On 24th June I informed the House that, following upon the successful atomic explosion at Monte Bello last year, we were going ahead with the development of atomic weapons to meet various service requirements and that arrangements were being made to carry out trials in Australia.

The proving ground for these atomic weapon trials is now being prepared on the Woomera Rocket Range. The trials will be conducted by Sir William Penney and a team of scientists from the Ministry of Supply. They will be assisted by Australian scientists, who have accepted responsibility for certain important tasks in connection with the observation and measurement of the results.

As at Monte Bello, the opportunity will be taken to obtain further data of interest to the Fighting Services and Civil Defence authorities. This will include tests of equipment which will be organised by the Royal Australian Navy, the Australian Army and the Royal Australian Air Force.

I am now in a position to announce that, with the agreement of the Australian Government, these next trials will take place in October.

On the face of it, this statement refers only to Commonwealth participation. Is it to be confined to Commonwealth people or is there any cooperation between us and the American scientists in this matter?

The House is well aware of the attitude of Her Majesty's Government, namely, that we are anxious for there to be a full and free exchange of information on this important subject, to which so much effort and money have been devoted. We should be ready at any time to consider, on a reciprocal basis, any arrangements which can be made for an exchange of information, in particular, of course, with the United States of America.

Can my right hon. Friend say on what date in October this will take place, and can he also say whether the Press will be able to see this explosion?

The timing of the test will depend upon a number of factors, one of the most important being the meteorological conditions, to ensure that the wind is in the right direction to prevent contamination. I am therefore not now in a position, and shall not be until the very last moment, to say exactly on what date these trials will take place. I am considering the question of whether the Press should be present. I am going to Australia in a few weeks' time and shall discuss the matter with the Australian Government.

I should like to pursue further the point put by my right hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) regarding our association with the U.S.A. on this matter. Hundreds of millions of pounds have been spent, and are being spent, on scientific research into atomic energy. The Minister has this morning indicated that he would welcome association and co-operation. May I ask him whether he has in fact, or the Government have, taken any active steps recently to ascertain whether it is possible to obtain this co-operation and association with the United States in these tests on a reciprocal basis, or has he left the matter to an expression in this House?

We have made quite sure that the American Administration is aware of our extreme readiness to have a frank exchange of information. But the position in the United States, as the right hon. Gentleman will know, is governed by legislation. There can be no doubt in the minds of members of the United States Government of our readiness to exchange information. I believe that as our atomic development proceeds it is becoming recognised in the United States that we have more and more to offer and that it would not by any means be a one-sided affair.

Does that mean that our allies, the United States, refuse to cooperate with us in this matter?

It is not a question of refusal, but of security, which is of extreme importance in this matter. We are the last to criticise the United States for the very stringent security precautions which they have taken. Nothing I have said implies the slightest criticism of the United States. It is a very serious matter to decide to impart information of this kind to any outside authority over whose security arrangements you have not complete control. But as I have said, our views have been made known. We think such an exchange would be mutually beneficial, and we are well able to provide the same kind of security safeguards as are provided in the United States. I do not think I can pursue this matter further by question and answer.

Does the right hon. Gentleman's statement mean that scientists are concentrating almost exclusively still on the development of atomic energy for defence purposes? Is it possible for him to say whether, as international tension eases, it will be possible for them to devote more and more attention to the development of atomic energy for peaceful and industrial purposes?

My statement was related to the arrangements being made to test certain atomic weapons and naturally I referred to the military side. But we are spending increasing sums of money on research into the civil applications of atomic energy. Only recently we started the construction of the first experimental power plant to be driven by heat generated from atomic energy.

While not asking the Minister to commit himself this morning, may I ask him to bear in mind that the Prime Minister promised me that at an opportune time the history of the development of atomic power will be published by the Government? Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that those who were associated with the men who were connected with this work in its infancy are anxious to give credit where it is due so that those who worked so hard and long in the Manchester area should have their efforts placed on record and credit given to them?

A great deal of information has already been published about developments in this field. I can assure the hon. Gentleman that, subject to overriding considerations of security, we shall continue to make information available. I agree that in those fields of science which are under the cloak of security, it is most important that as far as possible the achievements of scientists should be made known. But I do not think that there has been any lack of publicity about those who have contributed towards development in this field. There are great names which spring to one's mind and which are widely known throughout the world.

On a point of order. I apologise for intervening at this stage, but while not detracting in any way from the importance of the statement made by my right hon. Friend, I would point out that it has taken up ten minutes. I wonder whether the equally important subject of officers' retired pay could, therefore, occupy a full hour, especially as I understand that one of the other subjects down for debate is not to be pursued this morning.

It is true that the hon. Member for Leek (Mr. Harold Davies) does not intend to raise the subject in the time allocated to him after 4 o'clock, so I have half an hour in hand. I hope to distribute that time among the various subjects. I understand that there is also to be an interruption this morning for a Commission in the other place. I think that it would be wise to extend the first subject for debate until 12.15, and see how we get on.

The subject I wish to raise has already been discussed on several previous occasions both here and in another place. The last occasion when I spoke on this subject was in the Adjournment debate before the Christmas Recess on 19th December last. As then, so now, I must declare an interest. I retired from the active part of the Army in November, 1946, after over 31 years service, and I come for pension or retired pay under the new code of 1946 (Cmd. 6750), which is applicable to those who retired after 19th December, 1945. Therefore, I have a distinct interest in the result of this debate.

I should like to emphasise again in the last few words which I said on 19th December. I was speaking on behalf of certain classes of officers who are suffering great injustice. I said:

"We do not ask the country to overstrain itself on our behalf, but we do ask for justice, and for my part, whatever the cost and whatever the inconvenience to the Government, I shall not rest until we get a satisfactory answer."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 19th December, 1952; Vol. 509, c. 1826.]

In raising the same subject today, my main object is to focus public opinion on the need for fair play and justice for certain old officers who served their country to the best of their ability for a long period of years in all three Services. In addition, there is perhaps the more important aspect which the Government would be well advised to bear in mind that there is a danger that any Government who repeatedly neglect a just claim put forward on behalf of a section of the community will in the end forfeit the respect and confidence of a large number of people.

The present Government never had it.

The Government will engender a certain mistrust in the future on the part of those who are potential officers wondering whether to become Regulars or perhaps to serve for only the two years of their National Service.

In the simplest of terms, what I am asking is that those officers who retired before 1st September, 1950, should have their retired pay raised to the rates applicable to those who retired after that date. That is a simple request. The total cost in round figures would be about £2 million a year. I shall not weary the House by detailing the different changes since 1919. They are by now fairly well known not only by hon. Members but generally. Suffice it to say that between 1919 and 1935 pensions were linked to the cost of living and were subject to periodic review. In 1935, to use a word which I think describes this most accurately and which was used by Lord Schuster in another place, pensions were "fixed" at 9½ per cent. below the 1919 rates.

Many arguments are put forward on behalf of the Government showing why these things cannot be done. I admit that, from 1935 to 1938, there was a slight increase in the purchasing power of the £, and therefore, as a result, the fixing of the pensions was to some extent an advantage to those officers up to that date. On the other hand, if hon. Members care to look at Volume 510 of HANSARD, column 244 for 6th February, they will see that the Chancellor gave certain figures, in reply to a Question, showing the purchasing power of the £, starting with 1938 representing 100. They show that every year the purchasing power of the £ has depreciated in value until, in 1952, which was the last year compared with the figure of 100 in 1938, that purchasing power was only 44.

I personally prefer to take the purchasing power of the £ at 20s, and not 100 in 1938, and if one works it out on that basis, we find that, where an officer had 20s. to spend in 1939, he now has 8s. 10d. There are a number of ex-officers who are trying to exist on a pension given to them on the basis of the £ being worth 20s. at that time, and whose pensions are now worth well under half of what they were worth at that date. There are not many in this category who are completely cut in this way. The figures were given in another place. There are 359, all of whom are old veterans of the First World War, but there are over 6,000 who are not quite so badly treated, but who nevertheless are suffering grave injustice as compared with those who retired since 1st September, 1950.

The cost of restoring the cut made in 1935 would be very small; in fact, £210,000 a year, but, as the Minister of Defence said in another place on 17th June, such a course—that is to say, to restore the cuts for that small number of officers—would not be in accordance with Government policy. In any case, I am quite sure that I speak for all hon. Members who are interested when I say that it would not satisfy us. It certainly would not satisfy me. It might conceivably take some of the sting out of our arguments, but we shall continue until we get satisfaction.

I cannot see why officers who retire after a certain arbitrary date in 1950 should be at a considerable financial disadvantage as compared with those who retired before that date. There is, of course, the old parable of working for a penny a day, but I do not think there is any comparison between working for a penny a day in the 1914 war and working for a penny a day in the more recent war. I happened to be in both, and I can say with honesty that the first World War was 100 per cent. worse than the more recent one for the vast majority of people fighting.

Those officers who gave everything they had other than their lives are at a disadvantage as compared with those who have retired since 1950, and the Government must find an answer which is acceptable to them. To me, as a cavalryman, I find it particularly distasteful to see a Conservative Government, faced with this small obstacle of the Treasury triple bar, digging their toes in time after time and refusing to take the obstacle. Let us close our eyes for a moment and imagine that we have an arena and a small triple bar, with my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary, a nervous rider, about to mount a well known horse which was used for the Trooping the Colour and whose name escapes me at the moment——

Winston.

quite right—and trying to force it over this comparatively small obstacle. As a soldier of some years' service, I could offer him a little advice. He should choose the moment when the going is good, ride in blinkers so that this horse cannot be distracted by other things on all sides and get him over that fence—or through it—but he must not have another refusal.

In conclusion, I want to say that this is not a party matter, for both sides of the House feel equally strongly about it. All that we ask is justice for those who fought for their country and who now, for one reason or another, are not in a position to fight for themselves. For myself, as long as I am in Parliament, I cannot allow this matter to rest until I get satisfaction.

I want to support what has been said by the hon. and gallant Member for Devon, North (Brigadier Peto), but I do not stake my claim as high as he I rest my case, as he does, not on the grounds that these ex-officers want charity, but that what we are asking for is justice.

There is no doubt whatever that, in 1935—and I am making no political case, because we have approached the problem on a non-party basis—there was a breach of faith, and I do not apologise for taking time to recall to our minds the extent of that breach of faith. In 1919, there were two Army Orders, No. 325 for other ranks and No. 324 for officers, which provided for a sliding scale with a tolerance, up and down, of 20 per cent. In 1934, the Government threw it overboard, and said that the rates of retired pay for ex-officers should be fixed at 9½ per cent. below the 1919 rates. I stake my claim today, as I did on the 19th December, 1945, on the basis that the Government, in plain justice and honesty, ought to give a 29½ per cent. increase to all officers who retired before 1946.

I should like to go much further than that, because, as far as I know, the Government have no case at all. Neither the Parliamentary Secretary here nor his noble Friend in another place has ever attempted to answer the case, and, in fact, there is no case beyond the fact that the Treasury do not like these retrospective settlements or giving increases with retrospective effect. The cost of meeting this demand is £370,000, but, if the Government hit somebody in the Treasury on the head and made him disgorge that £370,000, it would have a value far beyond that of the money itself.

As I said a few nights ago during the defence debate, I am quite sure that the difficulties about recruiting, of getting officers to undertake a career in the Army and of persuading other ranks to stay in the Army, are due to the fact that they do not believe that the Army no matter who happens to be the Secretary of State for War, will give them a square deal. They feel that whatever promises are made to them, once the propaganda headlines and the attractive brochures and posters are taken away, someone will be done down.

We had a classic example of this on the eve of the last Christmas Recess when the Minister concerned made an announcement about pensions for the widows of other ranks. At first sight it looked good, but when one examined it more closely it resembled what happened in 1935. Of course, it did not involve a breach of faith as did the 1935 settlement. Despite all the difficulties that exist on this matter between the Service Departments and the Treasury, the Service Ministers know that they have the whole House behind them. They have a cast-iron case, and they are in a position to resist the Treasury's refusal to do anything.

I should have thought that even if the Parliamentary Secretary cannot go as far as his hon. and gallant Friend wants him to go, he could, at least, go as far as I want him to go and say that he recognises that the 1935 settlement, dictated, as it was, in the circumstances of that time, was wrong, and that his noble Friend will do his best to extract from the Treasury this very ordinary concession involving an expenditure of only £370,000. Were he to do that, I am sure there would be a different feeling throughout the Services and a recognition that a past injustice had, perhaps for the first time in history, been put right, and that those who have given their lives in the Service of the Crown have not been forgotten.

We all talk about old soldiers, and tears come to our eyes on Armistice Day, but here is an opportunity to do something which would have a very real meaning to the men concerned and their families, men who have given great service to the country and without which the country would have met defeat in the First World War. They are the most un complaining class of all. They accept duty in the same way as they breathe the air or take their food. They do it without any question and do not complain.

It may be that some of them would be upset because of the way in which I am complaining today on their behalf. But I do not apologise for doing so. As the House knows, I have spent most of my life in the Regular Army, and I honour the integrity and the devotion to duty of this particular group of men. The fact that they are my comrades—though they were officers and I was a member of the other ranks—gives me an opportunity to plead with the Parliamentary Secretary to right the very great wrong done in 1935 and to do something at last for those officers who retired before 1946.

On the last occasion on which we debated this matter, I, too, tried to intervene, but was unfortunate in not catching your eye, Mr. Speaker. Today, I am more fortunate. I do not intend to go over the ground again, because I have no personal connection with the Services, but I want to add my voice to the case that is being made. I will not call it a plea, because I do not see why we should plead in this matter. I think that we are making a straight, an honourable and a just case. For the life of me, I cannot see why the Treasury should not accede to the wishes of the House in this matter.

When the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Defence spoke to the House last December, almost everything he said was incorrect, that is to say, the wrong interpretation was placed upon the case put forward by hon. Members. I will give one example, because I think it is a very good thing to have it on record. In June last, the Minister of Defence, in another place, implied that the Stabilisation Order, 1935, met the wishes of those officers concerned, and, indeed, was welcomed by them, but that he was open to correction. But that is not entirely true. I feel very strongly that it is a very unfair way of presenting a case, because the ordinary public, on reading that, would think that what the Minister said was correct, when, in fact, it was not. We have the evidence of letters which were written at the time protesting against the decision made.

In another place, it was stated that the Minister of Defence, was naturally—as, indeed, I am sure he is—in favour of the claim being put forward, but he very rightly and properly pointed out that he was a member of a team, and that, therefore, he played the game by the team and accepted the decision of the team. That may be so, but I have been in Parliament a very long time, and I know that if Ministers go to the Cabinet and argue strongly in defence of a claim which they are putting forward, they can, on occasion, carry the Cabinet with them. I feel that the Minister of Defence was in a very difficult position, because, of course, he was a Regular serving soldier.

My own view is that a great many Members of the Cabinet do not know sufficient about the case that has been put forward. A great many of them are concerned with defence on a wide scale and with the economic situation on a wide scale. They are concerned to give support to the Chancellor of the Exchequer and to the Minister of Labour, and they do not get down to the human details of the kind of case that we are putting forward today.

It is extremely embarrassing on this issue to have a Parliamentary Secretary in the House of Commons who is not in the Cabinet, and, therefore, does not have to go to his Cabinet colleagues and argue the case. I do not want to join with hon. and right hon. Members opposite in complaining about Ministers in another place, but I think that in this case it is extremely embarrassing. If the Government want to get over that hurdle and want to have less criticism, then they have an admirable opportunity of showing that the position is not affected just because we have only a Parliamentary Secretary in the House of Commons.

I take a very strong interest in what I like to call the small income groups. In this House there is only a handful of people who speak for these retired officers. If they had the whole of the trade union movement behind them, the Government would give way. If they had the whole of the Civil Service behind them, the Government would give way.

No, a Royal Commission.

I seriously suggest to the Parliamentary Secretary that if we do not get justice on this occasion, we should consider opposing the Army Estimates on the next occasion. I should have very great pleasure in doing that because it may be the only way of getting any action taken. These people have no really organised voice to speak for them outside their own organisations, such as the Officers' Pensions Association and the Officers' Society, which, in fact, plead their case. They have no big guns to bring forward. I feel very strongly that it is not decent to listen to pressure from the big chaps and not listen to pressure from the small chaps. It is not the kind of thing I like my Government to do and it is not the kind of thing which is consistent with the spirit of the British people.

We believe in the rights of minorities and the rights of individuals. It is much more difficult for a Regular ex-Service man to plead his case than it is for the civil servant or the trade unionist or others. That is all the more reason why the Government should be the protector of minorities. Unless we get satisfaction, then, if I am spared and if I am still in the House, I look forward to opposing the Service Estimates next year in order to raise this case again.

As a civilian I consider it my duty to support this case, as I support the general case of the ex-Service man for justice. To me the case is a very simple one, both as it affects officers and as it affects other ranks. We have decided from time to time to give certain rewards in the form of pensions and allowances to ex-Service men. Those pensions have declined in value. Indeed, they have declined in value during the last two years inasmuch as the £ is worth 18s. 7d. now compared with 20s. two years ago. The £ is worth some 14s. when measured against the pensions which we gave in 1945. As the hon. and gallant Member for Devon, North (Brig. Peto) pointed out, the pensions of some of these officers are measured in £s which are now worth 8s. or 9s. when compared with 1939.

We have a duty to honour these obligations even in the terms in which they were undertaken in 1945. The men who had pensions awarded at that time have the right to have them made up to the value of 1945. That is even more the case with officers who had pensions awarded in pre-war years. They have a right to have their pensions made up to the same value as that which they held when awarded. The least we can do is to make up the pensions of these officers to their value when they were given.

I am glad that the hon. Lady the Member for Tynemouth (Miss Ward) called attention to the fact that this is a group of people living on fixed incomes, and such people are the real sufferers from the rise in the cost of living. If we can do something this morning to meet the case of one of these little groups, we shall have done not some act of charity but our duty.

I am very glad that two hon. Members opposite have taken part in this debate and illustrated once again that this is entirely a non-party matter and is based simply on the claims of common justice. The matter is one which demands the sympathy of all of us when we consider the services which have been rendered to the country by these officers who are now suffering from the increased cost of living which has taken place over a number of years.

We have had several debates on this subject from time to time but there has been an air of unreality in that nobody disputes that the case is sound and there is no need for us to put forward arguments in its favour.

I was saying that there is an unreality about these debates because the case for dealing with these pensions is so obvious that it scarcely needs arguing, and it is quite evident that both the noble Lord the Minister of Defence in the other place and the Parliamentary Secretary here have very little belief in the case which they have to put forward. Time after time they have been reading out a rather well-thumbed Treasury brief, which must be almost illegible by this time, full of irrelevancies and having little to do with the problem.

I can give the House a few examples of irrelevancies, though I hope that the Minister will not bore us by repeating them today, because we all know them and know that there is no foundation to their arguments. I hope that we shall not be told once more that this and that cannot be done because there is no such thing as retrospection in dealing with increases in pension. That is utterly untrue. Pensions have been increased retrospectively time and time again. Within the last decade there have been at least three Pensions Increase Acts and they have all increased pensions retrospectively. The only point is that they put a ceiling on pensions. The ceiling has been generally dealt with on the basis of hardship cases. The officers are now on the hardship level, and there is really no foundation for all the rubbish which is talked about retrospection in this matter.

The Department have been trying to get away with another ridiculous story. They say that there are not many of these officers now affected because most of them have had their pensions made up by having added service during the war. That means that a lot of these officers were receiving pensions up to 1939. They were recalled and did additional service, and as a result of that added service they have got increased pensions. But that has got nothing to do with the increase in their basic pensions. It is payment for additional service. I hope that we shall not have that nonsensical argument again. As a matter of fact, I do not think my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary will need much time to reply because all these nonsensical arguments have been demolished.

Another statement in this dog-eared brief with which we are so familiar is, "If you give this increase it will lead to a general pressure of increased pay claims." Of course, there is no foundation for that assertion either. The increased pay claims have already taken place. Millions of people have had their increases, and if this increase were given, there would be no justification for all those who have already had increases to say "We must, therefore, have some more." There is nothing in that point.

It should be remembered that, with one exception, this case is unique. There is no other body of people in this country who had a 9½ per cent. reduction in 1935 and have been pegged down to that level ever since. As I say, with one exception this is unique. The exception relates to some civil servants, and not a great number of them either. Their position is, in fact, quite different. They are on a very different structure of pay and superannuation, and it has no relation to the case of the retired officers.

The last defence of the Treasury always in this matter is, "We cannot really deal with this matter separately from the Civil Service. If we give an increase in pensions to retired officers, we have got to give it to all the civil servants." That, again, is utterly untrue. A few of them were in the 9½ per cent. frozen category, but, mainly speaking, there is a great difference between them. I do not understand the case that the two have always got to be considered together. I think there is a world of difference between the servant of the public who risks his life and the man who does not. This story is trotted out every time this brief is read out. But who prepares the brief?—the civil servants, of course. It is their case only, and they are fighting in the last ditch for their case at the expense of these officers. I hope that will not be allowed to continue.

The remarkable thing about this case is this. Suppose for a moment that there is some foundation for the case that they must be considered together. I have been probing this matter since the last time we had a debate, by Question and answer in this House—at least, by Question, for I have never had much of an answer. I have been putting a lot of Questions to the Treasury on this matter. Even if the equivalent increase were given to these civil servants affected, the number of civil servants affected is only 2,500 and the total amount involved would be £150,000. That is the sum total.

The result based on replies to the Questions which I have put to the Treasury about it has taken some working out, because the answers have been evasive and carefully wrapped up in order to give as little information as possible. But if that is the amount involved, it is a very small bill to have to meet in order to grant this simple case of justice.

Some of us are rather perturbed at the news of the appointment of the Royal Commission dealing with the structure of pay and pensions in the Civil Service. I hope that because all other arguments against the case for officers' pensions have now been destroyed, this is not another fence which is being put up by the Treasury so that they say, "We cannot now deal with the matter at all until the Royal Commission has reported." One knows only too well that that is a device sometimes employed and the whole matter has to be shelved. These matters are totally separate, and I hope that my hon. Friend is not now going to resort to that device.

There is a straightforward simple case of justice here, and I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Tynemouth (Miss Ward) that if this case is not met some of us will have to take firm action about it. I certainly would not hesitate to vote against the Government on this issue. It is a straightforward issue, and one on which I would be happy to face my constituents if I voted against the Government on it.

As my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Devon, North (Brigadier Peto) pointed out, we have already debated this subject several times and it has recently been debated in another place. My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Hove (Mr. Marlowe) has informed me that all my arguments are already demolished and dog-eared, but there are one or two comments that I should like to make.

First, I think it is a little unfair to accuse the Civil Service of trying to block this claim in their own interests. I have seen no evidence of that at all; in fact, it is far from being the case. My hon. Friend the Member for Tynemouth (Miss Ward) said that officers have very few supporters. Actually, they have many supporters on both sides of the House who put their case, as I have good cause to know, with very great vigour. When one is unable to announce a concession, even with the eloquence of Demosthenes, one is unlikely to please, and the last thing that officers want is a lot of soft soap.

The main thing I want to say is this. My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Devon, North, the hon. Member for Southampton, Test (Dr. King) in particular, and, to a rather lesser extent, the hon. Member for Dudley (Mr. Wigg), put the claims of officers rather higher than has generally been done before. I am not quite clear from what my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Hove said whether he was only asking for the restoration of the 9½ per cent. cut, or whether he was asking for the full 1950 rates. The hon. Member for Southampton, Test was really asking for more than the 1950 rates. He was asking that officers should be entirely spared all results of inflation.

It is perfectly true that inflation has caused, and is causing, suffering to everybody living on a fixed income. The question arises, however, whether it is really possible for the State to compensate all who have suffered from inflation. Some classes of people suffer very little from inflation—the ordinary wage earner, for example, whose wages lag slightly behind the cost of living, although, on the whole, his increase in wages marches fairly closely in step with the rise in the cost of living. But that is not so with those whom we are now considering, and it is perfectly true to say that they have suffered.

On the other hand, if hon. Members say that officers must be completely compensated, it will be very difficult, especially to go as far as my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Hove does and say that nobody else need be compensated. I do not think we can draw that distinction and say that only one class of Service pensioners or one class of person in the country should be able to get away from the evil consequences of inflation.

That is not the point. The point I am putting is that these are a unique class of case. They are the ones who were cut in 1935 and the others were not.

I was dealing with the claim that everyone should have the 1950 rates. As to the 9½ per cent. cut, it is not quite true to say that they were the only people affected. There were, in fact, as the hon. and learned Gentleman has elicited from my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer by a number of Questions, parallel cuts in the Civil Service, and, in equity, if we restore one we have to restore the other.

But there is a great difference. After all, the Civil Service were not subject to the provisions of Army Order 324, 1919.

That, of course, as the hon. Member knows, is a very old argument.

That is a silly thing for a Conservative to say.

It has been refuted from this Box by the right hon. Gentleman's party.

I should like to take up one point of my hon. Friend the Member for Tyne-mouth. She said it was quite untrue to say that the Service people at the time wanted the pensions stabilised. I have taken the trouble to look back at the files concerning events of those days, and it is true, as far as I can make out, that all the pensioners were in favour of stabilisation. It certainly has worked out badly in the event, but none the less, the pressure was in favour of stabilisation.

On the point of retrospection, it is true that the Pensions Increase Acts of 1944, 1947 and 1952 had certain retrospective effects, but the point has already been made that it is unusual—in fact, I do not think it is ever done—that when an entirely new pay code, such as those of 1945 and 1950, is introduced, the benefits of the new code should be automatically retrospectively applied. As my noble Friend has pointed out in another place, if, when there is a rise of pay, all the benefits have to be extended retrospectively to every single pensioner, then it will be very difficult to get any concessions out of the Treasury in the matter of pay.

My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Devon, North pointed out that he is a cavalry officer, and no doubt he is a much bolder horseman than I am. He urged me to get this particular horse over the obstacle. We are doing our best, but we are riding a very nappy animal and we have got a tough obstacle in front of us.

What is its name?

My hon. and gallant Friend will be able to think of an adequate name for it. I am sorry to say that I cannot announce any concession today. I can only repeat the words of my noble Friend, that he is doing everything he can to secure a fair settlement of this matter, and I can assure the House that he is pursuing the matter with all the vigour which he can command.

Our country almost lives upon coal and we all desire to increase its output, because coal is our modern gold. The nation wants more coal and, therefore, the nation should pay for the damage caused by its mining. On behalf of Stoke-on-Trent, in particular, and of other areas, my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, North (Mrs. Slater) and I are asking for an immediate investigation into the effect of mining subsidence, and that that investigation should be of such a character that action will be taken afterwards.

We fear that unless early action is taken Stoke will not be Stoke-on-Trent but, within the next 50 years, will become Stoke-under-Trent. I was privileged to raise this matter first about 1936. Since then, let me admit, we have made some progress. We now want this question to be treated as a matter of extreme urgency, and that is why we want to place on record some evidence that demands early investigation.

The Urban District Councils' Association have asked their local authority members for full particulars of the effect of mining subsidence throughout the country, with a view to approaching the Minister of Fuel and Power. We consider this investigation should be the responsibility of the Minister himself, and we are asking the Minister whether he will consider taking action. Many urban districts suffer from the effects of this subsidence, but I doubt whether there are any county boroughs which suffer like the city for which I speak. Mr. Harold Lockett, who is an authority on this problem, and who is secretary of the miners' lodge in my area and who has served upon the Miners' National Executive, has said there is no city in the country which suffers like Stoke-on-Trent. The whole of our city is undermined. It is to be a centre of great development, some of which is now taking place and there are to be further developments in the future.

Millions of pounds are now being spent in our area on capital equipment. Parts of the area will sink at least 15 to 16 feet during the next 20 years. There was nationwide sympathy when our fellow countrymen on the East Coast this year suffered as a result of the floods, and to the credit of the Exchequer, of several Government Departments and of the National Assistance Board, where our old friend, George Buchanan, serves as Chairman, immediate assistance was given to the people there. We fully approved of that, but what we say is that the time has arrived when the whole nation should come to our assistance in the same way.

When the terrible floods struck Lynton and Lynmouth in that beautiful part of the country, the same kind of assistance was given them. The whole country rallied to the support of the Lynton and Lynmouth people. Stocks of clothing were sent immediately, and, in addition, almost every Government Department went to the assistance of those areas. Immediate administrative action was taken, and we are asking today for the same thing. The time has come for the same sort of action and more national support for those who suffer in obtaining Britain's "gold" from our mines, and especially for our own city.

Here are just a few facts. There has been flooding in Fenton, Longton and Hanford, and my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, North will speak about her part of the city. The effect of the subsidence on the Trent, on our sewers and on our brooks has been simply terrible. The Fenton low area, in the centre of my division, during the past 20 years, due to subsidence, has been lowered 20 feet. During the next 20 years it will be lowered a further 16 feet. That means 36 feet of subsidence in less than my lifetime.

Is it right that the people who mine the coal and obtain Britain's "gold," so that we can all live, should also pay for the damage done by mining subsidence? Is it not time that the effect of this damage should be paid for by all? Because I believe that the best results are obtained by understating rather than overstating a case, I am giving a somewhat low figure when I say that there are 77 houses in the Northwood Road, Fenton area where the drains cannot function properly through subsidence. Flooding takes place and often the sewage flows into the roads, into the yards of the houses and even into the basements. Should this be allowed in 1953?

The city council are doing all they can, but they have inherited a terrible legacy from years of mining in that area. I want to pay a tribute to the officials for their public spirit. They are all eager to minimise the effect of subsidence and some of them have worked nearly day and night. Indeed, I understand from my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, North that one of them is now in a mental institution because of overwork in dealing with this problem.

While we wait for the Ministry of Housing and Local Government, the city are pumping, at a cost of £700 a year since last February, the sewage that should flow normally through the sewers. In April, they approved a relief of flooding scheme as a temporary method of dealing with this problem for the Fenton low area at a cost of approximately £9,000. It is at least three months since the city applied for a loan from the Ministry of Housing and Local Government to deal with this problem and the loan has not yet been sanctioned. The need for this scheme is entirely due to mining subsidence. Is it right that the men who mine the coal should be subject to this kind of treatment in their own areas? Is it right that the men and women who manufacture and decorate the most beautiful pottery in the world should be subject to this kind of treatment in their own area and in their own homes?

In the opinion of the city surveyor, who is a very able man, there would have been no problem of flooding had it not been for mining subsidence and the sewers would have functioned, as they do in other parts of the country, in the normal way for years. At present, due to mining subsidence, they have completely collapsed in several places in our city and, in my area in particular, the sewage is pouring into the old manholes.

Will the Minister ask that all responsible Ministers should be called together as early as possible to take administrative action within the limits of their existing powers? The Stoke-on-Trent Corporation is spending £36,000 a year on the maintenance of the city sewers alone. In the Hanford, Sneyd Hill and Smallthorne area there are beautiful new housing estates which are a credit to the people. Women, especially, regard living in them as living in heaven compared with the houses they have left. Yet even those houses are now affected, despite the fact that it cost at least £100 more to build each house with reinforced concrete rafts underneath to minimise the effect of subsidence.

Longton Town Hall has been seriously affected and our people cannot use their baths, with all that means to those in overcrowded conditions who think that cleanliness is next to godliness, and wish to encourage their children to believe the same. Further, new coal seams are to be opened at Mossfield and this will require immediate subsidence safeguards or we shall have further serious trouble in the Sandford Hill area.

I do not want to deal with the effect upon schools because my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, North, who has been the very able chairman of the Education Committee for many years, knows the effect upon schools and I shall leave that for her to develop. The same thing applies to churches and chapels and to working men's clubs. They all complain that they are suffering from this cause. Mining subsidence affects our gas mains. In the winter explosions often take place, a whole area is uprooted, and people who are as good as any of us lose their lives and their poor homes.

The same applies to water pipes, to roads and to streets. Subsidence has affected the foundations of the roads, with the result that water flows in and there is subsidence of the road itself. All the time the city pays for this damage, and when we speak of "the city" it means every man and woman who lives in that area and pays the rates. Therefore, we feel that we have produced sufficient evidence this morning to demand an early investigation and, when the report is presented, early action.

Up to now I have spoken only of the past, but what I am about to say will emphasise the seriousness of the problem in the future. In the city of Stoke there are at least 4,500 million tons of coal in deeper seams yet to be mined. Further surveys are being made and enormous development will take place in the southern end of the city towards Stone, Longton, Trentham and Blurton. We welcome this because, from a national point of view, it is good news and good work but we ought not to be left to bear the cost of what the nation demands.

There are millions of tons of coal which could not have been mined a few years ago because of the difficulties but, due to the development of science and engineering, it is now possible to mine deeper and deeper and we shall suffer as a result. Let me emphasise however, speaking for about 270,000 of our people, we welcome this development. Thousands of men and women will come and live in the area with all that means, but we say that if the nation takes the coal, the nation should pay for the coal. If the nation is responsible for the damage caused by the taking of coal, the nation should accept the responsibility of financing the results of the damage it causes.

Hear, hear.

My hon. Friend says "Hear, hear" and I am glad that he supports that statement. I believe in giving credit where it is due, and he and the previous Member for Abertillery, the late George Daggar, advocated this policy to the Turner Committee when they were investigating the problem. While that is not referred to in the report, which I have read carefully, it is on the minutes of the proceedings.

New shafts are to be sunk in our area, pits are being modernised and intensive mining is to be introduced. We welcome that, but we say that it is time it was paid for by the Exchequer. When my right hon. Friend the Member for Derby, South (Mr. Noel-Baker) introduced the 1950 Coal-Mining (Subsidence) Act, we took a great interest in it because of our responsibilities. I invite anyone who is interested to read what we said during the debates on that Bill. My right hon. Friend said:

"It is a modest Bill to deal with one part only of the problem caused by mining subsidence, but it is…the part which involves the cases of greatest need."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 25th April, 1950; Vol. 474, c. 787.]

The Act, as the Bill became, has given the greatest satisfaction to the people who have benefited in our area, but we now place on record the facts and hope that we have established our case for further action to be taken.

It was in 1938 that I saw put through the House the first Bill to nationalise the ownership of coal. I remember, in particular, the contributions of my late right hon. Friend Sir Stafford Cripps and of the late Mr. Oliver Stanley, who represented Bristol constituencies. I have not forgotten how constructive they were. In 1946, I saw the introduction of the Bill to nationalise the coal industry. We now say that the next logical step is to carry out an immediate investigation, because we are so sure of our case that we feel that an investigation would bring about an acceptance by public opinion that the responsibility of the damage done by mining subsidence is a national one and should be an Exchequer charge.

The people who can benefit from the 1950 Act are already very appreciative of its limited benefits. The women in Stoke now have a saying, "We have got the Coal Board in, and it is good work they do." I pay a tribute to the Coal Board, and especially to their officials in the North Staffordshire area, for the sympathetic way in which they carry out the provisions of the 1950 Act; and I compliment the workmen employed on their high standard of repairs. I have walked round street after street to see the work being done in Fenton and Longton, and their work is a credit, but we want it now carried a stage further to deal with the effects of mining subsidence upon the municipal services in the area.

When the Bill was going through in 1950 I said that I welcomed it as a first instalment. We now want further instalments for dealing with this problem. We call in aid paragraph 62 of the Turner Committee's Report, which states:

"… we can see no sufficient ground for distinguishing between the direct burden of subsidence damage when it falls on the individual and the indirect burden when it falls on the limited community of a coalmining area."

That is part of our case today.

We are also supported by paragraph 63, which further reinforces our plea. We ask the Minister to consider the case that we are making and to consider the facts that we place on record. We ask him to consult the Chancellor of the Exchequer as soon as possible, in the hope that an investigation will be made that will lead to early action upon the lines for which I have been asking.

I support my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South (Mr. Ellis Smith) in his plea that the question of an investigation is an urgent matter. In my own constituency, during the past few months we have had 16 cases of serious flooding. In each of those cases the cause has in the main been due to old and inefficient sewers and sewers which have been seriously affected by mining subsidence.

In one area in Cobridge, in my constituency, part of a new sewer has been laid, but it had to finish because of the expense; and in that area during the last few weeks the flooding resulted in sewage being washed into the houses of the people in the immediate area. The streets were also affected. Nearby is an infant and primary school, and many of the children from the adjoining area had to walk through the streets which were affected by the sewage being washed back into them. In addition, there is nearby a children's playground, and this, too, suffers from the effects of the flooding.

The complaints which were made to me about a month ago came not only from the womenfolk of the affected houses and those who had been affected over a number of years, but they came to me also from the school in the vicinity. This flooding is not only an inconvenience to the people in the houses, but is a positive danger to the health of the people, and in particular of the children, in the area. None of us would like to contemplate living near conditions of that kind.

Again, in my constituency, there is a large housing estate which has been built since the war. Three weeks ago I had a deputation of people to see me because they were living in houses which were seriously affected by mining subsidence. They wanted to know just what would happen to them. Those houses on the Chell Heath Estate are not only in one part of the estate, but are spread over many parts of it. As my hon. Friend has said, in our city we have to spend £100 on every house which is built as an additional precaution against the effect of this mining subsidence.

At Sneyd Hill quite recently, not only have houses had to be repaired, but public conveniences have had to be taken clown and rebuilt, because they were a danger. They, too, were comparatively new, having been built just before the war. The result of this is not only the initial expense, but the constant repair, the inconvenience to the people who live in the affected houses, and the fact that to the local authority every person who has to be rehoused while repairs are taking place means that another needy family is prevented from being rehoused for many months.

The reinforcement which has to be done on every new school which is built in Stoke-on-Trent runs into a cost of tens of thousands of pounds. This is a serious fact when one considers the great expense of building a school in another area; but to build it in an area such as Stoke-on-Trent means a considerable added expenditure.

Again, in my constituency, which was at one time the area represented by my hon. Friend the Member for Leek (Mr. Harold Davies), we have had recently to close and pull down a school in the Packmoor area which was shifting until it became too dangerous to leave children in the school; and we had to put on the site, because the area had to be served, a lightweight school. In another area we started to build a new school about two years ago, but difficulties were encountered immediately. That school has been delayed because of the effects of mining. Again, in Tunstall, the Roman Catholic school is wanting a site for rebuilding. At present the children are housed in a shocking old, dilapidated and antiquated building. It is a disgrace that children should have to be in a school of that kind. A site has been acquired but about four months ago it was stated that the site would have to stand for 10 years before it could be built upon because of the effects taking place.

My hon. Friend has mentioned the Eastern Valley sewer. As he said, we are spending £4,000 now on repair work to that sewer. It is a very old one and the original loan for the construction of the sewer has not yet run out. I have a report which our sewerage engineer and city surveyor produced recently. Discussing the question of new pumping stations, the engineer said:

"It is considered that the siting of one of the pumping stations in the Valley of and near to the Fowley Brook would be fraught with great practical difficulties which might become insuperable in the event of adverse conditions developing due to mining subsidence."

Future housing development in my constituency depends on the provision of adequate sewers. At present, when people in my area come to me about their housing difficulties, I have to tell them, "If you go to the southern end of the city you can get a house, but at this end we cannot build, even though we have sites on which to build, because we have inadequate sewerage facilities."

I wish to re-state the plea made by my hon. Friend that we should remember that the burden of damage in these coalmining areas is on those to whose efforts we owe so much. Our national economy depends very largely on how far we can continue to extract coal from the earth. My hon. Friend has said that our area is one which is due for large expansion in coal-mining and the sinking of shafts. We ask that very special consideration shall be given to an investigation into this problem so that local authorities such as ours may be saved from having to bear on their own rates the added burden for which the State itself should take responsibility.

As an hon. Member who was privileged to serve on the Turner Commission which investigated this problem, I wish to pay tribute to the really excellent work which was done by the chairman, officials and others who devoted themselves to travelling all over Britain investigating what is a tragic problem for local authorities in the coal fields. I was responsible for bringing that Commission to the City of Stoke-on-Trent and its environs. There we saw conditions which are second to none in Britain in the burden they cast on local ratepayers.

Coal must be won. Britain possesses few natural resources—land, coal and the skill, intelligence and profound common-sense of the British people—but with those possessions we can face the world. I would not like to introduce any acrimony into the debate by making a party point, but as one who has spent years investigating the problem I think the time has come for the British people to look into the question of mining subsidence from the national point of view. Whatever Government may do it—I hope the present Government may find time—another review of the problem should take place.

As we have to win more and more coal in order to build up our standards of life, we are bound to affect conditions in the mining areas. To me it seems very unfair that beautiful seaside places and country districts can have their coal as a result of the sweat and toil of miners, while people who live in the mining areas have to bear the burden of reconstruction of undermined property. It may be that the time has come for a Government to look at the problem from the point of view of a national coal levy.

I may be wrong, but I ask whether we could not put the burden for mining subsidence on the whole of the British people so that seaside places, country districts, and industrial districts may each bear a fair share. Probably that problem could be solved through the Exchequer. Might that not be a better way of dealing with the matter than to throw the burden on to the price of every ton of coal? The issue which we have to face is that if another 6d. is put on a ton of coal, we shall put up the cost of transport and the cost of production and that may affect our export markets. Every copper put on to the price of a ton of coal, by an economic multiplying effect, shows itself throughout Britain's economy. Therefore, I ask whether we could not look at this matter from a national point of view.

I know that the present Ministry are interested in this question, as we were when we were in power, and I am sure they are prepared to do their utmost to solve this national problem. I suggest that perhaps the time has now come to deal with the national problem of mining subsidence by somehow evolving a formula by means of which the entire financial burden of replacing amenities is not put on to the price of a ton of coal won from the earth, but on the people throughout Britain. I am sure the House is indebted to my hon. Friend for raising this vital problem today.

I begin by differing on one point from my hon. Friend the Member for Leek (Mr. Harold Davies). He spoke of mining subsidence. I always say subsidence because it is a subject in connection with which another similar word, "subsidies," should be freely used.

I want briefly but warmly to support what has been said so eloquently and cogently by my hon. Friends and to support their plea for an urgent investigation by the Government into this subject and for any action which, under existing legislation, the Government may be able to take. My hon. Friends have urged that coal remains, as it will long remain, the basis of British industrial prosperity. The National Coal Board have increased the annual output of coal by 40 million tons above the lowest level of production in 1945. We all hope—no one more than the Minister and his colleagues—that the output will be still further increased as quickly as possible by scores of millions of tons.

As my hon. Friends have said, every ton of coal extracted increases the prosperity of the nation on the one hand, but, on the other hand, is liable to cause hardship, injustice and serious financial loss and destruction of amenities to individuals who win the coal and the communities in which those individuals and their families live. These lamentable results have been recognised as a social problem for more than 30 years. In 1920 the Sankey Commission said that damage to houses from subsidence was

"not consistent with the public well-being."

In 1927 another Royal Commission published a Report after studying the problem for several years. It was not a very good Report. It proposed quite inadequate action about damage to existing small houses owned by private persons. It rejected all the claims of the local authorities to help or compensation for damage to schools, public buildings, sewerage systems, etc., the claims of public utility undertakings for damage to tramways, waterworks, etc., and claims for damage to large buildings—hospitals, churches and halls. But even on the small sector on which it recommended some action nothing was done for 20 years.

It was left to the Labour Government, in 1947, to appoint the Turner Committee, on whose Report the Government of 1950 based what my hon. Friend has referred to as their modest but, as he also said, and I agree, important, and I think successful Bill. That Bill dealt with what I called, in introducing it, "the cases of gravest hardship" that then arose—damage to small houses whether owned by private individuals or local authorities, whether existing or built thereafter: and it was retrospective, and dealt with the damage which had developed since 1947.

The Royal Commission of 1927 had hoped that as a result of its Report damage of all kinds, to all classes of property and public services and installations, would be reduced by better planning—this is a point which I wish to urge on the Parliamentary Secretary —better mining, better planning underground and on the surface, the disclosure of mining plans to local authorities and full co-operation between pit managements, local authorities, architects and builders. The Commission hoped that its Report would lead to better methods of construction, the avoidance of long terraces of houses which transmitted damage all along the row, that it would lead to the use of ferro-concrete foundations for new houses, etc.

The hopes of that Royal Commission of 1927 were not fulfilled. Up to the appointment of the Turner Committee in 1947 the physical effects of subsidence and subsidence damage had scarcely changed. But the Turner Committee agreed with the Royal Commission of 1927 that prevention is better than cure and that much could be done by better planning and construction to prevent the damage from taking place. The Turner Committee recognised that the nationalisation of the coal industry gave a great chance for a new start on all aspects of this problem. They believed, as I believed, and as I often urged on the Coal Board, that it should greatly facilitate this work on co-ordinated planning above and below ground to reduce the damage which results from subsidence.

The first thing I wish to ask the Minister is whether progress is being made in that regard. I realise that progress is very hard to measure, but has he been consulting the Coal Board about the matter? If so, what did they say; if not, will he do so and press them very strongly on the point? The second thing I wish to ask the hon. Gentleman is whether he has been studying, with a view to action, the problems that were not dealt with by the Act of 1950, and to which my hon. Friends have drawn attention? Is he seeing what will be required to carry out the rest of the Turner Report?

When I was introducing the Act of 1950, I made it clear that it was not adequate to deal with the problem which had to be solved. On Second Reading, I said of that Bill:

"Many of my hon. Friends wish that it went further. So do I, and so do the local authorities concerned. … we have discussed the Bill with the various local authorities' associations, which have reserved their right to press for further legislation to carry out fully the proposals of the Turner Report."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 25th April, 1950; Vol. 474, c. 798.]

I said, on Third Reading:

"This is the best Bill we could hope to get in present circumstances, and this is the most generous way in which we can deal with this…situation. Many of my hon. Friends and some hon. Members opposite have expressed the hope that there will soon be another Bill. Speaking personally, so do I. The subject needs a lot more study, and I am going to start the study."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 25th May, 1950; Vol. 475, c. 2328.]

I gave two reasons for limiting the Act of 1950 to damage to small houses, and to that alone. The Turner Report had proposed to change the whole law of mining, which is an immensely complex and difficult affair. To have prepared a Bill applying the whole Report would have taken months, perhaps many months. I judged, and events showed that I rightly judged, that if we had tried to get a complete Bill we should in that Parliament have got no Bill at all.

The second reason I gave was that in the then economic situation of the country we could not stand more charges. I gave further study to the subject after our Bill was passed, and I came to the conclusion that that second reason was probably almost completely invalid. I hope that the Minister will not urge it today. My further study made me think that this damage to all classes of property will go on occurring—we hope on a smaller scale if better planning succeeds, but it will happen. It has to be dealt with. The local authorities do in fact deal with it; they spend great sums on trying to put things right. The Treasury have to give them assistance to help them.

There is a certain amount of delay and a lot of hardship, inconvenience and loss of amenities to the communities concerned which should not happen. In the long run, however, the economic burden for the nation is the same. If we view the matter rightly, I think that if this problem is dealt with as a whole there will be no extra burden on the nation. The Treasury may have to carry a larger charge but the burden to the nation will be the same. It will, however, get much better results, and a grave injustice that now exists to the mining community will be ended.

The present Government were deeply committed, when they were in opposition, to dealing with this problem as a whole. May I remind the Parliamentary Secretary of some things which they said? The then right hon. Member, Mr. Brendan Bracken, who always took such a colourful and eccentric part in the proceedings of the House, and whose departure we all so much regret, called our Bill "totally inadequate." He asked us, "Why do you not bring in an adequate Bill. We on this side of the House want an adequate Bill." He made it plain that he wanted the whole Turner Report. The present Minister argued for a more adequate Bill——

The right hon. Gentleman is straying perilously close to the bounds of order. On an Adjournment debate we are not permitted to discuss further legislation.

I apologise, Mr. Speaker, if I am out of order, and I will refrain. I was only trying to make the case, in the light of what the present Government said when in opposition, that they ought now to carry through a very urgent investigation of this matter, and that they ought to take such action as may be possible under existing legislation. In view of your Ruling, Sir, I will refrain from an extremely effective quotation which I should otherwise have made from the Joint Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, who was a colleague of my hon. Friends on the Turner Committee, and who said in plain terms that we ought to get the whole of the Report.

That is the case I wish to make in support of my hon. Friends. I am urging the Government that they should not delay any longer in taking real action on this matter, that they should study what is involved and do their best to meet the great social injustice to which my hon. Friends have called attention.

I can, at all events, assure the House that there is no question of delay about this matter so far as we in our Department are concerned. We are very well seized of the seriousness of the problem; and if I may say so to the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South (Mr. Ellis Smith), we have very great sympathy indeed with the anxieties, the financial difficulties and troubles and the gross unpleasantness, which he has described, in his constituency and to which his constituents are subjected.

The importance of this matter is well illustrated by the fact that this is the third occasion during this Session on which we have debated the subject. That alone should assure the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Derby, South (Mr. Noel-Baker) that his hon. Friends have been exceedingly active in ensuring that my right hon. Friend and I recognise the need for a solution to this problem. The hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South, skilfully evaded the trap into which his right hon. Friend fell, by asking for an inquiry. That was very subtle. But I wonder whether he appreciates that he is not the only person who wants an inquiry. I came across a letter in the "Manchester Guardian" from a coal merchant, who shares the desire of the hon. Gentleman for an inquiry, but from a different point of view. Writing from Nottingham, he says:

"Personally, I should like to see an inquiry made into the amount being paid out by the National Coal Board for repairs to property on account of subsidence "—

I would join here with the hon. Member for Leek (Mr. H. Davies), and in opposition to the right hon. Gentleman, about the pronunciation of the word "subsidence."

"In my own area, subsidence and damage to houses has been known for many years, but never have I seen such a spate of repair work being done. The total cost throughout the country must be a colossal figure. How much increase in the price of coal per ton does that cost account for? To many people a nationalised industry suggests limitless funds. Is it becoming too easy to get repairs done and paid for by the National Coal Board? Could not some repairs well be left alone while more urgent building work is done? "

I quote that to illustrate the fact that there is another point of view.

A merchant's point of view.

He is a coal merchant, but he writes as a member of the public.

Since the Parliamentary Secretary has quoted that letter, I hope he will immediately dissociate himself from that point of view and tell us what is the cost to the Coal Board. He cannot want these houses to remain unrepaired, as they used to be in the old days.

I would not agree that they all went unrepaired in the old days, although there may have been a few instances where they were not repaired. I would not associate myself with that point of view any more than I would accept the argument in the letter, which I quoted merely to show that there is another point of view.

The hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South used an exceedingly interesting illustration during his speech. He said that the country rallied round in a national way to meet the flood disasters both on the East Coast and at Lynmouth. That is true. But the hon. Gentleman will agree when I say that the country rallies round in a national way when the mining industry suffers from one of those major disasters—which, we hope, may become less frequent—when often many lives are lost and grief and anxiety are caused. I do not recall any case where the public has been slow in coming forward to help the mining community.

The hon. Gentleman's claim is disproved by his own argument. I represent a seaside area, in which we suffer perpetually from coast erosion in a way analagous to that in which his constitu ency suffers from mining subsidence. We lose up to 30 feet of England every year in one part of my constituency where complete houses have fallen into the sea. It will be recalled that not long ago there was a Coast Protection Act, but I do not recall that during the discussions which preceded it the theory was advanced by the Government that the cost of protecting the coast of England should be a national charge.

Nevertheless, it should be.

That may be the view of the hon. Gentleman, but it was recognised—I may say, frankly, against my own argument, as one who was interested—that it was right for the primary cost of protecting property round the coast of England from erosion should be a local charge. There are certain contributions which may be received, but, by and large, the policy in that Act is the same as the Government policy regarding mining subsidence. If one argues that mining subsidence cost should be a national charge it follows that there are many other matters which also should be a national charge.

I believe that the cost of coast protection should be a national charge, but this is the point. The danger to life from cracked gas pipes following subsidence is considerable. People in Britain die because of these cracked pipes. Is the danger to life and limb from coast erosion greater? I cannot argue about it, but before I accept the statement of the Parliamentary Secretary I should like to weigh the evidence. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will not push that argument as though we were just looking to ourselves, and forgetting the people who have suffered from the effect of coast erosion. We are not.

I was not intending to push that argument; in fact, I thought I had left it. The fishing industry presents a similar problem. All I am suggesting is that once the argument for allowing these things to become a national charge is accepted a door is opened, and one does not know what may rush through it.

The hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South referred to certain matters with which I cannot agree. He quoted the effect on local authorities. The right hon. Member for Derby, South recognised that the special position of local authorities had been gone into at great length by the Blanesburgh Commission. He gave me the impression that he did not consider that the recommendations of the Commission were good. They went into the argument very fully and came to the conclusion at that time that there should be no additional advantage in this respect offered to local authorities, with the exception of certain mining areas upon which they make recommendations.

The circumstances of that time have not deteriorated so far as relationship is concerned. There is a general code for local authorities in dealing with mining subsidence. It is a complicated, difficult and somewhat limited matter, but it gives them certain advantages over and above those which private owners have. There are steps which they can take. It is impossible for me to argue the point about Stoke-on-Trent with the hon. Gentleman without knowing the special circumstances under which the local authority may be responsible for mining subsidence as a result of past history.

As I understand the position, it is that for main sewers in normal circumstances, where appropriate notices, and so on, have been given, there is a liability on the Coal Board for damage resulting from mining subsidence. Therefore, I am slightly at a loss to understand how the cases to which he referred arose.

Certainly, with regard to the drains of a house which comes under the 1950 Act—the drains which are actually beneath or within the curtilage of the house—there is no question of the National Coal Board's responsibility there, provided that the owner of the house is not the beneficiary of contractual rights with regard to mining subsidence and that the owner of the house has not opted for the benefit of his contractual rights as against his statutory rights. That is a minor point, but it is one which protects a certain number of cases, and I mention it particularly because the hon. Gentleman has recently written to me on a special case in which that arises. I have replied to him rather in that sense.

I fear that we have not much time for any general consideration of this subject now. We must recognise that the only way to avoid subsidence is to avoid digging coal. We all recognise that that is an impossibility, but there are considerable ameliorations of the situation which can be made. One concerns the method of mining—more improved methods of stowage underground—which is calculated to help. The hon. Member referred to the improvement in mining methods in his area, and also to the fact that it is planned to work deeper seams and to have deeper pits. All that is likely to help.

There is no limit of depth which we can fix below which subsidence will not go. One cannot say that if we mine at a depth of more than 3,000 feet we shall not get subsidence on the surface. It depends entirely on the geological formations of the soil. Mines may run into a fault and if it is disturbed the fault may run almost vertically towards the surface. Damage to the fault at the base may be reflected almost immediately on the surface. There is no hard and fast rule, but, as the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Derby, South said, there is the other direction in which improvement can well be sought and found, and that is with regard to planning control and planning permission.

The right hon. Gentleman asked two specific questions. The first was: what action is being taken by the National Coal Board about notifying their proposals and collaborating with others responsible for building and works in the neighbourhood? Considerable progress has been, and is continuing to be, made. The regional physical planning committees are kept in close touch with the plans of the National Coal Board. This is a two-way traffic which the Board have been pressing as they are most anxious to see that every step is taken to minimise potential damage for which they may be responsible.

The second question was whether we are studying with a view to action the Turner Report. I assure the right hon. Gentleman that our studies of this problem are continuous. I have said that hon. Gentlemen would give me no opportunity to go to sleep on it even if I wanted to, because they frequently seek to debate the question. Confession is good for the soul and I must confess that it surprised me when the right hon. Gentleman arrived at the conclusion that the second reason which he had given for not proceeding with a major Bill was invalid. That surprised me, because the cost of mining subsidence is an unknown quantity. Nobody can really tell what it would amount to.

There are many cases when cracks appear in houses. That may be due to damp getting into the ground and the shifting of clay subsoil or it may be due to bad building; but wherever there is mining subsidence the claim is made if a crack appears that it is due to mining subsidence.

Mathematics are on their side.

That is one of the great problems with which we have to deal.

The right hon. Gentleman asked me one other question about cost. The cost under the 1950 Act is well known. The actual figure to date is £1,200,000, which has been spent by the Board, to which the Government have contributed £600,000. In addition, the right hon. Gentleman asked for details of the compensation which the Board have to pay for mining subsidence or the cost of the repairs they make. The best that I can do, in immediate reply, is to say that in 1952 according to the Board's Report, and making certain allowances of which I have been advised, the overall figure for the repair of surface damage was approximately £2 million.

That is a substantial amount when we bear in mind the complications both of law and of fact, the multitudinous Acts passed in connection with mining subsidence, the inquiries which have already taken place, and the fact that a number of people have dispossessed themselves of rights to compensation whereas others have already acquired rights to compensation in days gone by. I think that the amount which has been paid out indicates that the Coal Board is meeting its liabilities in a very serious way and is materially assisting the problem.

While we will continue to consider the matter upon these lines, my right hon. Friend is anxious to see how this relationship between the Coal Board and the owners of property—whether they are local authorities or others—works out under the more modern conditions, and especially how the 1950 Act affects the position. With those observations, I assure the House that we recognise the seriousness of this problem and will continue to try to find a way of meeting the urgent needs to which the hon. Gentleman referred.

May I ask the Parliamentary Secretary a question? He spoke of the Report of the Blanesburgh Commission of 1927 and about the local authorities. I hope he was not endorsing what the Commission said; indeed, I would like him to deny it. After all, apart from that point, the Turner Committee threw it over completely and the whole of his party, when in opposition three years ago, endorsed the opposite principle now contained in the Turner Report.

I do not think there is anything that I need add to what I have said.

We may take it, then, that the Parliamentary Secretary did not endorse the Report of 1927?

I will readily admit, in changing the subject of debate rather abruptly, that a less appropriate day, or indeed a less appropriate season, to press for larger water supplies could hardly be chosen, but it seems about two years since the House had an opportunity of discussing rural water supplies. That may be interpreted as meaning, and perhaps does mean, that all is going very smoothly.

Generally speaking, I would not dispute that. I think we have made and are making good progress in this direction. Indeed, when the Minister comes to answer, I have no doubt that he will be able to produce some very admirable figures to that effect, but they will not—and I am sure he will admit it--tell the whole story of water supplies and the difficulties which are now confronting some of the local authorities.

There are some difficulties; we have encountered them in East Kent, and I have no doubt that other counties have experience of them. I think this is, in many ways, an appropriate time to raise this subject, because in a season of drought all rural water difficulties are naturally emphasised. This, however, has been, if anything, an inclement summer, and therefore the difficulties to which one calls attention are not these due to unnatural causes but, possibly, are more administrative.

In dealing with these difficulties, I have no desire to disparage the progress which has been made, and I hope that my hon. Friend will appreciate that. The overall figures are certainly impressive. Something like £72 million worth of rural schemes have been submitted, rather more than half of that total amount has been authorised to begin, another £15 million worth has been approved in principle but not authorised, and well over £5 million has actually been paid, with another £10 million to come.

But as was indicated two years ago, when we were discussing the 1951 Act to supplement the provisions of the Act of 1944, the crucial factor is not what has been promised or what has been laid on one side, but what has actually been spent, and in this direction one quite rightly recognises that my hon. Friend does not possess an unfettered discretion. The arbiter here is not his Ministry, but to some extent the Treasury, and I have no way of telling—and I would ask for guidance on that point—how far the capital allowance falls short of what the Ministry itself would like.

The principal water undertaking in my constituency, the Mid-Kent Water Company, was told by the Ministry in relation to one proposal that the capital available was totally inadequate for what they desired to do. That is a comment which has been made by the Ministry and passed on by the local authority, and I think it would be useful if some comment could be made on it. I should like to make the point quite frankly that the capital allocations from the Treasury—or the shortage of them, if they exist—can often be made the excuse for sluggish administration, not only at the centre, but locally as well.

This non-availability of capital can be used as a reason for not doing something which could perfectly well be undertaken administratively. I am well aware that the Treasury can be made the whipping boy for too much, and that too much can be laid at their door in relation to the capital shortage and the reason things are held up on that account. We should therefore like to have an indication as to how big a factor this capital allocation really is.

That brings me to my second point. In counties like mine, very much of the housing expansion programme in which we justifiably take pride comprises development in villages. Very great expansion is taking place there, and great care is taken that sewerage schemes keep pace with local building. No housing scheme, I think I am right in saying, can be passed unless a sewerage scheme goes with it, but the water capacity does not always form as close a part of these plans. It has been and sometimes is neglected, with unfortunate after-effects, and I should like to feel sure that there is no danger of rural water capacity—and, by capacity, I mean trunk mains capable of pushing the water to where it is required—lagging behind the very remarkable expansion in rural housing which has taken place in the last year or two. I think this applies particularly to trunk mains, where certainly the experience of my own county gives me cause for anxiety.

For instance, in the last eight years, the number of houses supplied with water in the 38 parishes of my division has risen from 5,763 to 7,376, which is a rise of about 28 per cent. Meter supplies—that is to say, water going mainly to supply agricultural undertakings—have risen from 1,030 to 1,687, or 65 per cent. It goes without saying that that increase has imposed very heavy demands upon the mains, and my information is that the expansion, replacement and increase in these mains is not proceeding anything like fast enough. A report from the principal water company in my division puts it this way:

"Most of the agricultural areas are supplied by small diameter mains, and, with the construction of new houses in rural districts, there is no margin at all for additional supplies for agriculture unless these mains are reinforced."

This may be purely a local problem, or a wider one and even a national one, but it is a rather disquieting situation, looking some way ahead into the future, and I hope that my hon. Friend may have something to say about it.

It is not only a future problem, but a present one. For instance, several parishes in one part of my constituency—the Tenterden district—suffer from inadequate pressure through the supply main being too small. Two of these villages—Stone and Wittersham—have to have their water supply supplemented by pumping, for which the rural district council is responsible. The pumping is done from old sources which had been abandoned, and it is carried out at the cost of the equivalent to a 4·2d. rate in the district.

To sum up this part of the problem, a healthy water supply in the rural areas must depend a good deal on maintaining healthy arteries, and I have the impression that in some local areas trunk mains are beginning to disclose the fact that very little was done to them during the war, and that they are now suffering from a kind of arterio-sclerosis. It is, however, difficult to ascertain what is the limiting factor in going ahead with these schemes, whether it is capital or pipes, I suspect that there is difficulty over the supply of pipes, particularly the larger diameter pipes. I am not an expert in these matters, but I mean the pipes required for the larger mains.

I shall be glad if the hon. Gentleman can tell us who is responsible for the production of these pipes, what is the supply situation, what is the prospect, and how things are coming along. I think I am right in saying that the eight and nine-inch mains are very difficult to get. In correspondence earlier this year between his Ministry and the West Ashford Rural District Council on the nine-inch main projected between Charing and Bethersden, a delay of two years was mentioned in the supply of pipes. Is that an inaccurate figure? I know that certain local authorities have cut down the delay very appreciably. It would be helpful to know what the truth is there, because I would say of pipes what I said of capital, that a shortage of them can be made the reason for a certain amount of unreasonable delay.

I now come to the question of grants. In my experience—and I think the hon. Member will have to bear me oat in this—very considerable delays sometimes occur in the trinity comprised by the county council, the Ministry of Housing and Local Government and the rural district council, particularly regarding grants in aid. The terms of the Act on this are clear enough, but the implementing of them, on which there is still doubt, has filled a large number of pending baskets, and not only the pending baskets of the local authorities.

The truth is that the cost of these schemes is really appallingly high, and rural district councils, who have to think in terms of rates, require solid assurances in terms of £.s.d. before they go ahead on sometimes even the smallest schemes. Is the hon. Gentleman sure that the machinery for settling these grant schemes is moving as smoothly and as swiftly as it should?

These schemes require the approval of the county councils. Generally speaking, the county councils tend to favour domestic supply schemes, and I am not happy that the right ratio is being maintained between the county housing estate water schemes and the individual agricultural schemes. If the hon. Gentleman could say a word about the liaison between his Ministry and the Ministry of Agriculture on the joint effort they have to make in these rural water schemes, I think that would be a help. Are we quite sure that those two Ministries are marching in step or that one of them is not getting too large a share of what is available?

There is one outstanding matter for which the hon. Gentleman is not responsible, but it is indicative of what can happen, and I feel constrained to mention it. One of the most afflicted of my villages is a village called Egerton where the shortage of water causes very serious inconvenience to the farmers. In February, the Mid-Kent Water Company wrote to the Board of Trade asking for permission to link a new main to a main attached to a factory controlled by the Board in that district.

I have received copies of the correspondence which has been running splendidly from February up to the beginning of this month, and in which have now become involved the Ministry of Materials and the Ministry of Works, and as yet there is no settlement and Egerton still waits for its water scheme. That kind of correspondence—although I stress again that it is not the responsibility of the hon. Gentleman—does not assist the rapid development of water supplies in the rural areas.

My county council has recently produced a report on the re-organisation of water supplies in the county, mainly concerned with the re-grouping of companies, certain authorities, and so on. I must not dwell upon it, because it may involve private legislation in the future, but the report underlines the very rapid growth of the population in the rural, as well as the urban, areas, and the need to look a very long way ahead in respect of problems which are possibly coming up in the future.

Whatever may be said of the scheme which they propose—and I have not yet really studied it—the Kent County Council have at least shown their willingness to look well ahead at the county's problem. I am sure the hon. Gentleman will agree with me when I say that there is a need for the Ministry to do this, too, and not only to administer the Act as it is, but also to look some way ahead and to examine this question of the capacity of mains and some of the bigger problems that are bound to arise out of the very rapid expansion of rural housing.

We hear a good deal about the need for more electricity—in fact I myself said something on the subject recently—and on the need for more rural telephones. Both are very important, but neither of them, in my opinion, is as important as water in the effort to keep the rural population in the countryside. A woman may be prepared to forgo the telephone, but no woman is prepared to forgo water. I do not wish to exaggerate the position, but the fact is that the lack of water is still sterilising a large number of good agricultural areas.

Whatever the Minister may say in response to this, I can inform him that the debate has paid a small dividend, because, by a remarkable coincidence, soon after it was projected, four of my local schemes, three in East Ashford and one in the Cranbrook Rural District area, were approved. I am not sure that they got the right ones in East Ashford, because neither of the two they picked was supported by the county council. But no doubt the intention was good. I am not looking a gift horse in the mouth, "but wish to express my gratitude here and now for what has been done.

I conclude by paying a tribute to what has been achieved, and I hope that what I have said does not suggest that there has been any considerable failure. I only ask the Minister to accept the fact that there are aspects of the problem which still need serious attention, and possibly a fresh approach, and I shall be glad to have the assurance that they will receive it.

When I saw the list of subjects which had been chosen for discussion today, I counted myself fortunate in that there were certainly two in which I was particularly interested. In my constituency we have, perhaps, more than our fair share of retired officers, and considerably less than our fair share of piped water supplies. Therefore, I was all the more disappointed that I was unable to catch Mr. Speaker's eye in the previous debate, particularly as I was able to draw his attention, on a point of order, to the fact that he might be prepared to extend the debate on the subject of retired officers.

Perhaps I may say, in passing, that I hope that my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Housing and Local Government will be able in his watery reply to lay some of the dust of the useless platitudes to which we had to listen from my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Defence, and perhaps he might tell our hon. Friend, as I was unable to do, that I entirely support my hon. Friend the Member for Tynemouth (Miss Ward)——

Order.

I beg your pardon, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, and I will now address myself to the subject under discussion.

This problem, which has been so ably put to the House by my hon. Friend the Member for Ashford (Mr. Deedes), is really one of a hydro-geological nature, and it obviously varies in different parts of the country. In North-West Sussex, which I have the honour to represent in the constituency of Horsham, there is an enormous area—I have here the actual geological survey on which can be seen a very large patch coloured grey, on the scale of one inch to the mile—which covers almost seven-eighths of my constituency, and which is an expanse of weald consisting of plain, solid clay. It goes down to a depth of from 600 feet to 1,000 feet, and below that, I understand, there are a further 300 feet of clay. On the fringe around Midhurst and the Sussex Downs there is an area of green-sand which runs to chalk, but the vast majority of my constituents must depend for their water supply on piped water and nothing else.

That problem has existed for many years, yet large areas of the constituency are only a matter of 40 or 50 miles from this House. Nevertheless, as far as water supply is concerned, they are living in the Stone Age. What is even more disturbing is that many parts of my constituency depend entirely on shallow wells. They have nothing else on which to depend. Yet as fast as my hon. Friend's Department are trying to improve the situation by approving schemes for piped water, so the Ministry of Health are pulling in the opposite direction by quite rightly condemning very many of these wells as unsuitable for human use.

I do not want to bring party issues into the matter, but I must say that the hopes of people like my constituents were raised by the 1945 Act. I am sorry that the hon. Member for Dartford (Mr. Dodds) is not in his place—I know he is to enter the debate a little later—for I must say quite frankly that it is a great pity that when right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite were in power they utilised so much public money in schemes for agriculture in East and West Africa when, if they had implemented the 1945 Act more fully, there would today be far greater possibilities of increasing the food supplies in this country.

There are three requisites to growing food. The first is the soil, the second is sunshine, and the third is water. Fortunately, in these islands we have the finest soil in the world. My hon. Friend has already referred to our climate, and perhaps the least said about sunshine the better at the moment, but the strange thing is that we seem to get our sunshine. There is, of course, nothing that can be done on the Front Bench here to increase the supply of that most important element.

I therefore come to the third requisite—water; and here I want to pursue the arguments of my hon. Friend the Member for Ashford by pointing out that even in such a summer as this we have a most astounding paradox. We are just seeing out the month of July. Tomorrow is 1st August. I venture to suggest that if our climate turned one of the somersaults for which it is so notorious, and if we awoke tomorrow and found the sun shining—and let us hope that, with Bank Holiday in front of us, that will be the case—and if the sun were to shine for another three or four weeks, then in some areas of this country, particularly in the weald in my constituency, a drought would be proclaimed and there would be a most serious situation in which people would be cajoled to cut down their use of water. That is the paradoxical situation in which we find ourselves.

I want to draw my hon. Friend's attention to some correspondence which we have recently had about a water scheme in my constituency—the Lodsworth scheme. Lodsworth is a small village to the west of my constituency. This scheme is part and parcel of a bigger scheme. The point I want to put to my hon. Friend is this: the scheme at Lodsworth has been turned down because in the opinion of the Ministry of Agriculture, there are not sufficient and weighty grounds in respect of agricultural claims. Nevertheless, it is part of three other schemes which I understand have been approved.

On behalf of my constituents in the neighbourhood of Lodsworth and the neighbouring village of Lurgashall, I want to ask my hon. Friend whether he can give any indication whether the starting date of this scheme will be this year, next year—and I will not go on to say "some time or never." There are in the area, whatever the Ministry of Agriculture may say, people who are making most serious attempts to help the Government by increasing the food production of the country. They have no other way of doing this except by the provision of a piped supply of water.

It is not my wish to detain the House unduly long, but one of the difficulties which arises in my part of the world arises under the Act itself. Under the conditions of the Act, if any person wants to bore a water hole to provide water for his own personal use, he cannot do so without first of all making application to the Ministry of Housing and Local Government. Under the Act the Ministry have to satisfy themselves as to whether or not there are any objections to that course being adopted. I understand that there is an exception in the case of domestic users who wish to bore for less than 50 feet, but normally if any user finds himself on the edge of green-sand country and wants to get a better water supply for himself, he has to apply to the Ministry who, in turn, have to find out whether there are any objections.

I understand that in practice the water companies always object on principle, although I think we all recognise that, with the best will in the world, the regional scheme itself, the main water supply scheme for the whole country, cannot possibly be completed before at least another 10 or 20 years. I do not know whether I am in order in pursuing this point on this subject, but I want to ask my hon. Friend whether some representations could be made to those water companies to think again before they object to such schemes and, furthermore, whether under the Act some encouragement could be given to farmers on a co-operative basis to bore water holes in these greensand and chalky areas and so supply themselves with water which at a later date could be incorporated in the general water supply scheme when it is completed.

The reference which I have made to this strange paradox of at one stage in a summer having too much water, and then, within a few weeks, having too little water, suggests that even when we have a general piped supply it would still be very greatly to our advantage to have some such bore holes which could be used in those circumstances to boost the water supply in the few weeks when, through entirely local reasons, there is a shortage of water.

I am most grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Ashford for raising this matter, because it affects a large number of my constituents in what is largely an agricultural constituency. I hope the Parliamentary Secretary will give me a helpful answer on the specific point I raised in connection with the Lodsworth water supply, and I look forward to the day when areas such as mine, which cannot of their own volition obtain water in any other way than through a piped supply, will, in this 20th Century, be able to receive a plentiful supply of what is erroneously considered to be one of the free elements.

I am sure that the House will be most grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Ashford (Mr. Deedes) for raising this subject on the last day before we go on our holidays. I should like to thank him for his courtesy in giving me full notice of the points that he wished to raise. I hope to answer most, if not all, of them.

My hon. Friend the Member for Horsham (Mr. Gough) seemed to think that the relationship of the number of retired officers in his constituency to the gallonage of water available was not what it might be. My impression of officers, at any rate of those who are not retired, is that their interest in liquid is mainly concentrated upon liquid more exciting and exhilarating than that which is in short supply at Horsham. My hon. Friend referred to Midhurst District Council. We have not yet agreed that they should proceed with the rest of the scheme which he mentioned. The reason for the refusal is the very heavy capital cost of £300 for each property served.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Ashford said, with the limited resources that are available it is up to the Government to see that as many people as possible benefit from a scheme in relation to its cost. It is obvious that when we proceed with schemes we must choose those which will benefit most people in relation to an agreed sum of money. If the Ministry of Agriculture advise us that expenditure on the scheme mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Horsham will be justified in terms of increased food production it might—and I underline "might "—be authorised, perhaps in 1954 or later as part of the extra £1 million capital investment which has been made available for agricultural schemes. It would be necessary to convince the Minister of Agriculture or his Parliamentary Secretary that increased food production would flow from more water supplies. As I am not an expert in agriculture, we in the Department would always accept the advice of the Ministry of Agriculture on that point. Whether it would be convenient or acceptable to my hon. Friend or not, we should be forced to accept it.

Under Section 14 of the Water Act, 1948, certain areas are protected against bore holes to the extent that fresh underground abstractions are only allowed by licence. The reason is that we do not want to dissipate our water supplies. We in the Ministry get the advice of the Geological Survey and we give weight to the opinion of their technical experts in deciding whether or not boring should be permitted.

If I put a specific case to my hon. Friend, will he look into it? It was brought to my notice but is really outside my constituency. My hon. Friend will appreciate that these water supply problems cannot always be confined to a constituency. In this case it is submitted that the water company have objected frivolously.

Certainly. Perhaps my hon. Friend will consult the hon. Member for the constituency concerned. I will look into the matter very carefully and will either write or speak to him personally about it.

My hon. Friend the Member for Ash-ford started by saying that all is going very smoothly by and large, but having been a junior Minister in a democracy where pressure on a Ministry is relentless and never ceasing, I assure him that on the day when I find that things are going smoothly I shall be so astonished that I shall pass away and go to another land altogether. The Government do not yield to anybody in their appreciation of the importance of rural water supplies as well as other services which are essential to rural life. It is not my job to deal with transport, roads and electricity. It is up to me to concentrate on water.

In these islands as a whole we are pretty well off for piped water supplies. It is true to say that about 95 per cent. of our population have a piped supply in their houses or a stand pipe supply not far away. That figure would be hard to beat anywhere else in the world. That is the percentage of the population as a whole. At the same time, in rural areas only the percentage of families with a piped supply is a good deal higher than 5 per cent. It may be about 18 or 20 per cent.

The basic reason for the difference in the figure for rural areas is that the population in the rural areas is much more thinly spread over the ground and it is more expensive and more difficult to take water to them. Long lengths of pipes have to be laid to serve comparatively few properties and often to earn a comparatively small revenue. That is one of the basic considerations which can never be ignored when looking at this problem. That is the reason, to a large extent, why the scheme mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Horsham has been turned down so far.

Another fundamental fact is that a scheme to improve water supplies demands just the same kinds of materials and labour as are needed for other kinds of work. Certain building materials which are required for water supply purposes are needed for other forms of building. Cement is used, and we are short of cement in various parts of the country. There is just about the right supply for the volume of building work, and only just. Cast-iron pipes which are so essential in this work are just as important to the gas industry. If a reservoir is constructed it may need steel or concrete and labour which are required for the erection of power stations and so on.

" Restriction of capital investment" is often thought by some people to be a phrase devised to give esoteric pleasure to backroom boys, but it is a question of assessing the total amount of resources available in terms of material and manpower, and then to allocate them to the schemes which the Government consider ought to be undertaken in order of priority. If too many jobs are started it does not mean that more will be finished. It means that prices will be increased and the completion time will be longer. That is the difficulty with some local authorities in the case of housing. Some plan to have under construction two and a half times more houses than they can complete in a year. They should finish the houses they have in hand first by concentrating labour and materials, and then come back for more.

The cost of rural water supply work is getting a shade alarming. It was nearly doubled between 1939 and 1946, and since 1946 it has nearly doubled itself again. But I think that we have grounds for thinking—and I will say no more—that this rise in prices has now been arrested. One of the things that can help in the matter of cost is to see that a scheme is well vetted technically and consideration given to it by a civil engineering consultant or a water supply specialist.

In a recent debate on small water supply companies, I said that the service of a consultant civil engineer was desirable, but by plucking one sentence out of its content it was possible to interpret my remark as meaning that all water companies should use the services of a consultant civil engineer. I am afraid that some engineers did so interpret my remark and were grieved in consequence. I am afraid that that interpretation wounded the delicate susceptibilities of some civil engineers, mainly, I think, those whose chief interest was in water schemes. But one cannot compare the Metropolitan Water Board, for instance, with a small rural water company. The Metropolitan Water Board would clearly have engineers of the highest standard because of the magnitude of the works that they undertake, but the small rural council have neither the resources nor the amount of work available to employ a full-time civil engineer and they should go to a consultant. My aim in considering these schemes is to see that technically they have received the benefit of the advice of the people who are best qualified to know how efficiently and economically schemes can be carried out.

I should like to give a few figures for the country as a whole. My hon. Friend the Member for Ashford wondered whether the proportion of resources going to rural areas was sufficient. That is a fair question to ask. So far, the demands of new housing, industry and public health have got to be met, but we are spending more in the countryside than we are in the urban districts. We have been more generous to the rural areas. Only one-fifth of the population of England and Wales lives in rural districts. For the want of a better line of demarcation, I refer to the areas under the jurisdiction of rural district councils—a line which is rather blurred, but it is the best I can take in the circumstances.

Bearing in mind that the population in the rural districts is only one-fifth of the total, the House might like to know that one-third of the water supply work authorised during the last year or so has been for rural districts. They have a fifth of the population, and a third of the work authorised has gone to them, which is not an unfair proportion. During 1951–52, £18 million worth of water supply work was authorised, and £6 million worth of that was in rural districts. In 1952–53 the total was £21 million, of which just under £7 million worth was in the rural districts.

I am aware that a large number of schemes have not yet been authorised, and there are many schemes in the queue. It falls to my right hon. Friend to have the unenviable task of having to decide on the order of priority. When pressure comes from local authorities, urban districts, rural districts, water companies and interested consumers, it is not always easy to give an answer which satisfies them all. We try to do our best. We try to be as fair and dispassionate as possible in every case.

It reminds me of Louis XIV when he was presenting a medal to a successful archer out of 13 contestants. In the course of the presentation he sighed. Asked why he sighed, he said, "By doing it I have made one man ungrateful and 12 men discontented." The position is rather like that when we at the Ministry have to decide. We never please everybody, and perhaps there are times when we never please anybody. Demands of new housing and of public health must come first. It is obviously no good building houses if they are going to stand empty for lack of water. I do not think there has been any general failure in this respect. By and large, the overwhelming majority of houses have got water. The difficulty is that in some cases it is not only a question of the extension of existing supplies but of getting a new supply of water, and that is where it becomes difficult because it is a longer process to find a new supply than merely to extend existing supplies. There is then a time-lag before the supply catches up with the demand.

That does not apply only to the countryside. It applies also to industry in certain parts of the country. Demands for water are steadily increasing. Some industries require immense quantities of water—sometimes staggering and frightening quantities. In addition, I suppose that as a nation we are getting cleaner and we are using baths more than we used to.

I now wish to say a word about water for agriculture. I shall come later to the question of cast-iron pipes and other points raised by my hon. Friend. Most water supply schemes in rural areas bring piped supplies within reach of the farms. In some cases only a few farms may require the supplies, but in others the farms may outnumber the houses. It is not possible to draw a clear-cut distinction between proposals to serve domestic needs only, and proposals to serve domestic needs and farms. What we try to do is to keep in touch with the Ministry of Agriculture.

Local authorities have been asked to consult and keep in close touch with the county agricultural executive committees, and when designing new schemes I hope hon. Members who are interested will see that their local authorities take the advice of their local committees. We always seek the advice of the Ministry of Agriculture on the effect that particular schemes will have on the ability of local farms to increase food production.

During this year and next year we intend to authorise an extra £500,000 worth of water supply work each year, over and above the capital investment programme originally contemplated. This additional work will be devoted entirely to schemes where agricultural interests predominate and where water is wanted by farms or is particularly urgent. Some schemes have already been authorised, and others will follow. On the selection of those schemes we must be guided entirely by my right hon. Friend the Minister of Agriculture.

My hon. Friend referred to the question of grants. The matter was fully ventilated about two years ago, but probably not since then. The basis on which grants are awarded is fairly well understood. There is no rigid formula, but each grant is related to the burden which will fall on the rates in a district when the work is carried out. Grants also take into account the burden which ratepayers in one district are carrying in respect of other parts of the county. Areas where the district rate is high are treated more generously than areas where the district rate is lower.

My hon. Friend asked whether the machinery for grants-in-aid is moving as swiftly and efficiently as it should. I would say that it is moving as swiftly and efficiently as it possibly can, taking into account the rather complicated method which we have to use in order to assess the merits of a particular grant. It is not moving as swiftly or efficiently as we would like; the complication of the assessment of the grant is the chief cause of the delay.

When assessing grants one has to take into account revenue as well as outgoings, and it is not always easy to get sound estimates. It is not always easy to arrive at the true financial assessment of a particular local authority, and one requires that information before making the grant. We do our best to avoid delays, and if there is a case which my hon. Friend has in mind we will see whether the matter can be expedited.

I ought to mention that while local authorities are under a statutory duty to see that water is available in houses and schools in their districts, they have no absolute duty to provide water for non-domestic purposes, including agricultural requirements. We are bound to look at any proposals and ascertain whether there is likely to be any reasonable return on the expenditure, which, after all, is just as much a part of the farmer's expenditure on equipment as, say, a tractor or a barn.

In many cases farmers will be substantial beneficiaries from the work carried out at the ratepayers' expense, and it is only asking for a reasonable guarantee when one requires that there should be a proper return on their expenditure and that when water is brought to the farms local authorities should be assured of obtaining their share of the benefit. The same thing applies in industry. If an industrial concern wants to install a large factory and requires to be supplied with water, the burden of meeting the expense of providing that water should fall on the firm and not on the general ratepayers in the district.

Reference was made to the proposal of the Kent County Council for merging some of their 40 water undertakings. They have considered the possibility of improving their efficiency by reducing the number to about half the present number. A Private Bill has been drafted, and I think the council have made up their minds to present it to Parliament. Therefore, as it affects the whole county and not just the rural parts, it would be inappropriate for me to discuss the matter any further at this moment.

My hon. Friend mentioned the question of the water supplies to Egerton. He stated that he did not blame my right hon. Friend or the particular Ministry which I represent, but he did say that many Government Departments had been concerned and that there had been a lamentable lack of swiftness and speediness in arriving at a conclusion. I think he is right in that, but it is a complicated case. The Board of Trade own a flax factory and it is managed by the Ministry of Materials. It is so complicated that I shall not weary the House with the details of it.

I will tell my hon. Friend this: I will write personally to my colleagues in the Government and give them the facts. I shall impress upon them the necessity of moving a little faster in these negotiations. I shall also ask them whether they will be good enough to let me have some idea when they can bring the negotiations, which I agree are essential, to a successful conclusion so that this matter can be settled.

I should like to finish on this point. The most grievous limitation in the past few years has not been so much because of capital investment but through lack of suitable materials, especially the supply of cast-iron pipes. There is no doubt that in building works of any description it is generally found that the high cost of building and slowness in completion is due generally—I do not say in every instance—to a lack of a smooth and even flow of materials. That is one of the reasons for the extensive nature of the delays we have had in rural water supplies.

The demand for cast-iron pipes is greatly in excess of the supply. Purchasers have sometimes, as my hon. Friend said, to wait two years or more for their orders to be fulfilled. The shortage of pipes has not been created to fob off people in rural areas, but there is a real shortage and we have adopted various expedients to get round it. However, the situation is very much easier. Pipes can be obtained at much shorter notice, and the simple explanation of all that is that more pipes are being made. During the first five months of 1953 deliveries were 12 per cent. more than in the same period last year, and increased production was particularly in the smaller diameter pipes which are so much in demand for water supplies.

I should tell my hon. Friend why this increase in production has come about. It has largely been because we have been able by Government exhortation and consultation to get the manufacturers to work double shifts. I should like, in passing, to make this one observation; the key to what we need in building in this country is a great deal more building materials, and that is one of our basic industries in which I hope some considerable expansion will take place.

Now that we are getting these pipes in greater numbers and quicker, I hope it will be possible to forge ahead with more rural schemes. Having said that one-fifth of the population in the rural areas is receiving one-third of the capital investment for water supplies, I hope my hon. Friend will feel satisfied that his efforts in raising this Adjournment debate have been successful. I can assure him and the House that if there is any particular point about any particular scheme which they would like the Ministry to look into. I shall do my best to deal with it as quickly as possible, and I think I can say the same for my right hon. Friend. I think the House ought to be grateful to my hon. Friend for raising this debate. This subject has not been ventilated for a number of years, and I hope now that he has got two additional schemes for his constituency he will feel that honour is partially satisfied.

In rising to open this debate, I think it is proper that I should say I have an interest, indeed, a very sad interest, in this subject. I am a breeder of pedigree pigs which are now suffering from this fever. It may be a consolation that had it not been for the grievous attacks of swine fever from which my herd is suffering I would not be so familiar with the effects and I would not be bothering the House with the subject today.

The position is really very grave indeed. The figures of the extent of the outbreaks of swine fever are quite alarming. In the 10 years since 1943 the number of outbreaks has gone up from over 500 to over 1,900 in 1953. That figure is only to July of this year, and only up to the 27th. It is true that the disease disappeared almost to vanishing point in 1947, 1948 and 1949, when the figures were 37, 27 and 5 respectively, but now there are 1,913 cases of outbreak of swine fever this year up to 27th of the month. The trend is upward, and the effects on breeding are so considerable that it is right and proper that before we go away for the Summer Recess we should remind the Ministry of Agriculture of these facts and ask some pertinent questions.

First of all, may I say that one of the difficulties of overcoming this disease, which is invariably fatal, is that it is extremely infectious. It is caused by a filterable virus, if anyone can tell me what that is. The efforts to overcome it are not made easier by the fact that farmers in some places are showing a superstitious attitude to it. I know that some farmers take the view that it is no good using the invaluable crystal-violet vaccine which is supplied by the Ministry of Agriculture for vaccination purposes because they say that if a sow which is in-pig is vaccinated it will slip its pigs, and that if a boar is injected it will become sterile.

I do not doubt that on animals in an advanced state of pregnancy vaccination will have a deleterious effect. Pigs are as temperamental almost as humans and they must not be upset in the last stages

of their pregnancy. The fact that in the past some farmers have suffered the loss of their animals or the loss of litters or have had boars become sterile is not a cogent argument against the use of the crystal vaccine.

There is a growing feeling—and I should like the Parliamentary Secretary to say whether it is true or not—that swine fever has been spread in this country through the American airfield stations and the swill obtained from those stations. This belief is based on the knowledge that there is a swine fever outbreak in the United States which has reached catastrophic proportions. It is believed by some that the food being brought into this country to feed the American airmen is in some way or another carrying the infection.

We had some doubts about this when there were outbreaks of fowl pest, but it was found eventually that fowl pest was brought into this country by food from America for consumption by American soldiers. If it is true on this occasion I ask the Parliamentary Secretary to see that the collection of swill from the airfields is stopped. It is of limited feeding value anyway, and the risks from it are very serious indeed. It would be much better if it were burned instead of being carried away and used to bring swine fever into healthy herds.

I have described the attitude of some of the farmers and the barriers they form against the abolition of this disease. But another barrier is the lack of enterprise and drive on the part of the Ministry. It is astonishing that an infectious disease of this kind is treated so light-heartedly by the Ministry in the direction of advising farmers when outbreaks are taking place. Unless a farmer has a private information service he cannot know that an outbreak has occurred for, unlike the situation that exists with foot-and-mouth disease, no one comes round to tell him that there is an outbreak in the district.

It is true that the area may be closed and that it may be impossible for a farmer to shift his animals to market or to sell any of his pigs off the farm, but he is not advised officially either that an outbreak has taken place or that an outbreak of the disease is suspected on the farm. The trouble with swine fever is that it can be taken unwittingly on to a healthy farm when it is in its early stage elsewhere.

Yet the Ministry knows who the pig producers are in an area which is infected or in danger of infection, because it has in its statistics the records of the pig producers. Above all, the police know because it is their job to go round the pig farms every so often to check the animal movements book. This is so important that I suggest some co-operation should take place between the Ministry and the police to see that, when an outbreak is suspected, the police warn farmers in the district of the dangers to their herds and to urge them to take urgent and effective action against the infection.

To quote my own experience, one of the things that has impressed me in our outbreak is the long time it has taken the Ministry to overhaul their propaganda machinery. It was in May, 1947, that the crystal-violet vaccine was released for general use and in May, 1947, some most effective propaganda in co-operation with the National Farmers' Union was issued by the Ministry, explaining to the farmers exactly what were the benefits of the vaccine. But in that year there were practically no outbreaks at all, as the figures I have quoted show, nor was there much in 1948.

The really serious outbreak of recent years took place in 1951. I cannot recollect, nor can I find, any examples of awareness on the part of the Ministry, which is absolutely necessary if we are to keep people informed: that is to say, by the issue of periodical reminders, exhortations and examples of the steps which should be taken to guard herds against this disease. Really, the Ministry have gone to sleep on this matter and it is time they realised the seriousness of the position and started it all over again with a really effective propaganda drive.

When a farmer gets a suspected case of swine fever on his farm, it is essential that he should get confirmation or denial of the existence of the disease in his animals as quickly as possible. Imagine the position of a man who finds that his own unvaccinated pigs are dying every day. He goes into his yards every morning and finds two or three corpses perhaps in each of his pens. He does not know the cause because he has not had any propaganda from the Ministry.

It is in those conditions that the man must be helped by being told as quickly as possible whether his animals have been infected. To quote my own case again, on Tuesday, 7th July, we called in the "vet" because we suspected swine fever. On Wednesday, 8th July, the "vet," after consultation with the Animal Health Division of the Ministries of Food and Agriculture, called on an official visit, slaughtered four pigs in accordance with the routine, carried out a post mortem and sent specimens to the Ministry of Agriculture laboratories, at Weybridge. On Friday, 10th July, he called again, again on an official visit sent by the Ministry, and repeated the operation. On Sunday, 12th July, he called again on an official visit and again repeated the operation.

Meantime, there was no word as to whether the disease was confirmed or denied. On Monday, 13th July, at approximately six o'clock in the evening a courteous and most helpful official arrived from the Ministry and said, "You will receive confirmation that swine fever does, in fact, exist," and on the morning of Tuesday, 14th July, I received a cyclo-styled and misprinted document saying, "Yes you have swine fever."

Incidentally, I do not see why the Ministry should not use, in connection with its information to farmers, a standard of typewritten correspondence at least equal to that sent to farmers by commercial firms. Six days elapsed——

How many post mortems had been carried out in that time?

About a dozen.

I appreciate the difficulties and I am sympathetic, but it is no consolation to the farmer who is anxious about his herd to have to wait for six days because the laboratories at Weybridge are blocked. Will the Parliamentary Secretary reply to the following questions? Is the Weybridge laboratory open on Saturday afternoon and Sunday to meet a situation like this? After all, British farms are open on Saturday afternoon and Sunday and it seems to me that, when farmers are faced with serious outbreaks of swine fever every day, Weybridge should be open day and night so that immediate confirmation or denial of the existence of the disease can be obtained. Is it really necessary that specimens should be sent to Weybridge? Why cannot the Ministry have a mobile laboratory which goes to the centre of the outbreaks so that confirmation can be given not in six days but in six hours?

What is the clinical position? As I understand, the Ministry confirms the existence of swine fever first on the probabilities as reported by the "vet" who, at this stage, has ceased to be the farmer's "vet" and is an agent of the Ministry. It is on his report on the probability, and on his report on the existence of ulcers on some part of the stomach, that the decision is taken as to whether swine fever exists.

What part of the stomach I do not know, because I find myself totally in capable of watching a post mortem, even on a pig. But surely it is not necessary to send specimens from all over the country to Weybridge to get that done. A trained, travelling man can do a post mortem side by side with the "vet" and can give confirmation practically on the spot. When we have outbreaks of this kind, it is no good trying to operate confirmatory investigations on the basis of the five outbreaks that took place in 1949. The gravity of the situation demands that the most serious measures are taken.

In May, 1947, when the crystal-violet vaccine was introduced for the first time after some years of experiment, the Ministry of Agriculture had a leaflet printed which goes out with the vaccine. Because I used to have some experience of the printing trade. I am able to interpret certain cabalistic references that appear at the foot of this leaflet, which I understand to mean that 50,000 of these leaflets were printed by the Stationery Office in April, 1947. The astonishing thing is that this circular has not been revised since April, 1947. It is six years old, and farmers are operating on the instructions of this leaflet in a way that is now being contradicted by the Ministry of Agriculture.

Let me give an example. The leaflet says that vaccination by the crystal-violet vaccine gives an immunity against natural infection for at least 12 months. But I was told a fortnight ago by a representative of the Ministry of Agriculture that that is wrong and that eight months is the period of immunity. I asked my "vet" whether he knew that it was eight months, and he said that he had never been told. He is still working on one of these forms and the advices issued six years ago.

Furthermore, the form says that

"young pigs from crystal-violet vaccinated sows should not be vaccinated until 14 days after weaning."

For those of my hon. Friends who have no technical knowledge, that really means 10 weeks. But the same most helpful young gentleman who comes to see me says, "Take no notice of that. Young pigs should be vaccinated at four weeks." Nobody had been told that, and no one had told the "vet" that it should be four weeks. It is in the interests of agriculture and of food production that the Ministry should see that these leaflets are brought up to date, and that "vets," particularly in areas where outbreaks are occurring, should be supplied with an information service regularly and quickly and in conformity with the facts as they are discovered.

I am sure that the Ministry can do little until they find out the exact period of immunity given by crystal-violet vaccine. The attack that I have suffered has cost me more than 100 pigs but most of them were young pigs up to about three months of age. All the adult pigs that we had vaccinated have survived the attack. It is therefore important that farmers should know—at any rate, in our case, where vaccination took place at the right time—that vaccinated pigs in an infected farm are almost wholly immune from attack.

What is the period of immunity for young pigs? I was told that it was three weeks. I was then told that it was eight weeks. I then asked, "Which is right, three weeks, eight weeks or, as I suspect no weeks at all—that no immunity is inherited by the young pig from its mother; and is immunity affected in any way by whether the mother has been vaccinated during her pregnancy? "I asked that question of the Ministry a fortnight ago, but I have not yet had a reply. The reason, I imagine, is that the Ministry do not know.

Why do the Ministry not know? The fact is that swine fever has to be notified under the Diseases of Animals Act and, as a result, most of the research on the disease is being done at Weybridge. Consider what effect that is having. As I said, the main problem is to discover what period of immunity is granted by the crystal-violet vaccine. Considerable additional research is necessary to investigate the duration of the immunity and the extent to which the disease is passed on.

Those experiments are bound to be complicated and to require a great deal of planning and organisation, but because it is a notifiable disease under the Diseases of Animals Act industrial firms and other normal research agencies are inhibited from carrying on the work that they should be doing in finding out the period of immunity; and an enormous amount of work is thus loaded on to Weybridge.

Is Weybridge properly equipped, both with laboratory equipment and with staff, to meet the situation, or is it, too, suffering from the economy drive that the Treasury have imposed ever since the Conservative Party came into office? Weybridge must have the facilities, both with laboratory equipment and with manpower. I presume that at some time or other the Ministry, either by statutory order or administratively, will have to take such action as will give power to the other research organisations to proceed with finding the answer. Any scheme for the provision of a cheaper form of swine fever vaccine, while it is desirable, will not really solve the problem until we discover how the disease is caused and the period of immunity afforded by the vaccine.

What is happening to the projected scheme for setting up the special panel of vaccinated animals and by which farmers are to be provided, through their "vets." or directly, with the vaccine at a reduced rate, and which seeks the cooperation of auctioneers in ensuring that they have special pens and give special publicity to the fact that vaccinated animals are for sale? Why does it take such a long time to get a scheme of this kind established?

I want also to deal with the question of compensation. I cannot see why, if a farmer who suffers foot-and-mouth disease in his pigs is compensated, a farmer whose pigs have swine fever receives no compensation whatever. I am wrong, perhaps, in saying, "no compensation whatever," for every time the Ministry "vet." calls to see me and orders the destruction of pigs he gives us 7s. 6d. towards the cost of digging the hole for burying, which is scarcely adequate compensation for the losses we are suffering.

If fowl pest attacks a man's flocks, he gets compensation. If the pig farmer is a bacon producer, if he suspects that there is swine fever on the farm, he can send his healthy animals into the bacon factories and, by and large, he is not a heavy loser; but when a pig breeder who tries to improve the strain of the country's pigs loses his young suckling stock, two, three or four weeks old, it is no use whatever sending that young stock to anybody. It is slaughtered and buried, and the man is a complete loser. Although destruction is in the national interest in checking the disease, I submit that those animals should be slaughtered under exactly the same conditions as apply to animals that are slaughtered because of foot-and-mouth disease.

Some pig producers oppose the payment of compensation because they believe that it would lead to a large-scale view by the Ministry that slaughter is the only way out. I do not share that view. Under certain circumstances slaughter is essential, but while there is no compensation many farmers who are not as careful and as honest as they should be, although they suspect that there is swine fever on their farms, are inclined to send their animals either to market or to sell them in another way, thus spreading the risk of the disease. It would be a perfectly simple thing to supply the necessary safeguards as exist with fowl pest and with foot-and-mouth disease, to ensure that claims for compensation were properly examined and that people were not getting away with anything to which they are not entitled.

May I make it quite clear that in all I have said I have no criticism of any kind to offer of the Ministry's staff in the area in which I live? On the contrary, the staff of the Ministry and that of the National Agricultural Advisory Service are, in my experience, always ready and eager to help the farmer. I want to pay public testimony to the spirit of cooperation and understanding that the Ministry officials show.

The trouble is that there are not enough of them. I will give an example. In the middle of this outbreak I wanted to talk to the chief animal health officer of the Ministry at Chelmsford, but I was told I could not do so because he had gone to Scotland. I asked why and the reply was, "Because there is swine fever in Scotland." I pointed out that there was swine fever in Essex. It is quite clear that there is a shortage of staff and he was not breaking any orders in going to Scotland. But it really is not good enough, when there are serious outbreaks of a kind like this, to find that a man whose advice is sought so eagerly is not available because there are not enough officials in another area.

If the Ministry are to tackle the problem and have a drive to eradicate swine fever, they will have to go to the Treasury to get the staff and money to supply the apparatus which is necessary. Above all, they will have to reorganise their own Department to see that the drive is made in the interests of farmers and of food production in Great Britain.

I feel that my hon. Friend the Member for Deptford (Sir L. Plummer) is to be congratulated on having raised this very important subject. It is a subject which has been treated with far too great complacency—indeed, a complacency which has been exemplified today when almost throughout the speech of my hon. Friend there has not been a single Conservative hon. Member present on the back benches. At the end of the speech one hon. Member opposite turned up, not because he is interested in this subject, but because he has the next Adjournment subject. That is evidence of the complacency with which the governing party and the Government have treated this problem.

Looking over the benches behind the hon. and learned Member, I would say that the situation he has described appears to be much the same on his side of the House. I think that there are six hon. Members there.

I must caution hon. Members against drawing attention to the number of hon. Members present.

A considerable number of hon. Members were present on this side of the House earlier; in fact, relatively speaking, there were serried ranks here.

For a long time foot-and-mouth disease was treated with the same sort of complacency as swine fever is treated now. That disease took a tremendous toll of the country's agricultural wealth and was then treated with energy and the situation was got in hand. Our losses in foot-and-mouth disease, even in the bad years, when a lot of slaughter is necessary, are trifling compared with those on the Continent and in America. That is because the disease is now treated with energy. Fowl pest was also more or less neglected until it became serious and it is now getting in hand, but swine fever is now getting out of hand. It has increased alarmingly and nothing has been done about it.

Will the Ministry really take this matter in hand? Pig meat is the one easily expendable source of meat? Will the Ministry see that treatment of this disease is dealt with with the same energy and upon the same basis as foot-and-mouth disease and fowl pest?

I begin by expressing sympathy with the hon. Member for Deptford (Sir L. Plummer) in his misfortune in having an outbreak of swine fever on his farm. All who have anything to do with the farming world know of the distress which is caused, apart from the cost by having an outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease, swine fever, or fowl pest.

In the figures given by the hon. Member about the incidence of the disease, I think he did not give an entirely fair picture of the general incidence of swine fever over the last 15 or 20 years. The fact is that in pre-war days the incidence was high. It was comparable to and sometimes even higher than what it is this year. That is not a matter of satisfaction but just a fact. Swine fever has been with us for many years, imported as well as germinated here, and except during the war years, when for a variety of reasons it was easier to get control, we have had a fairly high incidence. Certainly the incidence this year has been exceptionally high and it may well finish as high as in 1939 with 3,200 outbreaks. I hope it will not get so high as it was in 1940 with more than 5,000 outbreaks, but it certainly is high and a matter of deep concern to the Government. As I hope I shall convince the House, we are taking active measures to deal with it and I hope they will be progressively more effective.

On the matter of general policy, the main plank is the crystal-violet vaccination to which the hon. Member referred. We do use movement control and that is a very great help in dealing with an incidence of the kind we have had this year, but crystal-violet vaccine is the long suit for getting control and eventually I hope for suppressing the disease. The hon. Member asked if we thought that the very high incidence this year is due to swill from U.S.A. camps. The answer is, almost certainly not. The swill from those camps is now all sent to central processing plants where we can be quite sure it will be safely sterilised on premises where no livestock are kept. In the few camps where that cannot be done, they have agreed to burn it there and then on the camp, so we hope that not only this disease but fowl pest and all veterinary diseases from that particular source may be kept under control.

It is true, as the hon. Member says, that this vaccine became available in 1947 and its use has grown a little since then, though nothing like so much as I should like. Its use corresponds to a large extent with the incidence of the disease. When fanners hear that there is an outbreak in their neighbourhood they start to vaccinate, often of course too late. What we want them to do is to follow the practice of the hon. Member and vaccinate regularly every year in order to immunise their pigs. We do recognise the necessity at the Ministry to promote a drive to get this over to the farming community.

The hon. Member asked what had happened to the scheme which would make vaccination easier and more regular for farmers. Discussions with the British Veterinary Association and the National Farmers' Unions have been rather lengthy, but I am glad to say they have been practically concluded and, broadly speaking, agreement has been reached. I hope that in the course of the next couple of months an announcement can be made giving all details of the scheme. I believe that will offer to farmers generally the kind of vaccination service that they really could and should take up and use generally. When we are in a position to put that out we shall, I can assure the House, do everything we can to put it over and to keep on putting it over to the farmers throughout the country.

On the question of research, swine fever is, as the hon. Member observed, a notifiable disease, and following our general practice, therefore—there are exceptions—research work is done in our own laboratories. The research work is accordingly being carried on at Weybridge by our own people, and not, in this instance, by the A.R.C. Some valuable work is now going on there on three lines. The first of these is on the improved application of the crystal-violet vaccine, with the ultimate intention of being able to reduce the dosage in order to cheapen it. The second line of research work is on new and different methods of producing the vaccine; it is now expensive in production, as it has to be produced from a healthy pig. The third line of work is on a new method of diagnosis. Diagnosis is a difficult and lengthy process.

I have taken note of the hon. Member's observations about the need for research into the decreasing immunity conferred by vaccination, and I will consult the experts to get their view as to whether we could profitably engage on such a piece of research work. There are difficulties, however. To deal specifically with one or two of the points which the hon. Member raised on this matter, I would say that the best view is that vaccination is normally effective for complete immunity for 12 months.

When I say "normally" it must be realised that, as with any other vaccination, whether for human beings or animals, there are bound to be exceptions where the physiology of a particular creature is different from that of others, and the immunity is therefore not so strong. Then there is the other varient of the creature concerned, whether it be a pig or any other animal, meeting some particularly strong infection; so that there is the combination of a lower immunity due to less effective vaccination meeting an exceptionally strong infection. Then the immunity may break down. I can say that our view is that crystal-violet vaccination today is normally effective for a full 12 months. I can certainly confirm, and gladly do so, that the suspicion in the minds of some farmers that the vaccination in any way interferes with effective breeding capacity of either boars or sows is completely unfounded.

On the question of the vaccination of piglets, I have to wear a white sheet, and say immediately that this leaflet is out of date, but at the time when it was drafted the best view was that the pregnant sow would, after being vaccinated, confer some immunity on her piglets, and that during the period of weaning there would be some immunity for them. During the past few years the experts have gradually come to the view that that is not so, and that it is, therefore, desirable to vaccinate piglets as soon as possible after birth; and the present period after farrowing which we recommend is four weeks. I am sorry that the leaflet is out of date, and I have taken steps to see that it is brought up to date immediately. I hope that in the course of the next week or two the corrected leaflets will be going out. I am sorry that the hon. Member may to some extent have suffered by reason of the leaflet.

Turning to the history of the outbreak on the hon. Member's farm, it is true that it took six days before the disease was confirmed. I should be leading the House astray if I left the impression that we could normally expect a diagnosis to be confirmed more quickly. Diagnosis is difficult; it is not always possible to be sure, on one post mortem, that the disease is present in the entrails of the animal. Although there are clinical symptoms, the first post mortem may not confirm the presence of the disease and another post mortem may be necessary. It happened in this instance that the results were negative and a second post mortem had, therefore, to be made to confirm whether the disease was or was not present. Six days is really not unsatisfactory in the case of a disease which is so difficult to diagnose.

We are proceeding with research work on diagnosis to see if we can find some more certain method which will enable us to speed up the process. If we are able to do so we shall certainly put it into practice as soon as we can. It is worth mentioning that I understand that the hon. Member's private veterinary surgeon took the precaution of proceeding to vaccinate the young stock on 10th July, two days after suspicion was first aroused, so that the only possible precautionary measure that could be taken to save some of the young stock was taken, on the initiative of the hon. Member's own veterinary officer, and to that extent the losses were mitigated.

As for the absence of the divisional veterinary officer to which the hon. Member referred, that officer was absent in Scotland on leave. He was not, in fact, engaged on veterinary work there; he was taking part of his annual leave. During his absence the senior veterinary officer was deputising for him. It is fair to recall, in order to show that the veterinary staff of the county were really covering the situation, that although the senior veterinary officer was not present at the telephone when the hon. Member rang—he was out visiting a farm at the time—that information was passed to the hon. Member and he was given a number where he could ring up the officer if he wished to do so.

That was not done, but on the return of the veterinary officer to the office he was given a report and proceeded that afternoon to the farm. It shows that not only the veterinary officer concerned but the general capacity of the staff who cover the county was more than adequate that afternoon and evening. I should have thought that that was reasonably good service. I should also have thought that it shows that these men, while they are at times extremely hard worked, are sufficient in number for the many tasks with which they have to deal.

The hon. Member asked me an important question as to why we do not have notifications of swine fever in the same way as for foot-and-mouth disease. Foot-and-mouth disease is a very highly infectious disease which is carried in a great variety of ways—by human beings and possibly by birds and other animals. Therefore, in the case of a foot-and-mouth outbreak, it is necessary, as soon as it is confirmed, to establish an "infected area" of so many miles round the farm in order to limit the spread of infection. Therefore, arising from that physical fact notification must be made to all the farms in that area immediately, because they are all part of the infected area.

With swine fever we have a different picture. Fortunately, it is nothing like so infectious. To all intents and purposes, the infected area is the farm where the outbreak occurs, and it is normally possible to keep the infection within the boundaries of the farm. No infected area is therefore necessary, and isolation with all its consequent expense and the dislocation that follows is unnecessary. It is not a case of comparing like with like.

The hon. Gentleman asked why we should not have the same slaughter and compensation policy for swine fever as for foot-and-mouth disease. The answer is that this policy was followed until about 40 years ago. It was dropped in 1916 because the Government of the day, I understand, were of the opinion that the policy simply was not succeeding and the cost was very great.

May I make the point that crystal-violet vaccine was not then known?

At the same time vaccination was beginning to come in. The combination of those features brought the Government of the day to the decision that it would be better to drop the slaughter policy. The same considerations still apply and there is a further one which is intrinsic. That is the veterinary objection of the long incubation period of anything up to 28 days during which time infection may be spreading and the outbreak cannot be confirmed. That makes it difficult to apply a slaughter and compensation policy.

There is also the important point of general policy. Foot-and-mouth disease is highly infectious. It is impossible to contain the infection within the area of a farm, and it may spread all over the country. With swine fever the infectability is by no means so great. It is possible to contain the infection and a large number of animals will recover. Mortality is not always 100 per cent. The policy of vaccination with a really effective vaccine is obviously the right policy to follow and our concern is to see that this is put into practice universally, or at any rate by all pig breeders throughout the country.

I can assure the House and particularly the hon. Member that we firmly intend to prosecute that policy to the utmost. Calling attention to it today will prove of considerable help in giving information and publicity to a subject which is of great importance to the livestock of this country.

Yesterday in this House my hon. Friend the Assistant Postmaster-General made a statement concerning a long-standing claim for recognition by the Post Office of a union known as the Engineering Officers (Telecommunications) Association which, for brevity, I will refer to hereafter as E.O.(T.) A. A few days before that, because of the long-standing history of this case there appeared on the Order Paper a Motion in the names of some of my hon. Friends and myself declaring that this union should be recognised. Because of the statement that the Postmaster-General had decided not to recognise the union, I am raising this matter today. In view of the past history of this case, I feel that the decision not to recognise cannot go unchallenged.

I do not wish to weary the House but I think, as a background to what I have to say I must briefly recapitulate what has happened. E.O.(T.) A. claimed recognition to represent the technical officers' grade in the Post Office because they have 40 per cent. of the membership of that grade. So far as I know, that figure has never been disputed. On this question of 40 per cent. I must refer briefly to the handbook entitled, "Staff Relations in the Civil Service" which is issued by Her Majesty's Stationery Office and was reprinted as recently as 1952.

Paragraph 13 on page 5 of this handbook states:

"To secure recognition an association must show that it is representative of the category of staff concerned. In the Civil Service recognition depends solely on numerical strength. The Postmaster-General has recently announced that the Post Office will consider a request for recognition if the association making the request can show that it has in membership at least 40 per cent. of the organised staff of the grade or grades concerned…"

The next paragraph begins,

"As membership figures alone determine recognition…"

I ask the House to note that. We had two debates on this matter in 1950. Hon. Members will forgive me if I refer to two statements made then. It is a habit which some of us have: I have looked up what I said myself. The right hon. Gentleman who was Postmaster-General in the Socialist Government was being challenged by us for not recognising this union, and I said to him:

"Let me say in conclusion: We believe that he has altered the rules and has refused recognition not on the merits of the case but for political considerations. We condemn him for that and unless he can satisfy us that that is not the case, I shall ask my hon. Friends to divide the Committee."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 6th July, 1950; Vol 477. c. 704].

when I said: He did not satisfy us and we divided the Committee. The matter was again raised on the Adjournment in October. 1950.

"That is why I say to the right hon. Gentleman that it appears that he is coming to this decision from political prejudice…"

That was the decision not to recognise the union—

"Anybody who has read the debates and knows the history of this matter knows that that is the case."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 20th October, 1950; Vol. 478. c. 2446.]

I submit that after what was said only one impression could be left upon the mind of any hon. Member on either side of the House, and that was that had we at that time been in a position to recognise E.O. (T.) A. we should have done so. I do not think anybody can have gone away with any other impression. But having recognised this union, we would not say that the rules or customs under which it is recognised are sacrosanct, but we suggest that we should get together to see if the basis was the right one to continue to use as the basis for recognition. The rules or customs should not be altered in the middle of the game.

I do not suggest that an actual pledge was given to recognise the union but that most certainly an attitude constituting a moral, if not an honourable, undertaking was taken up by us at that time. We have gone back on that not upon the merits of the case, because they are the same—the union still has its over 40 per cent. representation and it still represents the same grade—we have gone back on it as a matter of expediency or appeasement. I do not believe that that in the long run will get the respect of anybody.

What should have been done was this: upon the morrow of our taking office we should have said, "This is one of the obligations into which we have entered and we must honour it." We should have added, "Having honoured it, the field is open for discussion as to how we should handle this controversial problem in future." I note that the hon. Member for Keighley (Mr. Hobson) is present. He was Assistant Postmaster-General at the time. I do not believe that he would have been surprised if we had taken that attitude.

I must make it plain that I and a number of my hon. Friends dissent, to put it at its mildest, from the non-fulfilment of what we regard as an honourable undertaking. I wish to refer to one feature of the statement which was made yesterday. Reference was made to certain events since the matter was first raised. My hon. Friend the Assistant Postmaster-General then said:

"He has also had the advantage of the opinion of a man with wide experience in labour relations, Sir Richard Lloyd-Roberts, whose appointment was agreeable to both sides and who attempted conciliation between them. The advice tendered in each case what the same: that E.O.(T) A. should not be recognised."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 30th July, 1953; Vol. 518, c. 1549.]

I am a little surprised that someone who is appointed as a conciliation officer to try to bring the two sides together in conciliation should make a recommendation as to the question about which he was supposed to conciliate; that is, on the merits of the case. I am very surprised that the Postmaster-General bases himself on the recommendation of someone who I do not think was appointed to adjudicate, but was appointed to see if he could bring the two sides together. I hope that my hon. Friend will say something about that when he replies.

Having said something about this particular case, may I now say something about this problem of recognition generally? I am not an employer; neither can I claim to be an employee, though, as a matter of fact, at one time in my life I spent 18 months at the workshop bench. What I should like to say is that, although obviously I cannot speak for the trade union movement, I am one of those who realise that that movement has been built up on loyalty, and I would be the last person to denigrate from the importance, and indeed the greatness, of loyalty.

Things do not remain static, however, and it seems to me that the trade unions to a very large extent have outgrown their original function. As I understand it, their original function was to protect the weaker workmen against the power of the employer. They banded together, and, of course, loyalty was absolutely essential if they were to band together successfully and achieve their objects. But we have moved a good deal away from that situation today, and from merely existing to get a fair deal from employers the great trade unions halve almost become part of the constitution. They are consulted on matters of State, there are joint production committees, and they fulfil a necessary rôle, which is recognised by everybody as being far beyond the one for which they were originally created.

And a very good job, too.

And a very good job, as the hon. Member says. While splinter and breakaway unions are anathema to the established trade unions, and, I would add, to employers too, I think some reasonable freedom of association must surely be preserved; otherwise, it seems to me that the individuals who previously banded together to form these unions for their protection are liable to be crushed by the very organisation which they created for that protection.

By way of illustration, I should like to refer to a couple of letters which appeared in "The Times" last week, and I use them as illustrations only because I do not know everything that happened in the case. On 25th July, under the signature of Mr. Victor Gollancz, there appeared a letter headed "A Trade Union's Decision." I do not want to read it all, because I dare say many hon. Members have already read it. It refers to the case of a man who, with complete anonymity, is referred to as "Mr. X." After having been a member of a trade union for many years, he was promoted to be a salesman, which meant that he passed outside the orbit of the union——

I take it that, if the hon. Gentleman is going to read from that letter, he will, presumably, read the letter that followed it a day or two afterwards, putting rather a different point of view?

If the hon. Gentleman will give me time, I have the second letter, which is the more important, and I am going to read it. I merely mention the first letter in order to give the background of the case.

As I say, this Mr. X became a salesman. He therefore went, I presume, into a grade above that which his previous union represented, and he lapsed his subscriptions. He met with misfortune. He became ill and had to be taken off the road, and, as a result, his employers, and indeed the local chapel of his union, wished him to be put back on his previous job. In order to punish him the union refused to give him back his card, which means, of course, a very serious thing for him because he cannot be reemployed in his old job.

Mr. Gollancz ventilated this case in "The Times," and on 28th July the following letter appeared, to which the hon. Member for Leeds, West (Mr. Pannell) referred. I ask the House to be good enough to let me read it at length, because it puts both sides of the case so well, the trade union side and also the threat of tyranny. It says:

"This man X had been a member of a trade society for many years, and during that time he had no doubt been pleased to accept all the many benefits and safeguards that his trade union had been able to gain for him. These had only been gained as the result of the assistance and unity of his fellow trade unionists. As soon as he was strong enough, or thought he was strong enough, to stand on his own feet, X withdrew his little help from a society to which he had then every cause to be grateful, and by giving up his card intimated to his fellow members that in future he would not call upon them for assistance. This was because 'there was no reason to believe that he would not be on the road permanently'"—

That is, of course, a reference to the new job which he had—

"but X at his age should have known that there is no reason to think that any job is permanent. In all this X has shown himself to be ungenerous, ungrateful and stupid, and such conduct must be punished by a trade union so that others may learn that it does not pay. The punishment in this instance, however, is of the utmost severity and amounts to the virtual denial of a man's right to work for a livelihood—a terrible sentence for any worker to bear. All good trade unionists will be sorry for X in his present distress, and although they will not uphold his actions, neither will they uphold what amounts to trade union tyranny."

I think that letter poses both sides of this problem very well indeed.

May I ask the hon. Gentleman one question? Can that possibly apply to any trade union in the Civil Service?

I do not quite see the relevance of that question. I cannot answer it, but I should have thought that it might or might not apply. Quite frankly, I do not see the relevance of it. I am talking about the general issue.

It seems to me that if the doctrine of trade union solidarity is to be pushed so far as to become a tyranny, then, in the long run, I do not believe that the ordinary men and women of this country will stand for it, because it is so against everything for which every class in the country has fought for so many years. Therefore, it seems to me that this question of reconciling recognition with the maintenance of the great trade unions is a question which has got to be approached, and approached by all of us.

I now turn to the present position in the Government service, particularly in the Post Office, which seems to me to be very confused. We have a particular interest in this House because the Postmaster-General is, of course, the only employer of labour who is directly responsible to this House and who can be taken to task by this House for what he does. At the present moment, we have the staff rules which say quite categorically that numbers are the only basis of recognition, and those rules were reprinted as recently as 1952. We have the Terrington Report. In its general recommendations it recommends that this basis be abolished but suggests nothing to put in its place. I want to ask the Assistant Postmaster-General what is to be the basis in the future upon which his right hon. Friend intends to deal with claims for recognition, because at the moment we seem to be in a complete void in this matter.

I speak only for myself, but I think a number of hon. Members agree with me, and I do not think any of them hold that the 40 per cent. figure is sacrosanct. Possibly it might have to be 50 per cent., or 55 per cent. if hon. Members like. But I think hon. Members opposite will agree with this: that the employer should not be the sole arbiter as to which association a man must join. Unless we have some numerical rule or something of that sort, it is difficult to escape from that being the case. It seems to me that the idea underlying these staff rules, where they say that numbers are the only basis for recognition has a great deal to be said for it.

When the hon. Member speaks about a given percentage for recognition, does he mean the percentage of a certain grade employed in the Post Office, because, if so, logically there could be nearly 500 trade unions in the Post Office?

There are always difficulties when we state a principle. Difficulties may always occur in particular cases. I am talking about a principle of recognition, and I believe that difficulties of that sort can be overcome. What I am saying—and I rather hoped that the hon. Member would agree with me—is that the Postmaster-General ought not to be the sole arbiter as to which union a Post Office employee has to join. I do not think the hon. Member could possibly dissent from that. It would surely be against the principle of freedom of association to say that no new trade union is ever to be recognised, and I do not believe the British people will ever accept such a suggestion. What we must do is reconcile this basic human freedom with the position which the great trade unions have built up and which, as far as I know, only the Communists would wish to undermine. In this case, can my hon. Friend tell me on what basis E.O.(T) A. could now be recognised?

In conclusion, I say with regret that, as I see it, we have gone back on an attitude and on a cause which we espoused in opposition, not on the merits of the case but for expediency; and in the long run I do not think this sort of thing will command either the trust of our friends or the respect of our opponents.

A number of my hon. Friends wish to take part in the debate and I will therefore be very brief. If I do not finish within 10 minutes I hope hon. Members will remind me of the fact, and then I will sit down.

The hon. Member for Westbury (Sir R. Grimston) referred to the rule about 40 per cent. He knows it is not sacrosanct. He has been Assistant Postmaster-General. He knows it is only one of the criteria for consideration. I do not think we need waste any more time about that. The hon. Member spoke of the function of the trade union to protect the weak. Heaven knows, they have had to protect the weak—and from whom?

The liberal employer.

The hon. Member for Westbury seemed to regret that their influence had increased—except in wartime when they shouldered great responsibilities.

If I gave the impression that I regretted that it had increased. I am sorry. I certainly do not. I was merely reciting what had happened.

The hon. Gentleman referred to a letter in "The Times" which had nothing to do with this case. He cannot point to a single instance in the Civil Service or the Post Office where an individual has been penalised by a Civil Service or Post Office trade union. We accepted responsibilities and we entered into an agreement. We expect you to honour the agreement just as we honoured it during your term of office. Is there no obligation on the other side towards a trade union which accepts responsibility arising from an agreement? Do you wish to interrupt?

No. The hon. Gentleman referred to the Chair as being expected to honour the agreement.

No, I do not think that I did. The hon. Member is often mistaken and he is mistaken this time. The Chair will call me to order if necessary, and without the help of the hon. Member.

There is no question of a denial of a new trade union. No hon. Members on either side of this House can prevent a new union arising. The hon. Member for Westbury said, I believe in July, 1950, that he wished to take no side. He has taken a side today. Hon. Members opposite are making this a political issue. They are doing a very bad dis-service to this country, because if this issue goes outside the House of Commons the repercussions will be many and serious. Hon. Members should take their choice.

Is the hon. Gentleman threatening?

I would not dream of threatening. I have said that you have turned this into a political issue.

Who?

The gentleman opposite.

The hon. Gentleman should not say "you."

I think that it would have serious repercussions. I know that hon. Members opposite treat this as a joke. [HON. MEMBERS: "No."] You are not up against the Union of Post Office Workers at all. It is not concerned in this case. The situation has changed since this subject was fully discussed before. We have had the Terrington Report, and I should have thought that it would have been the desire of the House not to take sides and that we would have been guided by the Terrington Report. Paragraph 25 of that Report states:

"We see no reason to recommend the grant to the Association of joint recognition in respect of technical officers, and we are satisfied that the P.O.E.U. provides the means whereby their grievances can be ventilated and their interests advanced."

More important still, the Terrington Committee point out that the conflict in this union between these technical officers is a domestic dispute and an issue that cannot be settled by setting up another Union. The dispute would go on, and the House of Commons should keep clear of that kind of dispute. I promised to be brief and I am going to sit down.

Hear, hear.

I hope that when the hon. Member gets up I shall give him some reason to sit down.

We have had this Report and the Government have made their decision quite clear in a very difficult situation. I hope that the House of Commons will not take sides. It will make a very serious mistake if it does so. I tell the members of the Unions concerned, speaking as one with 40 years' experience, that what is being advocated from the other side of the House today is not new. We had it 40 years ago—many trade unions, many grades, many rates of pay, low pay for all, and weakness and disunity. The views advanced by hon. Members opposite are advocated not out of interest in the worker but in the interests of the employer.

Rubbish.

It is a full attack on trade unions. You regret their increased influence. You regret their power, and in every way you can you use your political power to attack these unions.

I would remind the hon. Member that I am not using my political power.

I am sorry, Mr. Deputy-Speaker. It is an attack upon trade unionism, and I hope that the Government, having given their decision, will remain firm and not yield to the splinter group on the other side.

I recognise that the House might well be impatient of listening to someone who knows nothing at all about Post Office or trade union administration. But most certainly I have not the slightest doubt that it is right to make some reply to the hon. Member for Walthamstow, East (Mr. Wallace). How can I avoid being interested in this problem, as a Member of this House? I have three kinds of constituents. Some are on the E.O.(T.) A. side of the dispute. Some are on the other side, as trade unionists, and there is a larger group of constituents who are anxious to have the best possible Post Office service. I have to represent those three bodies here as best I can. I cannot avoid expressing some view about the matter.

I do not for a moment propose to enter into the large variety of considerations which must govern the question of recognition or non-recognition of E.O.(T.) A. but there is one matter which is greatly striking to a layman who looks at this problem. My hon. Friend the Assistant Postmaster-General, in making his announcement yesterday, pointed out the large proportion of representation—I think 16 out of 23—that this grade has on the executive of I might call the T.U.C. union. [HON. MEMBERS: "T.U.C.?"] Hon. Members know the right name, if I do not. I think it is, in fact, the executive of the P.O.E.U. That is a striking thing because, to a layman, it looks like overwhelming representation.

As against that, we have this view, which is also strange to a layman, that E.O.(T.) A., without the advantages which recognition can obviously give—and one of the advantages which recognition gives, I suppose, is having time off for attending to trade union matters—has increased its membership by attracting more and more people who apparently are prepared to pay for its services. I find it very difficult to square that situation with the view held by the contribution payers that they are receiving inadequate representation. That is what troubles me.

I wish to ask a question of my hon. Friend about his statement yesterday. The hon. Member for Walthamstow. East said that we none of us have power to prevent a new union arising. I am not so sure about that. It is an extraordinarily optimistic sort of union in the Post Office, I should have thought, which was going to arise and continue in being unless it had some hope of recognition at some stage. If we as a House are in control of recognition, we are in a position to stop new unions arising.

In his statement yesterday my hon. Friend the Assistant Postmaster-General said:

"… there are no valid grounds, as things are now, for acceding to their claim for recognition."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 30th July, 1953; Vol. 518, c. 1550.]

I hope that my hon. Friend will indicate what would be the circumstances in which there would be valid grounds for recognition. If he does that, then there may be some hope that some new union, should there be desire for it to arise, should receive recognition ultimately.

Mr. Gammans.

On a point of order, Mr. Deputy-Speaker. I should like to know whether you are permitting the closing of this discussion when the Minister has replied.

That depends on the time. I am not closing the debate at all.

May I put another point of order to you, Mr. Deputy-Speaker? Are you prepared to call me before you close the debate?

I can give no undertaking about that.

On a point of order, Mr. Deputy-Speaker. I hope you will bear in mind that there are considerable trade union interests represented by this side of the House, and that on this of all subjects it would be most unfortunate if there appeared to be a lopsided discussion.

Yes. Mr. Gammans.

The hon. Member for Walthamstow, East (Mr. Wallace), whom we much respect for his normal good humour and conviviality, misunderstood, I think, the reason why my hon. Friend the Member for Westbury (Sir R. Grimston) raised this subject today. My hon. Friend was not attacking trade unionism as such. If he was attacking anyone, he was attacking me because of the attitude that I have taken. I hope that the hon. Member opposite will not go away with any idea that this debate, which deals with a particular union, is in any sense an attack by my hon. Friends on either the great trade union movement or its place in the community.

The hon. Member is being attacked by his hon. Friends, but my interpretation of that is that it is an attack upon the trade unions.

No.

The hon. Member has misunderstood the whole object of the debate. When he started off I thought he was going to help to defend me, but at the end I was not sure whom he was trying to help.

We have memories.

Memories are no concern of mine.

Let me start by saying that I appreciate fully not only the motives which have led my hon. Friend to raise this question in debate, but also the very great sincerity which has prompted nearly 50 hon. Members to sign the Motion which appears on the Order Paper. No doubt they feel very passionately that when they were in opposition they took a certain line of action in regard to E.O.(T) A. and went into the Lobby and voted in favour of that line of action.

I went into the Lobby and voted with them, and, therefore, I not only appreciate their feelings, but so far as their political consistency is at stake, I am involved as much as they are. I would agree with my hon. Friend that nothing could be worse for the reputation of a political party or, for that matter, of parliamentary Government, than that it should be felt that we were changing the line that we took on a particular matter merely because we changed sides in this House.

What I hope I shall succeed in doing is to convince my hon. Friends that the action that they took when in Opposition does not conflict materially with the policy which the Government have adopted. That policy in no way upsets their political sincerity. There are two things I must make clear from the beginning and the first is that, so far as the Post Office is concerned, there is not and never has been a pledge that 40 per cent. membership of a particular grade would automatically qualify a union for recognition.

The hon. Member for Westbury (Sir R. Grimston) knows that.

As I told the House yesterday, the so-called Listowel formula, which has been used through these debates, qualifies a union with 40 per cent. membership for consideration, but consideration is a different thing from automatic recognition.

In view of the mutterings that are going on on the other side of the House, I should like to make it clear that we are fully aware of the fact that the so-called Listowel formula only entitles a union to consideration, but the point is that in 1950 and 1951 this party gave the unmistakable impression that had we been in office we should have agreed to recognition and all we wish to know now is, what have been the material changes since then?

If my hon. Friend will wait I am coming to that.

I must deal with the 40 per cent. formula from the point of E.O.(T.) A and perhaps I should draw the attention of the House to the documents which put that fact beyond any shadow of doubt. First, there is the Treasury booklet on "Staff Relations in the Civil Service," first published in 1949, to which my hon. Friend the Member for Westbury, who opened this debate, referred.

These words are used:

"The Postmaster-General has recently announced that the Post Office will consider requests for recognition if the Association making the request can show it has a membership of at least 40 per cent. of the organised staff of the grade concerned."

The second argument, of which my hon. Friend must be aware, is the letter sent by the Post Office to E.O.(T.) A. dated 26th November, 1945. This said:

"No definite figure has been laid down for general application as regards the minimum percentage of staff required for recognition."

If I may go on quoting, this is of great importance:

"Unless and until it could be clearly shown that the existing union which has enjoyed recognition for many years no longer substantially represents particular grades it would be contrary to any ordered method of staff negotiation to grant official recognition to another association."

That is what was told E.O.(T.) A. in 1945 and they could not think that the publication of the Listowel formula in any way changed the situation, because after that formula was published they were told all over again that 40 per cent. did not entitle them to automatic recognition. In fact, the phrase was used, "No precise rules were laid down."

Now I want to deal with the point raised just now by way of interruption, namely, what must be the overriding considerations which must guide the Post Office in recognising a break-away union. I hope I have made it clear that at no time was E.O.(T.) A. led to believe, either by the general Post Office procedure or in specific correspondence, that a 40 per cent. membership was all they needed before they could be accepted as a recognised union. On the contrary, it was made clear from the beginning and throughout all these negotiations that the exact opposite was the case.

So much for the relationship between E.O.(T.) A. and the Post Office. Now let us come to the point which is worrying my hon. Friends behind me. their own attitude to this question and the extent to which they feel themselves bound as a matter of political honour to a certain course of action. I have read and reread the debates in this House on the subject. I have examined carefully the statements made by the Conservative Party when in Opposition and never once, either in this House or anywhere else, have we as a party given a pledge that E.O.(T.) A. should receive automatic recognition on a membership percentage basis without consideration of any other factors. Never has that pledge been given. What. then, were the debates all about?

Hear, hear.

It is always unwise to cheer too soon. Hon. Members may have forgotten and, therefore, I will remind them.

The charge made in the debate against the then Government was put by my hon. Friend the Member for Westbury himself in words which clarify the issue beyond any shadow of doubt. He made it quite clear why we went into the Lobby:

"We are not taking sides with anybody. I say that most emphatically. We are concerned to see fair play between two claims."

Now the charge which the Conservative Party made at that time against the Government was that the then Postmaster-General was not unbiased. That was what the debate was about. To quote my hon. Friend again:

"We believe that he has refused recognition not on the merits of the case but for political considerations. We condemn him for that and unless he can satisfy us that that is not the case, I shall ask my hon. Friend to divide the Committee."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 6th July, 1950; Vol. 477, c. 702–4.]

Since my right hon. Friend the Member for Caerphilly (Mr. Ness Edwards) has been more or less accused of bias in this matter when we were the party in power, would not the hon. Gentleman agree that my right hon. Friend proved that he was not biased insofar as he set up the Terrington Committee?

I am coming to that. I was dealing with the point of my hon. Friends behind me, as to why, in those two debates, they divided the Committee. I know that what is concerning them is the feeling that they may have been bound by political honour to a certain course of action. It was because the then Postmaster-General was unable to satisfy the Conservative Party as to his impartiality that my hon. Friend forced a Division and he and I and a good few of my other hon. Friends went into the Lobby.

The charge, apparently, in the last part of the Minister's argument is that the decision before arose out of political considerations. Seeing that the same decision practically has now been arrived at, does this mean that the Assistant Postmaster-General now completely exonerates my right hon. Friend and his party of having dealt with the matter from political considerations?

The hon. Member had better wait until I finish my speech.

Let me give one more quotation which, I hope, will prove that it was the question of impartiality which was at stake. My hon. Friend the Member for West-bury, in the Adjournment debate on 20th October, 1950, said:

"What the right hon. Gentleman has done in this case is to refuse to recognise a body under circumstances which appear—I put it no further than that—to arise from political prejudice.…When a union is a member of the Trades Union Congress and when its ex-secretary is a member of the Socialist Party and has boasted in the journal of the union that he can get the ear of his colleagues even when E.O.(T.) A. is being discussed, is anyone going to believe that the union, although it may not be officially affiliated, is not tied up with the Socialist Party? … It is asking for too much credulity to accept that. That is why I say to the right hon. Gentleman that it appears that he is coming to this decision from political prejudice."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 20th October, 1950; Vol. 478. c. 2445–6.]

If the then Postmaster-General had satisfied my right hon. Friend and the rest of us on that point, there would have been no Division. What, therefore, I have to do today is to satisfy my hon. Friends fully that the case of E.O.(T.) A. has now been considered with the impartiality which, rightly or wrongly, they did not believe existed before.

They do not believe it now.

I start with one advantage over my predecessor, at any rate for the purpose we are now discussing: that is that neither my noble Friend nor I have any connection with any trade union. The essential criterion which must guide us is to decide whether under the arrangement at present in force this particular grade of technical officer has or has not adequate machinery for representing the interests of the staff concerned and of bringing forward to the Post Office any grievances or any constructive ideas which they may have.

These technical officers are a very highly skilled and an extremely loyal body of men. They make an essential contribution to the telephone service, both in peace and in war. They have every reason to be proud of the specialised position that they hold, and they have problems which are peculiar to them. On the other hand, they are members of the general engineering staff of the Post Office. They work side by side with engineers with whom they share most common problems. Anyone who has ever had experience of trade union negotiations inside Government service or in private industry would, I think, agree on one thing: that it is undesirable, from the point of view both of the employer and of the employee, to try to negotiate with a multiplicity of unions—[HON. MEMBERS: "Why?"]—especially when those unions represent men who are doing the same work and carry out their daily tasks together.

I am chairman of a joint industrial council and from the beginning we have had two unions and we invite them together.

I do not think that that vitiates the points I have made. I do not think that anyone with long experience of industry will disagree about the undesirability of a multiplicity of unions representing men who work side by side. It simply means that one union bids against another and it is very bad for the employer—perhaps even more so than for the employee. This was the problem which faced my noble Friend when he took office, and a distasteful problem it was. It was distasteful for the reason that the point at issue was not a dispute between the Post Office and its employees, but a dispute between two sections of staff. No employer, whether he be a Minister or a private employer, likes to be in that position.

As I have made clear to this House on several occasions, it is only in the last resort that a Minister or an employer would like to take a decision on a matter of that kind. For 18 months my noble Friend has been trying to see whether anything could be done and whether this matter could be settled between the unions themselves. These are the steps he has taken. He has awaited the evidence of the Terrington Committee, which his predecessor had set up, and which contained two employers' representatives, two such experienced trade unionists as Sir Lincoln Evans and Dame Florence Hancock, and an impartial chairman.

They recommended without hesitation that the interests of this grade of engineers would be best served not by the recognition of E.O.(T.) A., but by their continuing to be represented by the P.O.E.U. However, even this adjudication—a very powerful one—did not satisfy my noble Friend. He then tried discussions between the parties concerned, after seeing both sides. These broke down, so he decided to have one more try and, with the agreement of the Ministry of Labour, he asked Sir Richard Lloyd-Roberts to act as a conciliator, with the consent of both parties.

My hon. Friend the Member for Westbury rather suggested that Sir Richard had gone beyond his terms of reference and, therefore, I must clear that point. What Sir Richard did was first to report to my noble Friend that he had failed in his task of conciliation. Subsequently to that, he submitted a report in which he said, as the Terrington Committee had said, that E.O.(T.) A., in his opinion, could not be recognised. He specifically added that he considered—this is what we are worrying about—that he thought the best interests of the staff—about which my hon. Friends should be thinking—would be best served through membership of the P.O.E.U.

The point really is that when Sir Richard Lloyd-Roberts, whom I know very well, was appointed as conciliator it was never disclosed to hon. Members in this party that he was to make any report, and to that I take very serious objection.

I cannot see any conceivable objection to his making a report——

It was very unwise to do so.

He failed in his task, reported that he failed in his task, and then made this recommendation. I cannot see anything wrong in that; in fact. I am grateful to him for doing so.

My hon. Friend may be.

These protracted negotiations have produced what I hoped my hon. Friends would agree was a very marked advance on the situation compared with what it was when they and I voted on this matter three years ago. The P.O.E.U. are willing to amend their rules in a way which, as I said yesterday, I think is almost unprecedented in trade union practice. They have offered to arrange that no recommendation of a sectional committee could be overruled by the executive: council without a two-thirds, or even higher, majority. At present the grades which E.O.(T.) A. seeks to represent have themselves more than a two-thirds majority on that council.

Is that two-thirds majority required in the case of wages, conditions, holidays, etc.?

We have not come down to direct negotiations on specific points, but on the general attitude they are willing to make it an even higher majority. So far as I can gather, on only one occasion in their history have the Executive Council of the P.O.E.U. ever overruled a sectional committee, and it was when they suggested that they had not asked for enough wages.

Let me try to summarise the position. I hope that I can satisfy my hon. Friends that they can go away for the Summer Recess with absolutely clear minds and consciences in this matter. First, there has never been in the Post Office any such thing as automatic recognition on a 40 per cent. basis. That fact has been made clear from the beginning to E.O.(T.) A.

When my hon. Friends—and 1—divided the Committee three years ago it was because they could not be satisfied that the issue was being judged and would be judged with complete impartiality. The vote they gave then has, in my opinion, achieved the object which they then had in view, namely, that this issue should be judged with impartiality. It led to the setting up of the Terrington Committee. It led, furthermore, to all the negotiations by my noble Friend that have gone on, and finally to the attempted conciliation by Sir Richard Lloyd-Roberts.

Are we to take it the Terrington Report has been accepted by the Government not only as regards the specific recommendations regarding E.O.(T.) A. but its general intention of principles regarding the recognition of unions?

My hon. Friend should not make that assumption. We are dealing only with E.O.(T.) A. My noble Friend has been guided by the recommendation of the Terrington Committee on this issue.

The Report is not accepted?

Since that time not only has my noble Friend tried to resolve the difficulty himself; he has sought the help of these two impartial bodies, both of which gave him the same advice, namely, that E.O.(T.) A. should not be recognised.

Would any of my hon. Friends say that they are better judges or whether this union should or should not be recognised than the Terrington Committee or Sir Richard Lloyd-Roberts? I do not know whether they will feel that they have superior knowledge on this subject but the Terrington Committee and Sir Richard have gone into this question, have interviewed both sides, and they both make the same recommendation.

On a point of order. Before four o'clock, I should like to ask you, Mr. Speaker, whether you think it is fair that in this debate there should have been three speakers on the other side of the House and one on this side, on a matter which is of importance not only to both sides of the House but to persons outside? I should like to have your views about that, and, at the same time, record a strong protest against the conditions which have applied in the debate.

The hon. Member should blame the clock, not me.

Lastly, and this is what matters most, my noble Friend has taken this decision because he is advised, and he himself is convinced, that the interests of the men concerned would be best served, as things now are, by a continuance of the present arrangement. I hope that in the light of this decision all those concerned will seek means of reuniting those who have been divided by this unhappy controversy, and of furthering the best interests of a fine and loyal body of men.

I want to reiterate what I said——

I wish to reiterate what I said yesterday, that we welcome the fact that Her Majesty's Government are accepting the recommendations of the Terrington Report. We consider that by so doing they will go a long way to bringing about complete reconciliation between these break-away unions and those unions affiliated to the Trades Union Congress.

I wish to deal with the allocations of very high frequency and ultra-high frequency broadcasting——

On a point of order. Is there any precedent, Mr. Speaker—I speak with respect of one who is my hon. Friend—for going from one speech to another? Is there any means by which hon. Members on this side of the House may be safeguarded in a matter which has become a private dog-fight between hon. Members on the other side of the House?

Order. There is nothing to protest against. The Question before the House is, "That this House do now adjourn." That has always been the Question, and any speech which is in order on that Motion should be heard. As to the other point, the matter was raised by hon. Members on the other side of the House.

Yes, in three speeches.

I would say, at the outset, that I shall not raise the controversial issues for and against sponsored television. I hope I shall not weary the House by what is bound to be a somewhat technical discussion, but an endeavour must be made from this side to discover first, whether it is technically possible to have sponsored television without infringing the frequencies allotted to the B.B.C. for television and for very high frequency audio - broadcasting; secondly, whether sponsored television can be obtained on existing frequencies allocated to Great Britain without renewal or alteration of existing international agreements; and, thirdly, whether it can be obtained without considerable expense to those who already hold licences should their frequency allocation be changed as the result of the recommendations of the Television Advisory Committee.

I know that there are some frequencies allocated to defence. The hon. Gentleman need only give the slightest hint about that and I shall not pursue the matter. I wish especially to deal with Band I, the 41–68 megacycles band which, I understand, is the existing B.B.C. band to cover London, Birmingham, Holm Moss, Kirk o'Shotts and Wenvoe and five low-powered stations already planned. Would it be possible for the B.B.C. using Band I as they do now for the purposes of television, to complete the national coverage for television? Would it cover Norwich, for example? There have been Questions asked in the House about the absence of television from East Anglia. There is at present no station which can cover that area and I shall be grateful if the hon. Gentleman would say whether if Norwich can be accommodated on Band I.

Band II, the 75–100 megacycle band, is obviously a too narrow band. The characteristics of television require a broader band. It would appear, though we should like confirmation, that the B.B.C. intend some time in the future to use Band II for the purposes of V.H.F. audio-broadcasting. What is on Band II at the moment is difficult to ascertain. So far as I know there is the B.B.C. Experimental Station, at Wrotham, the Automobile Association, some police and some newspapers.

In fact, I am told that there is a complaint from the "Daily Mail" and the "News Chronicle" that they are overhearing each other's communications. Goodness knows what would happen if "Tribune" got on the same wavelength as the Kemsley Press. The consequences are too dire to contemplate. I fear that writs would be flying about like confetti at a wedding. It is obvious that there are difficulties already about Band II.

Band III has been referred to as the thorn in the flesh. It is the band about which there is the most argument—the 174/216 megacycle band. I thank the Assistant Postmaster-General for at last giving us information about Band III last Wednesday in answer to a Parliamentary Question. On this band there are mobile communications. We should like to know, and I ask the hon. Gentleman to give us a direct answer, whether this is in any way a contravention of our international agreements.

The protocol to the Stockholm Conference leads us to believe that the Post Office, as the responsible authority, were in order in allocating the frequencies for the purpose of air navigational services, taxi-cabs and public utilities.

Does not the hon. Gentleman agree that many of these allocations were made before the Stockholm Conference—between the Atlantic City Conference and the Stockholm Conference?

I understand that. The Atlantic City Conference dealt with the world and the one at Stockholm dealt with Europe. In that respect, until there had been a European Conference I consider that the Post Office were right. We shall have confirmation when the Minister replies. He is more up-to-date on these matters than I could possibly be. There are a host of commercial services on Band III, but there are two channels available for television. I want to know whether both these channels are required for complete coverage by a single programme of the B.B.C., or whether they need only one for Norwich to cover the whole of East Anglia, leaving only one channel which could be used for sponsored television.

I appreciate that on Band III—because the higher the frequency the shorter the wavelength and, therefore, the lower the coverage—the coverage is only 40 miles against 50 or 60 miles on Band I. It would appear that whatever channel is used on Band III—either of the two available—there would be coverage only for London or Birmingham. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will tell us. If this band is cleared, and it is a long-term policy, it will put people who are already on Band III—the mobile services—to very great expense. Where is it proposed, and on what wavelength or frequency, that they should be accommodated? Are they to be put into Band II, or what? Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will tell us.

Is the correct conclusion to draw from the allocation of these bands that it is only possible, without depriving the B.B.C. of their existing services or denying them the right to complete the coverage of the whole of Great Britain, to have one band available for sponsored television on that frequency?

I want to mention Band IV and Band V—the ultra-high frequencies. No television sets have yet been made in this country which can take any transmission on these frequencies. These are the frequencies used for the Services. There certainly would not be the valves available in quantity to put into the sets should transmission take place on these frequencies, and there is also the point that the cost of conversion of existing sets would be very heavy. We should like to know what is the proposed future use of these ultra-high frequencies.

Is it proposed to give the industry carte blanche to go ahead with the development of television on high frequencies? There has been a suggestion mooted in certain circles, to which I am not very close, that it is possible to accommodate quite a number of television transmissions by going either up or down the scale, and having a Band IIA or a Band IIIA. I am informed that it could be done. It would be a narrow band, the area covered would be small and the expense of the transmission would not be too great, but the real question that I want to ask is whether we could have television transmission on Band IIA or Band IIIA without having to have another international conference for the allocation of wavelength frequencies. It is very important that we should get an answer to that question, because of the controversy and the argument that is now taking place.

I want to raise another matter, of which I gave the hon. Gentleman notice. Has a decision been made by the Post Office and the B.B.C. as to whether we are to have frequency modulator or amplitude modulator for very high frequency broadcasting? It is time a decision was made, because I would recollect that, when I was in the Department, in 1948, this question was being taken up in the Post Office, and we should be very interested to hear if some agreement has been reached between the B.B.C. and the Post Office on whether there is to be frequency modulator or amplitude modulator for such broadcasts. The industry is interested in this, because there is the question of getting converters made for existing sets, and there is also the question of the export market. There is not the slightest doubt that some European countries have very high frequency broadcasts, with many stations, and this is developing, and it is of paramount importance that the export trade should know the decision.

There is even another reason much nearer at home. We have had many Questions over the last four or five years about the annoyance caused to people on the North-East Coast and in Northern Ireland because of the sharing of the wavelength which has to take place. This sharing of the wavelength between these two parts of Great Britain could be avoided if there were very high frequency broadcasts. I know the dilemma; there is nobody who can be held responsible for it. It is not a political, but a technical, dilemma. The fact is that, under the Copenhagen Plan, we were allocated only 13 frequencies, one long and 12 medium, and it is utterly impossible satisfactorily to cover the whole of Great Britain with broadcasts, but, with very high frequencies, we could get complete coverage.

I gave notice to the hon. Gentleman about a few general questions. First, when is the new station to be ready at Pontop Pike for the Newcastle area? Next, can we have a settlement of this controversy, which seems to be continually raised at Question time, as to where the B.B.C. are to put the Plymouth station? I am not as well acquainted with the topography of Cornwall and Devon as with that of my native Yorkshire, but I think it is time that the Plymouth controversy was settled and that we knew where the station will be.

Finally, I am very interested in the pressure questions which we get from various parts of the country about the need for television stations, and it has been passing through my mind that, now that we have stations in England, Scotland and Wales, perhaps the figures could be given of the number of television sets per 1,000 of the population for each of the three countries.

It would be very illuminating to know what interest the people in those three countries take in television, and we might learn something about each others characteristics even from the dull statistics which, I hope, the hon. Gentleman can give us. I know that I have asked quite a number of questions, and I hope that I have asked quite directly. I also hope that the hon. Gentleman can give us the answers, particularly with regard to the controversy about Band III.

I am glad that the hon. Member for Keighley (Mr. Hobson) has raised this matter, because it gives me the opportunity to express publicly, on behalf of my noble Friend and the Government, the debt we owe to the Television Advisory Committee, and, in particular, to its Chairman. Sir Charles Daniel, for the valuable Report they have produced at such very short notice.

I shall deal, first, with the last point raised by the hon. Gentleman, the distribution of television licences throughout the country. Curiously enough, it is somewhat uneven, although I do not want to draw any deep deductions from that fact. Taking the number of television licences per 1,000 potential viewers in England, Scotland and Wales covered by the five main stations, England, where the stations have been opened longest, has the highest figure of 66 per 1,000; Scotland, where the fourth Station was opened, has the lowest of 21 per 1,000; while Wales, which was opened after that in Scotland, has 32 per 1,000. I do not know what deductions we should draw from all that, but they are the figures for which the hon. Gentleman asked.

The hon. Gentleman asked me three questions. The first was, can the B.B.C. complete their programme, and can we have competitive television at the same time? We must agree on what we mean by the completion of the B.B.C. programme. At first, there were to be the five high-power and the five medium-power stations, and until only about a month ago that was regarded by this Government, as it was by the last Government, as the completion of the B.B.C.'s first programme coverage. They can all be accommodated in Band I.

But since that time we have added two more stations, the Isle of Wight and the Isle of Man. Those also can be accommodated under Band I. The B.B.C. have recently published a programme of development, and while the Government do not disapprove of it, they are in no way committed to it. That programme envisages, first of all, a second programme of television, but it also envisages fitting in some of the odd spots all over the country some further low-power stations in the first programme.

I am glad to be able to tell the hon. Gentleman that the B.B.C. now believe that they can accommodate these low-power stations also in Band I without impinging in any way on Band III. As I told the House the other day, the Government are in no way committed to giving the B.B.C. facilities for a second television programme before they have provided their rivals with a first television programme. What it really means is that the stations envisaged, apart from those for the second television programme of the B.B.C, can all go in Band I. I cannot give a better idea of how quickly this great science changes than by saying that not even the Television Advisory Committee believed that that would be feasible. But the B.B.C. now believe that they can do it.

The second question asked by the hon. Gentleman was about international agreements. He asked whether it would be possible to do what we propose without breaking international agreements. The information at my disposal suggests that it would be possible. It might be necessary for us to make agreements with any neighbouring countries who could conceivably be affected, but it would not be necessary to call a second conference, and we should certainly not. if we had those agreements with neighbouring countries, be breaking any international agreements.

The third question asked by the hon. Gentleman referred to what is called the clearing of Band III. In that band there are now a number of services which are not television services, and the Television Advisory Committee recommended that if possible the band should gradually be cleared. Will it cost money? Yes, of course it will. Will it cost a lot of money? It depends. A complete clearance would cost a lot of money, but if we envisage, as we do, a gradual clearing of one service after another over a period of years, there is no reason why any considerable amount of money should be at stake.

In any case, it is for the Government to decide which is the best use—whether it is better used for the services by which it is now used or whether it is better used for television. In so far as taxi-cab companies and other commercial users have a frequency in this band, it is on a licence which can be cancelled at comparatively short notice.

There may be difficulties. I can best illustrate this by analogy. We had this difficulty about who was to pay for the alterations in the electricity supply industry. There was argument about who was to pay for the conversion from direct to alternating current. Who would be responsible in this case?

According to the terms the Government are not responsible for any compensation.

The clearance of Band III is a slow and gradual process, but, in the meantime, two frequencies are available in Band III and neither is required by the B.B.C. for their first coverage in this country, even up to the 95 per cent. coverage. These two frequencies are, therefore, available for whatever purpose the Government may decide, and that is a matter which will be mentioned in the White Paper in the autumn.

In the meantime, while we are waiting to clear this band, is my hon. Friend issuing any further licences on Band III?

Licences are being issued on Band III, but the people to whom they are being issued understand perfectly clearly what may be the Government's plans for the future of that band.

I was asked about Band II and who is in it. The police are in a large part of it, but I am informed that the remainder of that band will be sufficient for the development of V.H.F. I was asked which form of modulation would be used. That matter is now before the Television Advisory Committee, and the hon. Member knows as well as I do what tremendous controversy there is and what strong views are held by the protagonists on each side. We hope that the Television Advisory Committee will report in the autumn.

At the Stockholm Conference, in 1952, we reserved the whole of Band III for television and we submitted a plan whereby this band could be used, if it were all available, for no fewer than 28 television stations of varying range and power; but we made it quite clear that we were using that band in the meantime for other purposes, too, and such use is in no way a contravention of the agreement which we reached at Stockholm. I do not want to go through the whole of the use of that band, because I gave the hon. Member the information in answer to a Question a few days ago.

The hon. Member also asked me about Bands IV and V. To a certain extent these are experimental, although both Bands IV and V are being used in the United States. I am told that the difficulty is one of valves, but when that difficulty has been overcome—and I have no doubt that it will be overcome before very long—we shall go into a large part of the spectrum where there is almost unlimited scope for frequencies, and I think that this not much sought-after slice of the frequency spectrum could take as many stations as the most ardent television fan could ever wish for.

The hon. Member asked for an explanation about Band III and whether it would be necessary to have a conference on it. I am informed that probably it would not be necessary, provided we had agreement with any countries who possibly could be affected by our going outside the band.

Pontop Pike and North Hessary Tor are two names of which probably most hon. Members have never heard except in connection with television. Pontop Pike is working on a temporary basis. After next year it will be on a permanent basis and then its power will be increased and its range extended and it will cover the whole of Durham and parts of Northumberland, and the North Riding of Yorkshire.

As I informed the House yesterday, a public inquiry is to be held into whether the North Hessary Tor site is to be used. The B.B.C. regard it as the most suitaable and, from their point of view, the cheapest site, but aesthetic considerations come in and so the Minister of Housing and Local Government has ordered a local inquiry. I warn the House that the holding of that inquiry will certainly hold up the erection of some kind of aerial in that part of the world and the provision of television in the Plymouth district.

I hope that I have dealt with all the questions that the hon. Member raised. This is a very technical matter of limited interest, but of very great importance in the television development of this country.

I am glad to have two or three minutes in which to address the House and I hope that my hon. Friend will consider some of the points that I want to raise.

I do not want to go into the question of why we gave away, at the bottom of Band III, some 10 megacycles for mobile radio purposes, but it seems to me that it was unfortunate because it has meant that our industry is manufacturing equipment which no other country in the world is manufacturing for the same frequency. It is extremely important that if we are to hold our own in the export market our exports should be based on similar home products. I would ask, therefore, whether, on the Inter-Departmental Committee which decided upon this allocation of Band III, the Board of Trade should not now be represented. As a temporary measure that might allow export needs to be borne in mind.

Secondly, to avoid a mistake like this occurring in future, ought we not to set up in this country something similar to the Federal Communications Commission? I realise that that Commission does not look after Service requirements and that the Services tend to be a little greedy in their needs, but if we had a civilian controlling authority looking after in particular export needs and civilian needs and the Services co-ordinated in a second committee the two requirements could come together at Cabinet level.

How about the public interest?

Surely that is represented by Ministers in this House.

It is important that these two sides should come together at Cabinet level. A mistake has been made and we have been left in an unusual position. We want to avoid making a similar mistake in the future, and I humbly suggest that this is one way in which it could be done.

The Minister said that there are two free frequencies in Band III. In those circumstances, why is it necessary to push all the other users operating in Band III off the band?

There is no question of pushing them off Band III. It is a question of clearing Band III and making better use of it for television.