I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."

This is a short Bill with a simple purpose. That purpose is to provide for the regulation of nurseries where children are looked after either for the day or day and night for the working week, and of persons who, for reward and in their own homes, look after children under five while their mothers are at work. Although the Bill is short and its purpose simple, its Object is important. It aims to safeguard the health and welfare of young children—most of them will be under five years of age—and to give mothers who go out to work either from economic necessity or in the national interest, the peace of mind that comes from the knowledge that their children are being properly cared for while they are at work.

Just as during the war we had to call upon married women to go back to work to produce the tools needed to win the war, so in some parts of the country we now have no alternative but to ask them to go back to industries producing goods vital to the success of our export drive. The House will be familiar with the great expansion of day nurseries and nursery classes which was made during the war almost wholly by the local authorities. Some local authorities also organised and supervised daily minding on a large scale. There were in fact about 1,400 day nurseries and 15 supervised daily minding schemes in operation at the end of the war. Soon after the war ended—on 14th December, 1945, to be exact—the Ministers of Health and Education after consultation with the Minister of Labour jointly issued a circular to local authorities on the adaptation of this war-time nursery provision to immediate post-war needs. I think the House will be interested in a few short extracts from that circular. The circular said: and important in the national interest as it was during the war.

The local authorities continue to play their part, and I should perhaps emphasise that with their nurseries this Bill is not concerned. They still provide nearly 900 nurseries with places for about 44,000 children under five. In addition, as local education authorities, they provide 370 nursery schools for 19,000 children and 2,360 nursery classes for over 68,000 children. In the cotton producing areas in the North-West the local authorities have, since the export drive began, produced proposals for 52 additional nurseries and 12 additional nursery schools, which will be operating as soon as the places can be constructed and staffed.

The difficulties which a local authority has to overcome in turning paper plans into a working nursery are greater today than they were during the war. Buildings which could then be opened as nurseries with relatively little alteration or adaptation are now needed for their normal purposes. Sites in places convenient for the mothers are hard to find, and building labour and materials are needed for housing and other urgent requirements. On the other hand, some mills and factories have, owing to the concentration of industrial processes or other reasons, spare accommodation which, with a modest expenditure of building labour and materials, can be turned into reasonably satisfactory nurseries.

The war-time objection to housing groups of young children in the factories themselves because these were vulnerable to enemy attack no longer obtains. A nursery on the premises in which the mothers work has a number of advantages over one established elsewhere. For one thing, mother and child can see each other in the meal breaks of the working day. The mother does not have to take the child independently to the nursery before she goes to work in the morning and fetch it again after leaving the factory at night.

These are important considerations not only to the convenience of the mother but also to the health of the child. For these reasons there are already in England and Wales some 8o nurseries operating in mills and factories, mainly in the cotton mills of the North-West. More of these factory nurseries are projected.

So far, the majority of employers have taken the advice of the Departments concerned. In this matter the Board of Trade, Ministry of Labour, Ministry of Health, Ministry of Education and Ministry of Works are working together as a team, regionally and centrally. Employers have sought the expert help of local medical officers of health, before setting up a nursery in their mills. One or two employers have been reluctant to do this. There is at present no statutory provision for the regular inspection and supervision of these nurseries, which is so important for the health of the children.

The Minister said that the Ministry of Education were working in central co-operation, but there is no mention of that Ministry on the back of the Bill. I see mention of the Ministries of Health and Labour and the Board of Trade.

In our view the local welfare authority are the right authority for this purpose. We have in the past found unsatisfactory conditions. We are aware of cases of bad overcrowding. We have learned from time to time of children housed in premises deficient in ventilation or sanitary accommodation. We have also learned of cases where the staff are completely untrained and not suited to the work. Our public health nursing officers have found that firms are, generally speaking, anxious to do their best, but they have not always been clear about where to turn for advice and guidance. As things are at present, a nursery can be in existence for quite a long time without anyone from a public health authority knowing anything about it. If they do know, they may be reluctant to undertake any responsibility because they have no sanctions and because their advice cannot be enforced.

We think this work is obviously suitable for the local welfare authority. It obviously cannot be done by any Ministry from Whitehall nor would it be satisfactory to try to do the work through the regional offices of, say, the Ministry of Health. It is work which is quite appropriate to the local authority and we think that the local welfare authority and the local medical officer of health should look after this matter. Young children are particularly susceptible to infectious disease. Unless nursery premises are de- signed and staffed with this susceptibility always in mind, the risks to the health of the children are serious. Those risks can be minimised only by designing the premises properly, and equipping and staffing them to proper standards.

It is to provide these safeguards that the Bill has been introduced. All those concerned with factory nurseries are at one in wanting the regulation and supervision provided for in this Bill. The Society of Medical Officers of Health, the associations of local authorities, organisations like the Cotton Board which are representative of both employers and employed, the Board of Trade, the Ministry of Labour and the Ministry of Health are all of one mind on the need for this Bill.

It is not only with nurseries provided in mills and factories that this Bill is concerned. The demand for women workers has led to the setting up of nurseries by private persons in private houses for private profit. How many such places have been established is not known, but in London alone the L.C.C. know of 47. For the same reason the practice of daily minding is tending to grow. It was, of course, traditional in Lancashire before the war but is not now so popular. Nevertheless, it is growing, although for the most part mothers who can place their children in day nurseries still prefer to do so rather than use the old system of daily minding.

Why is there a limitation of six days in Clause 1 of the Bill?

The answer is that we are here concerned with people who look after children either by the day or by the working week. We are not concerned with residential accommodation, which is covered by different statutes.

The House will, I am sure, agree that whether the children are cared for in day nurseries or by daily minders their health must be safeguarded, and that when we ask mothers to return to industry in the national interest, as we are compelled to do in present circumstances, we ought to be able to assure them that if their children go to a day nursery or to a daily minder while they are at work we shall do our best to supervise that nursery or minder so as to ensure that the children are being satisfactorily looked after. Without the Bill we cannot do that. Indeed, it is true to say that children who are privately looked after by daily minders are the only groups of children who are not properly cared for and supervised.

The existing law relating to child life protection does not give us the necessary powers of supervision. It deals only with children nursed and maintained for reward apart from their parents, and does not, therefore, cover children cared for during the day who return to their parents at night. We considered whether it would save time and be to the convenience of the House to incorporate these provisions in other legislation at present before Parliament. But the Children Bill is concerned with the welfare of children deprived of ordinary parental care, and clearly children who live with their parents and are only cared for by other people during the day-time, or for part of the week, are not deprived of ordinary parental care.

We found difficulty, therefore, in dealing with these two different classes of children under the Children Bill. Similarly, while it might have been possible to deal with children cared for in factory nurseries in the Factories Bill, we want, as I have already explained, to supervise not only the nurseries provided inside factories and mills but also those provided otherwise than by local authorities outside the factories and mills, and we also want to deal with daily minders. For those reasons we felt that we had to table independent legislation, but these powers of supervision are, I would assure the House, urgently needed.

The House will no doubt wish me to amplify, to some extent, what is said in the Explanatory and Financial Memorandum attached to the Bill, about the powers we are now seeking to take. Clause 1 requires county and county borough councils as local health authorities to keep registers first of premises not wholly or mainly used as private dwellings where children are looked after for the day, or for any longer period not exceeding six days, and secondly, of persons in their area who, for profit and in their own homes, look after children under five for the day or for any longer period not exceeding six days. The reference to a period "not exceeding six days" is necessary to cover nurseries or the homes of minders who look after the children of women employed at night or on late shifts where the children are looked after, apart from their parents, day and night for six days at a stretch and return to their parents at week-ends.

So far as we know the only nurseries at present provided for such children are provided directly by local authorities, but clearly there is nothing to stop private enterprise from setting up such a nursery, and obviously it ought to be supervised if it is set up. Clause I goes on to enable any person receiving or proposing to look after children in the way I have described, whether in a nursery or in his home, to make application to the local health authority for registration.

Before my hon. Friend goes any further, could he explain this point about the six days: suppose someone keeps a nursery in her home in which she looks after, say, the children of women employed in hotels or domestic work of some kind where they are employed on Sundays, and keeps them for more than six days; would such premises be excluded?

I would rather deal with that point when we come to the Committee stage of the Bill, though my first impression is that such a case would be covered by other legislation. However, I would ask hon. Members not to turn a Second Reading Debate into the Committee stage, when we shall take the Bill line by line.

Would my hon. Friend bear in mind that the sole object of our being here today is to find out whether to put down any Amendments on the Committee stage? Unless we have an explanation from him, we shall have to put down an Amendment on this point, which is one of some importance.

I want to help my hon. Friends in every way I can, but again I would say that it would really be better if I took the points from hon. Members' speeches so that I can produce some coherent reply to them later, instead of turning what I am trying to make now, a systematic exposition of the Bill, into a series of questions and answers.

As I was saying, the local health authority may refuse to register any premises or persons if they are satisfied that the persons who will look after the children are not fit to have the care of children, or if the premises are not fit to be used for that purpose. But there is a saving for existing nurseries which I will return to later.

Clause 2 enables the local health authority to limit the number of children to be received in a nursery or by a minder. It also enables the authority, as respects nurseries, to impose requirements for securing that the person in charge shall have proper qualifications; that the nursery shall be adequately staffed and adequately equipped; that the premises and the equipment shall be adequately maintained; that the children shall be under medical supervision, and that proper registers shall be kept in relation to the children cared for. Subsection (6) of Clause 2 provides that as respects existing nurseries no requirements as to the qualification of the person in charge or as to staffing or equipment or as to any structural alteration or repair of the premises shall be imposed so as to require anything to be done before the expiration of a reasonable time from the commencement of the Act, and thus allows existing nurseries a reasonable time to remedy defects of premises, staff, or equipment.

Clause 3 requires the local health authority to issue certificates of registration so that the providers of nurseries or daily minders may have in their possession evidence that they have been registered under the Bill.

Clause 4 by Subsection (I) in effect makes it compulsory to register any premises used as a nursery within the meaning of the Bill, and provides that if at any time after the expiration of three months from the commencement of the Act a child is received in such a nursery and the nursery is not registered, or any requirement imposed by the local health authority under Clause 2 is contravened or not complied with, the occupier of the nursery shall be guilty of an offence. Subsection (3) makes an offence punishable on summary conviction by a fine not exceeding £25 or, in the case of a second or subsequent offence, by imprisonment for not more than one month, or by a fine of not more than £25 or by both such imprisonment and fine.

Subsection (2) makes it an offence, punishable on conviction by the same penalties, for a minder to look after children in his home without being registered if he is not a relative of the children and the number of children exceeds two, and the children come from more than one household. We have tried here to limit registration and supervision to people who go in for the minding of children as a business. We do not want in any way to interfere with the kindly relative or friend who looks after one or two children while the mother is at work. The term "relative" is defined in Clause 13 as meaning a grandparent, brother, sister, uncle or aunt, and these will commit no offence if they continue after this Bill becomes law to look after the children of other members of their own family.

The neighbour who looks after children will not be interfered with in any way so long as the children come from one family or, if they come from more than one family as long as there are not more than two children. As I have indicated, we do not think much harm can come to children looked after by friends and relatives in this way. We want to distinguish here between the good neighbourliness, the kind of services that relatives provide, and the people who are going into childminding as a business. That is the line we have tried to draw, and I hope we have been successful. Where a minder looks after three or more children and the children come from more than one household, and the minder is not a relative of the children, the minder will have to register and to comply with the requirements of the local health authority.

Clause 5 enables the local health authority to cancel registration if any imposed requirements under Clause 2 have not been met, or if any person employed in looking after children in a nursery or any minder, or any person employed by the minder to look after the children is not a fit person for the purpose, or if the premises are unfit to be used for the care of children. Again there is a saving to ensure reasonable treatment for existing nurseries.

Clause 6 requires the local health authority, where they propose to refuse or to cancel a registration, or to impose requirements, to give the person affected an opportunity to be heard by the authority. If aggrieved by the authority's decision that person may appeal to a court of summary jurisdiction, or, in Scotland, to the sheriff.

Clause 7 provides for inspection of nurseries and child minders' homes by any person authorised on their behalf by a local health authority. Subsection (1) gives an authorised person the right to enter a nursery at any reasonable time to inspect the premises and the children cared for there, the arrangements made for their welfare and any records relating to them. If the local authority's officer is refused admission to the home of a minder registered under Clause 1, or has reasonable cause to believe that children are being received for minding in a home which is not, but ought to be, registered, or in any other premises in contravention of Clause 4, he may apply to a justice of the peace, or in Scotland to the sheriff, for a warrant authorising him to enter the home or premises and carry out an inspection. That seems to us to be the kind of protection which ought to be given to avoid any unwarrantable intrusion into private homes. The local authority's inspector is required, if asked, to produce his warrant of authority, and there are provisions about penalties for those who obstruct an officer.

Clause 8 exempts hospitals and other institutions subject to supervision under other enactments, or provided by public authorities, from registration under this Bill, and Clauses 9 and 10 exempt nurseries and minders covered by existing Child Life Protection enactments, from inspection—

Would the Minister explain what is meant by Subsection (2).

I will deal with that later. Clauses 9 and 10 exempt nurseries and minders covered by existing Child Life Protection enactments, from inspection and control under those enactments as well as under the Bill, the principle being that the code appropriate to the main user of the premises shall be applied. The occupier of a nursery will be saved from the inconvenience of having to comply with some enactments for some of the children he cares for and other enactments for others. As for minders, where the children taken are mostly long-term, there will be no need for registration under the Bill, and all the children will be inspected under the child life protection provisions; where the children are mostly short-term, it will still be necessary to comply with the child life putative provisions as to notification in the case of a long-term children, all inspection will be under the Bill.

I have tried to summarise the Bill, and I hope that I have shown that in dealing with this important matter, the Government have tried to secure the regulation and supervision of the privately provided nurseries and of minders which is essential to safeguard the health of the children cared for with the minimum of machinery and of inconvenience to those who run nurseries or undertaking the minding of children. Sharing as I do the representation of the County Borough of Blackburn, I have particular pleasure in commending this Bill to the House. I trust that it does not raise any controversial point, and I hope that it will be given a speedy passage.

11.35 a.m.

This Bill, which the Parliamentary Secretary moved so agreeably and with so much clarity, will have a very warm welcome from both sides of the House and from all those outside who are interested in problems connected with the care of children. I think it may be said of this Bill what cannot be said of any other Measure which has been put forward by this Government, that at worst it will be harmless and at best it may do some real good. I put those two alternatives not in any carping or grudging spirit of criticism, but simply because this Bill gives local authorities powers which they may or may not use. If they fail to use the powers energetically and conscientiously then the Bill will not be much good; but if they use them conscientiously and with energy, a great deal of good will be done.

The Minister referred to the fact that many women are tending to go back into industry and that their children must be cared for elsewhere than in their own homes. Quite apart from that aspect, we are all aware of the scandals which have come to light in the care of homeless children. Those matters are being dealt with by the Children Bill. It is most important that any possibility of similar scandals in these schools and in the homes of child minders should be avoided.

It is one of the pre-eminent merits of this Bill—a merit to which the Minister drew attention—that new duties are being imposed upon local authorities. The Minister said, quite rightly, that the duties were not such as could be discharged either centrally through the Ministry of Health or through its regional offices. It has been the characteristic of much of the legislation passed in this Parliament that there has been a tendency to remove responsibility from the local authority and to transfer it to a central authority. Therefore, a particular reason for welcoming this Bill it that it imposes specific duties on local authorities and does not, as has been more customary in this Parliament, take duties or responsibilities away from the local authorities and transfer them to the Ministry.

There are a number of Committee points that I would like to raise at a later stage. I will not trouble the House with them now, but there are one or two matters on which I think it would be useful if the Minister could give some elucidation when he comes to reply. Under Clause 2 the local authority is enabled to do a number of very useful things—to limit the number of children in a school; to settle the qualifications of those who are running the nursery; to see that the premises are adequately staffed and equipped, and to see that the children receive adequate medical supervision. It strikes me that there is one gap in this Clause which is so obvious that I feel that there must be some good reason for it. There is no mention whatever of any standard of feeding. Especially in those nurseries where the children will be in attendance for up to six days and nights, it would seem desirable that the local authorities should have power to lay down standards of feeding for the children. That is such an obvious gap that there must be some reason for it. I should be grateful if the Minister would explain the reason.

It is one of the good points of the Bill that it devolves responsibility on the local authority. Of course, the wide discretionary power which the Bill gives to the local authority is part of that responsibility. I do not think that it would be possible to lay down any hard and fast rules or standards to be observed throughout the country, because local conditions vary greatly. There seems to be such a wide discretion given to local authorities as to make it most difficult to set any effective standard of administration. Even when one reads Clause 2 with the greatest care, it is difficult to discover not what local authorities are empowered to do, but just what they are expected to do. For example, in Clause 2 are the words:

It is very usual.

Is it? It struck me as extremely vague in that context. There are one or two other small points on which I would like to touch. According to Clause 6, when a local authority makes an order cancelling the registration or refusing an application for registration, it has to give 14 days' notice, I wonder whether 14 days is sufficient or whether 21 days would not be better.

Then there is Clause 7 which I found extremely baffling; I hesitate to criticise the Parliamentary draftsmen, but it seems to me that this Clause is not very clearly drafted. Subsection (1) gives authority to the local health authority to enter any premises a ) refers specifically to nurseries and not to child-minders, which are referred to in paragraph ( b ) of that Subsection. I would suppose from reading Subsection (1) of Clause 7 that the power of the local authority to enter and inspect was specifically limited to nurseries, and that the private homes of child-minders were specifically excluded. I do not see why that should be, but, in any case, when one goes on to Subsection (2) it looks as though it was not the intention at all; under Subsection (2) the local authority appears to have power to enter either nurseries or homes, because it has the power to enter the home of a person registered under Clause 1 of the Bill. I do not think it is very clear from Clause 7 what the intention is. I may be wrong, and it may be more clear than it seems to be, but if it is obscure perhaps the Parliamentary Secretary will have the drafting of that Clause looked into.

Then there is another small point which I have found rather puzzling in Clause 8. Subsection (2) of that Clause says:

There are a number of other points of detail which one might go into, but with which I shall not now trouble the House. At a later stage we shall have an opportunity to move Amendments to the Bill. I can assure the Minister that we welcome it very warmly, and I trust that the local authorities will be able to use this valuable instrument to the fullest advantage.

11.45 a.m.

I should like very warmly to congratulate my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary for having introduced this Bill. I hope that the warmth of the congratulations on this side of the House will atone somewhat for the condescending speech of the right hon. Member for South Kensington (Mr. Law) and the "welcome" given by the other three lonely Members sitting in the dreary waste of empty benches opposite. Nevertheless, there are one or two points I wish to make. This Bill is a little too enabling to please me. I should like to have seen a great deal more enforcement in the Bill than exists at present. This, like so many of the enactments of the present Government, brings us face to face with the fact that there have been many long years of neglect, and this I do not say in any party spirit at all.

Those of us who were interested in and alive to educational matters and matters connected with children, at the time the 1918 Education Act, regretted that the part of the Act which dealt with the care of children of pre-school age should only have been enabling. Had Mr. Fisher's Act made it obligatory upon local education authorities to look after children of pre-school age, we should not have been faced, as we were at the beginning of the war, with a very critical situation in caring for the children of mothers who went out to work to assist thee war effort; neither should we be faced today with an equally difficult situation when mothers are required to go out to work to assist the export drive. Therefore, I hope my hon. Friend will use a little care and not repeat the errors of the past. There have been many long years of neglect. I want to be quite honest and fair; that neglect is not found only in areas where Tory Councils are in control, but over and over again we find it in areas where Labour itself has been in control. That is due to the fact that they have no sufficient directives on the care of children of pr-eschool age.

I have another very agreeable reason for being interested in this Bill, and that is that it brings in by a side wind, as it were, the care of children in one kind of private school, the private nursery. My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary and I, 20 years ago, sat upon a departmental committee inquiring into the conditions of the education of children in private schools. Our recommendations have got very far after 20 years, but here for the first time we have an enactment, which looks as if it might quickly become operative, for looking into the conditions of children in private nurseries I was rather astonished to hear the Parliamentary Secretary say that the London County Council had knowledge of only 47 nurseries in private homes. I really am astonished at that, because, if not under the L.C.C. directly, certainly in the extra Metropolitan boroughs—the suburban parts of this great city of ours —I should say there is a private nursery in nearly every other street.

I know that at a time when my own colleagues had to leave the teaching profession because of the marriage bar, many of them set up private nurseries and thoroughly enjoyed doing the work. It is true that a great many mothers—not mothers who go out to work necessarily, about whom I shall say word before I conclude, but mothers with a baby in arms and a toddler—want to find a place where they can leave their children so that they can have a little free time in which to attend to the baby in arms, or so that they can have a little freedom. I think we are likely to have quite a number of these private nurseries, especially as the Education Act relating to nursery schools and nursery classes is somewhat held up, and once we begin to hunt for them we shall find them. I am sure that people who run these private nurseries will be glad to come under the care of the local authorities.

I am very glad—and I have urged it on many occasions in this House—to find that there is now encouragement for the factory nursery. It will be of enormous advantage to a working mother not to have to trail to one end of the town to leave her child in a nursery, before she goes to work in a mill or factory at the other end. It will be an enormous advantage to her only to have to make the one journey, and I hope that hon. Members on this side of the House will believe people who have great experience in this kind of work and that they will not set their faces against the factory nursery; it is a real advantage to mothers, provided that it is supervised, that the nurses have the right qualifications and that there are the right hygienic conditions for the children.

I always hesitate to mention other countries, especially the U.S.S.R., in this House, but, many years ago, on both occasions when I visited that great country, I saw factory nurseries of this kind, which were a great help to the mothers in providing that they were not separated from their children during the day. The mothers, especially those feeding their children, were able to remain together, and although I agree that a mother and a very young child should not be separated at all, it was a fact, during the great drive that Russia was making to put her economy on the right basis, that many mothers with young children and even babies in arms were working and were enabled in the factory nurseries to breast feed their children, an enormous advantage and help, both from the psychological and the health point of view. Therefore, I hope that nobody will set their faces against factory nurseries, because I believe they are workable as long as they are properly supervised.

May I make another point? I understand that many of the children in nurseries will vary from quite young children up to the age of five, and I very much regret that the local education authority is not going to be closely concerned with the welfare authorities in this work. I know that the work of the welfare authorities, from the point of view of the children's health, will be absolutely without reproach, but I do not like the nursery which is supremely sterile, supremely clean and supremely quiet. That is a very unnatural condition for a young child to be in. During the war years, a great many of the day nurseries were entirely under the health authorities. I do not know whether my right hon. Friend is dissenting from what I have to say, but I went to many nurseries where I was almost afraid to step.

I was wholeheartedly approving what my hon. Friend has said, because I have been to some of these places where I did not dare to go inside.

That is perfectly true, and I am very glad that my right hon. Friend should have had the same kind of experience in this field as I have. There were many nurseries during the war which came under the control only of the health authority and where one hardly dared step inside. There were places where flowers and toys and noise were entirely banished, and where the children looked more like little cocoons in some Italian Florentine picture. I hope, when we come to the Committee stage of this Bill, some way will be found of bringing the education authority into very close co-operation with the welfare authorities in this matter, because I am quite sure that, if we are to have children over three years of age, each a little conscious independent entity on its own, they will want educational occupation which only the trained teacher can provide.

May I look back over those long arid years between the Education Act, 1918, and the Act of 1944, when we might have been training thousands of young women to do exactly the kind of work which we so badly need today—young women who would not only have cared for and loved the children, but who could have occupied them educationally and psychologically in the right way. If we are to have children over three in these places, we must bring in the education authority. It is absolutely necessary not only that the children should have scientific care from the health point of view, but that they should also be given some educational training in the right way to grow. With these observations, I very warmly welcome this Bill. I hope it may be improved in Committee, and I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for introducing it.

11.55 a.m.

I think this is a very good Bill, and, in commending it to the House, I should like to say two things. I think hon. Members on both sides will agree—although I am one of the lonely three—[HON. MEMBERS: "No."] Well, they have come in since, then. We have been asking questions about these nurseries for some time, and I agree with my hon. Friend who spoke last, although I am surprised at the figures of the nurseries in London. I could give the names and addresses of any number connected with various industries besides cotton. When we asked these questions of the Minister of Health, we got rather a dusty answer. The Minister's method, apparently, is to give us an answer and then produce a Bill. I do not mind if that is the case, because I say quite frankly that I was surprised to see this Bill appear so quickly. I thought we were tied up with so much other legislation that we were not going to get it for some time to come.

But why cannot we have the name of the Minister of Education on the back of this Bill? I know it is concerned mainly with younger children and the welfare authorities, but these children will eventually reach the ages of three, four or five. Last night, I was at one of the principal nursery schools in this country—the Edith Cadbury School at Bournemouth—and I found that the whole scheme was really improvised and that it is not an expensive business at all. Toys were made out of old rubber tyres and anything that could be obtained cheaply.

The only comment which I have to make about this very good Bill is that, socially, it is a regrettable necessity. I wish we could start children between the ages of three and seven in a proper nursery school to cover all types, and I think we must come to realise that we have to make these buildings very much simpler. If the Fisher Act had made provision for the pre-school child compulsory, we might have had more nursery classes now. There is still this problem of the very young child, and I do not wish to say much about it, except that it seems to baffle all Governments concerning the period after the Minister of Health leaves off and before the Minister of Education begins. We had the comic situation during the war that Mr. Ernest Brown and the right hon. Member for Saffron Walden (Mr. R. A. Butler) were going out together, to Manchester and elsewhere, one to get more nurseries and the other to get more nursery schools. Inspectors from the Health Ministry spoke to Mr. Brown and inspectors from the Education Ministry had a word with the right hon. Member for Saffron Walden.

It is a regrettable necessity that mothers and their children have to be parted and that the mothers have to go out to work, as they have to do in Lancashire. We have had reports recently about these nurseries, and, on balance, it seems that they can do quite a good job in or near the factories. Therefore, I would be the last to say that any of these places which can properly be used should not be used. The actual figures are important. My hon. Friend gave some interesting figures at the beginning of his speech, and, if I took them down correctly, I gathered that there were fewer children in nursery classes now than in 1938, when there were 168,000. I think the present figure is between 60,000 and 70,000, which means that 100,000 fewer children are in nursery classes. That is a very odd thing considering that there are more children of that age than in 1938 or 1939.

We must look at the picture as a whole. Like the right hon. Gentleman the Member for South Kensington (Mr. Law), I frankly do not understand what Clause 8 (2) means. It is a small point, but what is this particular kind of school where one does not have any education—which is not for the purpose of education? Perhaps there is a simple explanation.

A public school.

I thought perhaps it might be an independent school. The local welfare authority is going to look after these children and I presume we shall get a new kind of staffing. What I should like to know is, who will provide the staff for the nurseries? At the present moment the evidence is that a great many of them are quite untrained. When this is made compulsory and the Minister looks at the staffing and says it is not good enough, where is he going to get fresh staff from? That is a question which is worrying a great many people. It may be that new courses will have to be started, and started very quickly. I am not sure that there will not have to be improvisation like the emergency training colleges if we are to deal with the matter speedily.

Under this Bill a "child" means a child up to the age of five. I presume, therefore, that under the Bill we will have children who are of nursery school age and I emphasise what was said by the hon. Member for Epping (Mrs. Manning) that we wish to see that these children who are in nurseries graduate, if I may dare to use the word, into genuine nursery schools, where not only the physical but also the other side of their life is looked after. It will be necessary to keep not haphazard records, but really good and accurate records, and it will be necessary to have proper inspection and not haphazard inspection if the work is to be any good at all. With those general comments, I welcome this Bill and I hope that it will be put into operation as speedily as possible, that we shall be able to find the staff, and that we shall go out to find the staff to make the Bill practicable.

12.3 p.m.

I wish to raise one or two points, but I may say at once that I have to apologise in advance to my hon. Friend. I am asking him a number of questions and I may not be here to receive the answers at some later stage. I have to leave a little later—I have another engagement—but I shall return and I hope to be back in time to hear him.

The Bill has been receiving a warm welcome. The right hon. Member for South Kensington (Mr. Law), warmly welcomed it at the end of his speech, but at the beginning he said that on the whole it would not do any harm and it was conceivable it might do good. I am sorry that in these circumstances I am interposing with something which may seem to be a little like criticism. It is not intended to be criticism. I view with a certain amount of sobriety the prospects of success for the Measure when it comes into operation, and I want to deal with the Bill as a whole.

The hon. Member for Epping (Mrs. Manning) made a point with which I very greatly sympathise. She said that the advantage of the factory or the mill nursery to the worker was patently obvious, and that no mother would want to walk to one end of the town to the nursery and then come back to the other end to the place where she worked. I accept that, and I accept the fact that we must have a large number of nurseries if the Bill is to be effective in any of the large towns. I think, however, that in Lancashire at any rate there are some objections to a nursery at each individual mill. To start with, there are a great many mills. Secondly, in the cotton industry the number of persons employed in a building is very much smaller than the number of persons employed in a building of similar size in other industries.

I would like the Parliamentary Secretary to inquire into this. I will give an instance of what I mean. I went to my constituency a week or two ago and saw a magnificent nursery—improvised out of an old building, pleasantly and charmingly decorated, very well, indeed admirably, furnished—and I may advertise my constituency by saying that we make, for this particular type of work, very good furniture in Oldham—but the fact is that the number of persons in the nursery was very nearly equivalent to the number of mothers released to go into the mill. My hon. Friend shakes his head, but he need not do so. I checked the figures. I am talking about the cotton industry. There were 12 people enabled to go into the mill by the creation of the nursery and there were seven to eight people employed in the nursery, quite apart from the type of employment involved; the women released for the mill were aged from 30 to 40 while the girls in the nursery were from 20 to 23 who, I should have thought, could have been quite as effectively engaged in the mill.

I wish to divide my remarks into three sections. The first job we have to do in dealing with the question of a nursery is to decide whether we need one at all. I would say at once to the hon. Member for the Combined Universities (Mr. K. Lindsay) that I would answer that in this way. In a place like Oldham one is faced with this problem: however good the mothers, however clean the mothers, however admirable the mothers, the housing conditions are so appalling that no mother, however good, can give her children the opportunities of recreation, play, fresh air and treatment which can been given in a decently conducted nursery. I have seen the children in the nurseries and I have seen them happily, busily, pleasantly employed, associating with other children of the same age, which I regard as quite important in the cir- cumstances. However excellent are the mothers—and they are excellent mothers in Oldham—these amenities cannot be given in the housing conditions that prevail, because they are so lamentable.

The result is, having regard to the policy of the Government to press married women to return to industry as part of our policy to increase employment in the cotton industry, we have to accept the fact that we ought to have an increasing number of these nurseries, if possible. If we accept that fact and if we accept this policy as a reasonable policy, the Government should make up their minds how it will be implemented before we turn to the question of regulations. If there were a policy of financial encouragement for the creation of nurseries, priority of supplies, priority of permits, we should not be doing any harm to the children of Lancashire, but we should be doing a great deal towards getting women back into the industry. Before we issue regulations we should make the whole thing practicable. That is the first point.

Turning to my second point, I hope we shall be told something of the wages which are to be paid in the nurseries. I hope we shall be told whether the nurses qualified and employed in our nurseries, will be under the same wages conditions, automatically, as those they would be under if they were employed in a hospital or any other similar institution. I hope we shall be told that trade union conditions can be made to apply in these cases and that the people employed there can have definite standards so that they may regard this as a very appropriate and reputable profession; and that those employed can receive the treatment to which they are entitled in that employment.

A further question which I would like answered is: Who will administer this Bill? There are a great many hundreds of local authorities in the country, and in many cases they will have no factory nurseries in their area, but new appointments will have to be made and we shall have the creation of these little new departments in the town hall, the slight addition to the salary of the acting assistant deputy town clerk, who may be responsible for looking after the children. There he will be, entering a few particulars, issuing the the necessary licences and the position will be that the whole thing will be nobody's business. After all, one approves the plans, sees the building, know it is satisfactory—but the scheme is even then not running. So far as I can see, in the North the provisions which the Bill permits the local health authority to make in connection with the ordinary private house, affects the house where there are three children, and where the parents go to work. One even finds in the small terrace that one person stays at home and one person goes to work. Accordingly, as a family's circumstances change, it may be a different person who stays at home. I cannot see what these regulations are going to do about that. We can only make inspections when we have complaints of cruelty or neglect, and then we come back to about where we started, so far as the Bill is concerned, unless there is a concrete plan in the mind of the Minister of which we have not yet heard.

What, in fact, do the local authorities do about the matter, even supposing they appoint special officers to deal with it? I am going to say something now that I imagine will be unpopular amongst some of my hon. Friends, but I have had considerable experience of the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, a charitable organisation which has always suffered from shortage of money, and consequently cannot offer as high salaries as it would wish. My experience of its work is that it has been very good indeed. If the Government try to organise the work of looking after the children in the miners' homes with the co-operation of that society, with some financial help to the society, they may find that the work will be more effectively done than if it were passed to the town clerk or assistant town clerk or deputy assistant town clerk, the Government not knowing whether anything was going to be done about it at all.

I am sorry to be so deprecatory, because I wanted to welcome the intention of the Bill and to congratulate the Minister on bringing it forward; but I am a little dubious about how far it will be carried into effect, unless some very carefully matured plan is developed before the Bill goes through, and until we are given some more information as to how it is going to be worked.

12.11 p.m.

The hon. Member for Oldham (Mr. Hale) has made some very good points, with many of which I have understanding and sympathy, but before I touch upon those, I should like to refer to the speech of the hon. Member for Epping (Mrs. Manning). It is a great pleasure to hear her speak with admirable knowledge and understanding of young people. When she told us about the need to have nurseries near factories she made an exceedingly important point, but I noticed that she demanded only that Members on her own side of the House should support this idea, and I hope that Members on this, the "tinker's cuss" side of the House, will agree with her also, as, indeed, I do. I did not like the mention she made of the possibility that there might have been hundreds of people trained for these nurseries before the war. There was no need for the nurseries then. As the Parliamentary Secretary said, this is a need which arose out of the war and which continues during the present emergency; but there was no occasion for this provision before the war.

I welcome this Bill as a good Bill, and I hope it will not be delayed in its passage through the House. If the children are to be kept in the nurseries they must be supervised, and there must be laws for that, just as we have factory laws to protect the people in the factories. But this legislation is more than ever essential today, because the demand is so much greater than the supply, and when demand is greater than supply the value that is given is not always quite up to standard. In this case it is the security and the safety of the children of which we have to think. The Parliamentary Secretary said that there were 47 of these nurseries in London run by private enterprise. I am a great believer in private enterprise and all its virtues; but when the demand exceeds the supply even private enterprise can fall down, and I believe that, therefore, the Bill is even more necessary now than ever before.

This Bill does however raise the whole question of the cost of these day nurseries. The hon. Member for Oldham queried whether it was worth sending women into industry and then paying others to look after their children. That will happen more and more. This Bill alone will give publicity to the day nurseries, and the Government policy of persuading women to go into industry will also increase the demand for the day nurseries. What will they cost? The scheme may be worth while, but the Parliamentary Secretary did not give us any idea of what the whole cost will be, or estimate as to whether it is worth while or not. The financial benefit to the nation is somewhat dubious, but I think that, even if it is to cost money, it will be worth while.

Then we have to look at it from another point of view. As well as the question of cost, there is the question of home life. I think that nearly all hon. Members agree that a good home life is the best upbringing for children. I am not, however, against institutions. I have seen the admirable work that is done by institutions for children, and I prefer that a child should be brought up in a good institution rather than in a bad home; but still I say that a good home is the best possible upbringing, and better than even a good institution.

I would ask the Parliamentary Secretary if these homes are to be only for the children of the women who are working in industry. I do not know whether he can lay down a rule to that effect, to see that there are no lazy folk who send their children to the nurseries and then go off to enjoy themselves. Perhaps, he will assure us on that point. What happens when the mothers take their children to the nurseries, and then, instead of calling for them in the evening, perhaps go to the cinema and then home without the baby? There must have been experience of that sort of thing in the past, and, perhaps, the hon. Gentleman could tell us how it is proposed to get over that difficulty.

I would also ask him how many of the nurseries he considers are unfit at the present time, and what would be the cost of putting them right. Clause 2 insists that repairs, when necessary, are to be carried out in a reasonable time. Can he tell us where the materials are coming from? What priority is to be given, and how strictly is this provision to be carried out? We all know that at present there are houses which are condemned for sanitary reasons, but people are still living in them simply because there is not material with which to put them right and because there is no alternative accommodation. Is he going to give priority, as I hope he is, for the repair of these nurseries, for if they are to be repaired in a reasonable time, priority must be given. I would ask him not to be particularly strict about the time in which this is done, but rather to insist upon essentials being done. If there is something wrong which might injure the health of the children, let us have that put right, and the danger removed, and not be too strict about the time for doing all those repairs which are not so essential even though they would be advantageous if they were done. I hope the hon. Gentleman will issue instructions to local authorities giving them guidance to that effect.

I hope bureaucracy is to be restricted as much as possible under the Bill, and I am glad to see that there are not to be a great many unnecessary inspections. I should have liked to see notice given when the inspectors go round, but I now realise that the element of surprise is necessary in these cases if the inspection is to be of any use; but I am pleased that, in cases in which it is suspected children are being kept in places which are not registered, warrants must be obtained from Justices of the Peace before inspections can be made. That means we are not to have any more snoopers thrust upon us. I do consider it to be a good Bill. The other points I have in mind are small ones which I should like to bring up later during the Committee stage.

12.20 p.m.

I think it would have been better for the purpose that the Bill is designed to meet, if the last speech had not been made. It makes harder the job of those of us who represent industrial areas, and who are trying to encourage the production drive in them with a minimum of harm to the family life of this country, to have to combat the sort of speech which has been made by the hon. Member for Tonbridge (Mr. G. Williams). I was left at the end of it not quite sure whether he knew less about the nature of mothers or of the needs of industry. While I disagree with the remarks of the hon. Member, I find myself in the rather unusual situation of disagreeing somewhat with my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham (Mr. Hale), who regretted that we should have taken the step of regulating before the actual provisions had been made.

I suggest to the House that this Bill should not only be welcomed for its con- tents but also for its timing, because here we have an example of a Government Department acting quickly to fill the gap in our administrative provisions for the care of children as soon as any possible dangers arising out of that gap have been revealed. The Ministry of Health on this occasion has shown a speed of action and a readiness of response which, I think, is a model to all Government Departments. This Bill is, of course, of special interest to the cotton industry and cotton areas, because we have in those areas just that situation which the Bill is most immediately designed to meet.

I would remind the hon. Member for Tonbridge that this is not a new situation in the cotton areas. He told us that there was no need for these nurseries before the war. It was not that there was no need in the Lancashire area for properly equipped and properly run day nurseries before the war—there was that need—but there was a different situation then because labour was abundant, and employers were under no kind of obligation to try to create inducements for women to go back to industry. They were able to rest in the assurance that women would come back to the industry because they would be driven to do so by the unemployment of their men folk. These women had to find some device for taking care of their children, and very often it was the device of the child-minder on an unregulated and often unsatisfactory basis.

Since the war the situation is different. Now the employers, knowing that the husbands of these women are in good jobs, have to find new inducements, and it is because the employers have responded to this situation by the provision of private nurseries on a bigger scale than ever before that a situation is arising with which it is imperative this House should deal without further delay. Therefore, I am not suggesting that I do not welcome the creation of these private nurseries—I do. I agree with the hon. Member for Epping (Mrs. Manning) that in many ways a factory nursery has advantages over a municipal nursery, chiefly because the nursery is on the spot where the women work. Having had a rather brief but painful experience of a cotton operative's life in recent times, I know how precious ten minutes or a quarter of an hour can be in the dark hours between six and seven in the morning—the ten minutes which a mother can save by being able to take her child with her to the factory instead of having to go out of the way to leave it in a municipal nursery, very often in pouring Lancashire rain.

While I welcome these private nurseries, I would point out to the hon. Member who mentioned the importance of nursery schools that the difficulty which we find in the Lancashire area about the nursery schools is that their hours are not appropriate to meeting the problems of the mother going out to work. One of the difficulties that has arisen in the Lancashire areas comes from the fact that it was assumed that the switchover would be from the day nursery to the nursery school. I have criticised before in this House the withdrawal of 100 per cent. grant to local authority war-time nurseries and putting the emphasis on the nursery school rather than on the day nursery, because it was unreal in the situation in which we found ourselves. It was not real in this sense; that some other provision must be made for taking care of the children between the hours when the mother goes to the mill and when the nursery school opens its doors.

I have never said anything else. I said that when children between the ages of two and five were put in these nurseries, it was just as well to make provision for their minds as well as their bodies.

I agree, but the hon. Member did say that the real solution was the nursery school. I agree, but not unless some provision is made for covering the length of the mother's working hours

I welcome the initiative which employers have shown in Lancashire in providing these private nurseries. They have helped to fill some of the gap left by the local authorities as a result of the reduction in the grant. I want to make one thing clear because I think that it is important from the point of view of the recruiting drive among women. This Bill is not dictated by any scandal that has yet occurred. It is important that we should place that on record. It is not that there has yet been brought to the attention of a Government Department a really serious or scandalous situation in any unregulated private nursery.

On the whole, these factory nurseries have been very good—some better, some worse. At the worst, there has not been a suggestion of any real danger to the children, and that I think we should place that on record. In so far as we do have unsupervised or unregulated factory nurseries, there is always the incipient danger of a scandal, but what the Government have done is to act in advance of a possible event. That is something which this Government frequently does. The right hon. Member for Aldershot (Mr. Lyttelton) was taunting the Government last Tuesday for always succumbing to events; and for having a total lack of foresight in their administration. We find a persistent attempt made by hon. Members on the benches opposite and in the Press of the country to create an impression that the Government are always tagging along on the wheel of events which are driving us forward.

I ask the public of the country to remember, that the scandal that never happens is not news and that this Bill is part of the work being done all along the line by the Government to prevent scandals. I welcome it, therefore, as an example of foresight and of action which is taken before any danger has arisen, and which will effectively, I hope, prevent that danger from arising. I therefore hope that we shall see increased activity by local authorities in the provision of municipal nurseries because those of us who represent the cotton areas are not going to allow the Ministry of Health to shirk their responsibility in this matter. There has been an encouraging revival recently in the provision of these nurseries, but I hope that we shall welcome and seek to improve the private factory nursery as well. I know that the one which I had the privilege of studying at close quarters last September was a model of its kind. If it were emulated in other factories the result I believe would be a positive benefit to the children of this country. The youngsters, as I saw them, were not only playing happily and having their quota of food and sleep, being washed and medically supervised, but they were given a grounding of health greater than it has yet been possible to give in many of the homes in the back street Lancashire towns. I congratulate the Minister on having taken time by the forelock and on having enabled us to take a step further in that direction

12.30 p.m.

By now, it is axiomatic that the test of true civilisation is the care given to children, and I join with my hon. Friend the Member for Blackburn (Mrs. Castle) in congratulating the Government on the care they have taken of the child life of the nation, and on anticipating in this Bill some of the difficulties which may arise. The hon. Member for Blackburn spoke of the problems and the situation in the cotton industry, and what she has said is largely apposite to the area from which I come, which is not a cotton area but one in which we make pottery—an industry where female labour predominates. Figures are on record to show that some 56 per cent. of the labour employed in the pottery industry before the war was female labour.

The position which has arisen today is not unconnected with the wartime experience, when women were able to obtain employment in more modern factories, possibly at better rates of pay, with good welfare services. Because of the sound reasons which I thought the hon. Member for Blackburn adduced—that today, in a period of full employment, the menfolk are able to contribute to the upkeep of the household in a way that they could not in many households before the war, when the womenfolk had to help to keep things going--we have witnessed in the post-war years a reluctance on the part of some women to go into the factories. In my own area of North Staffordshire, where we produce some of the finest pottery and china, there is great difficulty is attracting sufficient female labour, and in inducing some of the old craftsmen to return to the industry. For that reason, this Bill will serve a useful purpose.

However, that is not our main problem, and it is not the important virtue of this Bill that it provides for that position. Our interest is primarily in the child. While I am glad that in this Bill we are achieving some sort of regulation for the kindly disposed persons, who perhaps with some measure of private enterprise, make a living or vocation of this kind of activity, in my view we are here dealing with very valuable material which should be most carefully handled; and in the care of small children we should be satisfied that nothing less than the best is provided in the way of trained staff and personnel. I, personably, am not satisfied that these people—many of them good folk, with the best intentions in the world—have been the proper people to run some of the nurseries. I believe that there is a science and a humanity about this job, which requires very careful thought; and I should like to be assured by the Minister that the Government have kept a watch on these points, that it is likely that the staff will be forthcoming, and that adequate provision will be made for the training of young women interested in this activity.

As has been pointed out, we do not want to make this a sort of sideline as far as the local authorities are concerned, for some department to take in its stride. It is important that overburdened local authorities should be encouraged to provide staff capable of supervising nurseries and other establishments where children are protected. The Parliamentary Secretary was most anxious to convey to us that he thought the local welfare department was the proper organisation to perform this work, and I am sure he is quite right. But is he sure that in all local authorities there are trained staff? Who will do the visiting of these places? We do not want to see a situation such as arose, in my view, in respect of the factory life of this country, where there was supposed to be periodic inspection by factory inspectors, but where, because of the inadequacy of the staff, there was not adequate supervision. Will that happen in this case? I hope not. I hope that account is being taken of the training of people, to supervise both the nurseries themselves and the administration.

I cannot help thinking that it is right to regard the training of children from the age of two as part and parcel of our educational system. We should not be anxious to take a child from its parents before it reaches the age of two. Indeed we should do everything to prevent it. A young child should be with its mother; but from the age of two, as is provided in the new Education Act, the growth of the child should be regarded as part of our responsibility in the great educational system. While I welcome the protection afforded in this Bill for other establishments, I hope that the aim and ambition of the Government will be to improve the existing provisions, and gradually to integrate the educational system so that from the age of two onwards a child will be properly cared for and developed. With those observations. I conclude by saying how much I welcome this Measure, which I believe will be eagerly supported and welcomed in the country.

12.37 p.m.

My remarks will fall under two headings, the main one dealing with factory nurseries. I recognise the existing situation which calls for a Bill such as this, but I deplore its necessity, as I am sure does the Minister; and I should have liked the Minister to be clearer—even clearer than the circular issued during the war—in saying that we do not expect mothers with young children under the age, say, of two years, to go into our factories. I agree that the Government have made their view clear; but I feel that more pressure should be exerted.

I wish to give the House an illustration, because of the statement by the hon. Member for Tonbridge (Mr. G. Williams) that there was no need for nurseries and child minders before the war. I remember, after the 1914–18 war, as a young married man with a child, when I lived on a new estate that had just been built, going out at six o'clock in the morning with a young baby, and trudging into the old town in order to catch a tram into the centre of the town of Northampton, where I and my wife worked. But that was not all. In the unemployment which followed a year or so after the war, only my wife could find work. The child, at three years of age, was taken to the place where she was working and placed in a skip behind the machine. There was need in plenty for a Bill of this description long before now.

I think it is a very bad step for factories in general to have nurseries attached. If nurseries are needed—and I am certain they are—local authorities should provide the service, in the same way as they provided services during the war with Government help. I will take the case of a factory in London. The hon. Member for Epping (Mrs. Manning) speaks with years of experience as an educationist. I, as a trade union organiser working in the London factory might be able to put the case from another angle, although finally we are agreed on our argument. We all know the type of London factory. Is it to be expected, just because a room is available in one of those factories, that it can be made into a nursery fit for young children? The majority of London factories could not provide such a good nursery as municipal authorities, who are able to clear bomb damaged sites, lay a lawn and erect a special building, as in the borough of Tottenham where I live.

We have before us those two distinct types of nursery. Only a few factories can provide nurseries fit for children. In my own constituency of Market Harborough, with its 9,000 inhabitants and several industries, a factory has the facilities for providing a nursery with all those requirements. Whilst, therefore, I cannot wholly condemn factory nurseries, I do request the Minister to be extremely careful about which factories are allowed to have nurseries. We must not put the kiddies into a shed surrounded by all the factory buildings and attendant noise: we must have proper nurseries for them.

I wish now to speak of the wives and mothers. In referring to my own industry I speak again from experience, which will enable hon. Members to understand my point. We were very pleased to have women working part time. They could not work full time because they had a home to run and children to look after. If factory nurseries are to be used, however, and pressure brought to bear on mothers to work, not part time, but full time in a factory, such a policy will be damaging to the mother as well as to the child. It has been proved that two part time workers can produce as much as one full time worker; that is a statement I can substantiate. Nevertheless, there is always a difficulty in employing two people. The manufacturer is prone to get one of them to work full time instead of having part time workers. I suggest that a wife who has children and a home to run, with conditions as they are today, is already giving something to the country if she works only half time, so that she can have the remainder of the time with the children—as she should. I hope that we shall impress upon manufacturers, if possible, that part time working for these women ought not to be cast to one side and that the provision of factory nurseries should not be used to compel full time working.

I may appear to have criticised the Bill, but that is not my intention. There is one final point I wish to make. Before and during the war we in industry always pointed to Lancashire as the place where a man got half a wage and his wife had to go into industry in order to earn the other half. We always said that industry must pay the mill operative sufficient to keep the wife and family in proper conditions and surroundings. I am hoping that this need, which we know exists, when women with home responsibilities are forced to go into factories, will pass away, so that the citizens of this country can live the life which they have a right to expect.

12.57 p.m.

Most of us, I think, have felt in very much the same way about this Bill. Although we welcome it warmly, many of us have misgivings about the way in which it will work out in practice. I hope that if I concentrate on the doubts in my mind the Parliamentary Secretary will not think that they detract in any way from the warmth of the welcome which I am giving this Measure.

I am sorry that the hon. Member for Tonbridge (Mr. G. Williams) is no longer present. He referred to the financial benefit of the Bill as being dubious. There is an answer to him on that score. There are today in Lancashire more than 6,000 women who would be prepared to come back to the textile industry if arrangements could be made for the care of their children whilst they are in the mill. Every thousand additional operatives in Lancashire means a million pounds more exports of cotton textiles. If we could get those 6,000 women back into industry it would mean an addition of £6 million towards the export target of the cotton industry.

One of my misgivings about the Bill is that now that private nurseries are to bed subject to public supervision, local authorities—many of whom are only too anxious to seize on any excuse for doing nothing—will be tempted to take the line that it is no longer necessary for them to make this very important provision. If, however, we are to reach the export target, it is essential that these nurseries should be provided. In the cotton towns there are 91 nurseries provided by local authorities and 60 by the mills.

I support what was said by my hon. Friend the junior Member for Blackburn (Mrs. Castle) about nurseries in some of the cotton mills in Lancashire; they are certainly as good as any I saw during my visits to the Soviet Union, and I should say there are some nurseries in the Lancashire mills which are in every way as good as those provided by any local authority. That is not true of them all, but some of them have reached an extremely high standard. There are plans for another 88 nurseries, of which 37 are to be provided by the mills and 51 by the local authorities; but even these figures are not adequate. It is important that local authorities should not make this Bill an excuse for going slow. Similarly, it is extremely important that the system of inspection, although it must be adequate, should be sufficiently flexible as not to discourage mill owners from going ahead in providing nurseries on their premises. I am afraid that there may be a possibility of discontinuing this provision when they find that the nurseries will be subject in future to inspections and regulations.

The Parliamentary Secretary referred to the fact that child-minding is carried on a good deal less extensively in Lancashire than in the past. That is true, but if still makes a substantial contribution to the care of the children of operatives in the cotton industry. I think it is capable of a good deal of development. The Parliamentary Secretary referred to the method during the war, whereby local authorities set up what were really sub-nurseries in private homes where six or seven children could be looked after in more or less intimate family surroundings. The child-minder was really the agent of the local authority. That seems to me to be the right kind of regulation in this sphere of child care.

I am afraid, however, that the inspections envisaged under this Bill may discourage a number of people from continuing with their work of looking after children. For instance, a large number of child-minders in Lancashire are old people. I am afraid that they will begin to feel, if they are to be subjected to inspections, that it is not worth going on with the work and they may throw in their hands. Then, of course, there are the neighbours who do an act of kindness by looking after children. The Parliamentary Secretary has said that it is not intended to interfere in cases of that kind. My hon. Friend the Member for Oldham (Mr. Hale) gave a very good example of what happens in rows of houses in Lancashire, and how women work in together in looking after the children. The Bill refers to the carrying on of this work for reward, and I am afraid that if there is to be investigation into the financial arrangements made between these women, there will be a danger of stirring up bitter opposition and antagonism to the operation of the Bill. I do not know how that can be overcome, but I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary will advise the local authorities of the great importance of being tactful and understanding in their administration of this provision.

The Parliamentary Secretary also referred to the fact that some of these premises were not suitable for the purposes for which they were intended, and drew special attention to the danger of infectious diseases. In the same connection, I should like him to define exactly what is meant by "a fit person." Will medical grounds be brought in just as much as moral grounds? Will tuberculosis be a reason for a person not being registered just as much as moral turpitude? In February of this year, Dr. Norman Tattersall, the principal medical officer to the King Edward VII Memorial Association in Wales, the great anti-tuberculosis organisation in that country, drew attention to the danger to school children of teachers suffering from tuberculosis. He particularly stressed the importance of this in connection with nursery schools. That argument applies with especial force to the day nurseries and to the homes where child-minding is carried on.

The right hon. Member for South Kensington (Mr. Law) spoke of the importance of having a proper standard of nutrition. That, of course, is absolutely vital, and there are many similar factors which are of the greatest importance in the operations of this Bill, but I ask the Parliamentary Secretary to advise the local authorities not to be too fussy in the way they administer the provisions of this Bill. Although nutrition and hygiene are important, there are even more important factors in looking after children. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Epping (Mrs. Manning). Mothering is at least as important to children as the provision of vitamins. There is a great danger of those children whose mothers go out to work feeling that they are not wanted, and it is for the child-minders to set their little minds at rest and assure them that they are loved and wanted. I believe that a warm heart on the part of the child-minder will conduce far more to the happiness of the child than the mastery of any number of books on child welfare. If my hon. Friend will advise local authorities to put this Bill into operation on these principles, it will be another milestone along the road which my right hon. and hon. Friends are building towards a land fit for children to live in.

12.51 p.m.

I wish to refer very briefly to an omission from the Bill, attention to which would improve it very largely. At the outset, I should like to say how shocked I was listening to the right hon. Gentleman the Member for South Kensington (Mr. Law) damning this Bill with faint praise. He said that it could not do any harm and that it might do some good. He failed to realise what a beneficial Measure this is, and implied that if his Party were in power it would not have been introduced. That, I think, is a great pity, if it indicates the social outlook of the Opposition upon the problems with which this Bill deals. It is true that he ended his speech by expressing a welcome to the Bill, but, taking his speech as a whole, it is difficult to know whether he approves or disapproves of the principle upon which it is based and this method of solving the problems involved.

There are two key phrases which occur in the Bill. One is the phrase "for reward," and the other is the phrase" a fit person." Both these phrases are unhappy reminders of the bad old days of baby farming, malnutrition, the tragedies of babies' bodies found in gardens and things of that sort. This Bill is, of course, designed to obviate those sorts of things. It emphasises the very serious need to regulate professional nurses and nurseries and people who look after other people's children. In our present state of society, this Bill is a boon to mothers who have to go out to work; it is a boon to those knowledgeable and sympathetic women who mind their children; and it will be a protection to the children themselves.

As I have said, the phrase "a fit person" occurs several times. This phrase is in no way defined. I think the House will agree that it is very important to know what that expression means. It occurs four times in Clause 1. Clause 1 (3) lays down that a health authority may refuse to register premises if there is employed therein a person who is not fit, if the premises are not fit and if the applicant is not fit. Clause 13, which is the interpretation Clause, defines six words and phrases, but it makes no attempt to define what is meant by the expression "a fit person." Clause 2 gives power to make an order imposing requirements in connection with registration. I do not know whether Clause 2 is intended to cover the gap which I suggest exists in the Bill.

I do not think it does cover it. The word "fit" and the expression "fit and proper person" have been judicially considered and defined in other connections. We find them defined in relation to landlord and tenant law and in relation to the licensing laws. The phrases occur in the Children and Young Persons Act, 1933, but they are in no way defined in this Measure. In view of the importance to the child, the person into whose care it is to be committed should have the qualifications which I have suggested. These should include not only knowledge of children but sympathy, kindliness and the capacity to mother children. For these reasons, some attempt should be made in the Bill to define these expressions.

1.1 p.m.

I am grateful to hon. Members for the reception which they have given to this Bill. I have been asked a number of detailed points which I will try to answer, although some of them could more properly be considered when we come to the Committee stage. Two things which were raised during the Debate I want to re-emphasise because they are points of some principle. I want to say again, as I said at the beginning, that times are not normal, and because times are not normal we cannot try to set out in any absolute form the doctrine that the child under two years should always be at home with his mother. It is true that in Lancashire at the present time we have quite a number of women in the mills who have children under two and for whom we must provide.

The second thing I want to re-emphasise—and here I agree with my hon. Friend, with whom I share the representation of Blackburn (Mrs. Castle)—is that the factory can make a real contribution partly because often there is vacant accommodation, which, without too much trouble, can be converted into use as a nursery, and also because of the convenience it brings to mothers. It is true that this cannot apply universally. There are mills and weaving sheds which are quite small and where a nursery could not be provided. Here it may be possible for firms to have a co-operative scheme or circumstances may be such that the local authority will supply the accommodation. We do not want to have one line running to the exclusion of the other. The local authorities—in the North-West at any rate—are going ahead with schemes, and we also want the firms who can do so to go ahead too.

I was asked detailed points, to some of which I should like to reply. The right hon. Member for South Kensington (Mr. Law) referred to the absence in Clause 2 of anything about standards of feeding. I am not sure that it is practicable to lay down such standards in the Bill, but I will look at it. I would hope that nutrition standards would be regarded as part of the work to be done under the heading of medical supervision. However, it may be worth considering to see if something could be put into the Bill to cover it. On the question of 14 days' notice, which was also raised by the right hon. Gentleman, we have consulted all the responsible bodies and they have agreed that 14 days' notice is the appropriate period. While I am prepared to look at it if there is any strong feeling on the subject, it is right to emphasise that we have been advised that 14 days is the appropriate time.

It is perfectly true, as the right hon. Gentleman said, that Clause 7 (1) only applies to nurseries, but Subsection (2) does pick up the minder's house. There is a distinction here. Subsection (1) gives an unqualified right of entry to any nursery at any time whereas Subsection (2) requires the inspector not to force an entry into a minder's house but to go for a warrant authorising entry to the magistrate or in Scotland to the sheriff. This is a distinction which has been drawn quite deliberately between the nurseries, which ought to be open to inspection, and the minder's home, which, after all, is a private dwelling.

I should like at this stage to turn to a point raised by my hon. Friend the Mem- beer for Epping (Mrs. Manning). I am not sure that I followed her argument that the Bill is "too enabling," because the whole point of this Bill is that for the first time we are going to have a complete register. Where there is a register we give local authorities powers to lay down conditions of various kinds, but it is difficult to see how one can go further than that when dealing with local authorities who have their own places in our constitutional system and who in these matters can be relied upon to do their own work. The hon. Member for the Combined English Universities (Mr. K. Lindsay) seemed to be a bit disturbed because the name of the Minister of Education was not on the face of the Bill. The reason for that is that we are dealing here with day nurseries and not with nursery schools. I can assure him, however, that there has been the closest consultation and complete agreement on these matters between my right hon. Friends the Ministers of Health and Education.

There is one thing I should like to say while I am on this theme. Several hon. Members have drawn a distinction between the local health authority and the local education authority. Let us remember that we are here talking about the same council. Councils of counties and county boroughs are both local education and local health authorities, and one must assume that there is a certain amount of co-ordination, especially at the medical level, for in many areas we have the dual post of school medical officer and medical officer of health. The hon. Member for the Combined English Universities asked about staffing, and I agree entirely that we shall not immediately be able to attain ideal staffs. We shall have to do some improvisation, but we have already started short courses on lines with which he will be familiar—the child care reserve which functioned during the war. Here the local education authority is the body which provides the training for the people in the nurseries, and in Lancashire we have already started a number of courses.

The final point which he raised was on Clause 8, Subsection 2. As I understand it, what we are doing here is to make clear—I am told it is necessary—that we exempt schools in circumstances for example where the buildings may be used for organised games or other holiday activities to which the term "play centre" does not apply in the statutory sense. We do not want to be cluttered up with regulations for existing school buildings just because they are used in holiday times for strictly non-educational purposes.

The hon. Member for Oldham (Mr. Hale) raised a number of interesting points, not all of which I wish to take up today. I want to deal with one point which he raised and which covered the circumstances in which young women are looking after the children in the nurseries while the older women are in the mills. That happens for the very good reason that those who are wanted in the mills are the trained women. People of long standing and experience in textiles who have children may want to go and work in the mills and the younger girls coming out of school can be given the necessary training to go into the day nurseries. I have been asked a number of Questions by hon. Members about priorities and I should like to say that in those areas like Lancashire, nurseries will have all the priorities we can give in the matter of materials and so on, so that they can be put into operation as soon as possible.

The salaries of nurses in these day nurseries are fixed and have been fixed in the past, by the same body that settled the salaries of nurses in hospitals, namely, the Rushcliffe Committee. In reply to a further point, I would add that the whole duty here will really be a part of the health function of the local authority and of the medical officer. There is no doubt that the medical officer and his trained staff of health visitors are the best people to do the work. They are quite competent and are properly trained. They are, after all, the employees of the major authorities—we are not here concerned with the minor authorities—they can be trusted to deal with matters of which they have such long experience.

On health questions.

Yes, on health questions. I do not think it would be right to make some arrangement with the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children in this case. We are concerned with children who are looked after during the day and go home to their parents at night. The society's interest is much more with children who are covered by the Children Bill which the Home Secretary is at present taking through the House.

The final point I will mention, was put by my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham in an interruption to my first speech, the limitation of six days. I want to make it plain that we have statutory cover for residential nurseries in the child protection provisions embodied in the Children Bill and that we do not want to cover them again in this Bill. We have to put in the reference to six days in order to provide that we shall actually be able to regulate and inspect nurseries which take children almost by the week and who would not be covered in the ordinary way by the provisions of the Children Bill.

The hon Member for Tonbridge (Mr. G. Williams) asked about the cost of this service. We understand that the cost is not likely to be very great because this service can very well be carried out by the present staffs of the local authorities. We do not expect that it will be necessary for them to recruit extra staffs. The hon. Gentleman asked me how many of the present places were unfit. I cannot even begin to give him an opinion on that matter. Not until we have all these places registered shall we be able to form any opinion.

We shall, of course, give guidance to the local authorities when the Bill becomes law, as we always do in such cases. We will bear in mind the various points which have been put, and not least those which have been put by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for North Aberdeen (Mr. Hector Hughes), about unfit persons. I am not a lawyer, like my hon. and learned Friend, but I venture the opinion that it would be extremely difficult to define a fit or unfit person for the purposes of the Bill. We might have a try at definition if we are talking about the staffs of day nurseries, but it would be almost impossible when we are talking about people who are to be allowed to mind children. We must therefore leave something to discretion.

We are dealing with skilled people such as health visitors and inspectors. We shall give advice to the local authorities in the administrative circulars that we shall issue in due course. The people who will do the work are qualified, and I have no doubt that we shall find that the whole thing will work out well. I hope that I have dealt with all the questions which have been put to me, and that the Bill can now be given a Second Reading.

Question put, and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read a Second time.

Bill committed to a Committee of the Whole House for Monday next.—[ Mr. Pearson. ]

I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."

The primary purpose of the Bill is to secure protection for the health of work-people and of the public generally against the harmful effects of undue exposure to dangerous radiation. There was a disposition among some people, when the first Bill—subsequently withdrawn—was introduced, to say that the safeguards were unnecessary. After all, experience of X-rays has lasted about 50 years and ignorance of their effects has now been overcome by modern education. Scientists and doctors are normally educated in their dangers.

I am afraid however that that education does not remove the need for the Bill. The safety code of the X-ray and Radium Protection Committee, which was appointed about 25 years ago by the Medical Research Council, remains as recommendations, and their advice is not always taken. The further and much more ample need for the Bill arises from the fact that we are now on the verge of a vastly extended use of radioactivity. Basic nuclear research has produced its most dramatic achievement in the atomic bomb, but of course, there has been amazing progress in other branches of physics, and in industry and medicine, and the power of apparatus used and the quantities of radioactivity available have increased enormously.

I have had some figures taken out in the realm of physics, in order to give hon. Members an idea of the kind of progress that has been made and the rate at which it is being made. Up to 1930, no apparatus for physical use was giving more than a few thousand volts, except a few X-ray sets. By 1932, the Cockcroft-Walton apparatus gave 250,000 volts. By 1939, the cyclotron—which accelerates positive particles—was giving 7 million volts in England and the United States. By 1943 betatron—which accelerated negative particles—had reached 100 million volts. Now in 1948 we have in this country a cyclotron—I hope hon. Members will note these names, and that they may have more significance for them than they have for me—under construction which will give 300 million volts, and by 1951 the United States hope to have in service a proton synchroton giving several thousand million volts. These figures go to show that enormous advances have been made and that we are dealing here with a field of development which is changing from day to day. Therefore, whatever Measure we enact must deal with this rapidly changing situation.

In medicine X-ray sets have reached 250,000 volts and betatrons may shortly be used giving 30 million volts. As a byproduct in nuclear research, and particularly of the great atomic piles, artificial radioactive substances—such as radioactive cobalt, radioactive iodine, etc.—are now becoming freely available for therapeutic use. These substances have tremendous possibilities and, of course, dangers. I am informed that all have different rates of emission, and other characteristics, and are extremely difficult to define. Indeed, one of the difficulties of definition has led to the rather unusual structure of the Bill.

These products and by-products may shortly be available in great quantities and quite cheaply and, as I have said they can be exceedingly dangerous. The high price of radium always protected it from use by ignorant people, but the larger quantities and the relatively cheap rates at which many of these other products may be available mean that unless they are restricted in their use, untrained people may get hold of them and do themselves great damage. Then just as radioactive substances are in great use and are of immense value in tracing biological reactions, in industry also, of course, the same tracers may be of equal importance in the understanding of industrial processes, especially in chemistry, metallurgy and engineering.

The dangers of radioactivity I need not emphasise; they have been sufficiently painted by more eloquent tongues than mine. Almost the whole world has been told of what happened at Hiroshima, and I will not horrify the House by giving instances of what may be the effect of long exposure to radioactive substances of any kind. In the hands of competent persons who are specially trained there is no danger, and I am not dealing with that type of person, as I hope to be able to show before I sit down. However, it has been established beyond all doubt that the effects of exposure to radioactive substances of high emission rate are often insidious, the consequences are often not known except after a number of years, and can be fatal. I have, therefore, been strongly advised by experts in this field that it is necessary to make provision for the protection of the public against the possibilities that have been indicated.

The Bill has already had a long discussion. It was first introduced in another place a year ago, then it was discussed in various quarters, and we were convinced that the Bill as framed ought not to be proceeded with, and that certain changes should be made. Now we have introduced into the Bill safeguards which were not present in the original Bill. It has been discussed in another place, and I believe I can regard it as more or less an agreed Measure.

Clause 1 empowers the Minister of Supply to acquire, to process and to distribute radioactive substances. It will enable the Radiochemical Centre established by the Minister of Supply to deal with natural radioactive substances. Clause 2 enables the Minister of Supply to control the import and export of radioactive substances when the present legislation ceases.

Clause 3 limits the administration of radioactive substances in the treatment of human beings to doctors and to dentists licensed by one of the Health Ministers, and makes illegal the supply to the public of medicines and toilet preparations containing more than a prescribed quantity of radioactive material except by licensed doctors or dentists, or on prescription by them. This provision gives Ministers powers to restrict the use of these substances in treatment to the doctors or the dentists who are competent to handle them, and safeguards the public from dangerous preparations now freely on sale.

Clause 4 requires anyone using irradiating apparatus of a strength to be defined in regulations, for medical or dental treatment, to obtain a licence from one of the Health Ministers. This enables the use of such apparatus to be restricted to doctors with the requisite knowledge of the dangers involved. This provision may be extended to diagnostic apparatus if the Advisory Committee so recommend.

Clause 5 empowers Ministers to make regulations laying down safety precautions for the protection of workers in premises where radioactive substances or irradiating apparatus are used. This is an extension of the provisions of the Factories Acts, an extension to premises not covered in those Acts and, of course, to hospitals and laboratories where radioactive substances are being produced or are being used, and also when they are being transported. The regulations also deal with effluents where radioactive substances are produced, such as raising the height of chimneys or dealing with the treatment or the segregation of effluents where they are pouring into rivers or where they are being poured out on land. This, I am informed by the experts, is an extremely important aspect of it, because the by-products from these piles and, indeed, many of the elements with which they get into contact, can be quite considerably radioactive for a considerable time, and unless proper protection is given, very serious dangers might result.

Clause 6 establishes the Advisory Committee to advise the Ministers concerned. I will say a word about that in a moment or two. Clause 7 deals with the powers of inspectors to enforce the Acts and regulations. These are based on the Public Health Act of 1936. Clauses 8 to 12 deal with penalties and matters of procedure.

It is obvious to anyone who reads this Bill that, short though it is, it is exceedingly important and gives Ministers unusual powers. It would be foolish to conceal from the House that many of these powers are novel. They are novel because of the very great difficulty in defining in the Measure what it is we are talking about. We are surrounded by radioactive substances of various kinds. Indeed, I believe that human beings are themselves radioactive, some in a lesser degree and some in a greater degree. It cannot be said that on a Friday morning there is very much radioactivity amongst any of us; but it is this universality of the phenomenon which makes it extremely difficult to isolate and pin down in a definition. Nevertheless, it is there. The gradation between small radioactivity and great radioactivity is merely a difference of degree. It is the difference between the luminous watch and the atomic bomb. At some stage it is necessary to define what it is that we can allow people to use in the ordinary way and what it is about which we must take precautions

This is, therefore, an enabling Measure to enable the Ministers concerned to lay down regulations. Obviously those regulations must be flexible. They have to define, with a degree of particularity that cannot be attempted in a Bill, what it is that people cannot do without incurring penalties. Therefore, from time to time the regulations will have to be amended and the lists of prohibitions will have to be altered, added to or revised. In order that these original powers should not be subject to abuse, we thought it wise to have a special procedure. First, a very powerful advisory committee is to be appointed. Perhaps it would be convenient for the House if I mentioned the bodies who are to be asked about the appointment of representatives. They are the Medical Research Council, the Royal Society, the Physical Society, the three Royal Medical Colleges and the three Royal Medical Corporations of Scotland, the Faculty of Radiologists, the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, the British X-ray and Radium Protection Committee, the British Employers Federation and the T.U.C. I think that hon. Members will agree that an ex- ceedingly powerful and influential committee should result. Furthermore, this Committee is not merely to come into action when it is asked to do so by the Minister, but it will have the power of initiative. It can from time to time, as it were under its own steam, meet and make representations to the Ministers concerned as to how they should use their powers. In addition, the Minister can make references to the Committee and ask for their advice.

No regulation can be made without the Committee first looking at the draft regulation. Every regulation must first be made in draft, advertised, and criticism and witnesses invited. The regulation will be reconsidered in the light of the representations made either by a public inquiry or by an inspector seeing the individual who wishes to make recommendations. Then the Advisory Committee itself will consider it and after that the regulation will be laid on the Table of the House and will be subject to negative procedure. I should say that in those conditions there is no danger at all that these powers will be abused. When we are dealing with matters of this sort—imprecisely defined, changing, almost as malleable as the subject with which they are concerned—when new discoveries are being made all the time and new dangers exposed, it is absolutely essential that we should be armed with an instrument sufficiently flexible to be adapted to changing conditions day by day.

Of course, it is equally desirable that these regulations should not be vexatious and should not interfere with scientific research. We must not attempt to fence the scientist in. We must not attempt to subject him to restrictions which are only intended for persons without his knowledge. Therefore, in this Bill we have armed the scientists themselves with the powers to say what they think ought not, or ought, to be done. It is absolutely essential if we are to have the work carried out willingly, that the workers in the various industries concerned must also be protected. Otherwise, they would not co-operate loyally with the research scientists. In addition—and I lay very great emphasis upon this—we must protect our population against commercial exploitation of these dangerous substances which can be put in soap, face cream, lipstick and all that kind of thing, the consequences of which are not immediately apparent but which may over the course of years be very dangerous and painful to the persons afflicted. For those reasons and with those limitations, I commend the Bill to the House.

1.36 p.m.

There is no doubt that the right hon. Gentleman has established the case for this Bill. There will be no disposition to hinder its passage or to refuse the Government in this matter the powers for which they ask. In my comments, which will be brief, I would like to refer especially to the unusual character of the Bill to which the right hon. Gentleman referred and the fact that it gives Ministers of the Crown such sweeping and, indeed, unprecedented powers. I think that the right hon. Gentleman was a little innocent in apparently suggesting that no Minister of this Government had ever before come down and asked for sweeping powers. Certainly, I do not think that even in any Bill introduced by this Government the powers given to Ministers have been so widespread and so free from any kind of external control. As a principle it is not a good thing, but I must agree with the right hon. Gentleman that in this case, if these substances are to be controlled and if individuals are to be protected from their action, no other course is open to him. As he said, it would be impossible to give a great catalogue in the Bill of prohibitions and regulations, a catalogue which would be changed and modified all the time.

Nevertheless, we ought not to forget that certain dangers arise from these very great powers. They are not constitutional so much as practical dangers. The right hon. Gentleman referred to one of them. He said that it would be absurd if, in his efforts to protect people from injury, he effectively prevented scientific research and development. Of course, if the provisions of Clause 5 were exploited to the fullest possible degree, that might easily happen. We would have perfect safety but, at the same time perfect stagnation. In dealing with the matters contained in Clause 5, it will be necessary for the Minister to strike a reasonable balance between ideal security and the needs of research, but there is another danger inherent in these powers and, indeed, in many parts of the Bill. It is that these powers might be used in order to give an advantage to one section of the community as against another. I do not mean that they will be deliberately used for that purpose, but the effect may be that an advantage will be given to one section of the community against another or to one section of the medical profession as against another.

The kind of thing I have in mind is associated with the provisions of Clause 4, under which irradiating apparatus of a prescribed class or description can only be used by a duly qualified medical practitioner who is also licensed under this Clause. I think I am right in saying that there is a fear, which would seem to me to be not unreasonable, in certain sections of the medical profession, that these powers might be used to give the radiologist or the radio-therapeutist, or whatever his technical designation is, a kind of corner in this field of radio-therapy to which he would not really be entitled from the facts of the case. I am told, for example, that dermatologists for a very long time have used various methods of radiotherapy, which have been very effective and that these people are highly skilled in their use. I think they are rather afraid that some kind of monopoly may be set up to their disadvantage, and, as they believe, to the disadvantage of their profession, for the benefit of radiologists proper.

All these dangers will be averted if the Advisory Committee does its job properly. We have had advisory committees in connection with other Bills, but this Advisory Committee will be far more important than the Minister of Health or any other Minister. I was glad to hear the list which the right hon. Gentleman read out of the bodies which will be represented on the Advisory Committee but he said—and I am not quite clear about this—that the Advisory Committee would be able to initiate advice as well as to give it when it is asked for on any matter at all. My reading of the Clause which sets up the Advisory Committee suggests that it will only be able to give advice on those matters on which its advice is required under the Act.

The Clause states:

"— and any matters connected with the exercise of those functions on which the Committee at any time think fit to advise."

I thought that might mean that it would be only if they thought fit to advise under this Clause.

I entirely agree with the right hon. Gentleman that it would be quite wrong if that construction were placed upon those words. I will certainly see that, if that construction can be placed upon them, those words are amended so that advice may be given over the whole range of the field.

I am extremely glad to hear that. I would like now to pass from that to the consideration of another aspect of Clause 1. The reason why I raised the question of the functions of the advisory committee was that I was not sure whether it could advise under Clause 1. Under this Clause, the Minister of Supply has various powers, and among these powers is that of disposing of radioactive substances which, presumably, he himself had manufactured at the Radiochemical Centre at Amersham. It seems to me that the allocation and distribution of these substances by the Minister might, in certain cases, be extremely important, and might raise very difficult questions as between one interest and another which wanted the substance concerned. I have been told, though my information may be wrong, and the Minister will no doubt correct me if it is, that some of these substances which will be produced at Amersham will be not only very costly but very scarce, and that they will, in fact, be produced nowhere else but at Amersham. I am thinking particularly of the more expensive tracer materials which will be in demand for medical research, for industrial research and even for agricultural research. I am told that they are extremely important in these cases, and it is very important, if there are to be rival claimants for these substances, that the advisory committee should give the Minister of Supply the benefit of its advice.

There is one further point which I want to put to the Minister. In another place, when this Bill was discussed, the suggestion was made that it would be extremely valuable if representatives of industry could be associated with the advisory committee. That suggestion was made by the Government, as the Minister has told us, but I wonder if it would not be worth considering whether it might be advisable to associate agriculture with the committee or whether such an association is already covered by some of the existing representatives. If it is not, I think it would be worth the Government's while to look into that possibility. I think the whole success or failure of this Bill will depend upon the advisory committee itself, the extent to which it exercises the functions which are expected of it under the Bill and on the personnel of the Committee. I hope, from what the Minister has said, that the committee will be fully adequate to perform the functions which are expected of it.

1.48 p.m.

I quite agree with the Minister and the right hon. Member for South Kensington (Mr. Law) that this Bill is absolutely right and necessary. The sweeping powers, which are unprecedented, seem to me to be unavoidable. It is a necessary Bill and this flexibility and these wide powers are needed to deal with the situation. But, because it is new and strange, it does not follow that Parliament must let this Bill go through without scrutinising it with the utmost care.

For 100 years, we have been content with the chemistry of atoms, and thought that atoms were fixed and never changed at all. At the end of the last century it was noticed that they do change and come to pieces, and, a little later, we learned to encourage them to come to pieces. Now we have got to the stage in which they come to pieces of their own accord as well as with encouragement, and, so far, we are not able to stop this process going on. It is this inherent instability of the atom, and its energy, which is so useful if directed in the right way and so terribly mischievous if directed in the wrong way, which makes the problem extremely difficult.

I want to refer to Clauses 3, 5 and 6, which deal with the control of the sale and supply of these substances, safety regulations and the establishment of the Advisory Committee. Clause 3 states that no person shall sell or otherwise supply these substances unless he is a qualified medical practitioner, a registered pharmacist or an authorised seller of poisons. It seems to me that this phrase has been lifted bodily out of some previous legislation, and that it does not fit this particular Bill very well. We are familiar with the process of a doctor writing his order and someone taking it to the dispenser, who makes it up, and it is then taken away, but that sort of method does not fit into this Bill at all. The dispenser has bottles and labels, and his task is one of weighing and measuring things correctly, and that is all right. But the material with which we are here dealing cannot be put into bottles unless the bottles are made of lead and are several inches thick. It is no good affixing labels relating to the quantity, because the quantity does not remain constant from one day to the next; and as for weighing, measuring and parcelling it out, those are tasks which require highly specialised apparatus and extremely careful training before anybody can do this job at all.

It is as well to try to get a mental picture of the stuff about which we are talking. The picture which seems to me to be the truest is if we think of an ammunition dump on fire, which goes on burning. The bigger the dump the faster it burns, and as it gets smaller so its rate of destruction declines. This is the sort of picture one should form of the life history of radioactive material. The technical or the convenient phrase which is used is the "half life" of the material. That means that if one has a certain quantity of radioactive material, after a certain period of time has passed one finds there is only half as much of it. The rest of it has flown off into space as particles or as radiation. This half life is the indication of the speed of change to which the material is subject. Some of the materials have a half life of thousands of years, so that the change is almost imperceptible, but several of those with which we are dealing nowadays happen to have quite a short half life. I will mention three of them. There is iodine 131 which has a period of eight days, and is extremely useful for thyroid troubles. Then there is phosphorous 32 with a half life of 14.3 days, and sodium 21 with a half life of 14.8 hours. In this medical work, it is very important to get the size of the dose absolutely correct. The concentration has to be such that it does its job but it has not to be so intense that it does harm.

In the case of cancer, what is required is that the malignant cells should be destroyed without destroying or harming the tissues. The work can only be done if extreme precautions are taken to administer the precise amount. When one thinks of the old process by which a dispenser makes up a prescription, one sees that it does not fit this case at all, because iodine 131, for instance, loses half its strength in eight days. There is little use in labelling a bottle with the strength or the quantity of its contents, because in a very short time they are quite different. The preparation must be made at Amersham, or wherever it is, and it must be kept under control day by day and hour by hour until it is actually used. The phrasing of the Bill does not seem to fit the actual process.

Again, the qualifications of a medical practitioner and a dispenser are all right for the work that they have done in the past, but their customary training does not fit them for this difficult and elaborate work. Another weakness in Clause 3 seems to me to be that when a person applies for a licence when the Act comes into force, there is a period of three months during which the licence is given automatically before the scrutiny takes place. That seems to me to be rather a dangerous loophole. The provision I have in mind appears at the top of page 4 of the Bill.

Coming now to safety, the old Factory Acts have been mentioned, and they contain a long list of regulations which must be complied with, and which also provide for inspection to see that compliance is complete, and penalties for disobedience. In the field of radioactive substances we are up against very special difficulties. Every day we all escape danger by using our ordinary senses. Our ordinary senses serve well enough in relation to factory machinery and for enabling us to avoid collisions and so forth. Some substances which are dangerous are detected by smell; one can feel heat, and so on. But the dangers in connection with radioactive substances are absolutely imperceptible. Sight, hearing, smell, taste and touch just do not give any warning. Therefore, something else must be done. It is because of this extreme difficulty that the safety regulations will be much more difficult to apply.

Another difficulty which has also been mentioned—the disposal of waste—is very serious indeed. Radioactive substances are much worse than disease germs, because they cannot be sterilised. Bacteria can be killed off by suitable processes and one can be sure that they have been destroyed, whereas the disintegration of atomic material goes on. If the stuff passes into drains or rivers the process continues, and in the course of time in some cases the danger may even accumulate. There has been experience of equipment in laboratories becoming radioactive to such an extent that the place has had to be abandoned and the work carried on somewhere else. This contamination of the place where the work is done is a serious part of the problem. The way to deal with it seems to me to be to have a very full understanding of the problem by all concerned, from the specialists of the highest technical training down to the sweepers, cleaners and the various operatives. They must all have an appropriate amount of knowledge for their tasks, and their knowledge and good will must be enlisted into a team.

Some of us had the privilege of going to Harwell a fortnight ago where we saw the safety department and were given an idea of the precautions which are taken at every stage. They seemed to be excellent. At some other establishments, however, these precautions have not been so thorough in the past. Even the simple precaution of having an ample supply of hot water and washing places, which is a very elementary safety precaution, has been neglected in some cases. A mishap can occur through imperfect team work between the management and the operatives. "Joint consultation" is a fashionable phrase used in many spheres nowadays, but joint consultation in the matter of safety in radioactive establishments is a first essential.

Coming now to the Advisory Committee, the tendency has been to choose the appropriate societies, and the list has got longer and longer in the course of time. I was very glad to hear today that the T.U.C. has appeared on the list. The T.U.C. has a scientific advisory council which has been in existence for some years, and that seems to me to be an appropriate body among the others to make its contribution to this work. My fear is that this great Advisory Committee, may be overloaded with eminent people. The eminent ones are generally those with great responsibilities, many activities and not a great deal of time to give to each one of their responsibilities. Generally a small group of people put in a lot of time and do a great deal of work—usually the younger and less famous people—and then the eminent ones come along and criticise, approve or amend proposals which the more junior people have introduced. It is my opinion that steps should be taken to draw into the Advisory Committee a few at least of those whose whole time is spent on the job. It is the people who are doing the work day by day who are most at home with the dangers and difficulties.

In this connection, I would like to mention that a branch of the Association of Scientific Workers last year became anxious about the health dangers and the radiation hazards involved. They got the Association to take the matter up with the best knowledge which was available and they have produced the first pamphlet in simple terms—" The protection of workers from radiation hazards." It will be ready for sale in a few days. That is an example of the excellent work which has been done by people who are not always the most famous, but are those who have the time, the energy, the ability and the special opportunity for doing this work. The foreword is written by Sir Ernest Rock Carling, who is Chairman of the Radiation Committee of the Medical Research Council.

That is the conclusion which I reach—that for safety work to progress it is necessary to obtain the good will and the thorough understanding of the middle and the junior branches of the organisation.

It rests with me now only to conclude my remarks, as I had already come practically to the end of what I had to say. I agree with this Bill, although it has sweeping powers, because it is necessary. It is clear that innovations are introduced, but with the good will which, I am sure, the Measure will receive from the highly technical people who will come into its operation, there is no reason why it should not prove highly beneficial. I think that before it leaves this House something should be done to make more precise the intention of drawing into its operation, especially within the safety provisions, the middle and lower ranks of those concerned, and to make sure that on the Advisory Committee are people who are doing the actual day to day work.

2.13 p.m.

I rise to make only one short point. As the Minister said when moving the Second Reading, this Bill is an example of the scientific times in which we are living, and I agree with him that it is, perhaps, unfortunate that it should be taken in the House on a Friday when there is not a great deal of activity, radio or otherwise, in the House; but, perhaps, more energy will be released on the Committee stage. As the Minister said, there are unusual powers in this Bill, and so I was very glad to hear him say that unusual arrangements are being made. I should like to refer for one moment to the industrial scientists. If I had not heard the Minister, I should have said that in this Bill we have to protect them not only from harm, but from red tape also. I was very glad to hear that the Minister appreciates that. As he said, physicists, metallurgists and engineers all use radioactive substances. They must be allowed some discretion to ensure that the use and development of industrial equipment and measuring apparatus are not retarded either by too many rules and regulations or by lack of substances and equipment.

This point was raised by Lord Cherwell on the Second Reading of the Bill in another place, when he said that one cannot stop somebody in a laboratory committing suicide, because one cannot stop a person taking poison, or ensure that he is kept away from high tension terminals. However, I think it should be relatively easy to protect the ordinary workers and the general public from harm from these substances. I myself have seen the most dangerous of this type of work going on at Chalk River in Canada, and at Berkeley University in California, where on all the machines and equipment there are regulations saying how long work can be safely continued on a machine without harm to the person from radioactivity. One must remember that those on the higher levels of the industrial scientists are sensible and high-minded people, and, as the Minister said, they are competent; and, therefore, great consideration ought to be given to them. I was particularly glad to know from what the Minister said that he appreciates that point.

2.16 p.m.

The important thing, as I see it, about radiations and radioactive substances is, not only that they can have very deleterious effects, but that those effects as the Minister has pointed out, may be a very long time in showing themselves. This was impressed on my notice only yesterday. Some 40 years ago I was casualty officer in a teaching hospital. In those days, X-rays were only coming into use and were a new toy. We did not know their dangers, but were very interested in them. Working with me was another doctor, a technician, and a nurse. I lost one of my thumb nails, and still have something to show for that loss. The doctor who worked with me died of X-ray cancer. The technician died also from this disease. But I learned only yesterday that the nurse, too, who worked with us in those early days was now suffering from X-ray cancer as well. That, as I see it, is the important thing to remember —that the effects of exposure may become apparent only many years afterwards; and for many years we may not know that any deleterious result exists at all.

I welcome the Bill, therefore; and in particular, Clause 5, by which regulations may be made: want to say a word or two. Doctors, as is well known, like rooks and rabbits, tend to collect together, and in most cities there is a medical quarter. I lived in the medical quarter of London for many years. I know that there were doctors of many kinds on each side of me, but I did not know if they were using these dangerous apparatuses or not, and I was anxious for the health of my children, because I knew that cancer could develop, as the result of irritation in childhood, even in old age. Therefore an important point about this Bill is that "other persons" are included in its scope, and that in framing the regulations the Minister will have to consider, not only those who are actually working in radiations or radioactive substances, but all the people who live and work near or have any connection with them. In this connection I should like to ask the Minister, What about X-rays that are used, for instance, in boot shops? Is he quite convinced that they are of any value? Is he convinced, also, that those who use them daily are sufficiently protected? If not, I should like to ask him if this Bill gives protection to such people?

There is only one other point with which I should like to deal. I read in Clause 3 that very rightly only those individuals who are doctors or dentists will be able to make use for therapeutic purposes of radioactive substances and only if they are licensed under this Section. I would like the Minister to tell the House a little more about this licensing. As already stressed doctors and dentists may go on with their work, and I think quite rightly, while the matter is being considered for the first three months after passage of the Bill. Who will determine this licensing and will it be the Advisory Committee the composition of which the Minister has already given us? I think the composition is a good one, but I am a little afraid that the doctors on that Committee may be to too large an extent specialists.

I am a little afraid of specialists, perhaps in particular those radio-therapeutic specialists, as mentioned by hon. Members opposite. There are individuals who have given their lives to the study of the treatment of cancer by radiations. I am afraid that these people will be inclined to think only in terms of radiation and will have quite unconsciously a vested interest in that subject. I would stress what has already been mentioned by the right hon. Member for South Kensington (Mr. Law) that there are other branches of the profession that use radioactive substances and radiations. There are the dermatologists. I would ask the Minister if in selecting members for this Advisory Committee he would include not only radio-therapeutists but ordinary physicians and surgeons with a general knowledge of medicine and perhaps a few dermatologists as well. I am quite sure that the Bill is a very valuable one and is very much needed at the present time.

2.23 p.m.

I cannot bring to this discussion either the expert knowledge of the hon. Member for Barking (Mr. Hastings) or that of the hon. and gallant Member for Chelsea (Commander Noble), but, looking at this problem from the point of view of a layman, there are two problems to which I would like to call the attention of the House. In a democracy the purpose of public opinion is to get itself expressed in action for the good of the community, and I believe sincerely that the purpose of the Bill is that and that alone. As the Minister has said, there must be a great deal of flexibility, because the human race is now dealing with an entirely new thing in society, about which much has yet to be learned. Under the Bill we are giving power to manufacture radioactive substances and setting up certain restrictions on their use. The previous Bill that was drafted for this purpose, seemed to hamper scientific research. I take it that this Bill will not hamper scientific research, and I would, therefore, like to ask the Minister two things.

In Clause 5 ( b ) we find the words: radioactive effluent in the River Thames held up research and the progress of the work. Now I am given to understand that there is adequate protection for the public. This is highly necessary because about 90 per cent. of the drinking water of London comes from the River Thames. I want the Minister to assure those of us who are laymen in these matters that it is not possible for a mistake to be made and for radioactive effluent to get into the rivers without it being known. Is it possible to make a mistake, just as a signalman can make when an express is going through by directing the train on to the wrong line? Have we any kind of guarantee that no radioactive effluent will get into the rivers and into the drinking water?

With regard to Clause 6, scientists have not a monopoly of thought. The only thing that the scientist has is monopoly of method, and it is essential that we should have laymen on this Advisory Committee who can bring the thoughts of the laymen to bear on these problems. I hope, therefore, that the Advisory Committee will be kept as flexible as possible, so that, as we go along and learn new things about the use of these materials, further appointments can be made and ultimately the Minister of Agriculture and others may be represented on the committee. I emphasise the paramount importance of some public safeguard against the possibilities of any radioactive effluent getting into the drinking water of the British people.

2.27 p.m.

We were discussing matters arising out of radioactive substances in another form just before the Whitsun Recess, and on this occasion we may congratulate the Government on trying to make radioactive substances of great advantage to the community. There are two or three matters which I want to raise in connection with what the hon. Member for Leek (Mr. Harold Davies) has said. I understand from the Bill and the explanations which have been given to us that the principal field of experimentation is now to be at the new Amersham station. I cannot understand why in any type of investigation which contains so much risk, a place like Amersham should have been chosen. It is an area where the Chiltern Hills give to us beautiful streams. Why should we take the risk of having an experimental station in that area when there are so many other parts of the country where a station of this sort could be provided. I cannot understand, and I have not heard an explanation from the Minister, why there is to be so much public expenditure in connection with that station.

I pass from that to another point, which I have put on previous occasions in criticism of similar Bills. I am extremely glad that it now seems to be accepted pro forma by both sides of the House that the T.U.C. ought to be represented on committees such as the proposed Advisory Committee. However, there is still an issue to be fought, and I am sorry that nothing has been done in this Bill to face up to it. When dealing with radioactive substances, which, as the Minister says, are now involved in the ordinary day to day trades of druggists and other shops, why should not the Cooperative movement be regarded as of the same importance as the T.U.C. in regard to representation on committees? I know that that suggestion will not receive the same sympathy from hon. Members opposite as they are now prepared to give to the claim made for T.U.C. representation. There was a time, of course, when they were as much opposed to T.U.C. representation as they are now opposed to representation for the Cooperative movement. When we consider that the Co-operative movement now has its own enormous network of druggists shops and other institutions, in which these radioactive substances are offered to the public for sale, and when we remember that the Co-operative movement has shops in which, as my hon. Friend the Member for Barking (Mr. Hastings) said, there are X-ray facilities for trying on boots and shoes, there is every reason why their point of view should be expressed, and capably expressed, by representatives of the movement.

I put this claim seriously to the Government. I am quite sure that no Bill involving representation on advisory committees ought to come before this House unless this problem has been dealt with in some form. On behalf of the Co-operative movement I say, with reference not only to this Bill but all similar Bills, that the time has now come when a Socialist Government should decide the best type of representation on advisory or other committees, when the needs of consumers as well as of producers are to be considered. I seriously put forward the claim that such representation should always be considered and allowed for in the Measures that are introduced. I do not know whether it is too late to consider this matter, but I should be very glad if during Committee, the Minister would examine it again and make provision by which my claim could be met.

2.34 p.m.

I think it should be acknowledged, in fairness to the former Minister of Supply, that the undertaking which he gave during the Committee stage of the Atomic Energy Act with regard to the disposal of radioactive substances has been observed by the Government. As far as I am aware, there have been no complaints from universities, hospitals, or any quarter, that proper steps are not being taken by the Government to ensure that radioactive substances are allocated in accordance with need. I was very glad to hear the Minister express concern when asking for wide and sweeping new powers, and I very much hope that on any future occasion when Measures of this kind are introduced, the Minister concerned will take as much care as the Minister of Health has taken today to see that the sovereignty of Parliament is maintained, together with respect for the freedom of the individual.

The Minister, under this Bill, has to set up an Advisory Committee. I am sure he knows that on the occasion of the passing of the Atomic Energy Act—which gave far wider powers, and was, in relation to this question, immeasurably more important—we asked for an advisory committee to be appointed; we asked all day; we asked with the approval of the scientific organisations concerned—the Atomic Scientists' Association and others—but we asked in vain. I can only hope that the very cogent reasons which have been given by the Minister of Health today will be reconsidered by the Ministry of Supply, and that in due course they will take administrative action, as they can, in order to appoint an advisory committee in relation to the exercise of the Minister's functions under the Atomic Energy Act.

Again, in relation to protection against the misuse of radioactive substances, there is a very creditable record. In the whole course of the experience at Harwell there has not been one case of people being taken ill as a result of dealing with radioactive substances. As there has been a good deal of criticism in the newspapers, which have been full of allegations that people have been injured by radioactive substances, it is only fair to state that there is no truth whatever in that. Not one serious case—I believe not one case at all—has occurred at Harwell of people being injured by radioactive substances. In fact, the precautions taken at Harwell have been so great that many people consider that they have been too great. I am sure my hon. Friend the Member for West Ealing (Mr. J. Hudson) will be glad about that.

In passing, I would mention only one small point on the question of protection. I do not believe there is any danger of radioactive substances getting into our rivers or reservoirs by accident. I believe there may be a danger at some time of radioactive materials being quite deliberately distributed by some malevolent enemies of this country, whether they be terrorists or others. I personally think, therefore, that complementary to this Measure precautions ought to be taken by the Minister of Health to ensure that we know at all times that our reservoirs are not subjected to attacks of this kind. It involves a quite simple scientific matter to do that. At the moment it is not being done, and I hope the Minister of Health will consider that.

It is a very sad thing that the Minister of Health has had to introduce this Measure today. Radioactive substances were being produced on a colossal scale in the United States of America in 1943, and I must say that I am by no means satisfied with our progress in the atomic energy programme. These radioactive substances ought to have been available on a far larger scale long before now, and this Bill ought to have been introduced long ago. In saying that, I do not allocate any blame. It is most unfortunate that America has not co-operated with us by letting us have large quantities of their radioactive substances before, as they ought to have done having regard to the enormous help we gave to them in their atomic energy programme.

I would emphasise the fact—I do not know whether the Minister knows it—that there are in New York no fewer than six corporations who are now responsible for distributing radioactive substances throughout medicine and industry; the most colossal effort is taking place in the United States. We have no reason whatever for satisfaction about this. We ought to recognise that in this development we are four or five years behind America, and likely to continue so at our present rate of progress with atomic energy. I hope that so far as co-operation with other countries and exportation are concerned—criticising, as I do, the United States—that we will set a good example ourselves. It is impossible for countries like Australia and New Zealand to have large quantities of radioactive isotopes. I hope we will let the Dominions have quantities of radioactive isotopes if they want them; they do not, being in comparatively small quantities, contain any warlike potentialities at all. Only in very large quantities would that happen. Therefore, I hope we will set an example, in cooperation with the Dominions, and, if necessary with other countries, as soon as our atomic pile is operating, as I very much hope it will be.

2.40 p.m.

I think I can say at the outset that I have every reason to appreciate the way in which the Bill has been received. Some of the questions which have been asked are, of course, more appropriate to the Committee stage, but perhaps I shall shorten that stage by giving one or two explanations now. I hope that we shall not be long in the Committee stage because the Bill has become urgently necessary.

I would mention first of all the Advisory Committee. It has been suggested—I believe by my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Dulwich (Major Vernon)—that we should try to get on to the Advisory Committee persons rather lower down than the "prima donnas" at the top; but it is one of the unfortunate facts of society that the "prima donnas" are more accessible than those on the lower tier. I am hoping that the members of the eminent bodies mentioned this morning will take note of what has been said and that, in putting forward names for the Advisory Committee, they will think rather more than they sometimes are inclined to do of the diligent workers in more obscure places.

I must resist the claim for the representation of the Co-operative Society. If we include that society it will be difficult to resist the claims of analagous bodies, in which case I would no longer have an Advisory Committee but a vast conference. All the claims that can be legitimately put forward by the Co-operative Society would be covered by the T.U.C. In so far as the Co-operative Society are druggists, we shall be principally concerned with the workers engaged in their establishments and they will be covered by the T.U.C. In so far as they are distributors, they are not involved any more than is the Pharmaceutical Society. If I called in that body and the Co-operative Society, because the latter are distributors, I would then have to call in the Chambers of Commerce; before long I would not have an expert advisory body at all but an eclectic body discussing everything except the special problem of radioactive substances. I must, therefore, in this case, resist the claims of the Co-operative Society.

It has been suggested also that we should make it possible to bring into the Advisory Committee other people like dermatologists. There is nothing in the Bill which prevents that being done. I have merely read out a list of the corporations and institutions and chartered bodies whom I intend to invite to send representatives; but I can, of course, extend the list. I am hoping that when the Royal Societies and Colleges have put forward their representatives they will bear these facts in mind, because it is on the advice of the Advisory Committee that we shall be granting licences. It will be noted from the terms of the Bill that I have taken power to license not only individuals but groups and categories; therefore, it would be within the terms of the Bill to license specially qualified dermatologists able to use the apparatus. In the same way, other persons like radiologists and radiotherapeutists and categories of that sort would be named normally by category and not personally. The naming of persons is a distinction which we are anxious to avoid in these conditions.

I was asked by the right hon. Member for South Kensington (Mr. Law) about the disposal of radioactive substances from the Amersham plant. He suggested that the agricultural industry was involved. I have been advised by the Par- liamentary Secretary of the Ministry of Supply that the point has been already covered; there is an advisory committee advising the Ministry of Supply on the distribution of radioactive substances and the Agricultural Research Council is on that body. It has been suggested—I believe by the hon. and gallant Member for Dulwich (Major Vernon)—that I was using common form language where it is said that radioactive substances as defined by regulation, can only be prescribed by duly qualified doctors and dentists. "Duly qualified" means specially duly qualified; it does not mean the ordinary specialist; it means those persons designated by the Advisory Committee. They are the qualified persons because, obviously, we have reached the point where the normal curriculum of the ordinary doctor does not cover the normal necessity to use these substances and drugs. This has been recognised by all the learned bodies concerned. That is why the Bill requires special rather than ordinary qualifications.

I can give the hon. Member for Leek (Mr. Harold Davies) every assurance that there is no danger of any contamination of our water supplies. That question is being properly looked after and I am advised by technical experts that there is no danger at all. We have tried in this Measure to draw a line of demarcation in what is necessary to protect the welfare of the public and to continue to enlarge the research possibilities of scientists. That is not a question of definition. It is purely empirical and varies from place to place and from time to time. That is why we have got such an instrument.

I have always been loath to ask Parliament to grant to Ministers powers which are not capable of being microscopically scrutinised. I was diffident, therefore, in asking for the powers contained in this Bill. I think I have convinced hon. Members that we have furnished the House with sufficient protection against the possibilities of abuse, and I hope that the House will now support the Second Reading.

Question put, and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read a Second time.

Bill committed to a Committee of the Whole House for Monday next.—[ Mr. J. Henderson. ]

I beg to move, in page 2, line 10, after first "benefit," to insert: if he is also receiving damages awarded by a court. From that point of view, a former member of the Forces receiving a pension stands in a very much worse position than the person who is receiving Industrial Injury benefit, who can at the most have only one-half of that benefit taken into account in the assessment of his damages.

I appreciate that it would not be in Order to discuss the Royal Warrant, but the position as it stands is somewhat unsatisfactory, in that the recipient of a Service pension may be in a worse position than the recipient of Industrial Injury benefit. I am sure that Members on both sides would regard even the possibility of that occurring as a matter calling for inquiry by this House. It may be that the Attorney-General will be able to give us an assurance to allay the disquiet which exists in this matter. It is in that sense that this Amendment is submitted to the House. I fully appreciate that if this Amendment were inserted in the Bill it would make the position of the Service man worse. It is clearly not our intention to do that. It is our intention to see whether this aspect of the matter which has not explicitly been dealt with so far in the Bill, has been considered, and it is our hope that we shall be able to get a satisfactory statement of the Government's intentions.

I beg to second the Amendment.

It would seem that this legislation is having an effect which no one desires. I cannot believe that Members on either side of the House would desire that recipients of Service pensions should be penalised. Therefore, this seems a straightforward matter. Some method should be found whereby this anomaly can be made good and the present disadvantage in the case of the Service man removed.

I should like to say a word in support of this Amendment. It would be wholly wrong if a man whose injuries had been sustained in the military service of his country should be in a worse position than the man who has sustained injury in industry. I think that the practice of the Ministry of Pensions in this matter since the first war has been wholly reprehensible. I understand that under the Royal Warrant the Ministry of Pensions have a discretion as to what they will do in regard to a pension in circumstances of this kind, and that they are not compelled to reduce or to forfeit the pension because a claim for damages has arisen in quite different circumstances.

I should have thought that the Minister of Pensions would have welcomed this opportunity for putting the matter right. Under the old law, it was always incumbent for a court in a fatal accident case to take into account any insurance, widow's pension or anything of that kind if a man was killed in a factory by reason of his employer's negligence. The damages were subject to no deduction in respect of any pension.

But if a pension was being paid under the Royal Warrant the Minister of Pensions stepped in; he diminished the damages by the extent of the pension, so that the damages became in fact damages awarded to the Ministry of Pensions and not to the insured party. I hope that the Attorney-General will be able to say now that people are not to be penalised in such a cheeseparing and catchpenny fashion, which is wholly unjustifiable and cannot be supported by any principle of equity which any of us can understand. I hope, therefore, that we are going to see the end of it.

This Amendment raises a matter which is not easy and is not unimportant. Hon. Members have pointed out that under the Royal Warrant the Minister is entitled to take into account any damages or compensation which may be awarded to a person who is entitled to a pension or gratuity under it, and that under the terms of the Warrant he may either withhold or reduced the amount accordingly. The matter is one which is left by the Royal Warrant to the discretion of the Minister of Pensions, but his constitutional duty in such a matter is to consult with the Treasury and with other Ministries, particularly with the Ministry of National Insurance, which may be concerned with analogous cases. Hitherto, the practice has been not entirely to withhold or cancel the gratuity or pension, but to reduce it. Broadly, the practice has been that the pension has been reduced by the annuity value of 75 per cent.—in the case of death claims, 90 per cent.—of the lump sum that may have been awarded by way of compensation or damages in the civil courts.

3.0 p.m.

In other words, the war pensioner retained, so far as his pension rights were concerned, 25 per cent. of the value of the additional sum which he secured by way of damages in the civil courts and his widow only 10 per cent. The practice to be pursued in the future, which will come into operation with the passing of the present Bill, will obviously require very careful consideration, and it presents in some respects a rather troublesome and difficult problem. It is perfectly true, as hon. Members have pointed out, that if the existing practice were continued there would be an anomaly between the position of the war pensioner who sustained a civilian injury and the industrial pensioner who sustained a like kind of injury because the industrial pensioner would be in a better position than the war pensioner.

If, on the other hand, the position of the war pensioner were assimilated, as this Amendment seeks to do, to the position of the ordinary industrial pensioner so far as the civilian accidents were concerned, the result would be to create an anomaly in the field of war pensions. The position would then arise of a war pensioner who suffered his injury in an accident in which damages can be claimed from a third party in the civil courts being better off than the war pensioner who had suffered the same injury in the same kind of accident in the course of military operations in the service of this country. It was to avoid that kind of anomaly in the position of the war pensioners that the present practice of abating war pensions was established.

Hon. Members will appreciate that this is not an easy problem to solve, but we agree that the passing of this Bill clearly necessitates a review and reconsideration of the whole question. Indeed, apart from the passing of this Bill and the particular provisions contained in it in regard to the effect of damages on payments and benefits under the National Insurance Act, the coming into operation of the National Insurance scheme generally will require certain changes in the administration of the war pension scheme. I can assure the House that the whole matter will be taken under review and will be given careful consideration. The Minister will consult the Central Advisory Committee and he will endeavour to promote proposals which will have due and reasonable regard to the anomalies to which this Amendment has drawn attention.

This is a matter which almost certainly can be dealt with by way of administrative action. It requires no legislation. In those circumstances, I am obliged to hon. Members who have raised the matter and canvassed it here, but I hope that they will think it right not to press it but to accept my assurance that the matter will receive careful consideration at the hands of the Government.

I do not regard—and I am sorry to have to say this after what happened last night—the answer given by the Attorney-General as anything but extremely unsatisfactory. It must have been obvious to any one for a considerable time, and particularly from the date of the Second Reading of this Bill, that this problem would arise and that consideration would have to be given to ex-Service men's pensions. Yet the right hon. and learned Gentleman can only tell us today that further careful consideration will be given to it. He says that it can be dealt with by administrative action. Will this House after today have an opportunity of expressing any view on the administrative action? Will there be a White Paper which we can debate, because this Amendment raises a very important question of principle?

The right hon. and learned Gentleman has very largely confirmed our impression that under the Bill there will be a discrepancy of treatment between those who are entitled to industrial benefit and those who are entitled to Service pensions. We ought to have some indication from the Government of the principle which they intend to apply in eliminating the anomalies, not between Service pensioners but between the industrially injured and the Service man, arising from the consequences of this Measure.

Obviously there are two possible courses. One would be to say that the Service pensioner should be treated in precisely the same way as an industrially injured person, where a claim for damages is brought by him. In the lengthy Debates we had on the National Insurance (Industrial Injuries) Bill we were con- stantly inquiring from this side of the House to make certain that the whole system was kept in line and that no anomalies were created which would be in any way to the disadvantage to the ex-Service man. If we bring the ex-Service man into line with the industrially injured, we shall, of course, be depriving the Minister of Pensions of the discretion which he now has. At the present time he has a very vast discretion under the Royal Warrant to deprive a widow of all but 10 per cent. of her pension.

In fatal accident cases.

Yes, to deprive her of as much as go per cent. and in other cases of 75 per cent. That discretion is intolerable when we contrast it with the industrially injured person, who will not be deprived of any part of the industrial injury benefit because he has obtained damages. Why should there be that disparity? There should be a further statement from the Government, who must have given consideration to this problem. Why should there not be at least the same treatment to the industrially injured and to the Service man? I must say that at first sight it would strike me as much better to work on the principle that the Service man and the Service pension should not be affected in any way by the amount of the damages recovered.

The right hon. and learned Gentleman pointed out that in some cases that would mean that a man who sustained the same injury in war would not get as much as the man who was able to bring an action for damages arising out of that injury. The same argument applies to those who sustain industrial injury. In some cases they can bring claims for damages and succeed, and in some cases they cannot. We are entitled to ask, before we pass from this important Measure, for something more than the statement that the matter will receive further consideration.

I am glad to see the Minister of Pensions here. I do not join with the reflections passed upon Ministers of Pensions by the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman). I think that since the Ministry was created they have all sought to do the best they could for the ex-Service man. I hope that the presence of the right hon. Gentleman here today will strengthen the determination which I feel sure he has to ensure that the ex-Service man does not get treated worse than the industrially injured person, and to strengthen what I hope is also his determination that the discretion which he now has, shall be surrendered by him in the future.

Before the hon. and learned Member sits down I would ask him, in regard to his testimonial to all former Ministers of Pensions, whether the practice of taking 90 per cent. of the damages awarded in fatal accident cases to the widow of a man entitled to pension was not maintained by every Conservative Minister of Pensions for 30 years?

I am not quite sure offhand how long the Ministry of Pensions has existed. I have not worked it out. I have no doubt that the practice has existed from the date the Ministry was first set up, including the periods of Socialist Government in those 30 years. I have not sought in dealing with this matter to make any party political point out of it. I rather regret the efforts of the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman) to bring party politics into this question. This is something which has a wider aspect. I was pressing for a further statement from the Government as to the principles which will be applied. I do not think that we can leave it merely with the statement that this could be dealt with by administrative action without some indication of the principles which will be applied to bring the industrially injured into line with the ex-Service men.

I am in considerable sympathy with the views expressed hitherto by hon. Members. Perhaps the Attorney-General did not go far enough. I hope that it will be possible for the Minister of Pensions to say something before we part with this Amendment. He is the Minister mainly implicated. This is not entirely a legal matter. It is a matter concerning the Minister of Pensions who alone can deal with the Royal Warrant which, I think it is right to say, we cannot discuss in this House. The hon. Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman) has referred to previous Ministers of Pensions, and I think that the hon. and learned Member for Daven- try (Mr. Manningham-Buller) will know that at least one Minister was somewhat sluggish, to put it no higher or lower than that. In the last Parliament both he and I, and many other hon. Members, played a considerable part in reminding that Minister of his duties to ex-Service men. We got certain concessions, but only after strenuous efforts to remind the Minister of his duty.

Since my right hon. Friend and his predecessor have been in office in this Government we have made considerable strides. I took an active part in these matters during the war years and today I, for one, am largely satisfied with what has been achieved. The Attorney-General continually referred to war pensions. I think that the correct expression is Service pensions, because a Service man, a member of the Regular Army, does not come under the Minister of Pensions for award of disability pension. A member of the Regular Army is dealt with through the Royal Hospital, the Chelsea Commissioners. That in itself is an anomaly which the Minister of Pensions ought to put right. We should not have these matters dealt with in relation to war pensions by the Minister of Pensions and in relation to Service pensions arising from Regular Service in the Forces by some other body. They ought to be co-ordinated. If my right hon. Friend replies, I hope that he will tell us that he intends to deal with that anomaly.

I do not think that we can pursue the matter too far on this Amendment. Obviously, it has only been put down in order to ascertain from the Government what their line of action is to be in future. I feel certain that the Minister of Pensions, who himself has played a most active part in previous Parliaments in this and cognate matters, ought to say something about what he proposes to do when this Bill becomes an Act of Parliament.

3.15 p.m.

I saw some signs from the Mover of this Amendment of the truth of what my right hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw (Mr. Bellenger) said, that this Amendment had only been moved to get an indication. If the Mover of the Amendment assents to that, I am a little surprised at the speech of the hon. and learned Member for Daventry (Mr. Manningham-Buller) because the Attorney-General had apparently given the Mover of this Amendment exactly what he asked for. However, perhaps there is some difference between the two hon. Members. For my part I am glad to see this Amendment moved; I am happy to see among hon. Members opposite a new-found sympathy for pensioners—

Really!

—perhaps that is the sweets of Opposition.

Will the hon. and learned Member give way? He was not a Member of the last House of Commons, so perhaps he is ignorant of the part played by these benches in securing a revision of the Royal Warrant, an alteration in the burden of proof, and many other important changes. If he was aware of the true facts, I am sure he would withdraw that last observation.

For more than 30 years the hon. and learned Member's party has held the reins of power and for 30 years Members of my party have been pressing for a revision of these pensions, and particularly for the operation of the Ministry of Pensions. They did not get satisfaction until the Labour Party was returned, and therefore I congratulate the party opposite upon their new-found sympathy for these pensioners, which they did not evince when they had the power to make it effective. However, whilst I can congratulate them upon their change of heart, I cannot congratulate them upon their Parliamentary ability in drafting Amendments, because a more futile Amendment I could not well imagine. Let us see what it does, but first let us look at the Clause. Clause 2 provides:

"In an action for damages for personal injuries…there shall in assessing those damages be taken into account, against any loss of earnings or profits which have accrued or probably will accrue to the injured person from the injuries,"

—that is, the injuries referring back to the subject matter of the action—

"one half of the value of any rights which have accrued or probably will accrue to him therefrom.…"

So this Amendment says that if a person gets a pension by reason of an injury and brings an action in respect of that injury, then one half of the value of the pension shall accrue to the employer. It is really a substitution for the old Section 28 of the Workmen's Compensation Act, which provided that in the case of industrial injuries an injured person would have to elect whether to proceed at common law for damages or take his pension or compensation under the Workmen's Compensation Act. The insertion of these words would be meaningless because nobody, in effect, gets a pension in respect of an injury for which he brings an action at common law. That is not the military pension which he is drawing. If the Amendment had any meaning at all, then the only meaning could be that half of the military pension was being given to the only meaning could be that half of the pension, it would leave the practice of the Ministry of Pensions entirely unaltered. A more unjust or idiotic proceeding I cannot well conceive. Therefore, I am somewhat surprised that the hon. and learned Member for Daventry should say that he was dissatisfied when the learned Attorney-General said that he would reconsider the problem which had been raised. What on earth else does the hon. and learned Gentleman want?

I will tell the hon. and learned Gentleman, and I hope I shall get some indication from the Front Bench in answer to what I want. I want some further statement in addition to the statement that further consideration will be given to the problem. I would like, if I could get it, an assurance from the Front Bench, that, at least, the position of the ex-Service man and that of his wife will be brought into line with that concerning any industrial injury. I express the hope that we may get that assurance before the end of this discussion, which, if it will help the hon. and learned Gentleman opposite, has been based upon an Amendment which has many objections to it. But, unless that Amendment had been put down, there would not have been an opportunity for this point to be raised.

That second statement is entirely incorrect, because this discussion would have been perfectly in order on the Question, "That the Clause stand part of the Bill."

The hon. and learned Gentleman has said that the discussion of this point would have been in order on the Question, "That the Clause stand part of the Bill." Does the hon. and learned Gentleman's Parliamentary experience extend to an appreciation of the fact that, on Report stage, there is no Question, "That the Clause stand part of the Bill?"

I am talking about the Committee stage. If hon. Members opposite had wished to raise this point, they could, at the proper occasion, have raised it on the Question. "That the Clause stand part of the Bill," in Committee, which would have enabled the Government to have considered the matter before this stage and to have given them an answer. Again, I must ask the question which I have been putting. Since they neglected their opportunities then—perhaps their sympathy for the pensioner was not discovered until the interval between the Committee stage and this stage —what on earth can they now ask for, any more than that the Government will consider how to deal with the problem? They have brought forward their solution as to how they think it should be dealt with, and now I gather that they admit that it is a wholly inept solution. Since they can only make a suggestion which they regard as wholly inept, why do they complain when they get the answer from the Attorney-General that the Government will consider it? What on earth else do they ask for?

May I say a word upon this matter? I am not going into the argument whether this Amendment is properly drafted or not. This is a Bill dealing with civil injuries, and it was somewhat of a surprise to me when I saw that an Amendment was drafted bringing me into it. I say that because it must have taken some degree of ingenuity to bring me into a civil injuries Bill. The short and main point is that hon. Members on both sides, whether the Amendment be good or bad, are seeking by raising this Amendment to pose the question that the man who serves in His Majesty's Forces should be no worse treated than the man in civilian life.

That is the point at issue. The Attorney-General met the argument quite fairly by saying that this problem arises not only on this Bill but on the introduction of national insurance as well. Therefore, we shall look at the matter. Normally, of course, hon. Members opposite and hon. Members on the Government benches have little in common, although I must confess, if I may be allowed to have my joke, that no Government has had an easier time in facing the Opposition than this Government has. However, in this case it is obvious that both sides are united on the main issues.

There is a National Advisory Committee of the Ministry of Pensions, and that committee is composed of every kind of person interested in pensions. Although there are no representatives of ex-Service men's organisations, people such as the hon. Member for Lonsdale (Sir I. Fraser) are permanent Members, and I see that another Member, my hon. Friend the Member for North Edinburgh (Mr. Willis) is present this afternoon. All the balance of that committee is on the side of the ex-Service man. Another reason why this Amendment is unacceptable is that the great bulk of our cases are settled out of court. If this Amendment were accepted, people would be obliged to take court actions when court actions were not necessary. We propose to consult the Advisory Committee freely, frankly and openly. That committee will be meeting a week on Wednesday, so that there will be no delay. The matter will be discussed and thoroughly considered. I might be asked how hon. Members will know what has been done. There will be an opportunity, because if any hon. Member asks me I will make a statement on the subject, and thereafter, there will be the usual opportunities to discuss my statement. I will also give the assurance that I will consult the Advisory Committee with a view to ensuring that the ex-Service man is no worse off than the civilian.

The sum involved is not very large. It is not one that need give us a great deal of worry, although there are one or two anomalies. I hope hon. Members will accept my assurance that I will meet the Advisory Committee and will listen to everything they say, and that just as I was guided by the Advisory Committee on the recent reform in giving a certain grant to ex-Service men of the 1914–18 war, I hope I will be guided by them in the same benevolent and tolerant manner on this question.

With the leave of the House, may I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his statement and say how much we welcome it? I would also like to express the hope that when he has made the statement which he said he would be prepared to make, if any hon. Member on either side of the House wishes to discuss the application of the solution which the right hon. Gentleman has found after meeting the Central Advisory Committee, he will do his best to enable this House to have an opportunity to discuss it.

Do I understand that the review will take into account the men who are in receipt of a Service Disability Pension—the emphasis always being on the "Service "?

Everybody for whom I am responsible will be included. With permission, may I give a brief word of explanation? It is as well to know for whom I am responsible. I am responsible for everybody injured since September, 1939. I am responsible for everybody injured in His Majesty's Forces now. No disabled Service person deals with Chelsea now. We deal with them all. There are, of course, the cases between 1920 and 1939. I understand there is practically nobody affected by this. But if there is anybody affected by it, the House can take it that the Service Departments will treat them in the way I have indicated.

As it is probable that discussion will not be allowed on another Amendment which deals with death as well as disability, will my right hon. Friend include that question as well as this?

I really thought I had made it clear. Widows will also be included.

3.30 p.m.

In moving this Amendment, which I believe—with one exception—has produced an extremely constructive and satisfactory Debate, I made it clear that it was not my intention to press for the inclusion of these words in the Bill. The constructive speeches on the merits of the case by the hon. Member for Bassetlaw (Mr. Bellenger) and the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman) show, I think, that with one exceptions, that point was appreciated.

I do not think I should be right to ask leave to withdraw while leaving com- pletely unchallenged some of the remarks made by the hon. and learned Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget) in his very blatant attempt to make a little party capital out of this Debate. First of all, may I say, in reply to the hon. and learned Member's statement that I and my hon. Friends left this matter to this stage and ought to have raised it in Standing Committee, neither my hon. and learned Friend nor I were Members of that Committee, nor, so far as I was concerned, could I have been a Member, as I was at that time a Member of another Standing Committee which was sitting not only every day but also all night.

The hon. and learned Members for Northampton said, perfectly reasonably, that this Amendment did not alter the practice of the Ministry of Pensions. The hon. and learned Member, who has already shown himself this afternoon a master of Parliamentary procedure, perhaps might even find it difficult to produce an Amendment which would pass the Table and which would effect an Amendment of Royal Warrant. I should be very interested to watch the hon. and learned Member's efforts in that respect. The substance of the Amendment, as he knows perfectly well, was to secure that the Service man was not in a worse position than the industrial pensioner. The hon. and learned Member knows that perfectly well, and, if I may say so, I somewhat resent his attempt to score the tricks of a third-rate lawyer in a Debate which was intended to produce, and in fact produced, a comparatively satisfactory result.

I did not attempt to intervene in this Debate until after the hon. Member for Kingston-upon-Thames (Mr. Boyd-Carpenter) had been given by the Attorney-General exactly what he had asked for. At that point, the hon. and learned Member for Daventry (Mr. Manningham-Buller) proceeded to intervene on a purely party line and I dealt with the hon. and learned Member.

The hon. and learned Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget) may be under the delusion that he dealt with my hon. and learned Friend, but I think he is in a minority of one on that. The hon. and learned Member really cannot get away with that. He is, perhaps, less of a judge of what the hon. Member for Kingston-upon- Thames asked for than is the hon. Member for Kingston-upon-Thames and what the hon. Member for Kingston-upon-Thames asked for was something considerably more than what the learned Attorney-General gave him and the fact that that was insufficient is, I think, corroborated by the very helpful speech that the Minister of Pensions subsequently delivered. I do not want to waste the time of the House on this, but I must make it perfectly clear to the hon. and learned Member for Northampton that the object of moving the Amendment was not achieved until the Minister of Pensions gave us that further assurance. It may be possible, even for the mentality of the hon. and learned Member, to perceive, if he reads the speeches of the Attorney-General and of the Minister of Pensions in HANSARD tomorrow, the very considerable difference between them.

However, I should like to thank the Minister of Pensions not only for the assurance he gave, but also for the interest he has shown in the matter by being here today for a discussion on a Bill which would not appear, prima facie, to be a Bill affecting his Department. I am grateful to him for both the assurance of reconsideration as promptly as Wednesday week which he has given, and also for the clear assurance he has given that this House will have an opportunity in due course of discussing the decision that he takes. He himself, I know, apprehends the feeling in all quarters of the House on this subject. There is a danger, as the law now stands, and, indeed, as the practice of his Department now stands, of the Service pensioner being in a worse position than the industrial one. I can assure him that the solution of this admittedly difficult problem will be received with keen, if sympathetic, alertness on both sides of the House. In the circumstances I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Bill read the Third time, and passed, with Amendments. [ King's Consent signified. ]

I wish to raise a not very controversial issue, but an issue that is of paramount importance to large numbers of people and to the parishes on the edge of my constituency of Leek, in the district which is quite famous throughout Britain and known as the Manifold Valley. Many years ago the people of this district subscribed to and helped to start functioning a light railway, and this light railway served the whole of the district until 1937. It was ultimately closed, the track was taken up, and a footpath was constructed through the valley; and a regulation was made whereby vehicular traffic was not allowed to use the road at all. Since 1937 all the rural district councils and the parish councils in the area have been agitating for the opening of this track for limited use by the people who have farms or crofts in the district. In this valley there are some 21 farmsteads, and the people find great difficulty now in farming their territory properly because of this limitation. Thus it is that I wish to raise this matter today with the Minister of Transport. I regret he is not present at the moment and I hope that he will make an appearance soon, because this is a matter of importance in our district.

I took the trouble to look up the Light Railways Act of 1896, and I have also an old prospectus relating to the Manifold Valley Light Railway. I am pleased to see that the Minister has arrived to hear my case. I would like to make it clear that even as far back as 1896, under the Light Railways Act, the then Board of Agriculture had power to make grants to any light railway construction in an agricultural area or in a fishing district if they thought that it would bring benefit to the community. Section 5 of the Light Railways Act states:

Altogether, at that period, the Treasury advanced some £17,500 towards the building of this railway. The purpose of the railway in those days was the carriage of coal, lime and manufactures, merchandise, provisions, agricultural implements and requirements, corn, grain and foodstuffs, timber and building supplies, and also to carry passengers. From 1904, when Lord Dartmouth opened the railway, until 1937 the agricultural community and the parishioners in the parishes around were able to use the railway. It must have been realised as long ago as 1898 that the railway was of value to the agricultural fraternity, otherwise there would not have been a free grant of £17,500. But the people of the district themselves provided £16,000 in share capital for the building of the railway; and not only did they provide that, but they further undertook to guarantee the interest payments on the county council loan, and, in consequence, they had to pay special rates for many years. So it is quite obvious—there is no argument about this at all—that the Manifold Light Railway was originally built because it aided the agricultural economics of the district.

In 1937, the railway was handed over to the county council, the track was taken up, and a footpath was constructed. I have asked questions on two occasions in the House about allowing a judicious, limited use of this path or roadway for veterinary surgeons and local doctors who serve the mountainous district and for the farmers. Up to now, I have had no satisfactory answer. Public interest is so great in the district that I took the trouble to convene a meeting on Saturday, 10th April, of farmers and others requiring the use of the Manifold Valley road for business purposes. The chairmen of the various parish councils roundabout were present including Waterhouses, Wetton, Warslow and Fawfieldhead and representatives of the National Farmers Union local branches. In addition, owing to the kindness of the county council clerk and other county council officials, there were also present the assistant deputy county surveyor and the divisional surveyor.

On that day three cars went down this track which was considered unsuitable for vehicular traffic. We were not breaking the law because special permission is always given for an inspection of the track by car. I then went a step further, and last Sunday took a fleet of 13 motor cars down the track: they were all inspecting the track. The members of the County Council Highways and Bridges Committee took the trouble to travel from all parts of the large county of Staffordshire to the Manifold Valley because of their keen interest and sense of public duty; they came to the track to see whether it would be suitable for the limited purposes required. There is not the slightest doubt but that if the track were opened for the limited use of farmers living in the valley, and for the local doctor and veterinary surgeons to use their cars, no additional expense would be put upon the county council at this juncture.

I would point out that the Manifold Valley is a rich food area, and the closing of such an area increases our problem of depopulation. I have analysed the population of these parishes in the district, and I should like to detain the House for a moment with one or two figures, because it is rather fascinating to notice what has happened. In the past 100 years the populations of these parishes have been decreasing. In 1831 the population of Quarnford was 783; in 1931 it had dropped to 296, because of the deterioration of agriculture and the growth of grouse shooting moors, and so on. In the same period the population of Hollinsclough had dropped from 564 to 194; the population of Heathylee from 689 to 358; the population of Fawfieldhead from 1,017 to 417, and the population of Warslow from 626 to 449. In other words, because of the neglect of the countryside and the drift from the land, some of the richest farming and milk-producing country in Staffordshire was gradually deteriorating.

Instead of this footpath helping the district, it limits it because of the enormous trouble farmers have at present in getting traffic by road. I know the Minister might say that a special application can be made to the county war agricultural committee in cases of emergency. But if a farmer is harvesting, and the day is sunny, and his machines break down, he has no time to get special permission from a place 30 miles away in order to get another machine down the road, or an engineer to prepare those which have broken down. The people who farm in and around that valley should have the right to use this track without any of the red tape of filling up forms.

The need for suitable means of transport is just as urgent today as it was before the construction of the light railway. Travelling by the alternative route —and the alternative route has to be seen to be believed—is ten times more dangerous than by the Manifold Valley track. Travelling over the steep and high hill is a complete waste of time, and causes hardship to those who reside and earn their living in the area. I believe that the local people who established this railway by their own labours, and by their own sacrifices, have a moral right to first consideration in the disposal of the residue of their own creation, and before this track was made a closed footpath the local organisations should have been consulted. This is one of the beauty spots of Britain and as far as ramblers are concerned there are hundreds of miles of footpaths in and around the valley. Most ramblers already use the paths outside the base of the valley.

The Minister may remember that during winter two years ago the members of a crew of an aeroplane lost their lives when dropping food to a village on the edge of my constituency which was in difficulties. One of the villages was cut off for several days. I am informed on good authority by local councillors and by people who have lived in the district all their lives that, had the Manifold Valley road been open, food could have been brought through to some of the districts cut off; there would not have been any need for an aircraft to drop food at the top of the Valley at Longnor.

I am handing my information to the Minister. It has been given to me in good faith by local councillors. As recently as last Sunday a statement was reiterated by responsible representatives of the National Farmers Union and other organisations at the edge of my constituency. The road is in excellent condition and, under the limited use which I desire, it will last for many years. There is no question of any great outlay of money. The people who came down the road with me—those to whom I had the opportunity of putting the question—agreed that a limited use of the road is justifiable and would help the district. I believe that the Highways and Bridges Committee of the County of Stafford are meeting either this week or next. I hope the Minister of Transport will give a word of encouragement to them; if he would be prepared to send an official to examine the road he would agreed that there is no earthly reason why it should be closed to the people living there.

I agree we should not allow the road to be used by scores of motor cars daily; I believe that not more than ten cars would use the road in a fortnight, but during harvesting and other periods it should be possible for any person to get down the road without let or hindrance. The local doctor gave me a typical example of his difficulties. Some of his patients live right in the valley. Last winter in an emergency, the nature of which I need not describe here, he was unable to get to those people as quickly as he desired; he had perforce to use roads which climb around the hills to the extent of some 1,000 feet. I have been over every inch of those roads. They are ten times more dangerous than the road on the base of the valley.

I appeal to the Minister, if he is not satisfied himself, to try to make this local concession for limited use. The persons using the road would have keys to the gates. The gradient end of the road is nothing in comparison with the other end. The gradient is one in 40. In case I am told that the road is only seven feet wide, I must say that I have taken the trouble to measure it in many places. It is over nine feet wide and in places has a good grass verge. There are bridges, some 21 of which were built for a light railway; they will carry any reasonable road traffic. I agree that we should limit the weight of traffic using the road and that lorries should not use it, but if a limit were placed on cars and machinery I see no earthly reason why the Minister should not grant permission for the road to be opened for local people. The road has been open for pedestrians, but ostensibly it is closed to cyclists; but everytime I go on the road I see cyclists on it. We might as well get rid of this kind of pretence that cyclists will be fined for going on this road and agree that it should also be open to them, if they wish to cycle in this beautiful district.

While this matter may not be an issue of terrific national importance, the function of this House is to raise these issues. I have taken the trouble to visit this road many times, and I have not been satisfied with the answers to the two Questions I have put down to the Minister. I hope that it will be possible for the Parliamentary Secretary to accede to my request, because I am speaking on behalf of my constituents. If he does so, I can assure him that it will improve the economic value of the district, improve the standard of the farming and get rid of a grievance which the parishioners are right in expressing at the present moment.

3.57 p.m.

I apologise to my hon. Friend the Member for Leek (Mr. Harold Davies) for not having been in the House at the precise moment when he started his eloquent speech—the previous Debate ended a little earlier than I expected. But I know his case, and he has been good enough to communicate with my right hon. Friend about it on more than one occasion. He has been most assiduous in pursuing his efforts to have what he calls the Manifold Valley Road, or what I would call by its correct title the Manifold Valley "footpath," opened to wheeled traffic. I have a great deal of sympathy with the case he makes on behalf of the residents of the Manifold Valley. If I were living in the Valley and saw a road or footpath, whichever one chooses to call it, with a big notice board prohibiting me to take a car on it, I should want to know the reason why.

My hon. Friend is quite right to pursue this matter. I ought to make it clear, however, that the responsibility for closing this footpath to wheeled traffic rests primarily with the Staffordshire County Council. It was upon the request of the Staffordshire County Council, after a public inquiry had been held by the then Minister of Transport in 1938, based upon the engineering conditions of the road as reported by the Staffordshire County Council's surveyor and the surveyor of the Ministry of Transport, that the road was closed to wheeled traffic. Perhaps I ought to go a little more into the history of this. As my hon. Friend indicated, this footpath is, in fact, a covered-in railway. When the L.M.S. found that they could not run this railway, they dedicated it to the Staffordshire County Council, and the Staffordshire County Council took it over, by resolution, specifically as a foot- path. They deliberately used the word "footpath," because in their view it was not fit for wheeled traffic.

The county council are the highway authority, and they were opposed to wheeled traffic using the road. They could have made a by-law under the Local Government Act, Section 249, which would have had the same effect as making this order, but they preferred to make the order after a public inquiry, and it was made in 1937 to achieve this end. There has been constant disagreement between the Staffordshire County Council and the smaller authorities in Staffordshire whether this footpath should be used for wheeled traffic or not. My hon. Friend said that before it was made a footpath and closed to traffic local organisations should have been consulted.

It being Four o'Clock, the Motion for the Adjournment of the House lapsed. without Question put.

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn."—[ Mr. Snow. ]

I am bound to say that there is no better organisation for consultation than the county council itself, and it was the county council acting upon their surveyor's advice who put this request to us and asked that the road should be closed. It would not be correct if my hon. Friend the Member for Leek were to leave the impression with the House that the then Minister of Transport had come along and suddenly said, "I am going to close this footpath to wheeled traffic without consulting the local authorities," for the initiative came from the local authorities themselves.

Did I hear the Minister say that it was on the advice of the county surveyor? That means on the advice of one expert alone.

I do not know that I am entitled to separate the County Council officials from the County Council. I prefer to rely upon the statement that I made that it was on the County Council's initiative that a public inquiry was held because they were desirous of closing the road. The inspector who held the public inquiry said that after considering the technical details that had been put to him and after examining the road himself—he went up and down it some 10 years ago—he came to the conclusion that it ought not to be open to wheeled traffic. That is where the initiative came from. My hon. Friend says there is really no question of any outlay of money on this road because it is in a good condition and that if we sent an inspector he would agree that wheeled vehicles should be allowed to use it. I understand that nothing has been done to the road for 10 years and the last technical advice which we had runs counter to what my hon. Friend is now saying. I am told that parts of the road are on an embankment without any parapet and that it goes close to the river. It crosses the river repeatedly by some 21 bridges none of which has parapets. Many of the bridges are weak as a result of the corrosion of the main girders.

I have been over the 21 bridges and they have parapets. So far as gradients are concerned the alternative road is 1,000 feet up over a mountain and there is not a little drop of three or four feet on one side but up to 40 or 5o feet right down into a valley. I am conveying the considered opinion of the mass of parish councils in this district that it is a much safer road than the mountain road.

I cannot undertake to enter into a technical argument with my hon. Friend about the conflict of technical opinion. I can only say that the County Council and the inspector who conducted this investigation both arrived at the same conclusion, and I must rely upon it. I would conclude the short sentence that I wanted to finish about the technical state of the road—that at one point it goes through a tunnel that is 170 yards long—

And 12 feet wide.

—and two vehicles find it extremely difficult to pass each other in the middle of this tunnel.

This is ridiculous. I have measured the width of the tunnel and I have seen it. Do you think that two people are going to be so foolish—

The hon. Gentleman is not entitled to ask me if I think so or not. The second point is that the hon. Member cannot make a second speech.

May I put this one question to the Minister? Does he really think that two people are going to try and pass in a tunnel 12 feet wide when the tunnel is perfectly straight and one can see clearly from one side to the other and for many yards beyond the opening of the tunnel? That argument will not bear any weight at all.

I do not know whether it will bear any weight, but I am assured that the tunnel will not bear very much. This constant disagreement is something in which the Minister is asked to act as referee, and the House will see this afternoon the sort of difficulties into which one gets with a controversy of this sort. I understand that the Staffordshire County Road and Bridges Committee are going to meet next month in order to consider this matter once again. If that is so and they have some different views which they want to put to the Minister, other than the views which they have already put, I say to my hon. Friend straight away that I have a perfectly open mind on the matter and that I am sure that my right hon. Friend will be prepared to consider anything which is put to him in that way.

The Minister has no desire to close this road and took no initiative in doing so. If those who advised us in the first place and asked that it might be closed now come back and offer different advice, that is a matter which can be considered. We shall obviously be bound by the technical considerations, about which my hon. Friend takes a view different from that of the engineering inspectors who have examined this project. I do not propose to pronounce upon that point. It is something that can be considered.

I am bound to say that if we were asked to make a further order there might be technical difficulties in doing what my hon. Friend has suggested this afternoon, making an order to open the road only for a limited number of people. As I understand it—and I am not finally pronouncing upon the legal aspects of the matter— Section 46 of the Road Traffic Act, which gives the Minister permission to close or open a road, gives him permission to make exceptions for certain vehicles, based upon the class or description of vehicle and not upon the class or description of the user of the vehicle. It may be very difficult to draw a distinction in those circumstances between a doctor's car and a car of a holiday-maker who wants to go up the Manifold Valley footpath, which is not really suited for indiscriminate traffic. In that way it may be difficult to achieve what my hon. Friend has in mind.

If the Staffordshire County Council come back to us and say that they would like us, as a Ministry, to reconsider the possibility of opening the road, just as they previously asked us to close it, for a certain limited number of people, I undertake straight away with my right hon. Friend to exercise all the ingenuity at my command to see whether that can be done. Obviously I cannot go further than that, and my hon. Friend will not expect me to do so. He will not take what I have said as an assurance on the matter at all. We are standing in the middle here. My bias is in favour of giving local residents such convenience as may reasonably be afforded, subject to that being legally possible and to its being technically possible on the basis of the state of the road as it is at the present time.

If my hon. Friend likes to pursue his campaign locally I think that is where he will win the battle, and not here. If he pursues it in Staffordshire and can achieve some victory, I can assure him that we should not be instruments to stand in the way of that victory, if it could possibly be put into effect.

Question put, "That this House do now adjourn," put, and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at Eleven minutes past Four o' Clock.