May I ask the Leader of the House whether he has any statement to make on the business for next Tuesday?

Yes, Sir. In view of the impending visit to Persia of Mr. Harriman, President Truman's personal representative, the Opposition have suggested that the debate on the Persian situation, arranged for Tuesday next, be postponed. His Majesty's Government agree with this proposal.

The business for Tuesday next will be a debate on Local Government.

In regard to Tuesday's business, no doubt the Leader of the House has observed that the Prayer to annul Statutory Instrument No. 1100 is now on the Order Paper for Tuesday. Will the right hon. Gentleman give an assurance that on Tuesday the Government will not perpetrate the unworthy trick they perpetrated last night?

That has really nothing to do with the question before the House. The hon. Baronet is surely not entitled to ask for guarantees like this now. He understood quite well why the Adjournment was moved last night.

With respect, this is Tuesday's business under discussion. Have I not the right to ask whether there will be an opportunity for the Prayer I have put on the Order Paper to be debated?

No, I do not think the hon. Baronet is using a proper opportunity at all. He can wait until the time comes and then he will find whether it is to be debated or not.

When the time comes, if I am denied an opportunity, as I was last night, shall I be given an opportunity of making another protest?

I would advise the hon. Baronet not to put down a Prayer at 11.45 the night before.

On that point, am I not entitled to avail myself of the Rules of the House which permit that course of procedure?

One can always obey the letter of the law, but sometimes the spirit of the law is more important

In support of the point raised by the hon. Baronet, surely it is legitimate for him, without wishing to look backward, which I have no desire to do, but looking forward—in fact facing the future—to get some indication whether there will be an opportunity for debating this Prayer? It is a perfectly legitimate Parliamentary exercise. May I ask the Leader of the House whether we can have such an assurance?

I gave such an assurance last night.

Will it be permitted on Tuesday?

That we will consider between now and Tuesday. I shall be very happy to talk to the hon. Baronet about it.

I think we had better get on now.

I have no questions to ask the Parliamentary Secretary to the Admiralty so far as the Royal Navy is concerned, but in view of the fact that total expenditure was within .05 of the Estimates, it shows that there has been unusually accurate forecasting, and it would be churlish of me if I did not offer the congratulations of this side of the Committee on so close an Estimate.

Question put, and agreed to.

II. Whereas it appears by the Army Appropriation Account for the year ended the 31st day of March, 1950, that the aggregate Expenditure on Army Services has not exceeded

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the application of such sums be sanctioned."—[ Mr. Jay. ]

11.12 a.m.

I think it is in order to ask a question about the reason for one of the surpluses which we are now considering. At a time like this, it seems rather important that the Committee should have explained to it why there was such a substantial surplus in 1949–50 on Vote 7D

the aggregate sums appropriated for those Services and that, as shown in the Schedule hereto appended, the net surplus of the Exchequer Grants for Army Services over the net Expenditure is £10,013,970 3s. 10d., viz.: —

And whereas the Lords Commissioners of His Majesty's Treasury have temporarily authorised the application of so much of the said total surpluses on certain Grants for Army Services as is necessary to make good the said total deficits on other Grants for Army Services.

"Warlike Stores." It is explained in the Appropriation Account that this was due to the shortfall in production being greater than expected. But it has been a very substantial shortfall on the Estimate and it must worry responsible Members of the Committee to know that the War Office estimate of expenditure should, at a time when the production of warlike stores is so important, be so wrong. I should like the Under-Secretary to explain to the House exactly why this took place.

I am much obliged to the hon. Member for asking his question so courteously. This is a complicated financial matter. I think it relates not so much to a failure to get the stores but to the time at which they were paid for. I can assure the hon. Member that we have now got the stores for which we were asking at that time, though they may have come a little later than we hoped at the time. These figures refer to the year 1949–50, before the re-armament programme was introduced, and relate to normal replacements which were going on before then. We got the normal replacements even if they came a couple of months later than they ought to have done.

If I understand the Undersecretary aright, the Estimate for the succeeding year 1950–51 included £3¼ million worth of stores which should have been delivered the year before, with the

Resolved: "That the application of such sums be sanctioned."—[ Mr. Jay. ]

result that the expenditure for that previous year was much smaller than the Estimate for that year.

indicated assent.

Question put, and agreed to.

III. Whereas it appears by the Air Appropriation Account for the year ended the 31st day of March 1950, that the aggregate Expenditure on Air Services has not exceeded the aggregate sums appropriated for those Services and that, as shown in the Schedule hereto appended, the net surplus of the Exchequer Grants for Air Services over the net Expenditure is £7,902,943 14s. 6d., viz.: —

And whereas the Lords Commissioners of His Majesty's Treasury have temporarily authorised the application of so much of the said total surpluses on certain Grants for Air Services as is necessary to make good the said total deficits on other Grants for Air Services.

Resolutions to be reported upon Monday next.

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

This Bill is essentially an economy Measure, which makes some minor changes in the obligations laid upon the Tithe Redemption Commission by the Tithe Act, 1936. The Bill has received an unopposed Third Reading in the House of Lords, and the Government there accepted a number of Amendments put forward on the Committee stage.

The House will recall that by the Tithe Act, 1936, Parliament extinguished tithe rent charge by granting Government stock by way of compensation to the tithe owners, and substituting 60-year annuities paid to the Government by the previous payers of tithe rent charge. That severed the link between the owners of tithe and the tithe landowners, who were the tithe payers, and satisfactorily ended a controversy which I am sure none of us would wish to rivive.

The Tithe Redemption Commission was set up to determine the compensation and to collect the annuities. The Bill does not in any way alter the general arrangement of the 1936 Act, or the position of the main parties to that bargain. What it does is, first, to relieve the Commission of the statutory obligation, under the 1936 Act, to prepare in duplicate registers and maps for each of the 11,000 tithe districts in England and Wales. Scotland and Northern Ireland are outside this Bill, as they were outside the 1936 Act.

These registers were originally intended to serve as a basis for the collection of the annuities, and they were to be revised every six months. Owing to lack of staff during the war the compilation of those maps and registers was not found to be possible, and experience has also shown it not to be necessary. There has been no difficulty in arranging for collection, and, where necessary, for recovery of the annuities through the courts, or indeed in ascertaining what the liability is attaching to any piece of land for an annuity.

It would take an additional staff of over 600 persons to carry out the full job of compiling the maps and registers, and it is estimated that it would cost about £2 million over the five years when they were being compiled, and another £100.000 a year for the rest of the 60 years would be necessary for their maintenance. All that expenditure would fall on the taxpayer.

The Clauses other than Clause 1 are either consequential on that or are minor simplifications. Clause 2 puts an end to the possibility that rent charges overlooked for many years might rank for compensation and the Commission be faced at the same time with having to collect annuities back to 1937. At present the Commission has discretion to refuse compensation in such cases, but it seems better that that should now be put on a statutory basis and not merely be left to the discretion of the Commission.

Clause 3 simplifies a small complication whereby two or three types of annuity may exist in respect of one piece of land. It amalgamates these various types of annuity. The House may know that there were three types of tithe rent charge, vicarial, rectorial and extraordinary, and those three might attach to the same piece of land.

Clause 11 is also a simplification. By the 1936 Act it was provided that the management of the annuities would in the end be transferred to the Inland Revenue from the Commission when the registers and maps had been completed. There again experience has shown that it may be more convenient not to make the transfer to the Inland Revenue but to some other Government Department. Therefore, that arrangement is made rather more flexible in the present Bill and the transfer to any suitable Department can be made when the time comes to wind up the Commission.

All this is possibly a warning against over-precision in legislation at the start. We evidently learn by experience what we cannot always foresee in detail when we are legislating. At all events, I do not think that there would be any doubt that this Measure, after discussion and amendment in the Lords, will enable some useful if minor economies to be made.

11.20 a.m.

I am happy to agree with the Financial Secretary that this is a Bill which raises no acute controversy, all the more so as he said that it extinguished a long drawn out series of bickerings which were bringing no credit either to the tithe payers or the tithe receivers. I had the honour of framing and introducing the Measure of 1936 which carried out the recommendations of a Royal Commission previously appointed to that end.

We were very grateful to have the tribute of the Lord Chancellor who said in another place that the Act of 1936, although passed by a Government with which he was not in sympathy, had been a very successful Act. The small points of tidying up which are now suggested are, we think, all to the good.

There are one or two points to which we would take a little exception. We should like to draw the attention of the Financial Secretary to two points in particular. He mentioned that the Tithe Act of 1936 lays down that eventually the revenue shall be collected by the Inland Revenue. He suggested that this should now be done by some other Department. I cannot see the point of that. What is the suggestion? Why should it go to some other Department, and what other Department has he got in mind?

He said that we should be careful not to be over-precise in legislation, but I think we should also not be over-vague in legislation. Is there any reason? He did not go into detail as to whether the Government had any other Department in mind. It is a pity that the collection of revenue—the management of these annuities—should not be done by the body traditionally entrusted with the task of revenue collection—the Inland Revenue Commissioners. As he is associated with the Inland Revenue, he might be able to give some reason why there is even a suggestion that it might go to some other body and—if it is suggested that it should go to some other body—what other body it should go to. If he cannot do that now, I do not think that this should be simply left to a stroke of the pen from a Government Department.

This is the sort of thing which might reasonably be brought before the House of Commons by the usual procedure against which the House of Commons can pray if necessary. That would enable Parliament to keep under review the proposal to change an Act of Parliament. It is a pity that Acts of Parliament should be subject to this filleting process. At least we should know when it is being done, why it is being done, and to what Department it is proposed to transfer the duty. I trust that the Financial Secretary can give us further information before we leave this stage of the Bill and that he might be able to indicate that, on the Committee stage, the Government might accept an Amendment indicating some more formal procedure than a mere departmental entry as between one Department and another.

There was a Section 45 of the Act of 1936 which laid on the Tithe Redemption Commission the duty to present a report to Parliament seven years after the commencement of the Act and, after that, biennially. That was done, but Clause 8 of this Bill repeals that Section and simply says that, if in any year there are matters other than matters of routine which are not dealt with in the accounts, they shall be appended to the accounts. Surely, when we are dealing with a transaction which will still run over a considerable number of years, and which concerns very ancient matters of great historical interest and also very considerable sums of money, it is desirable that there should be a report.

If the report contains very little, well and good; but we all know the difficulty of looking at these complicated documents without even an explanatory note of any kind. I trust that the Financial Secretary will indicate that some statutory obligation, at least to comment on these accounts which are presented, should still be laid upon the Commissioners. These are points of some importance though, of course, they can easily be dealt with on the Committee stage. I trust that, either now or on the Committee stage, the Financial Secretary will be able to meet them.

The Title of this Bill—Tithe Act, 1936 (Amendment) Bill—which will eventually be the Tithe Act, 1936 (Amendment) Act, 1951, is somewhat complicated. Would it not be possible simply to make the Title, the Tithe (Amendment) Act, 1951? One's eye is generally caught by the first date that one reaches. As this is a 1951 Act, I do not think that it is necessary to put in the 1936 date first. Tithe Acts are not very frequent. There is not such a crop of Tithe Acts upon our Statute Book that it is necessary to be very particular about the fact that we are amending this Act of 1936.

The point which the Financial Secretary made about the non-compilation of the registers may, I think, be allowed to pass. We do not wish an expenditure of £2 million and, still more, a skilled staff to be employed on compilation, although it may lead to difficulties and certainly to historical lapses which we shall be sorry to see. I trust that the utmost care will be taken to ensure that the record is kept informally, if not formally.

As for the Clause extinguishing the dormant claims, I think that is reasonable after this length of time. In some cases these claims are for very tiny amounts indeed. I remember one in my own experience which came to 1½d. The amount of time and trouble necessary to hunt and keep track of this claim of 1½d. was quite disproportionate to the actual return to the Treasury or to the taxpayer involved. I think that, although it is a rather short time in which to extinguish some of these dormant claims, the time has now come for us to do it. With these observations, I commend the Bill on behalf of myself and right hon. Friends.

11.29 a.m.

My right hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Kelvingrove (Lieut.-Colonel Elliot) said that the Bill was not controversial, but I wish to call attention to one part of the 1936 Act which is most controversial in the way in which it is being interpreted by the Tithe Commission. I refer to Section 9. Before I deal with that, I wish to quote the Preamble to the Act of 1936 which says: that has not been carried out by the Tithe Commission. I do not wish to weary the House by reading too much of Section 9, which is being repealed, but I think it is important that I should read the commencing words, which are:

I want to turn to Section 47 (4), which says:

The action of the Tithe Commission has been challenged twice in the county courts. In one case I was interested; I will not say that I was one of the unfortunate men, because I knew that I was going to lose. The case had been tried first in the Exeter County Court and, as is usual, the learned county court judge followed the findings of the previous court, but that did not deter me from drawing attention to something that was entirely wrong. I want to call the attention of the Financial Secretary to the calculation sheet under various headings. In column 2 is shown the amount of tithe rent charged, in column 3 under the agricultural section is the amount of the redemption annuity, and in column 4 is the half-yearly payment.

I want to give an illustration of what may be looked upon as an extreme case, but it is not as extreme as may be thought, because in the old days when tithes were first laid on land they related to very small areas. In those days fields were divided into small parcels, and today we may find a field of 10 acres with four or five different tithe apportionments on that same field. In some instances the tithe appointment was 3d. When it came to be broken down to the redemption annuity, it was found that the fraction of a penny in the broken-down charge was a halfpenny or more, and therefore the new value still remains 3d.

I make no complaint about that, but what I do complain of is that the Tithe Commission, in reckoning their half-yearly payments, divide the 3d. into two amounts of 1½d. and charge the tithe payer 2d. each time, so that instead of the Tithe Act, 1936, reducing the payment of tithe on those fields, it increases it by 33⅓; per cent. I call that iniquitous and I hope that in the Committee stage we shall be able to table an Amendment to remove what I consider to be completely wrong and quite against the intention of the framers of the 1936 Act.

On one estate for which I was responsible I worked out the whole of the tithe payments. Obviously every time the amount comes to odd pence it means there is a penny charged instead of ½d.; for instance, if the amount is 3½d. it becomes 4d. every half year. On this estate they pay £12 10s. per annum more because of the interpretation by the Tithe Commission of the Act in a way which was never intended. If we take that sort of thing into consideration throughout England and Wales it means that the Tithe Commission are extracting from the tithe payer before the tithe is finally extinguished hundreds of thousands of pounds which this House never intended they should have.

I hope the Financial Secretary and those responsible will give consideration to this matter so that we can deal with it in Committee. I hope I have made myself clear to the Financial Secretary. I do not suppose for one moment that he will be prepared to say anything on this matter at the moment, because it has probably never been brought to his attention before, but I hope that in the further stages of this Bill this anomaly will be redressed.

I hope the Financial Secretary will meet the wishes of the House and give us some information on the points raised.

I thought I would not say more at this stage, except to associate myself with what was said by the right hon. and gallant Member for Kelvingrove (Lieut.-Colonel Elliot), and indeed with what the Lord Chancellor said, about the generally happy results of the Act of 1936, with which I gather the right hon. and gallant Gentleman had a great deal to do.

On the points which have been raised, I would just assure the right hon. and gallant Gentleman and the hon. Member for Leominster (Mr. Baldwin) that we will consider those matters before the Committee stage and give the main answer then. Perhaps I might say this on the right hon. and gallant Gentleman's main point about the transfer of functions to other Government departments. Of course, this Bill does not exclude the Inland Revenue. It simply makes it possible to add other Government Departments to the Inland Revenue.

Question put, and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read a Second time.

Committed to a Committee of the whole House—[ Mr. Royle ]—for Monday next.

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

Rag flock is not a stranger to the Statute Book. The first legislation was in 1911, and there was a small amending Act in 1928. Rag flock, as hon. Members will know, is widely used in stuffing upholstery and making bedding and toys, and is made by tearing up by machinery woven, knitted or felted materials. The problem is that material used for making the flock can be either clean or dirty. I want to make it clear that the best manufacturers in the industry already do all that they can to see that the material is clean.

There is a very high standard indeed in the industry, due to the use of machinery for cleaning, which ensures that the material is free from dirt and infection. Dirty materials are a danger to public health, but cleaning costs money. I am certain everyone will agree that it is wrong to allow people to avoid the cost of cleaning and so endanger public health, and at the same time to undercut their competitors in the industry. They can undercut because they do not have the expense of cleansing which is incurred by those who observe the fair rules of the industry in seeing that everything is clean.

What is needed is control over the cleansing of the materials which go to make up rag flock. The existing legislation is inadequate. Its main weaknesses are these. First of all, it applies only to rag flock, and there are many other materials used in the upholstery trade and the manufacture of articles like baby carriages. A further weakness of the existing legislation is that it does not give control over the finished article —that is, once dirty material has been put into a piece of furniture there is no control.

In the opinion of the trade and of those who have had experience of what control the existing legislation gives, its enforcement provisions are insufficient. Further, under the existing legislation it is necessary to prove in court the intention of the individual, on whose premises the dirty material was found, to use the material for stuffing Those who have had legal experience will agree that to prove before a judge or magistrate the intention of doing something which was not actually done is very difficult. Another difficulty with the existing legislation is that it has been very difficult to establish a test for the standards prescribed.

As a result of the ineffectiveness of the existing legislation, an inter-Departmental Committee was set up in 1938 under the chairmanship of Lord Merthyr. Although it was set up in 1938, because of the war it did not report until 1946, but here I would say that the report was well worth waiting for and would pay a tribute to Lord Merthyr for his chairmanship and to the members of his committee, who gave a great deal of time and thought to the study of the problem.

Not only did the committee point out the weaknesses of existing legislation but they went further and did what is not always as easy—they made recommendations for changes which they thought ought to be made and which they thought would make the legislation on the subject effective. This Bill has been constructed on the basis of the recommendations of the committee over which Lord Merthyr presided and the committee's recommendations are embodied in it.

Perhaps I may briefly deal with the Bill itself. First of all, it provides for a system of licensing—and I am here dealing with the rag flock side of the industry—by the local authority of all premises where rag flock is manufactured. If the local authority are not convinced that the necessary and proper machinery for cleansing is available in the premises to clean the flock, they can refuse to grant the licence. Further, it is an offence to have dirty flock on the premises. Under this Bill it is not necessary to prove the intention to use the dirty material. It is an offence to have dirty material on licensed premises.

After manufacture the flock goes either direct to someone engaged in the bedding or upholstery trade or into store. Premises where rag flock is stored after manufacture and before use in the industries with which it is associated have to be licensed by the local authority and, again, it is an offence to have any dirty material on those premises.

Turning to the upholstery trade, the Bill first of all provides that the -flock must come from a licenced manufacturer or from premises licensed for the storage of flock. Under the Bill it will be an offence for an upholsterer or anyone engaged in using these filling materials to obtain them from premises other than licensed premises. In that way, by controlling the manufacture and storage of flock, and by controlling the ordering and receiving of it from manufacturers by persons who use it in the upholstery trade, there is for the first time a control right the way through which establishes the possibility of seeing that clean flock is used.

Rag flock is singled out under the Bill for this special procedure because it bears a very high risk of contamination and because of the considerable risk of dirty materials being used, from the very nature of the materials which are teased out to make the flock. But experience may show that other materials used in filling carry a risk equal to or approaching that associated with flock, and the Bill provides an opportunity to make regulations to bring in other materials on the same basis. By the nature of the other materials the regulations may have to provide different standards than in the case of rag flock.

The Bill goes further than existing legislation in dealing with the cleanliness of materials used by the upholstery trade because it extends the control to materials, other than rag flock, used for filling. It includes rag flock, but extends the control and the requirements for clean materials to other materials—feathers, down and that sort of thing— used in the trade. The Bill requires that all premises where upholstery is carried out—the stuffing of bedding, furniture and toys and that sort of article—shall be registered with the local authority, and on such premises it will be an offence to have dirty material, although an exception is made where a re-conditioning is carried out. A further point on which this Bill improves on existing legislation is that it makes it an offence to offer for sale or to sell an article stuffed with dirty material.

Here perhaps I should make some reference to the fact that full warranty defences are given, so that a person who is taking all possible precautions to ensure that the materials are clean is safeguarded. In fact, it is only the manufacturer or the person who stores rag flock who can really be sure that it is clean. If a trader has taken all the precautions that he can in buying it, by ordering from licensed premises, or by demanding in his order that the material shall be clean material, then, obviously, it would be quite wrong that he should have to stand the risk of conviction, when he has not committed an offence, and has been the unwilling victim of some one who has not carried out his obligations. Of course, control over the actual manufacture of the articles and over the offering for sale of manufactured articles means investigating the source of origin and finding out where the dirty material was being either manufactured or offered for sale, and that is not covered in the existing legislation.

I do not think that on Second Reading it is necessary for me to say much about the enforcement provisions of the Bill. They will be in the hands of the local authorities and courts of summary jurisdiction. Local authority inspectors have the power of entry at all reasonable times into premises which are licensed or registered and into premises which they have good reason to think ought to be licensed or registered, and they have power to take samples. They will take three samples; one to be left with the occupier of the premises; one to be sent to the public analyst; and one to be kept by the local authority. Under the Bill the Minister has power to set up standards of cleanliness, and equally to determine the tests that shall be made for ensuring that those standards of cleanliness are complied with.

I think I have given the House an outline of what we are trying to do in the Bill, and of the methods which we propose to use in setting about doing it, but I should like to make it quite clear here that, as I hinted earlier, this is not a burdensome control that is being forced upon an unwilling industry. In fact, it is the exact opposite. The traders realise the importance of cleanliness. They were concerned about the fact that certain persons in their trade were endangering public health, and the trade itself made the first move, in conjunction with the British Standards Institution, to set up standards of cleanliness. The traders themselves in the industry voluntarily set up those standards, and they have maintained them.

As I paid a tribute to Lord Merthyr and his Committee, equally I should like to pay a tribute to the public-spiritedness of the industry, and to the British Standards Institution which has cooperated with the industry in setting up and maintaining those standards. In effect, this Bill gives legislative approval and support to the voluntary arrangements that have already been made in the industry.

Here I should like to assure the House that the Ministry and the local authorities, in operating the Bill, will use to the full those standards and that machinery which the trade itself has set up.

I ought to say, too, that the trade union representing the workers in the industry is in full support of the Bill. The union, through the Trades Union Congress, had its own inquiry into the problems caused by some manufacturers who were using bad materials, and so, it was thought, causing diseases, such as dermatitis, amongst the workers in the industry.

Really what we are saying in the Bill is that we approve of what the trade has done in conjunction with the British Standards Institution. We are saying that those few—and comparatively they are very few—black sheep who would endanger the good name of the industry and who would endanger public health should not be allowed to do so. This Bill gives us the opportunity to control those people who have not been prepared to accept the voluntary control which the industry itself has voluntarily established.

As the House is aware, the Bill has already been passed through another place, and it has received its commendation. It is, as I have said, a Bill which is required by the industry, and required by the workers in the industry, and required to protect the health of the people of this country against manufacturers and dealers who are unscrupulous, and who would, for the opportunity of extra profit, risk the possibility of endangering the health of the public. I therefore ask the House with confidence to give the Bill a Second Reading.

11.56 a.m.

It has been said that this majestic Chamber of ours resembles the elephant, in that it can turn its mighty strength from the uprooting of a giant of the forest to the picking up of a pin. A few moments ago we were discussing on what occasion the House would review a difficult situation in the Middle East, involving great risks to peace or of war, and interference with a commodity essential to modern industry; now we are discussing the conditions in which rag flock to be used for upholstery should be made and sold.

One is also reminded of the memory of the elephant, and how it is one of its most outstanding features. It is said that an elephant never forgets. One feels one's brain reeling and a little taken away by the majestic process of the administration of this country. I remember well the appointment of this Committee. This morning seems to be an occasion for the recapitulation of some of my previous career. We have just dealt with a Tithe Bill and with the work of a Tithe Commission, which I appointed, that turned out matter for the Tithe Act, 1936. Now we are dealing with matter provided by the Merthyr Committee, which I also had the honour of appointing, whose report is now finding itself enshrined in legislation.

As long ago as 1938 it was appointed. A great change has swept over the land since. Three mighty empires entered into war against us. They have all been successively overthown: Italy changed sides; the atom bomb was dropped upon Japan; Germany was subjected to invasion and control, which is not yet at an end. Through all this time the Committee incubated its consideration of the problem of rag flock. It eventually emerged in July, 1946, with a report, presented to two Ministers, who, in their turn, have both passed away from the seats of the mighty. Two new Ministers have taken their places. A Measure has been considered in another place, and now appears in 38 Clauses and a Schedule for consideration by the House of Commons today. It is an awe inspiring spectacle, and we ought to consider it with due and proper respect.

I shall not go into the details which the Parliamentary Secretary has laid before us. There will be another occasion for that, for we shall not shorten our Parliamentary procedure upon this Measure. There will be a Committee stage for its further consideration, a Report stage subsequently, and a Third Reading will be given. The Bill is carefully laid out, no pains being spared, to ensure that it will not be liable to produce a constitutional quarrel between the two Chambers. There are words clothed in brackets and underlined lest questions of Privilege should arise.

All this has been done to ensure that consideration shall be solemnly devoted to rag flock for upholstery. It may be that a somewhat more cursory and summary procedure might have achieved its object, but who am I who appointed the Committee, and who am grateful to it for its report, to comment even if a certain amount of over-elaboration is possible in this very formidable, as far as flock is concerned, Bill which is laid before us now.

The only thing that any of us might fear is the possibility that Clause 8, which allows the Minister to take into account this procedure and to apply it in the case of materials other than rag flock, might lead to extensions which are not foreseen, for even with this long and meticulous consideration we cannot foresee everything. The whole of the trade is at one in this. It is true that it applies only to a relatively small proportion of the trade, and it is estimated that some 5 per cent. of it may be delinquent.

Less than 5 per cent.

We are applying the machinery of Lords and Commons to be sure that less than 5 per cent. of those engaged in this industry should not contravene the standards which we desire to have observed. It is good and proper that the House of Commons should devote itself to the securing of the safety of the subject and to making sure that both those who sleep upon materials so prepared and those who work upon them should have the utmost safeguarding that Parliament can achieve. Therefore, I and my hon. Friends on this side will certainly offer no opposition whatever to the Second Reading of this Bill.

12.3 p.m.

I cannot resist the temptation to say a few words on this subject, particularly when I remember, as a very small boy living in the West Riding of Yorkshire, which is a storehouse into which almost all the rags from all parts of the world are brought and where they are sorted, sold and made up, wondering how it was possible for this material to be brought into Batley, Dewsbury, and Morley from, on the one hand, the icy steppes of Siberia, and, on the other, from the far distant parts of America.

There is another matter that interests me. It is that there is a public health problem involved in this, and the fact that public health is concerned has affected the minds of both this House and Members of another place. I believe that on the original Committee, over which Lord Merthyr presided, there were four medical men. It is only right and proper that we should view any attempt by delinquent persons to impose bad standards upon us, and which might affect our health, with great suspicion.

It is notable that we have had celerity in this particular case, for from 1946 to 1951 is only five years, and the Committee finished its Report in 1946. I think this is very much more rapid progress than we are accustomed to, and there may be some reason for it. Perhaps the reason is that we were certain in this case that the delinquents were fewer than 5 per cent. of the manufacturers. I also am interested in other cases. For example, I am interested in the question of something equally universally used in the making of our bread.

As long ago as 1927, a Committee was constituted to consider the use of certain ingredients in bread making. It reported that we should abandon agene in the manufacture of bread. We have not yet done so, but we hope to do so fairly soon. There, perhaps, the interests are not delinquent at all, though they have not yet found it convenient to find us a substitute which will not affect the public health.

The most important aspect of this matter is that which concerns the worker. I do not think it has been technically proved that disease is spread by dirty flock. Strangely enough, one would assume that the public health would be seriously endangered by the use of such material, but, as I say, I do not think that as yet it has been proved that dirty felt and old torn stockings which have come from all parts of the world, and which have been sat upon and slept upon for a lifetime by people, do, in fact, transmit disease. I am sure they transmit vermin; I am sure they are aesthetically horrible, and I am quite certain we are absolutely right to take these steps to see that such material is clean.

But, so far as the worker who handles this material is concerned, the matter is different. There is ample evidence to prove that such materials—dirty and unwashed as they are—do cause dermatitis as well as infection of the skin. By dermatitis, I mean, of course, industrial dermatitis, a breakdown of the skin due to irritation by dust or liquids. There is ample dust and all sorts of other materials in this stuff when it is unwashed which cause ill effects on the worker, to say nothing of breathing in clouds of filthy material when sorting it.

I know there is a tendency to use less and less rag flock as time goes by. Other filling materials are becoming more popular. Rubber, for example, is being widely used to sleep on. Indeed, the upholstery on which we sleep—I mean sit —in this Chamber is made of rubber. I am told that nylon may be used in the future, but that it will present a complication in that whereas the laniator tears up the rag in the course of manufacture, I am told that if nylon is used it tears up the laniator because it is so tough and strong. Synthetic materials, of which rubber is one, will replace rag more and more as time goes on.

I was very interested to hear the Parliamentary Secretary describe something of which, I think, we are all very proud, namely, that without legislation there is always a tendency in this country for fair practices to grow of their own accord and for the majority of citizens to adopt a fair practice code. We know that if everybody had accepted the code which the British Standards Institution wished to see adopted, and which is indeed adopted by all the bigger manufacturers, we should not have had to spend our time on this particular Bill. But we are compelled to realise that legislation is forced upon the House by the delinquency of a minority. In this case, it is a very small minority, and I think they are going to be very easily dealt with.

The other point that one cannot help noticing is that the majority of manufacturers do not wait for legislation before conducting their businesses in a proper way, and that the average citizen is concerned with the welfare of his neighbour. That is a comforting thought. A short point, and perhaps not such a happy one, is that when opposition to legislation or to change is very much more than 5 per cent., reports from these Committees sometimes take 30 years rather than five before being implemented. None the less, in view of the assurances we have been given that other materials are going to be looked at—such materials as feathers and hair which can also be extremely filthy and unhealthy—I wish to say that I welcome the provisions of this Bill most heartily, and that I am quite sure that we shall all feel better in future whether we are sitting down or lying in bed.

12.9 p.m.

The hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central (Dr. Stross) made a very interesting speech to the House. He began by telling us of his childhood experience in Yorkshire when he saw rags coming from all parts of the world to be turned into manufactured articles, and his interest in the subject matter of this Bill apparently stems from that time. He wondered how it was that rags could be bought from all parts of the world and turned into manufactured articles in this country. I would point out to the hon. Gentleman that that is one example of private enterprise.

I should like to follow the hon. Gentleman in one respect only, in regard to the public health question which he raised and about which he is far more qualified to speak than I am. I ask the Parliamentary Secretary whether or not the Government intend in the regulations which will be brought in when this Bill is on the Statute Book to adopt a more up-to-date definition of what is to be "clean" in respect of these matters than there is at the moment.

I understand that the definition is taken from regulations made as long ago as 1912 under the 1911 Act. I will not weary the House with its terms. I should like to know whether or not the Government have in mind a better test and could make use of more up-to-date techniques and scientific knowledge. We have been discussing the question of clean or dirty rag flock and other filling materials, and we have no idea of the sort of test to be imposed. I should be grateful to the hon. Gentleman if he would say a few words at the conclusion of this debate, with the leave of the House, on that point.

Turning to the provisions of the Bill, I think that it is an admirable Bill in the circumstances. There are one or two minor points which I feel I must give notice that we may seek to put right in Committee. The first is that I am not at all certain whether the registration procedure laid down in Clauses 2, 6 and 7 is intended to be an alternative procedure for the manufacture of rag flock. Clause 2 requires that the premises must be registered, and there is a definite procedure laid down. Clauses 6 and 7 provide in the case of premises which are to be used for the manufacture and storage of rag flock—not other filling materials—a different procedure.

I am wondering whether or not the manufacturer of rag flock who obtains a licence and registration under Clause 2 would subsequently be faced with a refusal of permission and licence under the other Clauses, and whether or not the two schemes of registration are intended to be alternative or co-existent. I hope that we shall be given some idea of what the exact position will be.

I assume that there are a number of manufacturers of these materials who deal not only in rag flock but kapok, feathers, down and the other things listed in the Bill. Would such a person dealing not only in rag flock but other materials have to register twice, once under Clause 2 and again with regard to the rag flock part of his business under Clauses 6 and 7? With regard to Clauses 6 and 7, I must point out what I consider to be a very unsatisfactory position.

The Clauses provide in the case of rag flock manufacture a procedure for licensing which we all agree is necessary: but in the event of local authorities, who have the power to grant the licences, deciding that a licence shall not be granted, the Bill as at present drafted provides that the person may, within 28 days of service upon him of the notice of the local authority's decision, appeal. The appeal in this case lies to the Minister of Local Government and Planning or, in

Scotland, to the Secretary of State. I am not making any personal point, but I feel that it would be preferable if we retained the procedure so often embodied in other Acts of Parliament of a similar nature where an appeal lies to the local magistrates or court of quarter sessions rather than to a Government Department.

There are many precedents for that. For example, to take one which is, I think, in many ways similar to the question of the manufacture of rag flock, a person who wishes to run a petrol filling station can apply for a licence to a local authority and if the local authority turns him down, the appeal is to the courts. Similarly, a pawnbroker has an appeal to the court of quarter sessions rather than to a Ministry. In the case of adoption societies, nursing homes and war charities, appeal against a local authority refusing permission for registration is to the court. I think that it is desirable that we should consider adopting that procedure in this case.

There are two main reasons. The first is on the ground of expense. In the event of an appeal being lodged to the Ministry, I presume that they would have to send someone to inspect the premises and hold some sort of inquiry; otherwise, it would be difficult to see how the matter could be carried out. That will be a little more expensive than allowing the person aggrieved by the decision of a council to appeal to the local magistrates' court. In that case no expense falls upon him. The courts are there, their expenses are continuous, they hear other cases; and I should have thought that it would have been far better that they should have conducted any inquiry that is necessary.

The second reason is that they are local magistrates. They have knowledge of the local situation, and they are easily available, if necessary, to see the premises. I should have thought that on both those grounds it was preferable to have an appeal not to the Minister or to the Secretary of State but to the local magistrates' court or possibly to the local court of quarter session. I do not intend to pursue that point further at this stage, but I hope that it will be considered by the Government.

There are two other matters to which I should like to refer. In Clause 8, Clause 15 (5) and Clause 30 powers are given to the Minister and to the Secretary of State to make Statutory Instruments and regulations. I have not heard any reference at all as to whether or not those Statutory Instruments, when made, will be subject to any form of annulment procedure in this House. The Clauses to which I have referred provide that the regulations shall be laid before Parliament. I do not know whether the provisions of the Statutory Instruments Act automatically apply to them, but if they do not—

This is an important point. They just have to be laid.

Then I think we ought to have an opportunity of considering whether or not at a later stage we should introduce a method, which I hope the Government may feel constrained to accept, giving this House some power of control over the regulations when they are laid. I think it is desirable that with delegated legislation—I do not intend to develop this argument—there should be a little more control in the hands of the House rather than that the regulations should be just laid upon the Table. That is a point which I will follow up on the next stage of the Bill a week from now.

My final point deals with Clause 19, which relates to offences by corporations. Here again, we have this wording, which has been criticised quite a lot lately, providing that where an offence under an Act of Parliament of this kind is committed, everybody who happens at the time to have been a director, general manager, secretary or other similar officer of the limited company is automatically deemed guilty of the offence

The Bill has been commended by my right hon. and gallant Friend and by other hon. Members. I do not intend in the slightest to disagree, save for the doubt which I have about Clause 19. I think it is a Bill that should be speedily placed upon the Statute Book, where it will do good, useful work.

12.22 p.m.

The hon. Member for Henley (Mr. Hay) took some credit for private enterprise for bringing vast quantities of flock from the far corners of the world. I think he will agree that if it were not for the shadier side of private enterprise this Bill would not be here. It is a modest little Measure which is not likely to oust the news from Korea from the newspaper headlines tomorrow morning, yet rag flock and other materials which occupy a large part of our lives are not unimportant to the public.

Most of us can expect an average of eight hours sleep per day upon a mattress with flock or other fillings. Most of us sit for approximately six hours a day, some more comfortable on upholstery than others. So, for more than half the day we are very much concerned with the materials that go into upholstery. Therefore, it is important that a Bill of this kind should come before the House to protect the public, the retailer, and the worker in the industry.

The hon. Gentleman mentioned the committee which was set up in 1938 to investigate this matter. That committee was set up at a time when there was much more cut-throat competition in the trade than there is today and it was a very great temptation for the furniture industry to reduce its costs by lowering the quality of the fillings. I am prepared to argue that this Bill concerns only about five per cent, of the industry today, but in those other unhappy days many more traders were concerned in putting debased fillings across to the public.

Lord Merthyr's Committee did a good job, possibly as a result of being temporarily held up during the war, when bomb and blast revealed a good deal more about upholstery than might otherwise have been discovered. It is not easy to do research in upholstery without causing considerable damage. The Merthyr Committee sat for many years on this inquiry and have produced a good report, which is largely incorporated in the Bill. Their Lordships in another place have improved on the Bill. They have had first go at it and have improved it during their Committee stage.

Let me not forget for a moment that the trade union representing the operatives have been very much concerned about upholstery and have been agitating about it for many years. As long ago as 15 years they wanted additional legislation on upholstery. The Bill is therefore very much welcomed in the furniture industry because it will improve the quality of fillings and will cut down the incidence of dermatitis, which is one of the diseases affecting the furniture industry. In my constituency I see many unfortunate cases of this industrial disease, and if we can improve on that it will be one of the good results of this Bill.

I said a moment ago that in time of slump there is a tendency for the material used in upholstery to be debased. I am glad that the Bill puts its main emphasis therefore on the need for clean filling materials. Those of us who have had an opportunity of seeing rag flock dealt with in factories will know what a frightful mess it looks when it is first produced, and that one wonders whether it is wise at all to use, even after treatment, this filthy-looking material. As we well know, when men and women go into a furniture shop to buy furniture they find it difficult to decide even whether a piece of cabinet work is good or bad. How much more difficult it is for them to decide whether upholstery is well filled or not. What is hidden from the eye we have to be careful about.

There have been cases in the courts on the subject, and some have led to an exaggerated view on the part of the public that all fillings in furniture are bad. That is not true. Only a small percentage of the industry is guilty of the offences to which I am referring. On the whole, the standard of fillings is now greatly improved. It is not now in prosperous times that we have to worry about this matter. During the summer of last year there was a temporary recession in the furniture industry, and at the moment there is a slight recession on the upholstery side. In circumstances like these it is easy for certain manufacturers competing for a disappearing market to try to cut down prices by putting in faulty materials.

Many of my friends in the industry tell me with horror how in the past, workshop waste, and even shavings, have been included in the fillings with which they have been required to work. We certainly do not want to pass on to the public, whether in slump conditions or not, fillings which contain dirt, moth, bug disease perhaps, or anything which is below the standard which has been established by the British Standards Institution. Like the Parliamentary Secretary, I am glad that the Institution has set up standards of hygiene for filling materials.

It is probably not known in the House that in the furniture industry we have about 4,000 factories, most of which are very small. About 3,000 of them probably employ no more than 15 men each. It is an industry which consists largely of small workshops, and, consequently, there is a greater need than there would be in a more developed industry to have the supervisory powers which are given in the Bill.

A great deal of improvement was brought about by the utility scheme which was introduced during the war and has been very much developed since. It laid down standards for furniture, including upholstery, and one of the reasons why we are now saying that the Bill is not so necessary as it used to be is that the utility scheme has effected considerable improvements. Several hon. Members have said that new materials are now coming to the fore. It is true that rubber, feathers and other materials are in greater use today, but they are much more expensive than flock. Had the benches upon which we are sitting been filled with material other than rubber the cost would probably have been a third or a fourth of what it was, but I do not ask that this should be done, for the benches are extremely comfortable. It is likely as a result of the great price that we pay for rubber especially at today's price—that rag flock will continue to be used for a considerable time in the type of fillings with which we are concerned.

Like all other hon. Members, I welcome the Bill. I cannot recollect during my six years in the House a Bill of 38 Clauses getting such a unanimous reception. After the stormy times we have had, it is pleasant to have hon. Members opposite uttering words of praise for the Bill. I would remind my hon. Friend that it will be extremely important to see that the supervisory powers are properly carried out, and I hope that the local authorities, who will be the main supervisors, will be given full powers to investigate and supervise.

I believe that the penalties are not high enough. Clause 18 lays down that the penalty for a first offence shall be £50. Today that is the price of only one suite of upholstery. It is nothing at all. I do not believe that £50 is a deterrent penalty for a first offence, and I hope that we may amend that during the Committee stage. I should like to think that it will be possible to trace back to their source offending rag flock and other materials delivered to upholstery factories. That has frequently been impossible, and I hope that as a result of the Bill means will be found of identifying offending materials.

This is an excellent little Bill. I congratulate my hon. Friend upon the lucid way in which he presented it, and I am glad to hear that we shall have no difficulty in making it law.

12.34 p.m.

By leave of the House. I should like to reply to one or two of the points raised. First, I thank the House for the generous reception given to the Bill. We expected from the right hon. and gallant Member for Kelvingrove (Lieut.-Colonel Elliot) a speech in the good humoured manner in which he delivered it. I burnt the midnight oil in order to discover where all the materials mentioned in Clause 32 come from and of what they are comprised so that I might show my technical and detailed knowledge if there were interjections. The midnight oil was burnt in vain for this morning's purposes, but I may find a use for my knowledge during the Committee stage.

With regard to the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central (Dr. Stross), I ought to have said earlier a little more about the part played by the trade unions, and particularly by the Trade Union Congress in association with the trade unions, in the inquiries into the diseases which were alleged to have arisen in the industry because of the handling of these materials. It is true that there has been no direct proof that the user of an article has contracted disease from it, but there have been allegations that that has been so, and I have a suspicion that fear of libel actions has prevented any definite statement that such a thing has happened. Infection might arise in this way, and we ought to prevent it if it is humanly possible to do so.

The hon. Member for Henley (Mr. Hay) was twitted by my hon. Friend the Member for Wycombe (Mr. Haire) about private enterprise. My father was a carpenter and joiner, and between periods of unemployment he floated between the building industry, the furnishing trade and the pianoforte trade. In those days there existed "rat shops", a phrase common in the industry referring to firms who were quite well known— except to the people who used the goods which they manufactured. The phrase indicated the type of work that was carried out and the type of materials used, and, except for the exigencies of unemployment, no respectable craftsman would ever work for such a firm. As my hon. Friend the Member for Wycombe pointed out, the low price at which they had to try to sell very often forced firms into the cheapest markets for buying materials and therefore a certain amount of trade in unclean materials was done.

The hon. Member for Henley referred to standards. The standards for testing will be substantially those now recommended and used by the British Standards Institution, with whom we are in consultation to determine the type of standard which shall be established, the method of testing and by whom the testing shall be done. Generally the testing will be done by the public analyst, but in some circumstances—for example, for reasons of distance—it may not be appropriate to use the public analyst, and so certain firms will be approved for testing. This will be known when the inspections are carried out.

The difference between licensing and registration was also referred to by the hon. Member. Licensing applies to the manufacture of rag flock, in regard to which there is a requirement to see that adequate machinery from the point of view of cleanliness is available; registration refers to premises in which rag flock is used.

I believe that some words in Clause 2, in page 2, line 10, will probably need amendment. They refer to registration for the purposes of the Act, which would, of course, include the rag flock provisions.

We will look at that during the Committee stage.

I now come to the question of the courts or local inquiries. I ought not to say too much here because I have already earned a reputation for being antagonistic to the legal profession. I am all in favour of anything which enables people to avoid being put to expense through litigation. The matter is much more technical than legal. A licence would be refused because the local authority inspector said that adequate machinery and appliances for cleansing were not present in the premises or that the premises themselves were not adequate to the purpose. That is a technical point. We have a local inquiry with a technical person who will hear evidence on whether or not that is so and whether or not it is a question of law. I do not think this method will be more costly. In fact, it will be cheaper.

The only other point I need deal with is that raised by the hon. Member for Henley on Clause 19. We can look at that in Committee. In conclusion, may I say that I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Wycombe (Mr. Haire) that the effectiveness of this Bill will be an encouragement to local authorities to use their powers of enforcement, and in conjunction with the local authorities we will do our best to see that the provisions of the Bill are enforced.

Question put, and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read a Second time.

Committed to a Committee of the whole House—[ Mr. Kenneth Robinson ]

—for Monday next.