HC Deb 18 December 1961 vol 651 cc106-7W
51. Sir J. Pitman

asked the Lord Privy Seal whether, in view of the potentialities of recovering valuable raw materials, including manganese, from the bed of the seven-tenths of the surface of the globe which are under sea water and outside the territorial claims of national sovereign Governments, he will propose in the United Nations that these sea territories, which have not yet been subjected to sovereignty, should be vested in an autonomous executive body to be appointed by, and to be subject to dismissal by, the Security Council.

Mr. P. Thomas

No. Her Majesty's Government consider that the principles embodied in the Conventions on the Territorial Sea and Contiguous Zone and on the Continental Shelf, which were adopted by the First United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea in 1958, satisfactorily meet the situation.