HC Deb 10 February 1948 vol 447 cc32-4W
65. Sir J. Mellor

asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will identify the document by which the Treasury signified the opinion that British Transport Stock, 1978–88, was worth par on 1st January, 1948.

Sir S. Cripps

The Transport Act does not require the execution of any specific document; I will circulate at the end of this reply the text of the Minute of 1st January, 1948, in which the opinion of the Treasury is formally recorded.

Following is the text:

TREASURY MINUTE, DATED

1ST JANUARY, 1948

Pursuant to Section 89 (2) of the Transport Act, 1947

My Lords read Section 16 of the Transport Act, 1947 (10 and 11 Geo. 6. Ch. 49) which provides, inter alia, that compensation shall be paid by the British Transport Commission in respect of the vesting of undertakings in the Commission by reference to the values of the securities specified in the Fourth Schedule to the Act, and that the compensation so payable shall be satisfied in the manner provided by Part VI of the Act by the issue in accordance with the provisions of the Fifth Schedule to the Act of British transport stock to the holders of securities of the undertakings.

My Lords also read Section 89 in Part VI of the Act, which provides, inter alia, that the British Transport Commission shall create and issue such stock as is required for the purpose of satisfying any right to compensation which, under any provision of the Act, is to be satisfied by the issue of British transport stock, and that the stock so created and issued shall, subject to the provisions of the Fifth Schedule to the Act, be such stock as is, in the opinion of the Treasury, equal in value at the date of the issue to any amount of compensation due under the Act, regard being had to the market value of Government securities at that date.

My Lords also read Part 1 of the Fifth Schedule to the Act, which provides, inter alia, that the persons (amongst others) who immediately before the date of transfer, which is defined in the Act as the 1st January, 1948, were the holders of the securities mentioned in Part 1 of the Fourth Schedule to the Act, shall, by virtue of the Act, become instead on the date of transfer the holders of British transport stock representing so much of the compensation payable in the case of the body in question as is attributable to those securities, and that the date of transfer shall, for the purpose of computing the amount of British transport stock to be created and issued in satisfaction of any such compensation, be treated as the date of issue of that stock.

My Lords have before Them a Resolution of the British Transport Commission dated 23rd December, 1947, creating British transport stock which is to be issued on the 1st January, 1948, pursuant to paragraph (b) of subsection (1) of Section 89 of the Act, for the purpose of satisfying the amounts of compensation payable in the case of the bodies specified in the Third Schedule to the Act which are attributable to the securities specified in Part 1 of the Fourth Schedule to the Act.

My Lords have proposed that the said British transport stock to be created and issued on the 1st January, 1948, by the British Transport Commission, shall be issued at par, shall carry interest at 3 per cent. and shall be redeemed at par not later than the 1st July, 1988, but may be redeemed at par in whole or in part, by drawings or otherwise, at the option of the British Transport Commission on or after the 1st July, 1978, upon three months' notice being given in at least two London Daily newspapers.

My Lords declare that, on the footing that the said stock is issued on the above mentioned terms, then, having regard to the said terms of issue and to the market value of Government securities on the 1st January, 1948, the date of issue of the said stock, the amounts of the said stock set out in the second column of the attached Schedule are, in Their opinion, equal in value at the date of issue of the said stock, to £1 nominal value of the securities set out in the first column of the attached Schedule, being the securities specified in Part I of the Fourth Schedule to the Act.

R. STAFFORD CRIPPS,

C. JAMES SIMMONS,

Two of the Lord Commissioners of His Majesty's Treasury.