bring to the attention of the Committee—has the opportunity to apply for leave for the marriage to take place. Normally, but not always, it would take place outside the prison itself and outside the prison chapel. That would mean—and we were told that there would be a saving by the Bill—that the party concerned would be escorted by prison officers and certain arrangements would be made. However, the marriage certificate would then read that the marriage had been solemnized at St. John's church or at Marylebone registry office, or whatever the case may be.
My problem, which I tried to express on Second Reading, was to safeguard the party to the marriage who is detained and who for possibly a very good reason wishes the marriage to take place quickly and not at the end of even a short sentence—although there may be other cases where there is a long sentence. No longer will he be able to elect—because there will be rules in prisons as a result of this—to have the marriage solemnized outside the prison. He will be told that there is now an Act and the marriage will take place, if he wants it to take place, in the prison. The result of that will be that to the children of that marriage and, indeed, to anyone who applies to see the marriage certificate years afterwards—I put this problem on Second Reading—it would be transparent that the marriage had taken place when one of the spouses was in prison. This is not just an embarrassment: it is in some cases a tragic occurrence for a child who has to produce a marriage certificate afterwards.
The Minister, with his usual courtesy, answered me by saying that it was thought that this might be covered—indeed, that was the thinking at that time—by an address being given which would merely be the road or street in which the prison was located. I immediately ventured to say, having been born in South London and my late father having been the chaplain in South London to Brixton Prison—and I
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therefore knew it rather well—that I believed the address was Jebb Avenue, and so far as I knew the only thing in Jebb Avenue was the prison. I ought to have added that there were also a few houses occupied by prison officers. Therefore, it would be very well known to everyone in South London, and if the place of the marriage was put on the certificate as Jebb Avenue, and the residence of one of the parties was also entered as Jebb Avenue, Brixton, there would not be the slightest doubt about where the marriage took place.
The noble Lord the Minister was even more courteous after that because he took note of the point that I tried to raise and most kindly wrote to me. With your Lordships' permission, because this is such a serious matter and creates an entirely different situation, I propose to read the letter. We are still faced with a problem, and I hope that the noble Lord the Minister will be able to help, as indeed, may I say, perhaps will Member of your Lordships' Committee. The noble Lord, Lord Elton, wrote to me on 18th February. He said:
"In your speech during the Second Reading debate on the Marriage Bill on 28th January you expressed concern that the entry in the marriage register book and copies of the entry, commonly called marriage certificates, should not make it obvious to, say, the children of the marriage that the place of marriage was a prison. As Lord Glenarthur explained in his winding-up speech, the intention is that the place of marriage should be shown in the marriage register and in any copies of the entry in the register merely as the postal address of the prison. At the time you suggested that this practice might not be sufficient to conceal the fact that the marriage had been solemnized in a prison establishment, and hence I have looked further into the matter.
"The present arrangements for the registration of marriages in England and Wales are set out in the Marriage Act 1949 and in statutory regulations. Under these the place of marriage has to be stated. Moreover, under the 1949 Act the place must be set out in the notice of marriage given by the parties to the proposed marriage, and thereafter in the certificate of the superintendent registrar which authorises the marriage to take place. This requirement affords any person who may wish to allege the existence of an impediment to the marriage the opportunity to go to the place of marriage and lodge his objection either before or during the ceremony.
"By statutory regulations the entry in the marriage register book made immediately after the ceremony must record the place in which solemnization took place. I should explain that under Section 75 of the Marriage Act a marriage may be void if it is not solemnized in the place specified in the preliminary documentation, and hence it is of importance that the place of marriage is recorded not only in the preliminary documents but also in the register of marriages in order that it will be possible, should that be necessary, to confirm or refute claims that a marriage may be void on the ground that it was solemnized in the wrong place.
"As you will apreciate, a significant change in marriage law would be required if the place of marriage were to be omitted from the entry in the marriage registers and from the copies of entries, and any such change would be outside the scope of the present Bill even were it thought to be desirable in principle. My preliminary inquiries suggest, however, that there may not be the problem that we feared. Because it is already necessary to record in the register the address of a prisoner who marries outside, the difficulty is not a new one and addresses have been formulated accordingly. Thus, to give a few examples, Parkhurst is recorded as Rookwood House, Newport; Walton as 68 Hornby Road, Liverpool, and Wormwood Scrubs as 166 Du Cane Road, Shepherds Bush, W.12. Although I recognise that 1 Jebb Avenue for Brixton may not be entirely satisfactory, there are other houses, albeit prison officers' houses, in the avenue, and I should be hesitant about going to a point at which we could be accused of deliberate concealment.
"Within this constraint, however, we are looking at the postal addresses of prisons throughout the country as recorded by the local register office to see whether there are any cases in which we should try to modify the postal address in such a way as to make ready identification less easy. I hope that in the light of all the circumstances

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you will agree that the matter might best be dealt with administratively, particularly as it is clear that this issue is already being dealt with sensibly.
"I am writing a similar letter to the Baroness Macleod."
I have finished the quotation from the letter. With great respect, I wonder whether we as a Committee are doing our duty by leaving the matter to possible administrative action hereafter when the guidance appears to be that, if this Bill is passed, there will be readily identifiable addresses for the press to see, for children to learn about and for third parties to learn about in a way which may be so distressing hereafter. I repeat that that is a position which does not normally obtain now by virtue of the fact that the ceremony normally takes place outside the prison gates either at a church or at a registry office.
So I wonder whether the noble Lord the Minister could help us upon this, because I believe that it is a matter that would be of great concern to many Members of the Committee. I hope that I have not in any way jumped this upon him by virtue of the fact that there is this correspondence. If I have done so, and he is unprepared, then in sheer decency from my point of view I ought to invite—if I may respectfully do this—other Members of your Lordships' Committee to make a contribution to the discussion. Then we will not only hear from the Minister, the noble Baroness, Lady Macleod, and myself but possibly all Members who are interested. Perhaps we can revert to this matter at the Report stage; but I do believe that this is a very important human point.
7.42 p.m.
Lord Teviot: I do not want to add very much to what the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, has said. He has explained the situation carefully and has also given your Lordships the benefit of details of the letter in which the Government replied—and it was a very good letter.
There is one suggestion that I should like to make to him on this matter. It is regarding the introduction of a short marriage certificate. There is a short birth certificate available which was introduced after the war in order to help people who were born illegitimate when in those days there was a stigma about being illegitimate. They were given the opportunity of being able to buy this short birth certificate. Unfortunately, in the few years that ensued, anybody who produced such a certificate was thought to be illegitimate. However, times have changed.
People buy short birth certificates because they are cheaper than long birth certificates. They can be used for most legal reasons, as the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, will know as a solicitor. All your Lordships will know that to obtain a passport you only need to present a short birth certificate. I think the short birth certificate more or less does practically everything.
I should like to ask my noble friend to consult, if he has not already done so—and obviously he cannot do so today—not only the Home Office but the Registrar General. I do not think that this suggestion would even need a statute. I think that that would probably be a very good idea.
There was one other point that I was going to bring up which has completely gone out of my head.
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Perhaps your Lordships will forgive me if I come back to it later, if I feel that it is still important.
Baroness Faithfull: Before the noble Lord sits down, I wonder whether I could clear a point. With regard to the short birth certificate, is it not true that when you want to apply for a top job in the Civil Service or in MI5, 6, 7 or whatever it is, you have to produce the long certificate? Is this not so?
Lord Teviot: I am sure, my Lords, that the noble Baroness has made it quite clear. I think in those circumstances the answer is, yes.
I know the exact point that I was going to bring up. It is of great importance and has to do with registration. Anything on a certificate, I think we must all agree, should be the whole truth and nothing but the truth. There should be no fudging. Whether the marriage laws are going to be changed, or whether they need to be changed, we must explore that aspect. I am thinking of the short marriage certificate. If a person, let us say, applied for a top job in MI5, and if he was married in prison, probably he would not obtain the appointment. But if he had to produce the marriage certificate of his father, then I am quite sure—people are fairly enlightened these days—he would quietly explain his personal circumstances, and I am sure that the marriage in prison would not enter into it. I am very grateful to the noble Baroness for that point.
Baroness Macleod of Borve: May I briefly thank the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, for reading out that letter which I thought was very, very helpful indeed? I think that we are all worried about this particular point.
If we are talking about prisoners in this particular context, I was wondering whether a prisoner would be able to choose whether he should be married in prison or whether he would have the right to be married outside prison. If he felt very strongly, as is our worry, that perhaps any progeny of his might have an address that would not be acceptable within the family in the future—if he is far-sighted enough to see this point—then he might decide to get married outside prison. I should like to ask my noble friend if he can tell me about that, because that, it seems to me, might help the circumstances.
Lord Mishcon: May I deal with that point very humbly but only because the noble Lord the Minister, as I said, has possibly been caught unaware in regard to this matter? I have already said this and he ought to be treated with a proper amount of consideration as a result. But I did understand from the Second Reading speech that was made by the noble Minister, Lord Elton, that the purpose of this Bill, among other considerations, was to economise on prison officer services. We were told that quite a lot of time was taken up with taking prisoners for this purpose to an outside place.
Once this Bill has become an enactment, my impression from the noble Lord the Minister was that if a prisoner wanted to get married it would be compulsory for the ceremony to take place in the prison. Even if it were left as a discretion to a prison governor, I am not sure, frankly, trying to read a prison governor's mind, that every prison governor would say

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that it was a proper and legitimate use of a very exceptional right to a prisoner that the one reason that he wanted to get married outside was so that the address of the prison did not apear on the marriage certificate. I doubt whether that would happen.
Lord Mottistone: May I add very briefly the fact that I was very sympathetic to the view that was put forward earlier by the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon? I am not sure, having heard the letter which he so kindly read out to us, whether I am quite so sympathetic as I was. I quite see that when a child was born it would be very nice if we could cover up the precise address of the parents when the parents were married in prison, so that the child would never know about that. But I wonder whether that is not pushing it a bit far in view of all the objections to that which the letter so clearly points out.
Also, I was very struck by the fact that Parkhurst Prison—which is the one of course that I know best, coming from that part of the world—has a very sensible alternative in Brookwood House, Newport, which is exactly what I had hoped that it would have. Naturally in the Isle of Wight people always do things the best way, but I will not pursue that one. I suspect that that is the name of the governor's house or something like that. Would it be possible, where necessary, for all prisons to be given a similar address which would be to everybody, except the really well informed, a sufficient cover?
I do not believe that we will ever get round the people who really know what the form is, and I think that we are going to find it very difficult to keep this information totally from children. I would have thought that this is something that we really cannot pursue more than a reasonable amount. I would have thought that what the Minister says in his letter, with possibly some changes of some of the names that are used for prisons, would be a sufficient safeguard for the superficial reference to the address.
Baroness Faithfull: I wonder whether I may put one point of view that has been put to me. I have not investigated it very closely, but it is that the registrar, presumably, has to be present at the prison at the time of the marriage. Could not the address of the registrar be put on the certificate? Would that be completely outside the possibilities?
Lord Mishcon: I hesitate to come back and I promise the Committee that this is the very last time. I believe that when the noble Lord the Minister wrote to me he very clearly said, and understandably so, that the precise address where the solemnization takes place must be there in the notice, apart from anything else, and in the certificate, because otherwise, if it is at an address other than the one that is given, first there is no right to challenge the propriety of the marriage (if I may put it in those terms) and, secondly, there is a question of whether the marriage would not be void in any event if it were not at the address for which the notice was given.
Lord Glenarthur: I must confess that the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, has to some extent caught me on the hop with this one. I will do my best to try to explain
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to him a little in amplification of my noble friend's letter. The situation is as expressed in the letter which the noble Lord read out. It sets out very fully the reasons why I cannot promise more than a sensible approach at an administrative level. There are good reasons, such as being clear about the validity of the marriage—which is the point that the noble Lord himself made when he was answering my noble friend Lady Faithfull about validity—and why a certificate should state the place of the marriage, and at present, as he so rightly says, the address of the prisoner is recorded.
The address of the prisoner has to appear in however imprecise a form on the entry of marriage, even where solemnized in a church or register office, but the Government will do whatever is reasonably possible to adopt addresses for marriages under the Bill which will not disclose that the place of solemnization is a prison. I think it would perhaps be difficult, if not to some extent pointless, to go as far as my noble friend Lord Mottistone suggests in re-addressing prisons and giving them all another name, because those names will become known. I myself did not know the postal addresses of many prisons which have been referred to in my noble friend's letter, but they will become known in time. I do not wish to appear in the least unsympathetic to the noble Lord. I think he makes a point of which the department is aware, but I hope what I said earlier about the Government doing what they reasonably can to ensure some form of address which will not disclose the nature of the place appearing on the certificate will be something that will reassure him in this case.
Lord Mishcon: I am sure that the Committee is most grateful, as I certainly am, to the noble Lord the Minister. May I just explain to him, so that he does not think I was inconsiderate, that I was engaged on another Bill and was waiting for the noble Lord, Lord Elton, to appear to give him advance notice. I apologise.
The problem, in one sentence, is that, possibly without anybody realising it, we are taking away from a prisoner something which at the moment he has: namely, the right to get married outside the prison. I shall leave it at that because I think that is the proper thing to do and ask the noble Lord the Minister whether he will continue the kindness which has been shown to me on this matter about which I am troubled, and other Members of your Lordships' Committee obviously are, and see whether the matter can be carried further.
Indeed, if I may borrow something from what the noble Baroness, Lady Macleod of Borve, said, if something possibly could be written into the Bill which still gives the prisoner the option of marrying—I nearly said marrying out of prison, which sounds a little odd—but having the marriage solemnized outside the prison, then, of course, the reason for part of what I have said disappears. Only part, of course, because many may be thoughtless about this and not realise what it may do to children and so on hereafter. But if the Minister would be kind enough to say that he will consider what I and other Members of the Committee have said and possibly approach it along those lines, I should be very grateful.
Clause 1 agreed to.
Schedule 1 [Amendment of Marriage Act 1949]:
7.55 p.m.
The Lord Bishop of Derby The Lord Bishop of Derby moved Amendment No. 1:
Page 11, leave out lines 28 to 31 and insert—
("(b) stating that in the opinion of the responsible authority the circumstances of the individual case are such as to require the marriage to be solemnized with the precincts of the establishment.")
The right reverend Prelate said: This amendment attempts to set out clearly a matter of principle. The amendment may be defective technically, but if the principle it expresses is agreed by the Committee it would surely be possible for the draftsmen to include the correct wording later in the Bill. The principle is stated in this way. It is stated in the rubric in the Book of Common Prayer, at the beginning of the marriage service:
"the persons to be married shall come into the body of the Church with their friends and neighbours";
and the same idea is expressed in the preface to the marriage service in the Alternative Service Book, which begins with the words:
"We have come together in the presence of God to witness the marriage of N and N, to ask his blessing on them, and to share in their joy"
The Church considers it important that the largest number of relatives and friends should be able to witness the marriage. If the ceremony is to take place in the prison chapel it is likely that very few guests will be permitted into the prison. The Home Office has said that this will be a matter for the governor's discretion and will depend not only on the character of the detained person but also on the type of prison in which he is held. That seems to be the answer to the inquiry made by the noble Lady, Baroness Macleod of Borve, but her concern, that the prisoner should be able to express his wishes, is an important one.
Secondly, as I said in the Second Reading debate, the parish church is likely to provide a much more appropriate atmosphere than the prison chapel. To what extent will the wishes of the couple be regarded as paramount in this matter? Representations made on behalf of prison chaplains make it clear that they consider it crucial for the marriage to be conducted outside in the community wherever possible. Surely no bride, or even bridegroom, would want her or his wedding to take place in prison. Whatever the degree of nervousness at the time, the setting is of great importance in retrospect. All that the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, has said reinforces these considerations that I mention.
And they are human considerations, as he said, and they are not matters primarily, in my mind, of ecclesiastical regulation. To deny a person a wedding in normal surroundings (be it church or register office) on the ground of the cost of providing escorts is not an adequate reason. From information suppled by the Home Office it would seem that we are talking about no more than 300 weddings a year, the majority of which are probably not Church of England ceremonies. By comparison there are thousands of escorts required in a year for court appearances and hospital visits. Wedding escort duty is a tiny proportion of the whole and would make little difference to the total
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expenditure. The present requirement is that the marriage should be solemnized in the church or register office nearest to the prison, and normally escort there will not be a very expensive matter.
It will probably be said that the Church's proposal relates strictly to the operation of the legislation rather than its content and, whatever policy is followed, could be put into effect without amendment of the Bill. While that is true, it is important to consider what is said on page ii of the Explanatory and Financial Memorandum to the Bill under the heading "Financial effects of the Bill". It is stated that some financial:
"savings will result from some detained persons being married in their place of detention instead of being escorted to be married elsewhere".
Unless the Bill makes clear in some way that the norm is marriage outside the prison, it would seem to be Government policy to require marriage to be solemnized in the place of detention. If this is the Government's intention it should be clearly stated and not brought in under cover of the other considerations.
I am surprised that the present Government should seek to alter the ecclesiastical establishment to even this minor extent in this arbitrary way. It is to try and make the traditional position clear that I propose this amendment. I beg to move.
Lord Glenarthur: The right reverend Prelate has very fairly returned to a point he raised in his speech in the Second Reading debate on this Bill in which he voiced the concern felt by some prison chaplains that marriages of prisoners should, after this Bill comes into operation, ordinarily be solemnized inside prison rather than in a church or register office outside. He has referred in that context to the parish church as the most suitable venue for a Church of England ceremony, as likely to provide a much more appropriate atmosphere for the couple and wedding guests than an institution.
Her Majesty's Government entirely share the view of the right reverend Prelate that the proper place to get married is in a place of worship and that that place of worship should, whenever possible, be outside prison. That is the natural state of affairs and it is entirely appropriate to the beginning of a marriage. But where the bride or bridegroom is a prisoner, I must first ask the right reverend Prelate to remember that there is little more that we are able to provide, in the way of normality, than a few hours of liberty. Prisoners do not, by getting married, bring their sentences to an end. After the ceremony they return to custody and their spouse remains outside. And in many cases where prisoners cannot be left at large without escort, we do not achieve even that degree of normality when we allow them to marry outside the prison. Prison officers cannot be disguised as pages or bridesmaids and there is no concealing the fact of the sentence of which all concerned are in any case aware.
The right reverend Prelate is anxious, I think, for an undertaking that marriages of prisoners will only be celebrated under this Bill—and within the prison walls—if there are overriding considerations preventing their marriage outside. His concern is for the individual prisoner and the spouse, family and guests. I understand that concern, but I have another.

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I think he mut share a little of it and so I must tell your Lordships about it.
The prison system is at present under very great strain. Shortages of staff mean that we must rely on staff to work high levels of overtime if régimes are to be maintained at an acceptable level. Even so, there are restrictions on the extent to which educational opportunities can be made available to prisoners or on the times when workshops can be kept open. All this is compounded by the need, in many of our hard-pressed local establishments, to provide large numbers of staff to meet the requirements of the courts—such as the right reverend Prelate mentioned himself—and on occasions we are not even able to achieve this. It is in these circumstances that we have to view the provisions of this Bill at present and which leads to our concern.
Our concern is with the large number of prisoners who would be left behind on what, for those to be married, would be their happy day—not merely locked up in prison, as they can expect, but locked up in their cells for almost the whole day simply because staff who could have supervised them at work or recreation are engaged on escort duties instead.
The right reverend Prelate must, I think, allow the prison governor to decide, in the light of the staff available to him at the time, whether he can properly allocate staff to escort duty on the occasion of any particular wedding. If he cannot there is still a place of worship available. It is an essential part of every prison and the right reverend Prelate will not mind my testifying to the devoted work of the Prison Chaplaincy that assures its proper use around the year.
For the present, therefore, while the Government share the Church's preference for venue, I cannot undertake that if the Bill becomes law it will be possible ordinarily to give effect to that preference. If and when at some future time the staffing position eases significantly, my right honourable friend would be prepared to reconsider the position; but in the meantime I have to tell the Committee that the Government can only give such qualified assurance of favourable consideration of individual cases as is appropriate in all the circumstances. I hope that with that explanation the right reverend Prelate will see fit to withdraw his amendment.
Lord Mishcon: I hope that the right reverend Prelate will not do so without a protest or hoping that something more helpful might emerge from the noble Lord the Minister than has emerged at this stage. It was a harsh brief to which we listened. Nobody imagines that a prison warder would dress up as a page and I felt that, although it might bring a smile to somebody's lips, it was not quite the tone that I had hoped the noble Lord the Minister, with his usual kindliness, wanted to bring to the discussion of this matter.
I am a little worried. I see the case completely for those who are disabled and for those who cannot move away from institutions. I am becoming worried about the change that we are being asked to make in the case of prisoners because it is a right that they have at the moment, which is exercised quite freely. The noble Lord the Minister has not spoken about protests from
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the Prison Officers' Association. I do not know whether he has received any, but if so he will tell us. I have not read about protests from other prisoners concerning being locked in cells while the ceremony is taking place outside. So far as I know, it has not reached the press or the other media. If the Minister can tell us about such protests, I am sure that we ought to know about them.
However, the right reverend Prelate quoted the number of cases—300 or so a year—and he very charitably used another word rather than the word which occurs in the Explanatory and Financial Memorandum. He said that it is expected that, "some savings will result". In fact, it says that "minor savings will result". So according to the Explanatory and Financial Memorandum we are dealing with minor savings. If this were there on its own I would not be as worried as I am having heard the previous discussion that took place on the Question, Whether Clause 1 shall stand part of the Bill? The additional worry is not only that they will not have the privilege that they have now, but that what they will have in addition—what they do not have now—is a marriage certificate that will be identifiably there as evidence that the marriage took place in prison.
The noble Lord the Minister could help us very much if he went halfway and made it an option and said that it can take place in prison under the enabling procedures here if the prisoner so wishes—indeed, there may be many cases where the prisoner will say, "I do not want to go to a church" or, "I do not want to go to a synagogue" or, "I do not want to go to a mosque; I am perfectly happy to have the ceremony here". If that is so, so be it. He has elected to do this. But would it not be proper that this, at all events for a trial period, is made optional? If the Government subsequently find that the hardship on prison officers is really of such startling proportions that one ought to terminate the option, or that the option is not being exercised the right way from the Government's point of view, it will take a very small amending Bill to remove the option.
However, I am unhappy about this, and I believe that other Members of the Committee are, too. If I may say so most respectfully to the right reverend Prelate, I thought that he made his case so convincingly and so appealingly that I hope the Minister will at least say that he will consider the question of the option procedure between now and the Report stage to save some of us from having to put down an amendment on Report which will put the option into the Bill.
Lord Gridley: I should like to say a few words in support of what the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, has just said about the amendment of the right reverend Prelate. I shall say only a few words, for I did not take part in any of the earlier discussions on this matter. But tonight I have been most touched to think that here is an instance of a man in prison who may have all the desire in the world when he gets out of prison to forget that he was there, or not to let anyone know that he has been there; who has paid the penalty for being there; and who, therefore, if he is able to have his marriage solemnized outside, will have his mind relieved and be helped to forget the past, having paid the penalty for his wrongdoing. This is one reason

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which strikes me very strongly in thinking about the issue before us.
I am not entirely impressed by what my noble friend on the Front Bench has said about the difficulties of staffing, and so on, in present circumstances when it has been stated that there are only 300 records of marriages taking place outside prison throughout the whole of the United Kingdom in any one year. In a different light, I spent five years in a prison overseas, although not through any fault of my own, when I was incarcerated in a very up-to-date prison which had been designed to hold 500 convicts but which, in fact, held 1,600 of us for four years. Although one had not done anything wrong, after going through an experience of that sort one wants to forget all about it.
For those reasons alone I most sincerely hope that my noble friend on the Front Bench will consider very carefully what has been said this evening and will go away and think about the points that have been made.
Baroness Elliot of Harwood: I should like to add a few words because I spent about 16 years visiting prisons on behalf of the Home Office when I was a member of the Advisory Council on the Treatment of Offenders. I do not want to stress this too strongly because it was a long time ago, and things have changed tremendously. But I remember that on occasions—and they were very rare—when one visited a prison when a marriage was about to take place or had just taken place it had the most extraordinary effect on people. They were all interested. I did not find any of the officers in any way hostile to the job which they had to do, which was to be present when the marriage took place. It had a very friendly effect. It was the kind of effect that made you think that they really wanted to get better, to help and to leave behind their criminal background. This may have been my imagination, but it was the prevailing atmosphere.
As the right reverend Prelate said, these things happen very rarely, but, as has been suggested by the right reverend Prelate, I think it would be very wise to put something in the Bill which I am quite sure would not involve all the extra work and attention that the Minister has suggested it would, because in the very large prison population there are so very few marriages with which to cope. So it is exceptional. On this occasion, when everyone is anxious to have a united Bill, I think it would be a pity if something suggested by the right reverend Prelate should not go into the Bill in some way or another.
Lord Glenarthur: I am certain that my noble friend Lord Elton and the Home Office will read carefully what has been said by those noble Lords, who have spoken tonight on this subject. As I understand it, there are three categories of prisoner with which we are concerned. First, there are those who cannot be let out under any circumstances whatever because they are a danger in whatever way—and I think that all noble Lords who have spoken realise that. Then there are those who can be let out under escort for whatever reason; and then there are those who in some cases are allowed out without escort because they are trusted to return again. It is the second category in which we are interested. I am afraid that what I said before about the staffing arrangements holds good. It is something
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which the Church of England has been into quite carefully with the Home Office, and the Home Office has made its views plain.
As regards approaches from the Prison Officers' Association, there have been no formal approaches but I think it is fair to say that prison officers generally are unhappy about escorting prisoners to weddings because, among other things, the prisoner cannot be married in the sense of cohabiting, and other prisoners suffer as a result. At present, prisoners are not allowed out freely to marry and we have to impose restrictions to keep the escort commitment within bounds. The Bill will enable us to reduce these restrictions considerably.
The right reverend Prelate quoted a figure of 300 weddings a year. I am afraid I have to tell him that we do not, in fact, have any figures from any central registry of the number of prisoners who have got married. I should also say that I did not intend in any way to introduce any note of frivolity in what I said. It is a serious point that prison officers are bound to be there.
I take the points that have been made. I shall certainly read them and they will be carefully and sympathetically studied. But I am afraid that at this stage I cannot say that I can take this away and consider it and come back with my own amendment at a later stage. Therefore, I hope that the right reverend Prelate will not press his amendment.
The Lord Bishop of Derby: What we are all trying to do in this matter is to stand in other people's shoes—the shoes of brides and bridegrooms, the shoes of prison governors and prison officers. We are all seeking to do that, and I am sure that this is true of the noble Lord the Minister. Of course, the circumstances of a wedding outside prison are not normal; but it is not the length of time away from the prison with which I am concerned, it is the actual place of the wedding. It has nothing to do with extended and uproarious wedding receptions; it is the actual place of marriage which will be fixed in people's minds. Certainly I realise the difficulties that governors and prison officers must have, and I am sure that it is necessary to take full account of what the Minister has said, although it seems to me that the situation of not being allowed to permit any exception can land you in a difficult position.
What concerns me is the real danger in this Bill that in the future the marriages of prisoners will, as a matter of course, always take place in prison. I believe that some freedom in this matter is necessary. What the amendment seeks to do is to make sure that there is some careful consideration and justification of refusal of marriage outside. I must consider bringing this matter back in some form or other at the Report stage, but in view of the serious points that the Minister has made I ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Schedule 1 agreed to.
8.21 p.m.
Lord Mottistone Lord Mottistone moved Amendment No. 2:
Before Clause 2, insert the following new clause:
("Informing nearest relative
. The managers of a hospital or the governor of a prison in which a patient or prisoner is detained in accordance with section 1(3)(a) above shall take such steps as are practicable—

(a) to inform in writing the person (if any) appearing to them to be the nearest relative of the patient or prisoner at the time when notice of marriage is given to the superintendent registrar that the notice has been given; and

(b) to inform in writing the person (if any) appearing to them to be the nearest relative of the patient or prisoner of—

(i) sections 28 and 29 of the Marriage Act 1949; and

(ii) section 12 of the Matrimonial Causes Act 1973; and

(iii) Part VIII of the Mental Health Act 1959.").

The noble Lord said: At Second Reading the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Derby made the point that it is difficult, when a question of mental health is involved, to be certain that at the time that the wedding is proposed and takes place the persons concerned (or the person concerned if there is only one mental patient involved) are sure of the responsibilities they are taking on. The right reverend Prelate made the point, which I thought was relevant, that Article 12 of the Human Rights Charter, when read in full, says:
"Men and women of marriageable age have the right to marry and to found a family according to the national laws governing the exercise of this right".
The problem there is the phrase "and to found a family" and the implication of responsibility that that is going to cast on the couple. Therefore, I suggest that we need to be quite sure that every possible opportunity is given to be certain that all viewpoints about the behaviour of these people who are mental patients have been taken into account before the marriage is allowed.
The Bill makes provision in Clause 1 for certain safeguards, in effect, by the way in which it is set out. In effect, this puts the weight on the medical officers concerned with the patient to give the necessary authority for the wedding to take place. What my amendment seeks to do is to widen this—not very much—by making sure that the nearest relative (if there be such a person; and, of course, there is not always) is informed about the marriage taking place, and also informed under paragraph (b) of my amendment of all the relevant Acts of Parliament to which they can have resource in the event that they feel that the marriage should not take place.
This is a reasonable precaution to take, because experience has shown that in hospital people possibly present a different appearance from that when they are outside and allowed to live with their families. As your Lordships will probably know from what I said at Second Reading, the amendment has the support of the National Schizophrenic Foundation, and it is schizophrenic patients in particular who are so difficult to assess and to know when they are responsible for their actions. I would hope that my noble friend can either take this amendment or, as is so often the case, if it is not quite perfect that he will be able to accept the principle of what I have said and help me with an amendment of his in its place. I beg to move.
Baroness Lane-Fox: Being myself a senior citizen spinster it may be thought that I have little right to speak in this Committee, but I crave eligibility on the grounds of familiarity with this particular subject.
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Today such a lot is spoken of rights, but sometimes rights can turn into wrongs. An example is that if we have the real interests of the schizophrenics and the mentally defectives at heart, and particularly if we have close connections with such cases, we must provide for their limited ability to make decisions and fully to understand the implications of their actions.
They sometimes make their decisions in a mischievous vein, and with others there is extra sentimentality. Obviously their nearest and dearest need to know that in this unusual situation caring guidance should be given through probably the Court of Protection. It is much better that this should happen before a marriage, which could lead to the avoidance, therefore, of so many complications. The nearest relative, or nearest caring person, is likely to feel the worst repercussions of unwise marriage plans of this kind. Those of your Lordships who know enough of these people feel keenly that they should in these cases be protected from their whims. For these reasons, I support the amendment of my noble friend Lord Mottistone.
Baroness Elliot of Harwood: I, too, should like to support this amendment, I have had a lot to do with the schizophrenic society. I have also unfortunately in the the course of life had quite a lot to do with people suffering from this mental disability. It is such a strange illness because so often people can go on for days, and weeks, without any seeming disadvantages and then suddenly they change into something quite different. It generally makes any decision they take under those conditions unwise.
The proposals in this amendment for a consultation with the nearest relative, with somebody who is devoted, are important. It might be a son, daughter, or a brother, or anyone they know very well and to whom they are devoted. They are the people who understand and know the character better sometimes then even a doctor, although of course they are under doctors' supervision. It is important that the family should be brought in because there is nothing more tragic than for a fatal mistake to be made without knowing it. That is the point. You can sometimes avoid making mistakes in life when you know what those mistakes are, or what they will lead to. But the people concerned coping with this kind of mental illness—and other kinds of illness too—do not realise what the difficulties can be, and how strange the reactions can be. One can sometimes almost change character altogether under stress, or under this particular mental illness, or mental weakness.
What the noble Lord, Lord Mottistone, has said is right. It would be wise. It would not withhold liberty from anybody. It would simply be a matter of consultation and taking advice, if they want to take the advice. If they do not want to take the advice, of course they do not need to take it, but the advice would be there. It is the kind of advice which people understand even better than the medical advice they get, and I therefore hope that the Minister will consider the amendment to be wise, to be worth including in the Bill, and to be for the advantage of the people concerned.
Lord Mishcon: I promise the Committee that my observations will be brief. The noble Lord, Lord

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Mottistone, fairly said that the form of the amendment might not be precisely acceptable to the Government, but he hoped that something near it would be and that the Government would be constructive in their approach. I have agreed with every word spoken so far. My only fear—and I deal only with the form of the amendment; the noble Lord, as I said, invited the principle to be accepted and the form to be looked at—is the mandatory nature of the proposed clause.
In other words, I think it would be an extremely good idea to write into the Bill that where practicable—that where advantageous, if you like—the notification shall be to the nearest relative. But as to having to notify the nearest relative when the doctor concerned knows perfectly well that one of the difficulties from which the patient is suffering is the relationship with certain members of the family, it would obviously be wrong to make it mandatory that that person must be notified. Obviously my point is not one of great substance; but only because, as I said, the noble Lord, Lord Mottistone, was so fair in the way he put his case, with which in principle I agree, I suggest that it should not be mandatory but a matter of persuasion for the medical officer concerned, or for the board of the hospital or whoever is looking after it. In other words, it should be persuasive that there should be consultation with the members of the family.
Baroness Macleod of Borve: I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon. There must be many cases where a patient has been in a hospital in a schizophrenic stale for many years and suddenly falls in love with a pretty young nurse and wants to marry her, but for all sorts of reasons, does not want his relatives to know about it. We are surely talking only about people of marriageable age; we are not talking about youngsters under 18. Therefore, when they have their sane moments, they are, we hope, able to make up their own minds.
With respect to my noble friend Lady Elliot, I should have thought that the people with day-to-day knowledge of the state of mind of a schizophrenic patient are far more able to know whether that patient should or should not enter into a form of marriage with anybody at all. Under Sections 28 and 29 of the Marriage Act 1949, even if the patient decides that he will marry whoever it is a caveat can be entered by the psychiatrist or anybody else who is in loco parentis as regards the patient. I am not certain that the amendment is necessary. If it is mandatory that they shall be notified, it is possible that there might be a great deal of friction. Accordingly, I would prefer to leave it to the psychiatrist or to the people in charge of the patient to decide whether the patient is or is not in a fit state to marry.
Lord Glenarthur: As the Committee will be aware—though I think it needs reinforcing—the Bill deals only with the place of marriage, not with the law in relation to who has or has not the capacity to marry. My noble friends and those who advise them, and other noble Lords who have spoken, might feel that in some way the Bill introduces some new right to marry. I felt that I should preface my remarks by saying that.
My noble friend Lady Macleod is right in what she said: consent is of the essence of a valid marriage. If
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someone lacks the mental capacity to consent, there can be no marriage; and, as she said, under Section 29 of the Marriage Act 1949 anyone can enter a caveat with the superintendent registrar to stop a certificate for marriage. The case can go to the Registrar General on appeal, and if the person is found to lack the capacity to consent no certificate will be issued. All this will be drawn to the attention of the hospital authorities, who will consider whether to enter a caveat.
Although the opening lines of the amendment refer to prisons as well as hospitals, I must assume that my noble friend's intention is to provide principally for the case of persons described in Clause 1(3)(a); that is, detained patients. No prisoner can be a detained patient within the meaning of the Bill, but I would add that many of the points I shall make would apply also to the circumstances of prisoners.
I appreciate my noble friend's concern that the patient's nearest relative should know about the marriage. I think it virtually impossible that they will not be aware of it, provided they have remained in contact with the patient. Such marriages have been very rare and take place (under the present law, always outside the hospital) only after very careful consideration by the doctors and professional staff caring for the patient, as to the validity of the patient's consent. If the patient's nearest relative has kept in touch with the patient, he will be well aware of what is going on, and, I expect, would normally be asked to the wedding, whether it is to be held outside or inside the hospital. However, it may reassure my noble friend if I confirm that in the guidance we shall be issuing to hospitals about the Bill, if it is passed, we shall advise them to inform the nearest relative if the patient agrees.
The amendment would require the managers to inform the nearest relative of certain very complex and, I would say, rather inappropriate legislation. For example, Section 12 of the Matrimonial Causes Act 1973 deals with the grounds on which a voidable marriage can be annulled after the event by a court. The provisions are no concern of the nearest relative, since proceedings for annulment can be brought only by one of the parties to the marriage; the nearest relative has no locus whatever.
Again. Part VIII of the Mental Health Act, also referred to in the amendment, consists of 22 complex sections about the Court of Protection. I think my noble friend would be imposing a somewhat daunting task on the managers if they were to be required to inform the nearest relative of all these Part VIII provisions. The only one of possible relevance is that the Court of Protection may undertake divorce or nullity proceedings after the solemnization of a marriage on behalf of the patient, but, again, the nearest relative has no locus. I cannot think that my noble friend would seriously consider that because the patient wishes to get married the managers should suggest to the relative that he is clearly incompetent to manage his own affairs and should be put under the care of the Court of Protection. Only a small minority of detained patients are, in fact, candidates for the Court of Protection, which mostly deals with people who are not compulsorily detained.

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The only provision mentioned in the amendment of direct interest to the nearest relative in the context of the Bill is Section 29 of the Marriage Act 1949, dealing with the entering of a caveat with the superintendent registrar. It seems to me that there are two strong arguments against bringing this especially to the notice of relatives. One is that if the professional staff who know the patient well, in particular his doctor, consider that he does not have the capacity to consent to marriage, or are doubtful about his capacity, they will themselves cause a caveat to be entered, so that the issue can be considered by the superintendent registrar and, if need be, by the Registrar General. We shall be advising hospitals about this. It could be very confusing to the relatives for the hospital managers to write and appear to suggest that the relative should enter a caveat when those in the best position to judge the patient's mental condition either have not felt it necessary to do so or have themselves done so.
Secondly—this is a fundamental point which I have made before but must emphasise again—the Bill should not be used to deprive detained patients of their rights. As I have said, under the law as it stands today detained patients already have the right to marry if they have the capacity to consent to marriage, and such marriages have, albeit very infrequently, occurred. All we are doing in the Bill is permitting the marriage of a patient to take place in hospital, rather than necessarily ouside. In no way does the Bill enlarge a detained patient's right to marry by modifying the law as to capacity and under the Bill no detained patient who does not already possess the right will get the right to marry. What my noble friend's amendment proposes or implies is a new curb on patients' rights; one which many patients, and I believe the staff who care for them, will resent and find distressing, and which moreover may well confuse and distress a patient's relatives.
I have given a lengthy explanation to my noble friend, and I hope that he accepts it. I hope, too, that in view of what I have said, he will feel able with confidence to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Mottistone: I have confidence about all kinds of things, but not about withdrawing amendments. I greatly thank my noble friend for his very full reply, which I shall read with great care, and so will those with whom I have consulted. I might come back with something quite different on Report; but, in the meantime, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clauses 2 to 12 agreed to.
Schedule 2 [Application etc. of Marriage Acts in Northern Ireland]:
Lord Glenarthur Lord Glenarthur moved Amendments Nos. 3 to 5:
Page 16, line 38, leave out from second ("Act") to end of line 48.
Page 17, line I, after ("(c)") insert ("but as if").
line 3, at end insert ("and
(b) subject to such other modifications as the Department may prescribe.").
The noble Lord said: With the permission of your Lordships' Committee, I should like to take Amendments Nos. 3, 4 and 5 together. The
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amendments make a minor change in relation to the preliminary procedures for certain marriages under the Bill in Northern Ireland. The existing law of Northern Ireland is complex in this matter, but perhaps I may describe it as follows. After notice of marriage has been given to the registrar, the registrar has to carry out certain procedures which include sending a copy of the notice to the minister of the Church which the parties usually attend. If there is no minister of a Church which the parties usually attend, the registrar must instead publish the notice in a newspaper in the case of a register office marriage, and the cost of that falls on the parties to the marriage.
Paragraph 13 of Schedule 2, as drafted, removes for marriages under the Bill the registrar's duty to send the notice to the minister, or to publish it in a newspaper. That was because the circumstances of housebound or detained persons are, or may be, at variance with regular attendance at Church. However, concern has been expressed by the Presbyterian Church in Ireland over the possible effect of this on how Churches provide pastoral care; and I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Blease, (who is not present this evening) for bringing this matter to the attention of my noble friend Lord Elton. Accordingly, the Government have reconsidered the matter, and the present amendment allows a more flexible approach. Publication in a newspaper remains inapplicable. But sending the notice to the minister will not be simply disapplied; instead it will now be possible for the Northern Ireland Department of Health and Social Services to make regulations modifying the provision, and so to retain it to the extent that it can usefully apply to marriages under the Bill.
What the regulations will say will be a matter for consideration in consultation with the religious bodies affected. But it is envisaged that as regards the party who is not housebound or detained, notice might be sent to the minister of a Church which he or she usually attends; as regards a housebound or detained person, it might be the minister of the Church previously attended. In neither case would a refusal by the parties to specify a church that they usually attend be an obstacle to the marriage proceeding. I beg to move.
Lord Mishcon: First, I should like to thank the noble Lord the Minister for his kindly reference to my noble friend Lord Blease, whom I know felt very deeply about this matter. Representations have been made to many of us, and I had the privilege of a conference with a representative of the clergy almost immediately after he had seen the noble Lord. I know that this matter has caused great concern, and there was conveyed to me an expression of gratitude for the way in which the Government had accepted the representations which have led to the amendments.
Lord Glenarthur: I am very grateful to the noble Lord for his remarks.
On Question, amendments agreed to.
Schedule 2, as amended, agreed to.
House resumed: Bill reported with the amendments.

Transport Bill
8.47 p.m.
House again in Committee, on the Question, Whether Clause 5 shall be agreed to?
Lord Underhill: Just before we adjourned our consideration of this Bill I said that it was our wish to speak on the Question whether the clause shall stand part and to obtain the opinion of our Lordships' Committee. I shall not go through all the arguments that have been put forward in our various amendments; I think that the position is known quite clearly. Clause 5 is the kernel of the Bill, and judging from earlier debates, it is quite clear that many Members of your Lordships' Committee take very serious objection to the Bill on a number of grounds, including what it will do to local government, the question of the general constitutional relationship, the view that it does not give proper attention to transport needs and benefits, and so on. I shall not rehearse what was said in all the earlier speeches, but we consider the clause so objectionable that we feel that we ought to have our views on it recorded.
When in Standing Committee in the other place the Question was put that the clause stand part, not a single word was said on it, owing to the guillotine procedure. The Standing Committee proceeded straight to a Division. But at least in your Lordships' Chamber not only have we had good debates on many issues, but we now have the opportunity to voice oar objections to the clause. It is not my usual practice to be melodramatic in these matters, but I would say that the clause is so objectionable, so bad for local government and for transport, that we resist it and we shall be asking the Committee to divide on it.
Lord Pitt of Hampstead: I am one of the noble Lords who feel very strongly about the clause. Up until now we have committed ourselves to a procedure under which the Ministry and the transport executive prepare a plan, which will then go to the authority. The authority might modify the plan if it wishes, but it has to take into account guidance from the Minister. They then make a determination which goes to the Minister. If the determination is below or at the level at which the Minister has suggested that subsidies are satisfactory, that is all right. But if it is above that level, then, in effect, if we are to follow the White Paper, the authority run the risk of being surcharged.
Up till now, we have tried to find principles which the Government are prepared to accept, which would allow an authority to carry out their responsibility under the 1968 and 1969 Acts, and taking the Minister's guidance into account, make a determination which may be more than the Minister has suggested. I know that the noble Lord will tell me that they can do so, because he has always insisted that the power is with the authority to make a final decision. But the power is there only if the authority accept the Minister's guidance.
While the noble Lord the Minister has been very nice and affable and all along has tried to reassure us that the authority have the final word, his noble friend Lord Boyd-Carpenter spelled it out when he said, quite clearly, that, provided the authority do not exceed the
1122
Minister's subsidy level, they are in order. So what passenger transport authorities are confronted with is a situation where they can make subsidy payments, provided that they are payments which the Minister thinks they ought to make, and there is no room for making greater payments.
It is no good the Minister saying that they can do so. The whole tenor of the Bill confines them to doing it up to a certain level. That has been proved by the attitude of the Government to all the amendments that have been moved. We have moved several amendments which would have improved the situation, and would have made it incumbent upon central Government to give guidance to authorities; amendments to make authorities follow the plans in Clauses 3 and 4, and amendments which stated that they must accept that what they were doing was done because they wanted to observe the laws and obligations laid upon them by the 1968 and 1969 Acts. But the Government have refused to accept any amendment which would provide any sort of protection to transport authorities. Because of that, we have no alternative but to reject Clause 5. The Minister may say that it is a wrecking approach, but if we reject Clause 5 it will be incumbent upon the Government to think again and come back with some more reasonable proposition. Because of that, I hope that this Committee will reject Clause 5.
Lord Bellwin: I shall not make another speech. I shall just say that there is a difference between us. We have talked it out at great length and anything that I said now would be bound to be a repetition of what I said before. There is a difference which is deeply held on both sides and, if the noble Lord, Lord Underhill, wishes to put the matter to the Committee then he must do so.
8.53 p.m.
On Question, Whether Clause 5 shall be agreed to?
Their Lordships divided: Contents, 66; Not-Contents, 30.

DIVISION NO. 3

CONTENTS

Airey of Abingdon, B.

Glanusk, L.

Avon, E.

Glenarthur, L.

Bathurst, E.

Gridley, L.

Bellwin, L.

Harvington, L.

Beloff, L.

Henley, L.

Boardman, L.

Hives, L.

Brougham and Vaux, L.

Home of the Hirsel, L.

Caithness, E.

Hornsby-Smith, B.

Campbell of Alloway, L.

Inglewood, L.

Chelwood, L.

Ingrow, L.

Cockfield, L.

Kemsley, V.

Cork and Orrery, L.

Killearn, L.

Crathorne, L.

Kinloss, Ly.

Davidson, V.

Kinnaird, L.

De La Warr, E.

Lane-Fox, B.

Denham, L. [Teller.]

Lawrence, L.

Drumalbyn, L.

Long, V.

Ellenborough, L.

Lucas of Chilworth, L.

Elles, B.

Lyell, L.

Elliot of Harwood, B.

Mackay of Clashfern, L.

Faithfull, B.

Mackintosh of Halifax, V.

Ferrers, E.

Macleod of Borve, B.

Ferrier, L.

Mansfield, E.

Fortescue, E.

Mills, V.

Gisborough, L.

Molson, L.

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Mottistone, L.

Skelmersdale, L.

Onslow, E.

Stradbroke, E.

Orkney, E.

Strathclyde, L.

Portland, D.

Swinton, E. [Teller.]

Rankeillour, L.

Trumpington, B.

Rochdale, V.

Vaux of Harrowden, L.

St. Aldwyn, E.

Vivian, L.

Saltoun, Ly.

Young, B.

NOT-CONTENTS

Airedale, L.

Phillips, B.

Ardwick, L.

Pitt of Hampstead, L.

Bishopston, L. [Teller.]

Ponsonby of Shulbrede, L. [Teller.]

David, B.

Denington, B.

Rochester, L.

Hall, V.

Sefton of Garston, L.

Hampton, L.

Stedman, B.

Hooson, L.

Stewart of Alvechurch, B.

John-Mackie, L

Stewart of Fulham, L.

Llewelyn-Davies of Hastoe, B.

Stone, L.

McIntosh of Haringey, L.

Strabolgi, L.

Mackie of Benshie, L.

Tanlaw, L.

McNair, L.

Tordoff, L.

Milner of Leeds, L.

Underhill, L.

Mishcon, L,

Wigoder, L.

Nicol, B.

Resolved in the affirmative, and Clause 5 agreed to accordingly.
Clause 6 [Supplementary provisions]:
9.1 p.m.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees: I am instructed that if Amendment No. 41 is agreed to, I cannot call Amendments Nos. 42 and 43.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey Lord McIntosh of Haringey moved Amendment No. 41:
Page 5, line 30, leave out subsection (1).
The noble Lord said: I appreciate that we are now on the supplementary provisions in the Bill and that much of the substance of this subsection of Clause 6 has already been relatively fully covered in the debate in Committee. Therefore, it only falls to me to remind your Lordships of the issues which have been raised on this side of the committee in previous amendments and to urge that this Amendment should be agreed to. The subsection says that the executive shall supply the Secretary of State with such information as he may require for the purpose of giving advice. At first sight, this might seem to be something admirable, a short cut in a more roundabout procedure of the executive giving information to the authority and the authority giving information to the Secretary of State.
On that basis, I can see that some might be tempted into thinking that it was a reasonable proposition and one which would cut out unnecessary work and unnecessary circumocution. I am afraid that this is not the case with this subsection. I am afraid that this amendment is necessary still in view of the rejection of all the previous amendments. It is not a short cut, as has been made clear by the Minister in his replies on earlier amendments. What we have here is not a short cut but duplication of effort and, much worse than duplication of effort, although that is bad enough, we have also what must be a deliberate confusion of the relationships between the executive, the authority and the Department of Transport; and, in that confusion, we have an attempt by the back door—because it is never spelt out in the change of the formal
1124
responsibilities of the authority—to reduce the responsibilities and authority of the passenger transport authorities.
That seems to me to be extremely undesirable. It has been found to be undesirable by the courts who have said that the authorities must exercise their judgment in the light of a full examination of the facts of passenger transport operations before they come to a conclusion about the expenditure of public money. What is proposed in this subsection is that the executive should deal directly with the Secretary of State and that the Secretary of State, in return, presumably, must deal directly with the executive, by-passing the authority, despite the fact that the noble Lord the Minister has told us time after time in response to previous amendments that it is at the end for the authority to decide. If it is at the end for the authority to decide—and I believe that it should be—then this subsection is going behind the back of that responsibility. It is an undesirable accretion to the chain of communication rather than a short cut. This amendment, by omitting those undesirable words, would make the position better. I beg to move.
Lord Bellwin: In many ways, this is a very strange amendment for noble Lords opposite to be moving. The provisions of Clause 6(1) are important to ensure that all parties are kept informed during the planning process. The effectiveness of that process would be weakened by this amendment and I do not think that that would be in anybody's interest. If the Secretary of State is to give advice to executives under Clause 3(5), it is necessary that the Secretary of State should be able to call for such information as he thinks necessary in order to ensure that the advice is sensible and meaningful.
Uninformed advice would be of absolutely no help at all and could have serious repercussions on the effectiveness of the planning process. Moreover, I cannot readily understand why the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, would wish to remove the requirement of the executive to consult that authority before they prepare the plan. We have heard in debates on other amendments many accusations that the Bill, in giving the executive the task of preparing the draft plan, usurps the position and responsibilities of the authority. Those accusations could only be fuelled by this amendment and I fail to see what it will achieve. Clause 6(1) provides important consultation procedures to ensure the effectiveness of the planning process and I must therefore resist the amendment.
Therefore I have to resist the amendment. We consider that the provisions of Clause 6(1) are essential in order to ensure that all parties are kept informed during the planning process. This function was added by means of a Government amendment during the Committee stage in another place. The noble Lord says that this is a deliberate confusion. I am sure he does not really mean that. He may feel that it is confusing, but deliberate confusion is not the way to put it. There would be absolutely no point in doing so. We have to resist the amendment.
Lord Underhill: The noble Lord the Minister drew attention to the last part of the amendment. When my noble friend moved the amendment, I am certain that

1125
he was not so much concerned with the last line, which says that the executive shall consult the authorities, as with the other part. May I ask the Minister why the Government or the Secretary of State consider it to be necessary to obtain the information from the executive? Why not seek the information from the elected body? Why not seek the information from the authority? We do not argue that the Secretary of State should not ask for information, but why go to a non-elected executive? The Secretary of State will be free to ask for any information that he desires. He could ask why something which may refer to policy issues on which the authority ought to give an answer is being done. If the authority want to get information, they will go to their own appointed executive. Throughout the whole of the Bill there seems to be a suspicion that the authorities will not act correctly. It is that suspicion which we are criticising throughout. One reason, among others, why my noble friend has moved the amendment is because there is suspicion about the activities of the authorities.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: It has to be said that behind the amendment is a lack of trust. It is not a lack of trust of the noble Lord the Minister. Of course not. It is a lack of trust of the intentions of the Government in trying to include the clause in the Bill. If the noble Lord had said that the Government would specify publicly for all authorities and for all executives what information must necessarily be made available to the authority, to the public and to the Secretary of State in order that all parties could come to a reasonable conclusion about the right amount of revenue grant, that might have been a different matter.
However that is not what the Minister said, and it is not what the clause says. The clause says that an executive shall supply this information. It does not specify what the information is, or indicate that the information will be in terms which apply to all authorities and to all executives. It lays open the possibility that the Secretary of State can probe—I have used more unpleasant words than "probe" in discussions on earlier amendments, but I shall use the word "probe" now—into the day-to-day details of the operations of an executive. In other words, he can usurp the legally recognised function of the passenger transport authority. That probing is enshrined in the clause, and that is why we find it objectionable.
I recognise that the clause contains an element of consultation of the authority before the plan is completed To that extent I accept that the wording of the amendment may go too far. But I do not believe that any noble Lord on this side of the Committee can be accused of being antagonistic towards consultation between the authority and the executive. Throughout the debate on the Bill we have urged that there should be consultation and joint action rather than that procedures should go backwards and forwards between the executive and the authority.
Until the Minister can assure us that there will be a standardised requirement for information required of all executives through their authorities—because that is the right, responsible and democratic way to do it—in order to come to a general decision about the amount of public expenditure to be devoted to public transport, rather than the much freer, much looser and
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much more particular requirement for information that is contained in this clause, I am afraid that we will not be in favour of it.
9.14 p.m.
Lord Bellwin: I have already said, but probably I ought to repeat it, that a consultation document is in existence which sets out the proposals for the content of the plans. We are looking forward to receiving the views of the PTAs and the PTEs. I should have thought that that was the time for the authorities to put their 10 cents in. I shall call it more than 10 cents if the noble Lord would like me to do so. To answer the noble Lord, that must be an important point.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: I have to say that that document was one that my noble friend Lord Sefton and I had to draw to the attention of the Committee. It was not known to the Government Front Bench. We referred to it because we had to correct mis-statements made by the Government Front Bench, no doubt inadvertently, about the nature of the information that is to be required. We on this side of the Committee have made the point very clearly that the information that it is proposed to demand in that consultation document goes into the most extraordinary detail about the day-to-day operation of passenger transport undertakings. It is not the kind of thing that ought to be required by the Government in making a decision about the level of public expenditure on public transport. That is the essence of our case. It is we on this side of the Committee who had to draw that point to the Government's attention.
Lord Sefton of Garston: The noble Lord, Lord Bellwin, did not reply to the straight question asked by my noble friend Lord Underhill, which was: why go to the executive and not to the authority? I should like to frame that question in another way. I should like a straight answer to the question: does the noble Lord, Lord Bellwin, intend to reply to that question? Secondly, what the noble Lord, Lord Bellwin, has said seems to answer a question that not only have I asked in this Committee but about which I should also like to ask: am I likely to have it answered?
As to my question on whether or not the executives have been consulted, especially on the drawing up of the document to which reference has been made, it seems to me from what the noble Lord has said—and I do not wish to misunderstand him—that the executives have not been consulted and that the document was drawn up in complete isolation from them. That is a very serious statement, and I should not like to make a false assumption. If it is true, perhaps the noble Lord, Lord Bellwin, will reply.
Lord Bellwin: I cannot tell the noble Lord what the build-up was to the document in question. I just do not know the answer to that question. This was part of a process of discussion and negotiation. If the noble Lord feels that it was less than adequate in some way, I can make no comment but I will certainly find out and let him know. He knows that I will do that. I will tell him exactly what the position was.
As to the point about consulting the executive rather than the authority, I know that this was debated at

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great length and I do not see that it is so sinister. I know the point that was being made: that at the end of the day it is the authority that makes the decision and, therefore, why not go direct to them in the first place? Again, I do not know but I do not see that it is sinister in any way. At the end of the day, whatever is done, it has to go to the authority for modification, if they wish to modify it. I do not see why this is so important.
The PTEs already submit a lot of statistical information to the department, as do other transport operations. But the main source of information will be the plans submitted by the authorities. I know that this is troubling the noble Lord and that he seems to think that there is something amiss in following this route. It may be that I am missing the point, but I do not believe that I am. I do not see its importance in the context of the totality of what we are talking about.
Lord Tordoff: With respect, if the noble Lord the Minister does not see that it matters which way around this goes, why should it not go the right way around and the proper way around—and the way that retains the respect of the authority?
Lord Bellwin: That is a question of which comes first, the chicken or the egg.
Lord Tordoff: But the noble Lord the Minister has indicated that he knows which comes first.
Lord Bellwin: The noble Lord, Lord Tordoff, can turn words around, but if it helps I will make another observation to the noble Lord, Lord Sefton of Garston, on the document. The noble Lord asked whether we consulted on the document beforehand. The answer is that we did not because it is a consultation document. We put it out to get the authorities' views. Again, one can go round and round the consultation asking where does one start and where should one have started, but I do not believe it takes us that much further.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: I have to say to the Government Front Bench that we on this side were not responsible for the legislation. We get our information from wherever we can. We do not have the same resources that noble Lords opposite have. They are responsible for what they say and are responsible for knowing the answers to questions that are raised. I have to say that there have been a number of occasions when noble Lords opposite simply have not known the answers to questions which my noble friends have raised. It is not good enough for a Government Front Bench to be in that position on legislation which is to go on the statute book.
Lord Bellwin: I really think that gets us absolutely nowhere at all. As the noble Lord will find the longer he is in your Lordships' House and in Committees, when the day comes that everybody knows everything that he thinks they should know we shall have reached the millennium. We shall never reach that point.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: But in the meantime legislation will go through, and it will go through with imperfect information. I think there is a difference in the responsibility. However, the noble Lord the
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Minister rose when I was about to make my last sentence, which was to say that we recognise that in the last part of the clause there is something which ought to be preserved in one way or another and which it is clearly the wish of my noble friends to preserve. Therefore, because of that defect in wording, and not in any way because of the answers given by the noble Lord, Lord Bellwin, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Lord Underhill: Can I assist the Chair and say that I shall not be moving Amendments Nos. 42 to 51.
[Amendments Nos. 42 to 51 not moved.]
Lord Underhill Lord Underhill moved Amendment No. 52:
Page 6, line 22, leave out from ("Executive") to end of line 25 and insert ("and the Authority to comply with their duties under the Act of 1968 or the Act of 1969 as the case may be").
The noble Lord said: This is introducing a completely new feature which we have not discussed in the course of all the other amendments. It may well be that noble Lords looking at the clause might wonder what it is all about, because one has to cross-reference to Section 15(2)(a) of the 1968 Act or Section 11(2)(d) of the 1969 Act, and then refer back to Clause 2 of this Bill to find out what it is all about. Fortunately, the Notes on Clauses tell us what it is all about. Subsection (7), which we seek to amend, requires the authority before giving or withholding approval for a rise in fares under the provisions of the 1968 or 1969 Acts to have special regard to the effect of their decision on revenue grants, and also on its duty under Clause 2 of this Bill to break even and to achieve a proper balance.
But the comments in the Notes on Clauses are very interesting:
"It is important that authorities do not vary fare levels during a year either upwards or downwards"—
we have heard in response to certain amendments we have moved that the alternative is to put up fares. The Notes continue:
"without taking into account the effect of a variation on the executive's financial duty, bearing in mind that revenue grants cannot be increased during the year, and to achieve a balance between ratepayers and users."
So it is when one reads the Notes on Clauses that one sees what subsection (7) is all about.
If this is to be carried out as laid down in subsection (7), it will place the executive and the authority in a straitjacket, because it means that they have got to look only at the question of cost. I am not one of those who say cost is not important; of course, it is. But there is no regard to needs, no regard to benefits, no regard to anything at all except the question of complying with the grant. What we are seeking to do in the amendment is to delete the last few lines of the subsection and replace them with the words set out in the amendment, so that the provision reads that in considering any upwards or downwards movement of fares the authority and the executive must comply with their statutory duties under the 1968 or 1969 Acts as the case may be.
Time and time again we have come back to the statutory duties laid down in the 1968 and 1969 Acts. I would remind your Lordships that we have been told quite clearly by the Minister that these provisions will

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not be repealed by the Bill. If they will not be repealed, then the authority and the executive ought to have regard to those provisions in any proposal for increase or decrease in fares. I beg to move.
Lord Bellwin: It is important that authorities do not vary fare levels upwards or downwards without taking particular account of the effects of such a variation both on the executive's ability to meet its financial duty and also on the need to achieve balance between the interest of the ratepayers and the users. This is particularly important after the amount of revenue grant has been determined for the year, because once set it is not to be increased.
Furthermore, it would be totally unsatisfactory to replace the specific requirement to take account of the executive's ability to comply with its financial duty, and the need to balance the interests of ratepayers and users, by a vague reference to the authority having to have regard to its duties under the 1968 or 1969 Acts. The noble Lord has mentioned more than once this evening this matter of the 1968 and 1969 Acts. May I just say that the Bill alters the law from that under the 1968 and 1969 Acts by protecting from challenge up to the protected expenditure limit. Clearly we cannot accept the amendment. I just hope that the noble Lord is clear as to why not.
Lord Underhill: Of course we accept that an executive and an authority must keep in mind their financial duty. I am certain that the Minister does not intend to imply that the executive or authority will not do that, although we have a feeling that there is a suspicion throughout this Bill as to what an authority might do. The Minister also said that, once fixed, the grant cannot be increased. That, again, is one of the problems we have endeavoured to show up in various other amendments.
I am afraid that I cannot accept the position as stated in the subsection. I think that our amendment is a sensible one, but naturally at this late hour I would not attempt to divide the Committee. We will study what the noble Lord said because it may well be that on Report we can deal with the statutory duties at the same time as covering the point made by the noble Lord. Therefore, on this occasion I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 6 agreed to.
The Earl of Swinton: I think that we have made enough progress for this evening. Therefore, I beg to move that the House do now resume.
Moved accordingly, and, on Question, Motion agreed to.
House resumed.
House adjourned at twenty-seven minutes past nine o'clock.

  TREATIES WITH SOVIET UNION: FULFILMENT
  TREATIES WITH SOVIET UNION: FULFILMENT
  NATO: DEFENCE BUDGETS OF MEMBERS
  NATO: DEFENCE BUDGETS OF MEMBERS
  HENDERSON ISLAND: MR. A. M. RATCLIFF
  HENDERSON ISLAND: MR. A. M. RATCLIFF
  CONSERVATION OF NATURE CONVENTION: SOUTH PACIFIC
  CONSERVATION OF NATURE CONVENTION: SOUTH PACIFIC
  SSSIs: RENOTIFICATION
  SSSIs: RENOTIFICATION