I beg to move, That leave be given to bring in a Bill to extend control over the importation of live animals. When I first tabled this Motion, it was my intention to introduce a comprehensive Bill to cover the importation of all live animals from tropical and subtropical countries; but, on further consideration and after further research, I came to the conclusion that this was too comprehensive a Measure to introduce at this stage in the Parliamentary calendar. I therefore propose to ask the leave of the House to introduce a Bill to control the importation of tortoises and terrapins. I will, Mr. Speaker, with the leave of the House, move an Amendment in Committee so to amend the title. As there is some doubt about the definition of tortoises and terrapins, the Bill will contain a Clause defining these as the species chelonia.

I should like to inform the House that I have the unanimous support of a recent Parliamentary Committee of the Animal Welfare Group. I have support from the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and from the British Veterinary Association. I have the support of Dr. Boycott, a director of the Public Health Laboratory Service, Taunton Branch, the British Veterinary Zoological Society, the Universities Federation of Animal Welfare, and the Animal Health Trust. I also have all-party support in the House.

These authorities would welcome the restricted import of this species because of the danger of importing diseases transmit-table to man and to domestic animals. Parents buying tortoises do not realise the health risk which may be involved in their children handling these pets. I quote from a letter received from Dr. Boycott, a director of the Public Health Laboratory at Taunton, an independent authority, who, referring to tortoises, said this: Few people know that these animals are a real source of human disease, if a rare one. It was this which first interested me in them. Eighty to 100 per cent. of the species imported here harbour in their bowels bacteria which can cause enteritis in man. The risk is a slight one, for obvious reasons, and limited, as far as I know, to children, who are the only ones likely to fondle a tortoise. He is informed that about six infections have been reported in this country and the same number in Holland and Germany. There have been a good many more in the United States of America, but the species kept there as pets are terrapins … which are bred in captivity and fed on offals. It is not generally realised that about a quarter of a million tortoises are imported into this country each year for sale to the general public as pets. They come by sea and by air, from Morocco, Tunisia, Yugoslavia and the U.S.S.R. Many of these tortoises die in transit, despite improvements brought about in transport conditions as a result of agitation by the R.S.P.C.A. and the Universities Federation for Animal Welfare. Of those that survive the journey and are subsequently sold to the public, herpetologists estimate that only about 1 per cent, survive the first 12 months after purchase. Replacement of these casualties helps to boost the trade.

I should like to give the House brief details of a large consignment of tortoises which reached this country in 1966. In May of that year, a consignment of 6,000 tortoises arrived at London Docks from Casablanca, consigned to a pet stores in the Midlands. They were in 100 baskets, each containing 60. As no representative of the firm had called to collect them, the matter was reported to the R.S.P.C.A. The Society arranged for the tortoises to be collected from the docks and transferred to its air hostel for animals at London Airport, where they remained until 4th June. When ultimately contacted, the owner of the pet stores claimed that he had cancelled the order for this consignment, but he eventually agreed to accept delivery. One wonders how long they would have remained at the docks but for the prompt action of the R.S.P.C.A.

In a similar case in April of this year, the River Thames Police reported to the R.S.P.C.A. emergency night staff at headquarters that there were 104 baskets containing tortoises which were awaiting collection at Free Trade Wharf. Each basket contained 60 tortoises—a total of 6,240. It transpired that this was part of a consignment of 35,000 tortoises, some of which had been collected by lorry, but the rest were left on the quayside when work for the day finished, where they were found by the river police. The 6,240 were taken by the R.S.P.C.A. to its air hostel for animals at London Airport. Of the 3,000 examined before they were collected by the firm that had ordered them, 40 were dead and many were weak. It must be remembered that these tortoises had already been transported from their country of origin. Other cases could be cited, but I will not bore the House with them.

The Royal Society fully realises the difficulty of looking after tortoises, and it has issued a leaflet on the subject. The problem is that these animals are not really fitted to live in our climate. An early spring causes them to wake up from hibernation, and they subsequently die. There is no doubt that many parents buy tortoises and terrapins as pets for their children without any knowledge of how to keep them.

It will be seen that terrapins as well as tortoises are included within the provisions of the Bill. The following comments in The Field of 27th April this year, regarding the tortoise trade, make my case clearly: Commenting a year ago on the scandalous casualties among oriental finches consigned in bulk air freights to the British pet trade, we called for its prohibition. The case of the tortoises found dying on arrival at London Docks demands that this call be repeated. Very few among those who sell imported cage birds or tortoises are callous. But some of those operating at the wholesale level quite obviously do not know, do not care, or do not think what is happening to the creatures out of which they are making money. Their abuses should be stopped by law. That is precisely what the Bill is designed to do. I can understand the child's viewpoint, but tortoises need professional care, and my Bill would allow them to be imported only for zoos, learned societies and those who have the facilities to look after them properly.

I appreciate that it is late in the Parliamentary calendar, but, in view of the interest which the Government have shown in giving time to private Members for the promotion of animal welfare, I very much hope that—I put this plea to the Leader of the House—that time will be given for the introduction and passage of this Bill.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill ordered to be brought in by Mr. Costain, Mr. Burden, Dr. Summerskill, Sir Ronald Russell, Dr. Winstanley, and Miss Harvie Anderson.

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

Hon. Members will be aware that this Bill stems from support in the House for a proposal that permission should be given for the use of reflective number plates on motor vehicles as an additional road safety measure. Many hon. Members have from time to time raised this question, but I pay a personal tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Hudders-field, West (Mr. Lomas), whose persistence and initiative on the matter, including the speech he made a short time ago proposing to introduce a Private Member's Bill on the subject, has spurred us on to the introduction of this Measure this morning.

The reflective materials which are used in the manufacture of these plates are of a comparatively recent design, and they were not in sufficient general use in this country for them to be taken into account when the Road Transport Lighting Act, 1957 was passed.

It now seems that there may be some doubt in law as to whether reflective materials which are neither lights, lamps, nor reflectors as such come within the scope of the 1957 Act. I am sure that the hon. Members will agree that it is essential that the status under the law of reflecting materials, which for all practical purposes might be said to show a light when another light is shone upon them, should be clarified; and this is done in Clause 1. Clause 1 may seem very simple—almost naive—to many hon. Members, but I am advised that it is a necessary step forward to clarify the law on the subject and to indicate what we are talking about when introducing the power of the Minister to make regulations regarding the use of reflective materials.

Those of us who have witnessed demonstrations of the effectiveness of reflecting material at night will agree, I am sure, that good use can be made of it, subject, however, to a degree of control. At the same time we must exercise the greatest care in defining the types of reflective materials which we are trying to control. I would certainly not wish to create a situation wherein one of my hon. Friends might leave this Chamber one evening, climb into his motor car, and find himself summonsed because, over the weekend he, or his wife, had found time to clean it and polish it and thus restore to it a reflective surface. We are not concerned with that. Yet what could be more reflective than a highly-polished chromium-plated rear bumper or the cellulose finish on a newly polished motor car?

It is, obviously, not our wish to interfere in any way with such standard characteristics of modern vehicles but only to control those materials which are specifically designed to act as a form of reflector in the commonly accepted sense of the word.

The powers we are seeking would not prohibit altogether the use of these new materials but would enable us to permit their use where we consider that this would be beneficial to road safety or make the task of identification easier for the police.

As hon. Members no doubt know, the present terms of the 1957 Lighting Act are such that, once it was established beyond doubt that reflective materials must be treated as showing a light when another light is shone upon them, it would be illegal to use any reflective material on the back of a vehicle except a red one. It has been the policy of all Governments, and will remain so as far as we are concerned, that a red light or reflector on a vehicle denotes the back of that vehicle. Therefore, any permission to use reflective materials will not include the use of red on the front of a vehicle.

Where, however, it is proved to our satisfaction that the use of a colour other than red on the back would be beneficial for road safety without confusing other motorists on the road—trials which have been carried out at the Road Research Laboratory indicate that red is not always the colour most easily distinguished—we wish to have the powers to permit it.

In order to guard against possible confusion, it is necessary for us also to be able to control the quality and quantity of the material which is used. These are the powers which we seek under Clause 2.

One of the major developments in this field relates to the use of reflective number plates. I shall not deal with them in much detail because I expect that my hon. Friend the Member for Huddersfield, West will wish to speak about them. I just say, that although doubts have been expressed to us as to their value in aiding road safety, we think that there is sufficient evidence that they do make a vehicle using them more conspicuous and, consequently, lessen the chances of its being involved in a rear-end collision. For this reason, we think that we should allow reflective number plates to be tried out.

Our belief is based on trials which have been carried out at the Road Research Laboratory and also on the experience of other countries where the use of reflective plates is permitted. There can be no doubt that their legibility is such as to make the enforcement task of the police much easier.

I can tell the House now that when my right hon. Friend has the necessary powers, if Parliament grants them under this Bill, it will be her intention to make the use of reflective number plates permissive. We do not at this stage intend to make their use compulsory, but we shall watch with interest their effect on our road accident figures. There is also the possibility that we shall require certain vehicles which we think constitute a special hazard on the roads to carry a distinctive marking, involving the use of reflective materials. Again, the trials which have been carried out indicate that the most conspicuous marking, both for day and night, requires the use of a combination of red reflective and fluorescent materials with those of other colours. But until we have the powers of the Bill, any marking which we could legally require could only be fourth or fifth best.

There is another aspect of rear lighting which has caused us some concern. When the Road Transport Lighting Act, 1927, replaced by the 1957 Act, was drafted, it was appreciated that certain signalling devices such as direction indicators were necessary on the backs of vehicles. For these to be really effec- tive, it was necessary to distinguish them from the normal rear lighting of the vehicle and this could best be done by using a different colour from the red of the obligatory rear lamps and reflectors.

Provision was, therefore, made to permit the fitting of such devices, but experience has shown that the words in which this was done might be interpreted in such a way that it would be legally permissible to fit any device which is described as intended for use as a signal to overtaking traffic and which is illuminated by a lamp of any colour on the back of any vehicle. I do not think I need to stress the confusion which this might create on our roads. I think that the House will agree that it is essential that when a driver gives any signal it must be clearly understood by all other road users. Otherwise chaos will ensue and the best of intentions may result in serious accidents.

Some of the devices which may be developed by ingenious designers who are working on this subject may, in fact, prove to be very beneficial so we do not want to take any action which would be a bar to further progress; but we do want to have the powers to control such devices and to permit the use only of those which my right hon. Friend is advised will make a worth while countribution to road safety. In such cases the Department would be responsible for ensuring that the meaning of the signal was clearly understood by all road users and not just by a few who might adopt some device of their own.

The Bill which is now before the House will make a worth-while contribution towards road safety and help us to alleviate the individual suffering and loss to our national economy which stem from the appalling toll of casualties which are suffered on our roads every year.

I therefore ask for the support of the House for the Bill.

10.22 a.m.

I wish to associate myself with the Joint Parliamentary Secretary's congratulations to the hon. Member for Huddersfield, West (Mr. Lomas), because no one has done more in this House towards furthering the great development in reflector materials and drawing attention to the experience gained elsewhere, where the use of reflective number plates has reduced considerably rear-end accidents.

This is an all-party matter. Hon. members on both sides are tremendously interested in the subject. That is why we joined together originally in putting a Motion on the Order Paper, which was followed by the presentation of a Ten Minute Rule Bill by the hon. Member for Huddersfield, West. This Bill is designed to resolve doubt and to establish the status of this material, particularly where it is used as a safety device, for its status must be clarified.

The Parliamentary Secretary made the important point that, with the amount of chromium plating modern cars carry, it seems ludicrous that the law is such that chromium plate, which could act like a mirror and have dangerous effects, is permissible whereas material which is only capable of reflecting an image could be considered to be outside the law.

When the earlier Acts were introduced, there was not sufficient development or enough known about reflective materials to make them part of the law but the important thing is that one could now, I understand, use a reflective material on a number plate at the rear, provided it was red. But that would conflict with the normal test plate used by garages for moving vehicles from point to point and therefore could lead to more confusion if used on cars.

As the hon. Gentleman has said, the main thing is to prove whether these new devices are beneficial to road safety and that the Ministry should be able to control their quantity and quality. Experience elsewhere has shown a great reduction in the number of rear-end collisions by the use of these devices and that is of great importance.

Another point which impresses me is that with the use of reflective number plates, even on the front of a vehicle, one is capable of reading the number even with the headlights shining at one. This should surely be more helpful to the police. They will be able to read a number plate whether the car is approaching or departing.

I believe that this is a good Bill because it seeks to resolve doubt and makes certain that any motorist can adopt these number plates in future. As the hon. Gentleman has said, they will not be compulsory. Obviously, one hopes that many people will use them and that we shall then be able to start compiling some figures of accident rates to see whether there is any change. In the light of those figures, no doubt we can decide in future whether stricter measures are or are not needed. I believe that it is right that there should not be compulsion at present.

The hon. Gentleman also commented on certain types of vehicles on which a reflective material might be helpful to road safety. This point has been raised by a number of hon. Members before in relation to very long vehicles turning. There is no requirement under the law to show a light on the side or even to have a reflective material for use when such a vehicle is turning. This has led to accidents. I hope that the Minister, in making orders under the Bill, will take into account the long articulated vehicle and require a reflective material at some point along the side of the vehicle. This would reduce the danger of accidents in situations where a car approaches a long vehicle which makes a turn.

I fully support the Bill because it clarifies a doubt. I believe that, once it is passed, many people will supply themselves with these plates and that, as a result, we shall find that the Bill is helping to reduce the appalling accident rate.

10.30 a.m.

I should, first, like to express my very sincere thanks to my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary for his extremely kind words about the part which I played in helping to bring the Bill forward. In return, may I express my personal thanks both to him and to his Department for the help and guidance which I have received over the last few weeks. I couple with those thanks the name of the hon. Member for Totnes (Mr. Mawby) who, on an all-party basis, has joined in stimulating and creating interest about the concept of reflective number plates.

I am extremely glad to have the opportunity of speaking in support of the Bill, because it deals not only with reflective number plates but with the whole question of the lighting of vehicles in general. It is customary for a Member to declare his interest. I will declare mine: road safety, and the saving of lives and of suffering by people who sustain accidents on the road.

Without seeking to dramatise an already dramatic situation, may I say that I think that everyone in the House should be appalled that during the time that the House has been in recess—from Friday, 12th May, until today, 31st May—400 people have been killed on our roads, 5,000 have been seriously injured and 15,000 have been slightly injured—20,000 people involved in accidents in the short space of two and a half weeks. Some of those who died would have been alive today and some of those who were injured would have been fit and well if motorists had obeyed the simple road safety slogan "See and be seen".

To me, it is ludicrous that as the law stands a vehicle can be on the road, day or night, without either headlamps or stoplights. I therefore warmly welcome the recently published Report of the Home Office and Metropolitan Police on the compulsory fitting of dim-dip headlights on all vehicles. I hope that the Minister will give urgent consideration to the recommendations made in that Report, for this is literally a matter of life and death. I hope the Bill will give the Minister power to do something about this matter.

As hon. Members know, my main interest in the Bill is the power which the Minister will be given under it to lay regulations to allow the use of reflective number plates on all road vehicles. Before I deal with that matter, I should like to say a few general words about the rest of the Bill.

It may come as a surprise to some hon. Members to know that Britain is second only to Italy in the number of road vehicles in the country per road mile. In Belgium, there are 34; in Canada 14; in France 17; in the German Federal Republic 49; in the Irish Republic 6; in New Zealand 15; in Spain 24; in Switzerland 44; in America only 24. In this country we have no fewer than 57 vehicles per road mile. Faced with that appalling density on our roads, it is obvious that any measure designed to assist motorists to see and be seen, especially at night, should be warmly welcomed.

I was glad to hear the Parliamentary Secretary say that a measure is being contemplated to standardise the lighting of vehicles at the rear. It is time that this was done, and the Bill gives the Minister power to do it. The assortment of colours which sometimes appear on the backs of vehicles needs to be standardised. The gimmicks and gadgets which we sometimes see should be outlawed. In many instances, only the person driving the car knows what those gimmicks and gadgets mean; the person following has no clue. I have no objection to having a "tiger" in my tank, but I object to having one in the rear window of a motor car which flashes its eyes at me. This is a matter on which the Minister should take action.

I hope that under the Bill the Minister will have power to introduce, and will introduce regulations stipulating that every vehicle should be equipped with stop lights. It is ridiculous that stop lights are not obligatory at present. Few drivers use hand signals to denote that they are slowing down or stopping. Stop lights are a great help in warning approaching vehicles that the one in front is coming to a halt.

I was glad to hear the Minister say that regulations would be laid before the House to require certain commercial vehicles to carry a distinctive rear marking to show that they constitute a special road hazard. I am thinking of those types of vehicle, the heavy lorries, which carry equipment longer than the vehicle or those which are so long that to overtake would be highly dangerous unless one had a warning signal that the vehicle was over a given length. If the rear lights of these vehicles fail, vehicles which can be under-run can cause the worst possible kind of accident, especially to motor cyclists and the baby and mini cars. Whatever form these markings take, they must be visible at night in the light of the lamps of a following car. It was very heartening to hear the Minister say that the Ministry has in mind that there should be a reflective triangle in the centre of the tail board and reflective and fluorescent zebra stripes on either side.

I turn to the specific question of reflective number plates. I should like to say why I believe that they should be introduced at the very earliest opportunity. I first raised this question in the House in November, 1965, and I have been pressing for their introduction since. During that time, I have met no one who has argued a case, let alone a convincing case, against them. They are designed to stop accidents. Other safety measures which the Ministry of Transport has introduced—for example, the compulsory fitting of seat belts—are designed to reduce the severity of accidents. Reflective plates are designed to stop accidents.

Clause 2 gives the Minister power to permit the use of reflective number plates. I am sure that this will make a great contribution to road safety because it will allow motorists to fulfil the second part of the slogan "See and be seen", even if all the lights on the vehicle should fail or if it is left parked or abandoned on the roadside at night without lights. It is no use denying that this happens. We all know that it happens. Many serious accidents occur because a vehicle has been left with no lights showing and an oncoming motorist has no indication that there is a hazard in front of him and there is a rear-end collision with sometimes appalling results.

The Bill is obviously necessary, as the Parliamentary Secretary said, because under the Road Transport Lighting Act, 1957, the fitting of reflective number plates would be illegal, because they could be held to be showing a light to the rear, unless the colour was red. The Road Research Laboratory and the Lighting Working Party of the Ministry and the experience which has been obtained from other countries where these plates are now in use point to the fact that the most effective colour combinations are black and white at the front and black and amber at the rear.

Forty million vehicles in the world out of a vehicle population of 160 million, or 25 per cent, of the total, will by the end of 1967 be equipped with these retro-reflective number plates. I am all in favour of some form of standardisation of lighting on the rear of vehicles, and I hope that we shall not seek to emulate certain States in America where these plates are in use which have chosen a colour combination which sometimes has very little to do with the most effective road safety combination but has more to do with the colours of the local State baseball team or the State college or university or the personal whim of the governor. One State has chosen the combination of white on green merely because the Governor happens to be an Irishman. There could be worse reasons than that, but it seems odd that there should be this lack of standardisation. I hope that we shall not allow this but that we shall seek to standardise colour schemes.

However, I appreciate that a convincing case could well be argued for the police or doctors or Government officials having a distinctive marking so that people know who they are. An argument could be advanced—in fact, I have heard it advanced—that in the period when these plates are made permissive, provided the Minister gets power to do that, and until they are in general use, some confusion could arise in the minds of members of the public. But this is an argument which I reject completely. It is not an argument against retro-reflective number plates; it is an argument against change.

I am certain that, once these plates are allowed under the Bill, motorists will soon see the benefit and more and more will come to adopt them for their own use. It would be logical to argue that, once the case for these retro-plates has been accepted, it would be right for the Minister to introduce compulsory regulations. However, at this stage I am content to see the introduction of permissive legislation in the firm belief that the value to road safety will become obvious within 18 months, and I give notice that at that time I shall begin to press the Ministry for the compulsory fitting of these plates to all new vehicles and to all vehicles coming up for Ministry of Transport tests, which, I hope, will be down to two years by 1969.

When in the process of preparing my Private Member's Bill for presentation to the House on 19th April, a Bill designed to allow the use of reflective number plates on all road vehicles, I wrote to a number of organisations for their views, including the R.A.C. and the A.A. The R.A.C. replied on 18th April saying: I am pleased to confirm that the Club is sympathetic to the objective of your Bill which will enable further experience to be obtained concerning the advantages of reflective number plates which have been revealed by the limited experiment in this country and the use of such equipment in other countries. It is the Club's view that it is desirable to encourage the use of devices which may help to reduce the risk of accidents at night, especially when vehicles have broken down on the highway and when their lights are not operative. The Automobile Association replied on 12th April saying: We would certainly be in favour of permissive legislation as this would enable more experience to be gained of the practical value of these number plates. Thereafter, the possibility of making reflectorisation a standard requirement might well be considered". Those two organisations represent a considerable body of motorists and their opinions should be noted.

Clause 2( b ), says that the provisions which may be made by regulations include: where any such light is required or authorised by the regulations to be so shown by means of reflecting or fluorescent material, provision imposing conditions with respect to the material, its position and dimensions … I assume that the Minister's decision about the material to be used will be taken after consultation not only with her technical advisers, but with the motoring organisations and other interested bodies. Without seeking to delude the House into believing that I am a technical expert—which I am not—I hope that the Minister will not think in terms of British Standard 873, of 1959, which is the material now used for road bollards and road signs, but more in terms of the superior British Standard AU47 of 1965.

The Minister will have power to specify the position of these plates. I appreciate the difficulties of obtaining uniformity at once on all road vehicles, but I trust that the Minister will bear in mind the advantages which would be obtained if these plates were to be centralised on the rear of vehicles, because that would be a further indication to motorists that there was something on either side of the reflected light.

I assume that the area of the plates will be roughly the same whether the plates are oblong or square, but at some date perhaps the Minister can think in terms of introducing regulations to standardise the shape of the plates on all vehicles.

I am well aware of the efforts of the present Minister and her Ministry to promote road safety and to overhaul the Lighting Acts. The Ministry is doing great service. We know that, according to the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents, the cost in monetary terms of road accidents in this country in 1966 was no less than £267 million, a factor of which we must take careful note. Lighting regulations are crucial. Almost 50 per cent, of all road deaths occur at night and more than one-third of road accidents occur during the hours of darkness, and this is at a time when traffic is much less when measured in vehicle miles travelled.

Motorists pay too little attention to ensuring that their vehicles have adequate lighting. According to a recent survey conducted by the A.A. one-third of all vehicles on the road today are inadequately lit at light, which means that 5 million vehicles constitute a potential source of a road accident at night.

The previous Government—and I am grateful for the efforts which they made—in April, 1964, asked the Road Research Laboratory to conduct a trial with reflective number plates and I am glad that the present Government are acting so rapidly on the conclusions obtained from those trials and the investigations of the Lighting Working Party.

Quickly to summarise the advantages of these reflective plates for the benefit of those hon. Members who were not present on 19th April when my Bill was introduced and for those who are not yet convinced; they are not dependent on their own lighting system; they have no battery and no bulb and no wiring is required; their brightness is at least 100 times that of white paint; after 80,000 miles of motoring—this was the rigorous test to which the Road Research Laboratory submitted these plates—they were still 60 times brighter than white paint and could be restored to about 80 or 90 per cent, of their original power by the use of a simple polish.

There are those who argue that it is just as efficient to have simply effective or enlarged ordinary reflectors, but I point out that there are no red reflectors on the front of a vehicle and that in any case reflectors are brittle and can easily be damaged and that a reflective plate means that a vehicle can be identified even if all the rest of its lights are out, and that is something to be welcomed as a contribution to law enforcement.

I will not weary the House with them, but statistics can be produced to show that in America, where tests have been carried out in Minnesota, Maine, Illinois and Iowa, night-time accidents, especially rear-end collisions, have been greatly reduced by the use of these plates. At the Fifth World Meeting of the International Road Federation in London in September, last year, Mr. Kare Rumar, who is well known in road safety circles and who comes from the Department of Psychology at the University of Upsala in Sweden, said: The retro-reflective materials that industry is now able to produce are capable of giving the registration plate … a sizeable increase in the night-time visibilty of the vehicle. With reflectorisation there is also a considerable improvement in the legibility of the number at night as well as increased difficulty for those who might attempt to fabricate counterfeit plates. When reflectorised. therefore, the-registration plate becomes a definite safety element. He concluded by saying: In the beams of headlights they make the vehicles carrying them visible from long distances and almost any angle, a fact which contributes to greater road safety. The four plates as well as the rear plate are more legible to law enforcement patrols—and from a greater distance. This is a factor of order and discipline on the roads. At the Fifth International Congress of Traffic Police in Paris in 1965 a resolution was adopted recommending the use of reflectorised registration plates as a contribution to road safety and to assisting in law enforcement.

If these plates are introduced, they will do much to reduce the number of accidents involving parked cars, because the plates reflect at an angle regardless of the position of the vehicle. I understand that some time ago a comparison was made of the number of fatal and serious accidents involving parked cars in an 18-month period before and after the coming into force of regulations allowing parking without lights in certain areas of London. Serious accidents involving heavy vehicles parked without lights increased by 50 per cent. This would not have happened if the parked cars had been fitted with reflective plates. Once again, it is a simple question of seeing and being seen.

The Pedestrians' Association, which is concerned with road safety, was in touch with me and was concerned that reflective number plates might take the place of the light which must be shown over the rear number plate. That, however, is not the intention either of myself or the Bill, because the light which is required over or under the number plate would still remain to assist pedestrians and when vehicles are parked.

It is wise to dot the i's and cross the t's when one has the opportunity, and perhaps I may correct a slight mistake which I made on the subject of reflective plates when presenting my Private Member's Bill last month, when I mentioned that the cost of the plates would be about £2 a pair. I should have made it clear that that was the manufacturers' price.

Road Research Laboratory Report No. 44 states, in paragraph 7: Ordinary registration plates are sold by manufacturers to garages at a cost of £2 a pair and upwards and fitted to cars by garages at a cost of £3 10s. It is estimated, after consulting with the firm making plates of the type used in the experiment, that the price would be about £2 a pair. Even if the price increased slightly, this would be well worth paying to save life.

A number of organisations which have been in touch with me would like to see, for example, raised digits and numbers above the surface, of the reflective material. With that I do not quarrel. Perhaps my right hon. Friend the Minister can consider it at a later stage. I am, however, glad again to assure the House and the Ministry that I have received a number of letters from the Number Plate Manufacturers' Association, one of which, dated 5th May, states: We do not wish to resist the reflectorisation of vehicle number plates for the purpose covered in your Bill. As a result of further correspondence, a letter dated 26th May signed by the chairman of the Association, states: I am of the opinion that all the points raised have been satisfactorily covered and can therefore assure you of my co-operation when the Bill is finally passed. We therefore have the support of a tremendous number of bodies which are interested in the project.

I am also informed that the plates can be produced in this country. No dollar expenditure is involved, no balance of payments crisis is threatened as a result. The purpose of the plates is, however, to help to save life. They have been tested and tried in over 30 American States and many other nations have accepted them, including France, where they are now compulsory on all heavy road vehicles.

I have a report which I obtained from the Tasmanian Government from a 1965 Committee on Road Safety and Traffic Accidents, in which all the advantages of reflective number plates are given. I quote merely two short paragraphs: Whilst they are obviously not a complete answer for the following too closely or improper signals accidents, we believe that the reports which we have read show that they materially reduce night-time accidents. The Committee recommended to the Tasmanian Government that reflectorised number plates be issued to all vehicles at the earliest opportunity. It is the same story in Australia as well.

Police forces throughout the country have expressed themselves, and have being doing so since 1959, in favour of these plates. A sub-committee of the United Nations has gone on record as giving its support. As the hon. Member for Totnes said, Members of all three political parties have urged their introduction. I hope, therefore, that it will not be long before we have the appropriate regulations.

I express once again my appreciation to my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary for the speed with which the Bill has been brought forward by his Department and I hope that it will have a speedy and successful passage through its various stages to the Statute Book.

I conclude with the words of my right hon. Friend the Minister of Transport, who, when speaking at Brighton in October, said that coming to terms with the motor age means developing a new sense of urgency about road safety. In the last 10 years, 3< million people have been injured on our roads, and if accidents continue to increase at the present rate the figures will have risen to nearly 1 million a year by the 1980s. We can no longer tolerate this terrible toll. I entirely agree with those sentiments.

Let us make sure that when we drive, all of us can see and be seen. To do that we must act, and act now, and give the Bill our full support and ensure that the Minister is in a position to lay the appropriate regulations to allow the permissive use of retro-reflective number plates, certainly before the dark nights come upon us again.

10.55 a.m.

I should like briefly to add my general support to the Bill. Very often it is the simple things which are the most effective, and this is a simple Measure to have reflective number plates. Therefore, I am certain that in the long run we shall all feel the benefit of it.

My view is that the Minister is right at this stage to make the use of these plates permissive. It would be wrong to go ahead to compulsion without a little more practical experience. So often a little soap and water are necessary if something is to become effective, because even a reflective number plate, while admittedly better than a normal one, would be almost valueless if caked with mud, as can often be seen on our trunk roads.

In talking of simple remedies, I often wonder why we do not advance lighting-up time by, perhaps, an hour or half an hour. All of us who are interested in road safety know that very often when we are travelling along at about dusk, we see enormous vehicles without their side lights on when it costs absolutely nothing to turn them on except the effort of reaching forward and turning a knob. I hope that this is something to which the Ministry gives constant thought.

The Bill is brought forward not only because of the excellent efforts of the hon. Member for Huddersfield, West (Mr. Lomas), but also because of the increasing use of reflective substances on the rear of motor cars. I hope that during the Committee stage of the Bill, if a regulation governing their use is not presently in force, consideration will be given to the use of rotating beacons on cars.

For the very reason that we have found a sudden increase in the use of reflective material, so, too, we are finding a rapid increase in the use of beacons, frequently without genuine reason. We rightly accept that police, fire and ambulance services and roads staff when working on the highways should use reflecting beacons, but we now find them on all sorts of heavy vehicles and loads. I have even seen their use reported on airport buses going in and out of London airport. This debases their use. We must maintain them for essential purposes and only when their use is essential.

I should like the Parliamentary Secretary to give his views on the sudden and rapid increase in the use of rotating beacons which is getting out of hand. If there are not regulations which he can make more effective, perhaps he can give the matter early consideration. In general, however, I am warmly in support of the Bill and I hope that it becomes an Act in the very near future.

10.58 a.m.

I do not want to take up too much time. It is no use my going again into the arguments in favour of reflectorisation. They have been put exceptionally well by my hon. Friend the Member for Hudders-field, West (Mr. Lomas) and by the hon. Member for Totnes (Mr. Mawby). It is sufficient for me to say that I, too, have seen reflectorised number plates in use and, like everyone else who saw them that day, I came away convinced that they were an absolute necessity, particularly on our motorways.

I had the unfortunate experience a few weeks ago of travelling on one of the motorways and seeing one of the pile-ups from a rear-end collision. Anyone who saw the chaos caused and the number of people standing in the middle of the motorway flashing torches to warn oncoming motorists of what had happened would agree that reflective number plates are an absolute necessity.

While I welcome the Bill and feel that it would be almost churlish to find fault with it, Clause 3 worries me a little. It says: Section 2 (2, b ) of the principal Act … shall not authorise a vehicle of any description to carry a lamp showing a light to the rear for the purpose of illuminating any device for giving signals to overtaking traffic … I hope that does not mean that the Minister will not look at the possibility of some rear light warning on very large vehicles for overtaking purposes. During the Whitsun Recess, I travelled on the Continent and, for part of the time, I was driving on dark winding mountain roads crossing the Pyrenees. When following very large vehicles, I was greatly helped by the presence on the back of most of them of two flashing signal lights. One is a flashing red light which tells a motorist not to pass and, as my driving wheel was on the near side, it was difficult to see to pass such a large vehicle. As soon as the road is clear, the driver changes the red light to a flashing green light, and the motorist behind knows that it is safe to pass. I hope that the wording of the Bill does not mean that the Minister has closed her mind to the advantages of such a system.

This is a Bill which both sides of the House will support. Road safety is not political. Anything which adds to safety on our roads is desirable. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Huddersfield, West on all the hard work which he has done, and I thank the Parliamentary Secretary for the sympathetic way in which he has listened to my hon. Friend.

11.3 a.m.

We are glad to see the Joint Parliamentary Secretary here in the morning. Often he is here late at night tidying up the affairs of the day, sometimes in a dinner jacket, though not always.

I join with him in congratulating the hon. Member for Huddersfield, West (Mr. Lomas) on the valuable work which he has done in attempting to pioneer activity in this respect by earlier legislation which has now been taken over by the Government. It is a better use of Government time than the Live Hare Coursing (Abolition) Bill which has been taken over in a similar way. I want also to join in the tribute which has been paid to my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes (Mr. Mawby) for what he has done to help. If nothing else, it proves that there is peace and harmony on all sides of the House.

It is right that the powers in the Bill in respect of reflective number plates should be permissive at first to see how they work out. However, we have had information from the Road Research Laboratory, and I should like to know whether there has been any recommendation by the National Road Safety Advisory Council, what advice that Council has given the Minister, and if there were any restrictions on that advice.

There are many councils and groups which advise the Minister of Transport on a wide variety of matters. Indeed, there might almost be an advisory council to count how many there are. We know that recently the Chairman of the Road Safety Advisory Council, Sir Alfred Owen, was replaced by a Parliamentary Secretary. On these occasions, one always wants to know if independent advice is still given. That is why, on this non-controversial matter, I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary will tell the House whether the Road Safety Advisory Council approved of this Measure freely and without inhibition. Was a vote taken, and what other advice was sought from outside bodies? I think that the hon. Gentleman covered the latter point, but I am sure that the House would wish to know what rôle the Advisory Council has played.

This is not the first time that the independent chairman of an advisory body has been removed by the Minister of Transport and replaced by someone who is much more dependent upon her. When considering road safety matters, this is to be regretted, and one would like to know whether there is a definite reason for it.

When the White Paper is published, I hope that we shall have further details about points raised by hon. Members on both sides of the House which could possibly be incorporated into the Bill but which would probably require an amendment to the Long Title. Hon. Members on all sides have said that they approve of the Bill. However, we all think that it should be more comprehensive. My hon. Friend the Member for Totnes made a point about the long vehicle coming out of a side road, having to turn or having been involved in a jack-knifing accident. Such a vehicle is at an angle with the main road and completely unlit, presenting a terrific hazard to other traffic. I know many cases of people who have been killed by running into these vehicles at great speeds. I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary will find it acceptable, by way of an amendment to the Long Title of the Bill, to bring such a desirable and urgent matter before the House at a time when we see more and more trailers on our roads, in line with Continental practice, and an increasing number of large articulated vehicles. This is an urgent matter, and I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary will agree that the Bill would be improved by the addition of some provision in this respect.

We welcome the Bill, and we know what has led to it. However, we should like to know a little more about the legal side. The hon. Gentleman talked about the principle of red at the rear and white at the front, which would make side lighting a problem. Is there any evidence that accidents would be reduced, because it appears that they have been in foreign countries? Is there much evidence of accidents being caused by the unlit sides of heavy commercial vehicles?

We all know that we can amend the law as much as we like, but that, without enforcement, it is worthless. Those of us who drive to town from our constituencies know how under-policed our roads are. I wish that there could be more police in evidence, because I know that I behave with greater circumspection when a member of the police force is not far away. A conspicuous police vehicle helps to improve driving standards. Any officer on road patrol finds that driving standards are excellent when he is driving his patrol car. However, they are very different when he is driving home in his own car.

My hon. Friend the Member for Dumfries (Mr. Monro) talked about the increasing use of rotating beacons on vehicles of all types. I agree that we should have better control of them. On ambulances, vehicles doing maintenance work on motorways and police cars, they are essential, but we must prevent their indiscriminate use. A rotating beacon on a vehicle represents something important, often an accident, and their indiscriminate use creates yet another hazard.

We can see evidence of another matter near to this House. I am thinking of what I call a portable container dustbin which is used when a house is being demolished. It is left at the side of the road and loaded with rubbish. When it is full, it is hoisted on to a vehicle, and in fact becomes part of it. I do not know what it is called, but what concerns me is that it is not properly lit at night, and I think that regulations ought to be introduced to deal with this hazard. As far as I can see, the common practice is for the local authority concerned, which apparently supervises these things, to place on the container a road lamp of the very oldest kind, which any hooligan returning from a party at night can remove, thus leaving an unlighted obstruction in the road. This is an extreme hazard, and if we were able to extend the scope of the Bill, perhaps something could be done to deal with it.

Having said that, I commend the Bill to the House. I thank the Joint Parliamentary Secretary for what he said. I hope that he can tell us a bit more about some of the points which have been raised, and I conclude by congratulating the hon. Member for Huddersfield, West and my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes on this issue.

11.11 a.m.

With your permission, Mr. Speaker, and that of the House, perhaps I might make a few comments in reply to the hon. Member for Weston-super-Mare (Mr. Webster).

First, I am pleased that the Bill has been welcomed by both sides of the House. I think that all hon. Members have found that the Bill is a valuable clarification of the existing law. The first point to get clear is about the state of the law with regard to the use of reflecting material.

Secondly, I think that it is generally accepted—certainly by hon. Members who have studied the experience in the United States and the evidence which was referred to by my hon. Friend the Member for Huddersfield, West (Mr. Lomas) and which was laid before the International Road Congress in London, namely the results of trials at the Road Research Laboratory—that we have sufficient evidence of the safety value of the use of reflecting material in relation to number plates and other devices, and of its value as a means of identifying the vehicle for the purpose of enforcing the law, to say that we must come to the point of making it permissive for these things to be used.

Thirdly—and here I deal with the point raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley (Mr. Binns)—part of the Bill is simply and solely for the purpose of establishing control over signalling devices. I remind my hon. Friend of what I said in opening, namely, Some of the devices which may be developed by ingenious designers who are working on this subject may prove to be very beneficial, so we do not want to take any action which would be a bar to further progress; but we do want to have the powers to control such devices and to permit the use only of those which my right hon. Friend is advised will make a worth while contribution to road safety. Our purpose is to bring about standardisation and also a standard of compre- hension by all road users of the signalling devices used, but certainly not in any way to count out further technical progress which undoubtedly may be made in the development of such signalling devices.

The hon. Member for Totnes (Mr. Mawby) mentioned the importance of distinctive markings on lorries. I should like to emphasise this. I hope that the Bill will make a contribution by enabling my right hon. Friend to make further regulations about this. We have very much in mind the point about distinctive markings on heavy, long, or wide loads. This has frequently been mentioned in the House, and it has been the subject of criticism from many sides. Many hon. Members have referred to the dangers caused by wide, heavy, and long loads, and we have it in mind that the regulations which my right hon. Friend will be able to make under the Bill will be useful in dealing with this.

As one would expect, my hon. Friend the Member for Huddersfield, West made an important contribution to the debate. He and a number of other hon. Members raised a number of important points, and the hon. Member for Weston-super-Mare, not for the first time this Session, suggested that we might consider extending the Long Tide of the Bill so that hon. Members could range further and wider in their consideration of road safety measures. There has been no lack of opportunity during this Session for considering these things. I think that some matters were raised when we were considering what is now the Road Safety Act. We have also had before us the Measure introduced by my hon. Friend the Member for Gateshead, West (Mr. Randall), and another Measure dealing with off-street parking. During discussions on all these Measures suggestions have been made that their scope should be extended so that the House can discuss other matters. I am sure that during each Session hon. Members would like to produce an omnibus Bill to enable them to discuss all these wider issues of road safety, but we must take these things as they come from the working parties and from the technical reports which we receive and from data of that kind.

My hon. Friend mentioned headlamps and, I think, stop lamps. These are being considered with a great deal of urgency. We have draft regulations about the compulsory fitting of headlamps. It might come as a surprise to many citizens, and indeed to hon. Members to know that although it is generally assumed that vehicles must be fitted with headlamps, this is not obligatory, and we are about to make regulations to deal with this.

Nor is the fitting of stop lamps compulsory. This is something about which my hon. Friend is concerned, and we intend to take action to deal with the matter. We are being held up by a lack of international agreement on the standard to be adopted. We are trying, as in so many of these spheres, to get international standardisation of the type of device to be fitted. We intend to make the fitting of stop lights compulsory, and to take similar action about direction indicators. We are proposing to take action in many respects which I hope the House will agree will raise the standard of safety on the roads—working on the basis of my hon. Friend's slogan, "See and be seen on the highway."

The hon. Member for Dumfries (Mr. Monro) raised the question of rotating beacons. The use of these beacons is at present controlled by Regulations, but if hon. Members feel that their use is being permitted too widely, perhaps they will let me have evidence of this. The Regulations deal principally with the use of these beacons by the police and the fire, ambulance, and breakdown services, especially on motorways. If hon. Members have evidence of the use of rotating beacons spreading unnecessarily, I hope that they will let me have it, because we want to ensure that they are used only for essential purposes.

The hon. Member for Weston-super-Mare asked whether the principles of the Bill had been considered by the National Road Safety Advisory Council which advises my right hon. Friend. The Council has from time to time considered whether the law should be changed to permit the use of reflective materials, and it has given its blessing in principle to the provisions of the Bill. It was a result of the Council's deliberations that the technical matters involved were referred to the Lighting Working Party, which recently reported to my right hon. Friend in favour of the permissive use of reflec- tive number plates and other changes for the control of the rear lighting of vehicles.

The Bill is supported by a wide consensus of opinion, and I hope that hon. Members will ensure that it receives a speedy passage through the House.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read a Second time.

Bill committed to a Committee of the whole House.—[ Mr. Walter Harrison. ]

Committee Tomorrow.

On a point of order. Mr. Deputy Speaker, may I ask for your guidance whether you are in a position to accept a reasoned Amendment on Second Reading?

Technically I am in a position to accept one. Whether it will be selected is a matter for the Chair.

We did not hand in the reasoned Amendment until we had had time to obtain a Ruling from you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, whether it would be in order. Is it in order for me to hand you the reasoned Amendment now?

It is in order at any time to hand in an Amendment.

Then I will hand it in now.

I am afraid that I am unable to select it.

11.21 a.m.

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

Some hon. Members will remember that my hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (Mr. Blenkinsop) introduced a Private Member's Bill dealing with anchors and chain cables in February, 1965. Because of the desire shown by a number of hon. Members to widen the scope of the Bill, and because of the eventual advent of a General Election, we ran out of time and the Bill was lost. I now introduce the Bill as a Government Measure.

In effect, it repeals the Anchors and Chain Cables Act, 1899, dealing with the testing of cables and anchors for ships registered in the United Kingdom. That Act, so it seems to us, has two defects. First, it embodies many detailed requirements concerning the ways in which anchors, and cables should be tested. With the development of modern techniques and the introduction of different types of material many of these requirements become out of date, and yet to alter them requires legislation. Under the new Measure we propose that these changes should be made by way of negative Resolution.

Secondly, under the old Act all manufacturers are compelled to test the anchors and cables they make in licensed proving houses. This involves some expense and delay to the manufacturers. Many manufacturers have their own testing equipment and use it for anchors and cables which are to be sold to ships not registered in the United Kingdom. We have been told by Lloyds Register—and I believe it to be true—that there is no significant difference in the number of breakages as between those tested in proving houses and those tested by the manufacturers. This Measure, while allowing the continued use of proving houses to manufacturers who want to use them, will also permit testing by manufacturers on their own equipment in conformity with the rules laid down by the Board of Trade.

That is the purpose of what, at the moment, is a simple Bill. There are, however, two other aspects that I should mention. First, liability for ensuring that ships have properly certificated anchors and cables will be placed not only on the owner but also on the master. The reason for this is that some ships registered in the United Kingdom may be owned by people whose premises are outside these islands—perhaps in Canada, Bermuda or the Bahamas—and it would be very difficult to bring home to such owners responsibility for any breach of the regulations. We therefore think it right that the master should be joined with the owner in this matter.

The second aspect that I should mention is a throw-back to the debate we had in a previous Parliament, when many hon. Members expressed a wish to extend the scope of the Bill. Naturally, since that time we have given serious consideration to the points made, but we still think, on balance, that the original limitations were correct. Suggestions have been made that the Measure should apply to hovercraft. This is an extremely difficult legal problem. We are dealing with ships. Hovercraft, whatever else they are, are not ships—

Does the Minister realise that in the debates to which he is referring his predecessor ruled that hovercraft were ships, and that in the Finance Bill debates last year this was accepted?

I am afraid that it has not yet been accepted, because their exact legal position has yet to be established. At the moment I believe that they are dealt with under air navigation orders. I would prefer to say that these are not ships or aircraft, but hovercraft, and that in terms of the rule of the road and other matters they will have to be treated as a distinct entity. It is proposed that when the legal status of these craft has been finally established we shall deal with them in separate legislation.

It was also suggested that fishing vessels should be included. There is no doubt that they are ships. They have traditionally been exempt from many safety regulations which apply to other ships. At present, international discussions are taking place on the whole question of safety aboard fishing vessels and I would much prefer to wait until we are in a position to bring forward special legislation dealing with them than to do it piecemeal by adding them to this Measure.

It was further suggested that we should include pleasure yachts carrying less than 12 passengers. If we consider the myriads of small boats in these islands we see that any attempt to do that would produce a sizeable new slice of bureaucracy. It would be unnecessary and probably unworkable. They are exempt from the Merchant Shipping (Load Lines) Measure, which was generally accepted. There is no case for including them.

I hope that the hon. Gentleman will forgive me for appearing to be somewhat behind. I want to refer back to what he was saying about hovercraft and I have been trying to find the reference. If he has read every word of that precious document, the OFFICIAL REPORT of the Standing Committee which considered the original Bill in 1965, he will see that the late Mr. Edward Redhead said: … seized … with the point that to the extent that at the present moment hovercraft are required to use chains and anchors it would be reasonable and sensible to bring those chains and anchors within the provisions for testing under this Bill. In those circumstances, I am ready to accept the principle of the proposed new Clause …"—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Standing committee C, 19th May 1965; c. 172.] The new Clause to which Mr. Redhead there referred contained the words: For the purpose of this Act a hovercraft shall be defined as a ship or vessel.

I was aware of that and of the reason why Mr. Redhead was prepared to accept it. He was anxious to get the Bill through.

I am sure that Mr. Redhead meant what he said when he said it.

Mr. Redhead was saying that, in so far as hovercraft carry anchors and cables, it would be reasonable to call them ships, and I agree with that. But there are other considerations about the classification of hovercraft. I do not think that this is a vital point. It is untidy to call them ships when we are not sure what they are legally to be described as.

Harbour moorings, chain ferries and so on are covered by existing regulations. They are not ships and we do not think that it would be desirable to extend the scope of the Bill to take them in. But, though important, all these are matters of detail which we shall have a further opportunity to discuss, and I do not think I need go into them in a long argument on Second Reading. The aim of the Bill is to simplify the procedures of regulation, to make them more flexible. It is a modest little Bill but an important one, and I hope that the House will give it a Second Reading.

11.33 a.m.

I thank the Minister of State for a longer explanation than we had on the occasion of the Second Reading of the 1965 Bill, which was introduced under the Ten Minute Rule so that there was no possibility of debating the matter with thoroughness.

I am very sorry to see that the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull, East (Commander Pursey) is not here. I have a feeling that both he and my hon. Friend the Member for Gosport and Fareham (Dr. Bennett) will be sad that this Bill, despite all the hard work which we put into the subject, remains largely unaffected by that work. It is certainly a simple Bill but it lacks the precision of its ancestor of 1899. Whatever the defects of the 1899 Act are, it is precise. It has 21 Sections and 3 Schedules. This Bill has 2 Clauses and no Schedules. Yet this Bill is very vague; it lacks precision and fails to deal with so many of the modern developments of nautical events which are coming so rapidly.

My hon. Friend the Member for Gosport and Fareham and I have been proved right in pressing the case for the hovercraft. It is now in mass use but it seems that we are waiting for disaster before dealing with it, as is all too often the case. That aspect also applies to drilling rigs. I remind the hon. Gentleman that even now legislation would be after the event in their case. It is not sufficient just to say that the case that the Continental Shelf Act, 1964, was not precise about the mooring of these creations has been amply proved by tragic events.

Incidentally, perhaps this Bill should be referred to the Prices and Incomes Board. After the 1965 Bill had been amended, with great trouble, in five meetings of the Standing Committee, its price was 6d. The price of this Bill, unamended, is 10d. That is almost double the price for less than half the value. Perhaps the Board should look at the Bill, particularly as it contains so little for the price.

The 1899 Act itself now needs to be modernised, but an important constitutional principle is involved. The Act is precise. It has 21 Clauses and 3 Schedules, and there are no vague rulemaking powers.

We know the practice in this House. We give great rule-making powers to the Executive, who bring them on at a fairly late hour of night with the Whips on and always get what they want if it is under the negative procedure, as in this case. In 1965, we sought to make the Bill more precise, both by new Clauses and by new Schedules, and in some respects were carrying our way. But all that has been taken out. That is regrettable because we also know that the more delegated legislation there is, the less Parliamentary time can be found to pray against it. One is thus giving a blank cheque to the Government in a case where they have already proved that they are inadequate to deal with the situation.

Modesty may not be my greatest virtue—I have not analysed myself to that extent. But I recall the Merchant Shipping Act, 1964, which I had the honour to introduce. It got an unopposed Second Reading and, with the aid of the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull, East, got through the Committee stage in one sitting. This was because, although it also gave immense delegated legislation, it was made utterly precise because the regulations were based on rules contained in the International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea which was signed in June, 1960. The document is 388 pages long and consists of precise regulations.

If one is to give wide rule-making powers, they should be laid down precisely. But that is precisely—to use the word yet again—what this Bill does not do. That is regrettable, and it will be necessary once more to try and improve it in Committee with the aid of hon. Members on both sides.

As is the case with all marine matters, this subject has an international flavour. But no convention has been signed in this case. It is probably in itself an isolated matter and is too small for a convention. On the other hand, we want to make our usage as much as possible the same as that applied abroad, otherwise we place the masters of our vessels at a disadvantage and put ourselves at a disadvantage commercially as well. This is a very delicate matter in relation to the safety of life and to the protection of our commercial interests.

I wonder whether the practice in the United States might be to the disadvantage of British shipping. We know that the Federal Maritime Commission—which the hon. Gentleman has no doubt had to deal with—is a tricky customer. It is dominated in that huge country by people who have perhaps never seen the sea, largely and very often it is in direct contradiction to the interests not only of foreign vessels but of American vessels as well. It would be worth looking into this matter so that we should not be at a disadvantage in this respect or at a disadvantage with our rapidly declining coastal fleet at a time when so many foreign vessels seem to be getting into the business.

The original Bill said the fine should be £100 and in the present Bill that sum has been increased to £400. I said that £100 would be chickenfeed to any operator, but increasing the fine to £400 lends force to the argument that the master of the vessel concerned should not be responsible for paying the fine. When the master was to be liable to a fine of £100, there was much strong feeling in maritime circles and it was equally felt that £100 would not be enough to check any owner who was not fulfilling his responsibilities. Now that the fine has been increased to £400, there is a still better reason for excluding the master, and I hope that those who serve on the Standing Committee will consider this matter carefully.

I notice with regret that an Amendment to the original Bill to protect the rights of proving stations has been taken out of this Bill. I appreciate that the Bill represents an improvement on the original, but there are plenty of people in the Black Country around Dudley, the area represented by the Paymaster-General himself, who work in small chain-making factories and, although there were many at the time of the 1899 Act, the number of proving stations is now down to four. The mayor, aldermen and burgesses of Bristol and of Hull among other places were involved. These provisions will reduce the number of chain-making factories even more and the small establishments will go out of business, which will mean unemployment, or, in the more fashionable expression of the day, redeployment. We should like to know why there has been such a change from two years ago when the party then in power is still in power.

I should be grateful if the Minister of State could tell us a little more about Section 684 of the Merchant Shipping Act, 1894, because a new provision has been introduced which he did not mention. It would also help if he could tell us how many examples there have been over the last convenient period, perhaps five years, of defective anchors or cables, preferably giving the numbers separately. Perhaps he could provide a schedule if we put down a Question on the subject. Perhaps he could also say what weights were involved. There is no provision for a limitation on weight. In the original Standing Committee we sought to bring it down to 50 lb. but failed to do so.

In the Second Schedule of the 1899 Act there are precise specifications, such as anchor ex stock and proving strain and so on, and it would be better if the House had been provided with a little more detail of that kind and also if more attention had been paid to modern developments at sea. When we last discussed this matter we talked a great deal about sea anchors, but there is nothing about them in the present Bill. I would have thought—although it is abundantly clear from my remarks that I am not a seaman myself—that there should have been a reference to this subject.

I now turn to the subject of drilling rigs. A drilling rig in the Bristol Channel near my constituency provides a good example. Despite every kind of expert opinion then available, we were assured that the régime of the Bristol Channel was absolutely firm and that there would be no deflection. We in the House were over-ruled—we got them in the end—and the drilling rig was installed. Its effect on the régime of the Channel was to begin to scour under one of the legs and this set up an inverse pendulum movement which increased the scouring until, after about two days, the whole thing gradually tilted over and almost disappeared. If there had been many people on board and if it had been difficult to get them off, there would have been a tragedy. There have been tragedies in the North Sea. The B.P. drilling rig "Seaquest" has nine anchors of 300,000 lb. each and it seems absurd that the Bill should not contain any reference to this kind of activity.

If it is said that this is a modest little Bill, then the Minister of State should become immodest and make it a Bill which is more effective and which can deal with an activity which is springing up all round our shores and which requires urgent action. This was the first thing for which I looked on the day when the Bill was presented by the President of the Board of Trade in his delight and celebration of the fact that the Prime Minister had announced that we were going into the Common Market. I found no reference to drilling rigs nor any adequate reference to lightships.

I must join issue with the Minister of State on the subject of hovercraft. In solemn words we had a statement by his late predecessor, Mr. Redhead, to whom I must pay tribute both as a Member whom we all very much loved and also because he arrived on the Bill by accident. I know that he would have forgiven me for saying that, because he said so himself. He was obliging the other Minister of State who has now gone to another Department but who was then abroad, having been told that this was only a little Bill. Mr. Redhead was with us for five weeks on what was then a two-Clause Bill.

He said that hovercraft required to use chains and anchors so that it would be reasonable and sensible to bring those chains and anchors within the provisions for testing under the Bill. He said that in those circumstances he was prepared to accept the principle of the proposed new Clause which defined hovercraft as ships for the purposes of the Bill. Apparently those words no longer stand.

I hope that I misheard the right hon. Gentleman when he said that that concession was made only to get the Bill through. That is not a fair reflection on the memory of Mr. Redhead. I withdrew my new Clause because the principle had been accepted. It is exceedingly regrettable that such a provision is not in the present Bill and unless the Bill is amended by the Government, my hon. Friends and I will seek to amend it in Committee.

We shall seek to reduce the Bill's regulation-making powers, to make them more precise and to bring in Schedules which are as precise as possible. We shall probably seek to amend the Long Title in order to do so and to introduce new Clauses to make this Bill, necessary in itself, relevant to the modern age and to new developments of maritime engineering and to one of the best inventions of Great Britain—the hovercraft. In this respect we have the chance to lead the world, provided that we take the requisite action.

We will not oppose the Second Reading of the Bill, but, in nautical terms, I fire a warning shot to show the Minister of State that if he does not do something to make the Bill more up to date and more adequate, he will not find us particularly obliging when we get to Standing Committee.

11.50 a.m.

May I ask you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, whether a further reasoned Amendment which, I believe, is in your possession is considered to be in order?

I am afraid that I am unable to select the Amendment handed in by the hon. Gentleman.

This Bill seems familiar to some of us. Indeed, it is, in all substantial respects, the same Bill as that which we dealt with for a few weeks in those charming summer mornings of 1965. In spite of the "serious consideration" which the Minister says has been given by his Department, the Bill is virtually unchanged. It seems that the Government, once again, are like the Bourbons: they have learnt nothing, or virtually nothing, from all those long and serious discussions which we had two years ago.

May I say a word of praise for the late Mr. Redhead, who was the Minister in charge of those discussions, for his unfailing good humour. We all liked him very much before, but we liked him a great deal more afterwards. It is very sad that he is no longer with us.

What I object to about the Bill is its kinship with certain other Bills before the House. This Bill, like them, when stripped of the necessary trimmings, is a Bill of few words. Clause 1 merely provides: The Board of Trade may make rules with respect to the testing of anchors and chain cables … That is all. This seems to me to be a typical Socialist blanket enabling Bill, just like another one, the "Nationalising of Computers Bill" alias the Post Office (Data Processing Service) Bill which, in seven words, enables the same sort of thing to be done without safeguards, undertakings or assurances of any kind.

This Bill does not say that the Board of Trade "shall" make rules; it says that the Board of Trade "may" make rules. I consider legislation in this form to be a contempt of Parliament. We go to a lot of trouble over getting elections and representation in the House and yet we have frivolous wording in Bills of this sort merely saying that the Board of Trade may do anything it likes about anchors and chain cables, just as the Post Office may expect to do anything it likes about computer communication networks. This is an insult to the process of democracy, and this is why I regard this as a nasty little Bill. I opposed it before when it reared its ugly little head, and so I oppose it again.

Having said what I think of this thoroughly defective Bill, I should like to make clear that I do not approach this subject in any nihilistic or unconstructive sense. As a practising seaman, I am in favour of the testing of anchors and chain cables. I am in favour of the marking of anchors and chain cables as having been satisfactorily tested. I am in favour of the obliging of all registered vessels to carry and use only anchors and chain cables which have been tested and marked. I am in favour of putting the onus for that on the owners of the ship, and, if need be, the placing of writs on the ship against the master as the representative of the owners. However, that is the position today. The 1889 Act ensures all those things. Why, then, must we have to put up with this little specimen of creeping Socialism?

The principal argument for the Bill which was put forward by the then Minister in Committee was that it was to ensure that British manufacturers shall have freedom to have their product tested by equipment on their own premises if they have such equipment."—[OFFICIAL REPORT. Standing Committee C, 19th May, 1965; c. 13.] That is an excellent idea. I am sure that it is a very reasonable way of extending the provisions of the existing legislation. However, I understand that, apart from the four testing houses which exist and whose cause was fought for and won in the Standing Committee when the Government accepted, unwillingly enough, the Amendment put forward by one of their own supporters……

The Government did not accept it. They were defeated on a Division. It was a decision of the Committee.

I was being immensely polite and courteous, as usual, to the admirable Minister on the Government Front Bench. I said that the Government accepted it unwillingly. It was forced upon them. It was to be incorporated in this beastly little Bill until it died, quietly strangled, on Report. There are four testing and proving houses which still exist. As I say, Mr. Henderson, the then right hon. Member for Rowley Regis and Tipton, put forward an Amendment in their favour.

However, to quote the words of the Minister again: As far as we know there are only three chain manufacturers who have the equipment for testing a full length cable, although several places have equipment of some kind… As far as we know no anchor manufacturers have anchor testing equipment."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Standing Committee C, 19th May, 1965; c. 13.] So what is all this about? All that we are doing is allowing three manufacturers to test their own products. Nothing is changed. All that we have is a Bill which gives no one any guidance and which gives the country no assurance that guidance will be forthcoming.

As I have said, we have a Bill which provides that the Board of Trade can do what it likes. Is this a sufficient reason for the issuing of a blank cheque? It is nonsense. But, since we have the Bill before us, ostensibly in the light of new circumstances, there are plenty of new points which it should include. There are new materials. There are new types of vessel. There are new lower limits of size which are relevant today. In 1899 the late Mr. Frank Cooper was the only man mad enough to go cruising in a converted fishing boat for pleasure. Nowadays many people do so at very great expense. A smaller ship may very well cost as much as a much larger ship and be of as much value to the owners and underwriters and need as much protection, when the weather comes in hard, as any of the bigger, more classical type of ship.

The 1899 Act had a Schedule on testing establishments including those of the mayors and burgesses of Hull and of Bristol. I remember that we discussed on the former occasion whether mayoral chains had been tested. The Bill has absolutely no Schedule. It has no factual content. The Minister at that time said that there was some point in keeping some flexibility in this matter, but here there is the flexibility of a drunken snake. It would be much more flexible if a few new establishments were added to existing ones and if necessary we could leave out the mayors and burgesses of Hull and of Bristol.

Surely something is needed in Schedules dealing with tensile strengths. The 1899 Act had Schedules dealing with them but this Bill has none. It is merely an enabling Bill. We have to swallow the Bill—not the anchor—and wait for rules which may or may not be made. Many of these materials are standard and have been unchanged since 1899. Why on earth should there not be tables of testing strengths included in a Schedule to the Bill where they could be referred to? All that we need do is to add new tables for new materials and new patterns of anchor as they arise. This could be done in a Schedule.

We could have Schedules dealing both with testing establishments and tensile strengths and these provisions could be removed or added to by affirmative or even negative Resolution of both Houses. This would give the Bill some material and still enable it to be changed without the burden of having to put new legislation through all stages whenever we wanted to make a change to the existing Measure. On testing establishments and on tensile strengths the Bill is defective.

Since 1899 several new types of vessel have been evolved. This Bill should bring them within its scope. The Bill refers to registered ships, but there are new types of vessel which are just as much ships, just as important and in their own ways just as established as registered ships, but this matter has been side-stepped. Here was a unique opportunity for bringing all these things under the same form of legislation.

I say this because those of us who have been in this House long enough have discovered that quite soon in one's Parliamentary career when something has not been put into a particular Bill during its passage through the House, when the matter is mentioned later there is a not very pleasant smugness shown by the Department concerned and the reply is, "This should have been brought up at the time when the Bill was before the House. You had your opportunity then. Why did you not propose that it should be in the Bill?" One needs to be more than a little tenacious in trying to get the right thing done when the opportunity occurs so that there will not be that type of Parliamentary brush-off later.

That is not quite so bad as what appears to be happening when we are reminded that two years ago we had an assurance from the Minister of State and now we appear to be getting a brush-off.

I agree. This is a specific point which has arisen during the debate this morning. There were all the undertakings and judgments given which were quoted a great deal in debates on the Finance Bill last year when we discussed Customs legislation with reference to hovercraft. On that occasion two years ago Mr. Redhead said: I am advised that it is not free of legal doubt, as the hon. Member for Weston-super-Mare (Mr. Webster) said. It has not been tested in the courts at any time, but the view taken by the Customs for the purpose about which I was concerned was that it … the hovercraft— is a ship. This is the basis upon which the duty relief provisions will be administered in that particular connection."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Standing Committee C, 19th May, 1965; c. 69.] That was the judgment of a Minister and the whole matter has been discussed again in the interminable debates late at night on the Finance Bill. To say that we should wait for special legislation is not only wrong but actually dangerous.

I frequently commute by hovercraft. The hovercraft is a very thriving industrial business and probably its most successful commercial application is the service which I use in crossing the Solent with great frequency. Are we to wait for special legislation knowing how slowly such legislation is produced in this House which is always preoccupied with idiotic Socialist dogmata? Can we afford to wait until after the hovercraft, which is known to break down sometimes, has had some trouble with its anchors or chain cables and may drift into the path of some other vessel? I saw one being towed up Portsmouth Harbour since the beginning of the Whitsun Recess. If there had not been plenty of boats about it would have had to anchor.

Is it right that passengers employing hovercraft should not know that they are not in any way under any assurance given by the Government that the conditions under which they would anchor in distress are not being supervised by the Government? This is a matter of great urgency which cannot wait for special legislation.

My hon. Friend the Member for Weston-super-Mare, with his well-known passion, mentioned drilling rigs, which are an unorthodox type of craft. Surely they should not be outside the law simply because they are unorthodox. That seems a very strange doctrine. They carry anchors. I do not think they are anchors of 300,000 lb. because 300,000 lb. is a lot of tons, and I do not think many ships could float with anchors of that weight. I think my hon. Friend intended to say 30,000 lb.

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for allowing me to put the record right. I put in an extra 0 because I was excited.

It was another link in the long chain of 0s.

Another type of vessel mentioned in previous debates on this interesting subject which was not mentioned is a type which has probably not been built since the 1899 Act—the old chain ferry which goes on its painful course across various estuaries and harbours. There was one at Portsmouth which finally expired with a gasp and has now been scrapped. There is one asthmatically wheezing its way across the Itchen at Southampton and one which goes across the Medina at Cowes. There is one at Torpoint.

There is one in that dangerous estuary at Poole Harbour, where even the boom intended to keep the oil out or in was torn away by the strength of the tides. If a boom intended to keep the oil out or in can be torn away by the strength of the tides, it stands to reason that the floating bridge ferry that pulls itself across that estuary, across that very rapidly moving water—the ferry goes far faster sideways through the water than it goes lengthways along the chain, if the dimensions can be distinguished—is a conveyance in which a large number of people are entirely and wholly dependent upon the integrity of the chains which are used. Yet two years ago there was the most prolonged and fanatical opposition to their inclusion in that Bill.

It is not a frivolous matter to try to extend the application of the Bill to chain ferries. They are not registered ships. They could not go outside territorial waters. Nobody has made a chain long enough for that. But the passengers who use them should be entitled to the protection of the Government.

Therefore, all these things—hovercraft, drilling rigs, chain ferries—should be classified as ships, whether registered in one way or another. They are all registered in some appropriate manner. They should be classified as ships for this purpose, but they are not. The Bill merely enables. Therefore, in this sense again the Bill is defective.

Then there is the question of the lower limits of size. The 1899 Act made a lower limit for anchors which needed testing of 168 lb. I imagine that chains of comparable weight were also subject to such a lower limit. It was regarded as highly lunatic to go cruising around the coasts in vessels smaller than a fishing smack in the old days. Fishing smacks were pretty big. In fact, it is a well known old aphorism at sea that the man who goes to sea for pleasure would go to hell for a pastime. That is one of the oldest saws which have ever been said at sea. Nowadays people have entirely given that the lie. Nowadays, as the Minister of State acknowledged, there is a huge population at sea, in vessels using bower anchors of much less weight than are the minimum in the table, and often of new designs of anchor which require less weight and give the same holding power when embedded in the bottom of the sea.

The late Mr. Redhead gave a very hopeful reply to this point in the Committee proceedings on the previous Bill. He said this: Turning to Clause 1(1, e ), this provides that the rules may exempt small anchors and chain cables, and also anchors and chain cables which have been manufactured or tested outside the United Kingdom. There again the 1899 Act applies only to anchors and chain cables exceeding 168 lb. in weight. At our previous meeting there was a sugges- tion that this figure should be amended to a lower figure, and I think 50 lb. was suggested. That was prompted by the view that with the vast increase in small craft and with the growing popularity of yachting around our coasts, it would be reasonable in the interests of safety to bring this limit down. I take that point. Whilst not committing myself on the particular figure, may I give an assurance that we shall be prepared to consider this point in formulating the rules."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Standing Committee C; 26th May, 1965; c. 67–8.] The present Minister seems to have abrogated his predecessor's statement on this matter, too. It is not just a question of bureaucratic interference with pleasure yachting. These are substantial vessels that cost far more per ton than any other form of shipping, I should be prepared to wager. They are valuable. They are insured. I should think that Lloyds would be very interested in this. These vessels carry anchors. They carry some form of cable. I would advise the House that, to have the maximum disposable ballast weight for racing, many large yachts of 20 tons or more leave their chain cable ashore and take a length of nylon warp instead.

In the debate on the Question, "That the Clause stand part of the Bill" in the previous proceedings—it was the only operative Clause—I mentioned the present Royal Yacht "Bloodhound", which some Members of the House have had an opportunity of sailing in. About 10 years ago when she was under other ownership, she was caught by a hurricane which got up from negligible strength to a wind of something like 100 or 120 m.p.h. She was entering the Solent coming in past the Nab. Then the wind got up. Even though she was a powerful ship of over 20 tons, fitting the 12-metre rules for scantlings, she was unable to get into the Solent. She was blown back out of it and ended up by having to drop anchor near the Owers Shoal. She dropped anchor there and sent up distress signals. The lifeboat came out and took off everybody on board, but was unable to take the vessel in tow because of the conditions. Those on board reckoned that they were lucky to escape with their lives.

They were taken ashore and they thought, "That is the end of the good old 'Bloodhound'." Not so. Next morning she was still bobbing serenely there off the Owers. They went off. They got aboard. They pulled up the gear. They found that the top fathom or so of the chain was so stretched by what she had been through that the chain was not flexible at all. It was like a metal rod, all the links being bitten into one another in a straight rod. When they finally got that lot; aboard, they found that the anchor to which she had been lying had had both arms sheered off. The flukes were gone. She was lying with just the crown of the anchor—that is the swelling on the end of the shank which unites the arms—wedged in a crevice in the rocks, and that was all that was holding her.

Nothing had given. If anything had given, that would have been the end of the ship. This is why I say that it is not safe to allow these big and substantial fine-looking yachts to go to sea with nothing more than a piece of even synthetic line as an anchor warp. Registered yachts of any substantial size should carry tested chain. It is no hardship to anybody. It is not a bureaucratic interference. They should be expected to do this. They would welcome being told to do so, because it would stop their competitors from getting away with something which was not quite safe. As the Bill does not include any such provision, in this sense, once again, it is defective.

While I am on this point of yachts, with which I have a certain acquaintance, may I say that the word "registered" is still unclear to me, because the great majority of yachts of any size are registered; but the registration is slightly different from that which is known in the merchant shipping world, where a yacht has a classification and where, as the Minister's predecessor was at great pains to tell us on previous occasions, the periodical Lloyds examinations of a vessel include the anchors and chain cables of a vessel. Therefore, the argument used was that new chains and cables needed to be tested and marked, but older or secondhand chains did not need to be tested and marked, because the Lloyds' surveyors would turn them down, if necessary, on their periodical examinations of the chain and anchor. But I remind the Minister, in case he does not already know, that if one looks through the pages of Lloyd's Register, approximately one yacht per page—perhaps I am pessimistic, and there may be two—has a Lloyds' classification. Yachts are: mostly registered yachts, registered with the Board of Trade, but they are not liable to Lloyds' periodical surveys. We need clarification on this matter. The Bill says nothing about it, and in that sense, too, it is defective.

In our debates two years ago, we on this side raised the question of moorings. In many harbours, ships lie to buoys. Neither the promoter of the Bill two years ago nor, if I remember aright, the Minister was au fait with this. I recall the Minister saying once, inadvertently, that ships tied up in harbour by using their anchor cables off the quay. This caused a certain amount of merriment among those of us who had had to handle anchors and cables. There was some doubt about whether ships ever lay to buoys at all, but, as anyone who knows about these things realises, oil ports, for example, increasingly put out large moorings for tankers now up to 120,000 tons which come to load or discharge their oil. The vessels lie off because there are submarine pipes which they can hoist to the surface and connect up in order to load or discharge cargo. Today, therefore, ships of all sizes, including the very largest, can be expected to lie to buoys.

What occurs in such circumstances? Generally, the ship uses one of its own anchor chains to make fast to the buoy. The anchor is taken off, and the chain is used and shackled direct to the buoy. Below the buoy there is the chain which never sees the light of day. It lies permanenalty between the buoy and the bottom of the sea. No one knows what that chain is. Certainly, the ship master does not, and he is supposed to be responsible under this Bill. He has no idea what goes on under the water. With a bigger ship, because of the heavy strains involved, the buoy is not used; it is hoisted clear and removed. The ship shackles straight on to the chain underneath the buoy, and there is therefore an uninterrupted length of chain from the ship to the bottom.

In these circumstances, whether the buoy is there or not, whether the ship is fast to the top of the buoy or the bottom of it, is immaterial in one sense because there is just this long length of chain cable running from the ship's hawse pipe down to the bottom. Under the Bill, the captain will be responsible for the proper standards of strength, testing and marking of the cable to which he is lying, down to the water-line. But below the water-line he is still responsible for his ship, though he does not know what is there.

I made this point strongly in the Standing Committee, as did many hon. and gallant and shell-backed Members. We insisted that moorings must be included in the provisions of such a Measure as this. The responsibility of the port authority is every bit as great, yet no such responsibility is accepted under the Bill. Therefore, the master of a ship riding out a storm on moorings has no idea what is holding his ship, and he has no assurance that Her Majesty's Government have any interest in the matter.

The Minister said earlier today that no one is compelled by this Bill to use tested and marked chain because that is all covered by regulations elsewhere. We went into this in the Standing Committee. I remember that the Government were at some disadvantage there because neither the promoter of the Bill nor dear Mr. Redhead knew one end of a ship from another, and no one could find out what were the regulations or legislative provisions under which the standards of moorings provided in ports were regulated. I do not know to this day what the standards are, and I have a deep suspicion that no such standards have been laid down. It is up to us on this occasion, now that we have the matter before us again, not to let the opportunity escape us but to get down to the job of ensuring that all chains used for the mooring of ships are subject to one standardised type of provision under a Measure of this kind. In this respect also, the Bill is defective.

With the utmost brevity, I have touched on a few respects in which the Bill is defective. There are half a dozen of them, but they are of radical importance. I regard this as an absurd Bill as drafted. I believe it to be objectionable in principle, as I have said, and to be defective in practice in many respects. We should strangle it, as we quite properly strangled the earlier Bill, or if, by some mischance, it should survive our opposition on Second Reading, it will be our business to cut it about ruthlessly in Committee. I urge the House to reject it.

12.26 p.m.

I apologise to the Minister for not being here to hear his opening speech. I had hoped to do so, but a deputation arrived to see me, and I was not able to come in time. If the questions which I wish to put to the hon. Gentleman were dealt with in his opening remarks, I can only apologise.

First, I take the question of the people competent to carry out these tests. Clause 1(1, c ) provides for regulations to be made covering the supervision of such tests by surveyors of ships and by such other persons as the Board of Trade may authorise". This is a major departure from the 1899 Act, where it was clearly provided that there had to be a qualified inspector to do this work.

What worries me is that, although the shipbuilding regulations covering work done in shipyards on such matters, provide that a suitably qualified person should do the tests, the wording of the present Bill is extremely wide, covering any persons whom the Board of Trade may choose. This must be wrong.

My second question relates to the vessels to which the Bill is to apply. The 1899 Act specifically provided that it should not apply to Admiralty vessels and, presumably, to a wide range of work done in naval dockyards and elsewhere. There is nothing in the present Bill to indicate that it will not apply to Admiralty vessels. When the detailed regulations are made, it may be stated at that stage that it should not apply to Admiralty vessels, but the Government should tell us now whether they intend in such regulations to exclude Admiralty vessels, and they should also tell us why, if that is their intention.

Does my hon. Friend recognise, as was recognised in our debates two years ago, that there are times when Admiralty vessels are disposed of to the civil market and may then be used for commercial purposes? Their anchors and chain cables may have been exempt under the Admiralty regulations, but they will not be in civil life.

My hon. Friend makes an important point, even more important now, perhaps, than it was when the previous Bill was discussed. In the past, the Admiralty vessels constructed in our yards were essentially vessels to be used for one purpose, but in the Clyde shipyards, where I worked for five years before coming to the House, Admiralty vessels of a far wider range of activities were built, for example, naval assault craft and supply vessels. I believe that a larger proportion of the vessels being built on Admiralty order can be used for such civil purposes. As my hon. Friend has rightly indicated, this point is even more relevant now than it was before.

My third question concerns methods of testing. When we were discussing with the Ministry the question of shipbuilding regulations, it was quite alarming to see how little progress had been made.

It being half-past Twelve o'clock, the debate stood adjourned.

Debate to be resumed Tomorrow.

I asked for this debate on the cost and costing of hospital laundries following a talk I had some weeks ago about something quite different—Selective Employment Tax—with the managing director of a well-known laundry in my constituency. I thank the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health for being here and apologise to him if I have given him somewhat vague notice of some of the things I intend to raise. If I raise anything in detail of which I have not given notice sufficiently, I shall not, of course, expect an answer this morning.

I have had correspondence and conversations with other laundry experts, most of whom are anxious about the growth of hospital laundries and group and regional laundries in the hospital service in recent years, together with the effect of this on the taxpayer and on established commercial laundries. The question we have to ask is whether the growth of hospital laundries is in the national interest.

I have asked Questions of the Ministry of Health on 23rd January, 20th March and 13th April about various aspects of this problem. The first Question concerned the amount of capital invested in the past two years in building laundries to serve hospitals in the National Health Service and the interest charged. I wanted to know how much had been saved in the cost of laundering compared with charges made by existing independent laundries. The answer in relation to capital investment was £3.6 million, including the cost of machinery. I was told that this had been financed from the general revenue—the taxpayer—and a notional calculation of the cost of borrowing would give current interest charges of about £230,000 a year.

I was also told that information about comparisons with independent laundries was not readily available in the form I sought. But it should be available. The taxpayer's money is involved and the taxpayer is hard pressed enough today. His money should not be spent on building laundries specially for hospital use unless it can be shown beyond doubt that they can do the work much more cheaply than commercial laundries when costed on exactly the same basis or that commercial laundries are not conveniently available.

The sum of £3.6 million in two years is not an unappreciable amount of money when one considers the other things that need doing in the N.H.S. I realise that, in some parts of the country, commercial laundries may not be available but in most areas they are and there are some with spare capacity. There are also some with no spare capacity but which might be expanded with help from private capital at much less cost than the building of a whole new laundry for the National Health Service. There does not seem to be enough investigation into the costing of hospital laundries. They vary enormously, as the figures contained in Part II of the Hospital Costing Returns show.

Incidentally, this must be one of the largest documents in area ever produced by the Stationery Office. It is about 15 inches by 10 inches. It only just goes into the normal briefcase and all three volumes probably would not. The Minister of Health, in answer to a supplementary question from my hon. Friend the Member for Essex, South-East (Mr. Braine) said in relation to this subject: … it is much more economic to run a laundry with a very large turnover than a small laundry."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 20th March, 1967; Vol. 743, c. 1020.] The N.H.S. laundry with the largest turnover is the South-West Regional Hospital Board's laundry at Carshalton. Its turnover in 1966 was 144,736 items and the unit cost—per 100 items—was £2 3s. Id. The fourth laundry down the list, the Hope (Salford) laundry, had 53,357 items at an average unit cost of £1 1s. 9d.

Another point is that the number of articles laundered per operative week in the case of Carshalton was only 1,035 whereas in the case of Hope it was 1,769. A laundry with a much smaller turnover, Halifax General, which was 63rd in the list, had a turnover of 23,071 units, the average cost being only 19s. 5d. The number of items laundered per operative week was 2,728—nearly two and three-quarter times that of Carshalton. I wonder why.

This discrepancy does not fulfil the Minister's statement that it is much more economic to run a laundry with a very large turnover than a small one. On 13th April, I asked about the different unit costs at two teaching hospitals, St. George's and Guy's. I asked why the cost was £2 6s. 9d. per unit for St. George's and £1 8s. 9d. for Guy's. Both these figures are given in the Returns. The difference, apparently, is due to higher transport costs because the St. George's laundry is at Wimbledon. But there is also a lower output per operative week at St. George's—only 1,133 compared with 1,895 in the case of Guy's.

Such variations show that there should be a thorough probe into the whole costing on a national and not only a regional or group basis, particularly into the differences involved in the number of items laundered per operative week. Presumably there is more incentive and less disincentive at Halifax and Salford, for example, than at Carshalton, and more incentive at Guy's than there is at St. George's. There should be a proper comparison with commercial laundries.

I also have a figure relating to commercial laundries used by one of the London teaching hospitals, St. Mary's, Paddington. It is £2 4s. a week. I understand that the Whitley scales for the employees of hospital laundries are higher than the minimum rates agreed with the Laundry Council for commercial laundries. Most London commercial laundries, however, pay more than the minimum rate. Some hospital laundries do not include all the items of cost which should be included. For instance, if there is a hospital administrator responsible for a laundry, is a proportion of his salary charged in the costing of the laundry? Is the rent of the land used by the laundry charged, together with the cost of the building? If the boilers serve the whole hospital, is that included?

According to the Returns, the cost of boilers per unit item is £2 9s. 9d. in the case of Loughborough Genera] Hospital, but only Is. Id. for two other hospitals, Ipswich and South-East Northumberland. There must be a very great variation in the way that costing is carried out. Commercial laundries, being independent undertakings, have to include all these items and more, and hospital laundries should be costed on the same basis. What proportion of laundry work is done in hospital laundries and what proportion is done by contract? I hope that the hon. Gentleman will be able to give me that answer. I wonder how many hospital laundries obtain commercial quotations as a check against their own costs.

Finally, without wanting to be dogmatic about this, is not this really a problem of private enterprise versus nationalisation in the form of group or regional laundry units? Surely the test should be cost and efficiency. The hospital service should not be allowed to spend public money on building laundries unless no commercial laundries are available and unless it can be proved beyond any doubt that hospital laundries can do the work more cheaply, after being properly costed.

12.40 p.m.

I am grateful to the hon. Member for Wembley, South (Sir R. Russell) for his acceptance that he may have asked me certain questions of detail to which, without notice, I would not be able to provide answers. However, I must say that I agree with his general case that there should be the maximum possible publicity to the statistics upon which the costing and costs of laundries are based.

At the inception of the National Health Service, there were more than 1,000 hospital laundries, mostly of small capacity. During the early years, resources were used mainly on maintaining existing plant and machinery and it was not until the end of the 1950s that the hospital authorities began a programme of replacing uneconomic plant and improving productive efficiency and quality standards. The main development lay in the closure of some of the smaller and less efficient units and the concentration of work in larger hospital laundries where improved facilities would achieve economies of scale. This process of rationalisation, the establishment of group laundries serving neighbouring hospitals, has resulted in the closure of about 450 smaller hospital laundries since 1948.

The planning of hospital laundry services rests with regional hospital boards and with the boards of governors of teaching hospitals as part of their responsibility for hospital development programmes. To assist hospital authorities in their task, the Ministry issues guidance about the design, equipment and cost limits of hospital laundries. In addition, the Ministry has a small staff of professional laundry engineers who are available to visit hospitals on request from hospital authorities who are contemplating reorganising their laundry services and to advise on technical and other questions affecting the efficiency of operations.

Furthermore, by virtue of the Ministry's membership of the British Launderers' Research Association both the Ministry and individual hospital authorities have available to them facilities for keeping in touch with modern developments in the industry. Hospital authorities have access to the Association's library and advisory service and full information is made available to the Ministry on the results of relevant research carried out by the Association.

Separate figures for laundry investment are not maintained centrally, but in the financial years 1964–65 and 1965–66 hospital authorities in England and Wales spent a total of £3.6 million in building and equipping hospital laundries. Any forecast of future expenditure must necessarily be tentative since priorities are kept under continuous review and the total capital resources available from year to year are subject to the prevailing econo- mic circumstances at the time. However, the present plans of hospital authorities envisage spending £10 million on laundries up to 1970, slightly more than half on the provision of new and the remainder on the improvement of existing laundries.

Hospital authorities are, of course, conscious of the need to take full account of local circumstances, including transport costs, the local labour available and, not least, the possibility of using commercial services for hospital laundry. As I shall show the hon. Gentleman later in my observations, this is a dominant consideration when examining these problems. But decisions whether laundry should be done by direct labour or contractual services, assuming that it can be done satisfactorily either way, must depend on the economics of each case.

Hospital costing arrangements are governed by the relevant Statutory Instrument, No. 1414 of 1948, which requires hospital authorities to prepare cost accounts in such form as the Minister may prescribe. A working party set up by the Minister to devise a full Departmental costing system for hospitals reported in 1955 and from 1956–57 onwards laundries have been costed on the basis of the cost per 100 articles laundered. The costed expenditure includes all the direct costs—salaries and wages, steam, materials and so on—and depreciation on plant and equipment. It does not, however, include interest charges on capital expenditure on land and buildings, nor any allowance for general hospital overheads.

This is because the primary purpose of the costing system is to assist hospital authorities themselves in the day-to-day management of hospital laundries by keeping costs under continuous review and to provide a common basis for comparing performances with other hospital laundries. It is not designed to provide a straightforward comparison between the cost of hospital laundry services and contractual services. Nevertheless, hospital authorities can readily adapt their existing costing system in cases where they would find it useful to assess the relative costs of hospital laundries against the cost of commercial laundry contracts.

In 1965–66, the latest year for which information is available, the average cost per 100 articles laundered for a sample of 183 laundries serving more than one hospital was £1 11s. 8d. The costs ranged from 17s. to £3 13s. 3d. The lower costs occurred mainly where the scale of operations was greatest and also because there is some employment of patients in laundries attached to mental illness hospitals. In case the hon. Gentleman thinks that the cost of such labour is included, I should say that it is, but payments to mental patients are not on a commercial scale, for obvious reasons. Conversely, the highest costs were mainly in those laundries operating on a relatively small scale. There is also a wide fluctuation in efficiency measured by the average number of articles laundered per operative per week, and this is a reflection mainly of the extent to which modern laundry equipment is in use.

The hon. Gentleman may like to know that an alternative cost unit "per 100 lb. dried weight" has been introduced on an experimental basis in cases where weighing facilities are available, and the value of this unit of measurement will be assessed when the 1966–67 cost accounts become available later this year. The costed expenditure covered will be the same as that used to produce the cost per 100 articles laundered.

Both the measurement units can be criticised, because they do not reflect the size of laundry or the particular laundering process involved, but any improvement would mean using a complicated system of weightings for the many different articles laundered and the costing process would consequently be more time consuming and expensive. Furthermore, it is not clear whether there would be any consequential advantage for hospital management, and we consider that the present arrangements are adequate for the purposes of financial control.

Since the present hospital costing system does not include items such as interest on capital, it might be contended that the costing figures do not reflect the real cost of the work done in hospital laundries and that in some cases it would prove advantageous for hospitals to use the services of commercial laundries instead of investing in laundries of their own. However, boards are conscious of the need to plan laundry services taking account of local circumstances, geography, communications and transport costs, local labour supply and availability of commercial laundries able to provide reliable and economic services. Indeed, the latter is considered, as part of a board's submission, when it seeks approval of individual building schemes including a laundry. I emphasise that before approval is given to the building of a new laundry, or substantial re-equipment, the whole position of local availability of commercial services is investigated.

Comparisons between the cost of providing direct labour services and contractual services very widely in different parts of the country. It would be wrong to compare the costs of the least efficient of the former with the most competitive of the latter, especially when they are not in the same locality. There is no doubt, however, if only because of the physical limitations of space as well as capital resources, that some hospitals in built-up areas will need to continue to rely on the services of commercial laundries for some time to come.

Hospital authorities, wherever possible, obtain competing quotations from commercial laundries before entering into contracts for laundry work. Although the position has improved, we have had the experience in the Department of not being able to obtain competitive tenders. Not all commercial laundries have the necessary capacity to provide a satisfactory service to hospitals at competitive rates. The capacity varies widely in different parts of the country and at different periods not unrelated to the state of the domestic economy.

Thus, in a cool atmosphere, economically speaking, as is normally commercially to be expected, there are more offers by commercial laundries to service hospitals than in times when their facilities and capacity are fully absorbed by other work. In 1965, for example, several hospitals in the London area without their own laundries experienced some difficulty in obtaining competitive tenders for laundry work from London firms. The position has now improved.

Another factor which might have some bearing on the willingness of commercial laundries to undertake hospital work is the problem of fouled and infected linen. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will pay close attention to this. Hospitals with attached laundries are generally better equipped to cope with this problem by means of segregation, preliminary sluicing and disinfection of the soiled work before the normal laundering process is undertaken. This work is reflected in the costing of these hospital laundries. On the other hand, hospitals which use commercial laundry services must themselves carry out the preliminary sluicing and disinfection before the work is passed to the laundry contractor, which process inevitably involves some double handling.

In 1959, the Central Health Services Council issued a Report on Hospital Laundry Arrangements which was circulated to hospital authorities with the Minister's commendation. The Report recommended, inter alia, procedures designed to minimise the handling of fouled and infected linen to prevent cross-infection. Articles in these categories should be segregated in impermeable bags from ordinary soiled linen and subjected to preliminary sluicing and disinfection as appropriate before being laundered. Sluicing should be done with mechanical sluicing equipment and disinfection is achieved by means of soaking in a recommended solution of disinfectant.

I wanted to emphasise that point because the public should know all the factors involved, and the question of cross-infection from hospital to public, and even vice versa, has to be very seriously considered. The information about the proportion of hospitals with or without their own laundries is not readily available. However, if the hon. Gentleman would say what sort of statistics he would like, we could produce the information, although it would not be easy because of the complications and the variations in practice. For instance, some hospitals contract outside and also have their own laundries.

No one would disagree, however that, given a completely reliable commercial service, the criterion of choice between the one method or the other should continue to be efficiency combined with economy of expenditure. Although there is perhaps a natural tendency for capital investment by hospital authorities to be devoted to urgent projects more directly affecting the well-being of patients, the total capital investment in hospital laundries is by no means insignificant. It must be our continuing aim to ensure the maximum returns from such investment, and hospital authorities as well as my Department are fully conscious of this responsibility.

With the advent of new and larger machinery and the increasing use of automation the future trend is in the direction of larger group laundries to take full advantage of the economies of scale which they can achieve. The Ministry's professional engineers are keeping abreast of technological developments in the industry and taking active steps to encourage the use of advanced techniques in hospital laundries. In this way productivity and efficiency are continually being improved.

Moreover, benefits which are essentially long-term can be expected to derive from the efforts of the specification working groups set up by the Ministry's Supply Division primarily to examine the requirements for, and the most suitable methods of purchase of, items of equipment and commodities widely used in the hospital service. These benefits are likely to accrue from greater standardisation of textiles used in hospitals.

The report on bed linen, for example, which has recently been circulated to hospital authorities, not only recommends articles of standard quality, but also of standard size. The latter consideration, in particular, may be regarded as of incidental, but, nevertheless, welcome advantage in the laundering processes. Similar developments may be expected with other textiles in due course.

Of more immediate concern, perhaps, a working party of chief O & M and work study officers of regional hospital boards has recently prepared a draft report bringing together the practical knowledge and experience gained from surveys and studies conducted by them in almost 100 laundries in the hospital service. The report, which is expected to be published shortly, is concerned with managerial and operational aspects of hospital laundries and suggests possible improvements with a view to increasing productivity.

Methods are also suggested whereby individual laundry managers can readily measure standards of performance. An important part of the report deals with the future planning of hospital laundries, and sets out data for determining the optimum size of laundries taking account of variations in size and location of the hospitals to be served and other local circumstances.

The hon. Member asked about the present position at certain specified hospitals. In 1965–66 the costs per 100 articles laundered were: £1 8s. 9d. at Guy's; £1 15s. 3d. at St. Bartholomew's; £2 6s. 9d. at St. George's. Transport costs are incurred at St. Bartholomew's and St. George's because the laundries are situated at Swanley and Wimbledon, but the main reason for the higher costs is the lower output per operative per week as compared with Guy's Hospital where an incentive bonus scheme is in operation.

The lower output at St. Bartholomew's Hospital is mainly due to the inadequacy of its worn-out boiler equipment—which was inherited—and which is to be replaced under a £50,000 scheme in hand; some new machinery is also due to be installed. An experimental bonus system for increasing the productivity of operatives at the St. George's Hospital laundry was introduced last month, but it is much too soon to judge the results.

In 1965, the Minister authorised six experimental studies designed to reveal the extent to which different types of incentive schemes could contribute to increased productivity coupled with enhanced remuneration. One scheme has been operating since the beginning of this year, and three are in course of introduction, including the one at St. George's. After a trial period of operation each scheme will be evaluated to see whether it will be possible to extend some type of bonus scheme more widely.

It is to be noted that Report No. 29 of the National Board for Prices and Incomes entitled "The Pay and Conditions of Manual Workers in Local Authorities, the National Health Service, Gas and Water Supply", recommends the introduction generally of schemes of payment relating earnings to performance for all manual workers in the National Health Service. In the short term, this would be on a fairly rough and ready basis, directly relating increases in pay to overall savings in manpower. In the longer-term, say after two or three years, any bonus scheme would depend on accurate work-study measurement and control; but this will need a large increase in trained work-study staff.

During the debate, I have dealt with many aspects of a part of the work of the hospital service which, although important, tends to receive perhaps less public attention than it deserves. Therefore, the House is indebted to the hon. Gentleman for initiating this debate. Although the hospital laundry service may cost a lot of money in terms of capital investment, I can assure the hon. Member that we are fully conscious of its importance. I hope that he will agree that I have set out in my reply a convincing case that the Minister and the Department are conscious of the economic requirements of the situation, and of the need to make hospital laundry services as efficient as possible. However, when commercial laundries can be shown to be more economic, they will be seriously considered.

It being One o'clock Mr. DEPUTY SPEAKER suspended the Sitting till half-past Two o'clock, pursuant to Order.

Sitting resumed at 2.30 p.m.

I have a communication to make to the House. I received from the Speaker of the Canadian House of Commons a copy of a Resolution which was passed in that House on Monday, 8th May last. I shall now read to the House the version in English: The House of Commons, Canada, Resolved, That this House, acknowledging the Resolution of the British House of Commons conveying most friendly greetings and warm congratulations on the centenary of the establishment of the Canadian House of Commons and all good wishes for the second century of its existence, Recalling the unfailing good will extended to it by the British House of Commons at the time of Confederation and throughout the century that has followed; Mindful that parliamentary institutions, our heritage from the Mother of Parliaments, have served Canada well during the past 100 years; Requests Mr. Speaker to express to the British House of Commons sincere and grateful appreciation for its kind greetings and congratulations. A copy of the Resolution in both English and French will be placed in the Library together with the relevant OFFICIAL REPORT.