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

I regret that I shall not be able to be as admirably brief as my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Scotland (Mr. Alldritt) was in moving the Adoption Bill, because I believe that my Bill is of such importance that the House requires adequate explanation of its purpose and its scope.

Its purpose is simple. It is to implement the conclusions of the Joint Select Committee of both Houses and of all parties on the censorship of the theatre. That Committee's Report was published in June of last year and was welcomed enthusiastically by the entire Press. I had the privilege of chairing that Committee. It was an interesting and fascinating experience. Looking round its disparate membership during our early meetings it seemed certain that there was no possibility of any general agreement. Two or three minority reports seemed inevitable. Yet at the end we achieved unanimity, not only on basic principles, but on all the controversial minor aspects of the problem.

This was not because of any common political outlook. It was because the evidence and the arguments put before us led to the inescapable conclusion that the pre-censorship of plays by the Lord Chamberlain should cease and be replaced by the application of the laws of the land.

I remind any hon. Members who consider this solution to be dangerous or wild that among the members of the Select Committee were Lord Brooke, who was held in high respect in all parts of the House when he was a Member of Parliament, and the Earl of Scarborough, the present Lord Chamberlain's predecessor.

The central question to which the Committee directed itself was whether the present censorship procedure was a violation of the rights of free speech which should be maintained in our democratic society; and, if so, whether there were alternative means by which that freedom could be maintained without the theatre becoming licentious or in other ways publicly offensive. The more we examined the present system of censorship the more indefensible it appeared in principle, the more ludicrous in practice, and the more it became apparent that it should end and be replaced by applying to the theatre the laws of libel, slander, obscenity and blasphemy that already govern all other forms of literary expression.

Today the playwright alone of all creative artists is prevented from presenting his work to the public by the arbitrary decision of one individual against whom there is no appeal whatever. His decisions cannot be questioned in the courts or in this House. This is a gross injustice which has long incensed the whole writing profession. A playwright may spend months and years writing a play which he and other literary judges consider to have artistic merit. Imagine his feelings when the censor forbids its production because he thinks it might offend some people or because it has political implications he does not like. And, as I say, there is no appeal.

No individual, however sympathetic or knowledgeable, should have such dictatorial powers, but it becomes more intolerable when the man who exercises those powers has no other qualification than that he happens to be the head of the Queen's Household. I invite the House to note that not only does the censor penalise the playwright, but he also penalises the public who are prevented from seeing his work which they might want to watch. We are the only democratic and freedom-loving country in the world which has a theatre censor. There is none in Belgium, France, West Germany, Finland, Italy, Holland, Norway, Sweden, Australia, Canada or the United States. No one could possibly allege that in those countries the morals of the public are debased or corrupted by what happens in the theatre.

Parliament gave the powers of censorship to the Lord Chamberlain in the Act of 1737. It did so because Sir Robert Walpole wanted to put an end to the political attacks being made on his Government by the theatre at that time. I shall show that censorship still today often has a deliberate political purpose. In 1843 Parliament passed the Act under which the censorship operates and has done ever since. Since then every author of original ideas who has examined in his plays topical, social or political problems which the censor considered respectable people might find unpalatable, has at one time or another come under his ban. These include Ibsen, Pirandello, and Shaw. Yet some of their plays were being presented in other countries at the same time that they were banned in this country. At one time Gilbert and Sullivan's "Mikado" was banned. On another occasion Laurence Houseman's "Pain and Penalties", which dealt with the relationship between George IV and Queen Caroline, was banned.

It would be quite wrong to think that these were only the regrettable happenings of the past and that this sort of thing does not happen today; it does. Plays by Arthur Miller and Tennessee Williams and John Osborne have been performed in other countries when they could not be seen in theatres in this country. Some hon. Members may have seen a letter in The Times last week from Bamber Gascoigne, a well-known television personality. He has had a play banned which is shortly to be produced in New York.

I quote as one example of many that I could quote, the recent case of the poem by E. E. Cummings "I Sing to Olaf" which has been contained in a book of modern verse in print for 20 years. The Royal Shakespeare Company wanted to include that poem in a programme which it called "The Rebel". The Lord Chamberlain said no because he objected to a few of the lines in it. So the poem was printed in the theatre programme and the actor stopped reading when he reached that point so that the audience could read the lines for themselves. Then the whole poem was broadcast on television to 4½ million people without a single letter of protest being received. All this is obviously ridiculous and it is time it was stopped.

Then there is the political censorship which the Lord Chamberlain admitted he imposes. He has permitted leaders of Communist countries to be presented on the stage in a highly unfavourable light but he has banned the Royal Shakespeare Company's performance of "U.S." on the ground—which had little if any justification—that it might be considered offensive to the United States. It is true that finally the Lord Chamberlain relented and allowed the play to be put on with a few alterations, but he similarly prevented the production of the play "Macbird". At the same time that play was being performed to interested audiences in the United States. This also is nonsense which ought to stop.

Another factor which weighed with the Committee was that Lord Cobbold himself stated in examination, and in his speech in the House of Lords, that the powers of censorship should no longer reside in a court official. No one was able to suggest any acceptable alternative. Lord Cobbold, to our surprise and to the horror of the Chairman of the Arts Council, Lord Goodman, suggested that the Arts Council should take on that responsibility. Obviously no body can simultaneously discharge the duty of fostering and fettering the art of the theatre. In fact, the Arts Council has come down firmly in favour of the abolition of a pre-censorship of plays.

No one should think that abolishing the Lord Chamberlain's powers of censorship over the theatre would leave the theatre unrestricted. Indeed, it was argued before the Committee that if his powers are abolished the theatre may become less permissive than it is today. Managements will think carefully before putting on a play which might fall foul of the law. If they did so they would not only expose themselves to severe penalties which are stated in the Bill, but they would lose, or risk losing, very large sums of money put into the production of the plays. Play production nowadays is a very costly business. Critics are certain to condemn a play which goes beyond the accepted standards of decency and experience shows that the public is unlikely to attend plays which are offensive.

I think the Bill self-explanatory, but it is my duty to explain one or two of its more important features. Clause 1 abolishes the censorship powers of the Lord Chamberlain over plays. It also abolishes the Royal Prerogative. We are doubtful whether there is a Royal Prerogative and that the Sovereign is entitled to stop or to censor plays, but we were advised that that may be so and that it was necessary to make the position clear. Clause I also establishes that the theatre licensing authority should have no censorship powers. It would be a terrible state of affairs if, instead of one censorship in London, there were to be a large number throughout the country which resided in local authorities.

Clause 2 applies the Obscene Publications Act to the theatre. It does so by a very slight alteration in words, only such alterations as are necessary. I think, however, that I should read the few key lines. Clause 2(1) provides:

"For the purposes of this section a performance of a play shall be deemed to be obscene if, taken as a whole, its effect was such as to tend to deprave and corrupt persons who were likely, having regard to all relevant circumstances, to attend it".

Clause 3 provides the possible defence, which, again, is broadly the same as the defence permitted under the Obscene Publications Act as applied to books and literature:

"A person shall not be convicted of an offence under section 2 of this Act if it is proved that the giving of the performance in question was justified as being for the public good on the ground that it was in the interests of drama, opera, ballet or any other art, or of literature or learning."

The defendants will be the presenter of the play and/or the director of the play. Some Amendment may have to be considered in Committee on this point. Certain representations have been made to me by the Society of West End Theatre Managers which appear to me to have substance.

With one exception, the penalties under the Bill are the same as under the Obscene Publications Act. Conviction before a magistrate would carry a maximum penalty of six months' imprisonment or a fine of £400. Under the Obscene Publications Act, conviction in those conditions may carry a penalty of only £100, but in the Committee's Report it was suggested that the penalty should be increased. Conviction on indictment may bring a maximum penalty of three years' imprisonment and an unlimited fine.

I should make it clear that the Bill impinges only on plays, ballet and opera. The licensing and penal laws which control music hall performances, revues or cabaret remain the same as at present, unless they contain a sketch which is deemed a play, in which case they will come under the provisions of the Bill. Performances in a club would not be protected against prosecution. No prosecution may take place without the consent of the Attorney-General. We considered this necessary to prevent vexatious or frivolous prosecutions by outraged individuals or societies and to ensure uniformity of enforcement.

Clause 4 provides that, if anyone is slandered on the stage, he may bring an action under the laws of libel, which will make the penalty more severe than if he sued for slander.

Clauses 11 and its following ones deal with the licensing of theatres. They are very detailed, and it would be wrong to take up the time of the House discussing them now. They are necessary and they can be carefully considered in Committee, but, broadly speaking, the effect will be to give theatre licensing authorities the same authority to license theatres for plays as exist today under the licensing provisions of the London Government Act, 1963. In other words, the London procedure, which appeared to us and the Home Office to be a correct one, will apply to the rest of the country in regard to the licensing of theatres for the performance of plays.

Now, a few words about some of the doubts which have been expressed in the Press and elsewhere about some of the features of the Bill. First, should the presentation of living people be permitted on the stage? It seems to me that this boils down to the question whether public figures should be presented on the stage. Private individuals are protected by the laws of slander, which will operate in regard to plays as they do at the moment in regard to newspapers and books, and it seems unlikely that anyone would wish to caricature or bring into contempt a private individual by presentation on the stage.

There seems to me, however—I hope that the House will agree—nothing wrong in allowing public figures to be satirised on the stage. This is already happening under the present censorship arrangement. It is a new development and one which we welcome. In the play "Mrs. Wilson's Dairy" now being performed at the Criterion Theatre, public figures, the Prime Minister and other members of the Cabinet, are satirised. If they can be satirised in newspapers, in cartoons and in books, for which there may be a readership of millions, why or earth should they not be satirised on the stage? We have had long, bitter and very successful satire in popular programmes on television, particularly the programme "TWTWTW", and Mr. William Bird has given pleasure to millions by impersonating and making rather ridiculous the Prime Minister, the Leader of the Opposition and others.

All this is healthy and good, and should be welcomed in a democratic society which believes in free speech. Only in totalitarian society is this sort of thing banned. It certainly should not be here. It is impossible to draft an Amendment to the Bill which would protect living individuals from presentation on the stage without at the same time banning justifiable satire.

There is the more controversial question of banning the presentation of the Sovereign on the stage or allowing improper comments about her. The ground for this is that the Sovereign is unable to bring an action for slander. The Committee gave long and serious thought to the problem but finally came to the conclusion that there should be no such ban imposed by Act of Parliament. It did so on the grounds, first, as suggested by Lord Cobbold himself, that it would be exceedingly difficult to draft acceptable words to carry out the purpose; second, that it seemed illogical to ban contemptuous references to the Sovereign on the stage when newspapers, magazines and books have no such ban imposed upon them; and third, that it was unlikely that the public would tolerate for a moment offensive personal references to the Sovereign on the stage any more than they would such offensive references in the Press. The Committee was unanimous in this as in all other matters, and it should be noted that one of the members who supported this proposal was Lord Scarbrough, who was Lord Chamberlain before Lord Cobbold took his place.

There remains one more point on which comment is necessary. It has been suggested by many—the point was made by the Lord Chamberlain himself—that pre-censorship is desirable to protect the casual theatregoer, to protect him, presumably, from shock at what he sees on the stage. The answer is succinctly given in paragraph 29 of the Committee's Report, from which I now quote:

"Attendance at a theatre is a voluntary act, usually decided upon after more conscious thought than going to the cinema or turning on television. The Committee consider that it is better that an individual should have the right to decide, with full knowledge, what sort of play he wishes to see than that some central authority should attempt to lay down what is suitable for the ' average person'."

The theatre managers' association suggested that plays should be put in categories, perhaps, A, B and C, according to their shockability. That is a matter which we thought might or might not be desirable, but it was one for the theatre business to decide. If it would like to set up some organisation which placed plays in various categories, advertising that fact at the box office, and in Press announcements, well and good. But Parliament should have no part in it.

I apologise for keeping the House so long, but I am sure that it will agree that the subject is important. This Bill will alter the law which has governed the theatre since 1737. The House would not want to do so without realising its implications.

I shall end by quoting the words of Lord Chesterfield in another place 230 years ago, when the present laws of censorship were instituted by Parliament on the initiative of Sir Robert Walpole. Lord Chesterfield then said:

"Our laws are sufficient for punishing any man that shall dare to represent upon the stage what may appear, either by the words or the representation, to be blasphemous, seditious or immoral. … If the stage becomes at any time licentious, if a play appears to be a libel upon the Government or upon any particular man, the King's courts are open. …

"If poets and players are to be restrained, let them be restrained as other subjects are, by the known laws of their country, if they offend, let them be tried, as every Englishman ought to be, by God and their Country. Do not let us subject them to the arbitrary will and pleasure of any one man. A power lodged in the hands of one single man to judge and determine, without any limitation, without any control or appeal, is a sort of power unknown to our laws, inconsistent with our constitution."

With those noble words in mind I hope that the House will today bring to an end the present archaic, illogical and indefensible system of stage censorship which we have tolerated for far too long.

I begin by apologising to the right hon. Member for Vauxhall (Mr. Strauss) for not being in my place when he began his speech. I thought that the energy of the House on the subject of adoption would be greater than it proved to be.

The right hon. Gentleman's views are very well known, as is the extraordinarily thorough work he did as Chairman of the Joint Committee, to which I pay the fullest credit. The Committee's Report is a remarkable State document. Nevertheless, I shall refer to the Bill in critical terms, and I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will pay attention to the points that I shall try to make.

The Bill has been presented by him and others sincerely as meaning a great liberalising of the theatre. It has been claimed that it will usher into the theatre a new era of freedom and, therefore, of excitement and energy. If I were convinced that that were really so, I should be a very enthusiastic supporter of the Bill. My fear is that, except in the very short run, the effect of a change of this character may be the exact opposite of what is desired.

I take as my starting point the proposition that we have in London—and, alas, our theatre is concentrated, perhaps ex cessively, almost exclusively in London—more theatre, better theatre, and more experimental theatre than anywhere else in the world. If that is so, we should be very cautious before making too radical a change in the system under which it operates. We could be like the monkey in the story which takes the watch to bits to see how it works and then cannot put it together again.

In the Committee's Report there is a very full list of the practices concerning control of the theatre in other countries. I should be more impressed if it were possible to point out to me another country where the theatre flourished more than it does here. I should then be more inclined to look at the system of control which has been originated there.

In evidence to the Committee, Mr. John Osborne pleaded most eloquently against the restrictions of the present system. It is very natural that a playwright should do so, that he should ask in effect for complete freedom of expression in the exercise of his art. What artist since the beginning of time would not wish to have the ability, if he is a playwright, to put his plays upon the stage, a poet, to publish them, or, a painter, to paint his pictures without any control?

I do not believe that any likely system will give any playwright that complete freedom, because I do not think that public opinion will allow it, that it will provide a carte blanche for the artist in a public performance. I am aware that the Bill does not advocate any such thing, but it has sometimes been glossed over by the advocates of the change, that all other public performances in this country are controlled in one way or another. It is no good saying that there is no censorship in radio or on television. There is none in the limited sense that at present applies in the theatre. But those organs of public entertainment and information are controlled by public bodies set up under the authority of the House bodies that act as the custodians of public taste. Many more people still go to cinemas than to theatres, and films are governed by a system which comes to much the same thing as a public body and relies ultimately on the licensing powers of local authorities.

The Bill will replace censorship by the Lord Chamberlain with censorship by the courts. Such a censorship might well be harsher and, above all, would certainly be far more uncertain than the present system. I am not for a moment saying that the exact details of the present system should be continued. The Lord Chamberlain's evidence was that he would wish not to have this duty, and I wholly agree. But there are considerable risks in changing from a system of pre-censorship, however it might be arranged, to a system of reliance solely on the "King's courts" of which the right hon. Gentleman spoke in his borrowed peroration.

The House must give weight to the fact that in its evidence to the Committee commercial theatre management was dead against the Bill with remarkable unanimity. After all, the people who make up commercial theatre management keep the theatre going. They are the people who give employment to the actors. They are the mainspring of the watch that we may be in danger of taking to bits without due care and attention.

My guess is that if the Bill were passed there would be a short period of glorious freedom and there would be many experimental plays that might now find themselves in difficulty. But that short period would be followed by one or more causes célèbres which would receive a great deal of publicity, cost a great deal of money and end—perhaps only one of them—in heavy damages against a theatre management. Once that happened, the period of glorious freedom would be over and from then on theatre management would be much more cautious than it is now. Milton said of the Commonwealth religious establishment that:

"New Presbyter is but old Priest writ large."

Adapting that phrase, one might say that in the future "new court action will be but old Lord Chamberlain writ large".

The evidence to the Committee suggested that it costs between £30,000 and £50,000 to put on a West End production. I suggest that there is risk enough when money of that order is concerned without adding another certain risk from the courts thereafter. I think it is worth remarking in passing that the very nature of the evidence which would have to be brought in a case referring to a play would add to the uncertainty. If one is having a court case about a book, the evidence is very simply brought into court. The book is published; there is no doubt about what happened.

In the case of a play one can produce the script. But the script is only a very small part of the play. We have all seen different productions of plays and realised that a difference in production makes an enormous difference to the whole character of a play. So evidence would have to be brought in respect of not only the words written by the playwright or the words as they ended up as the script of the play, but also the production. It would be very difficult to produce evidence, particularly for an individual to do so, on this score. For this reason, it seems to me that an additional source of uncertainty would be brought into any court case referring to a play.

I realise that not all of the London theatre is—to use a word disapproved of by Mr. Littler—commercial. In other words, there are—he gave the figure three-subsidised theatres. Mr. Osborne in his evidence placed very great reliance on these theatres as providing the avant garde, the experimental end, of the theatre. If I understood him correctly, he thought that even though the commercial management might perhaps be more timid as a result of the passing of a Bill such as this, one could rely on the subsidised theatre to hold up the flag. I thought that that view was perhaps too optimistic. I do not think that ratepayers or taxpayers who have to produce money for these theatres will take it at all well if they find themselves paying out large sums, contributed originally in rates or taxes, in court actions. I think, therefore, that we may well find that if we get this sort of situation of uncertainty the managements of subsidised theatres will find themselves at least as cautious as those of commercial theatres.

We have lived for some time in a period when increasing freedom of expression, like inflation in the economic sphere, has been more or less taken for granted. In many ways this has been a liberating process. There has always been in the process an element of schoolboy competition, of who can say the rudest word first, but if historical precedents are anything—and I believe that they are—this period of increasing freedom of expression will end. It could be that it will end before long, and when it does, there will be a quite different public opinion. I think that when that time comes, the theatre might well regret the passing of such a Bill as this.

I apologise to my right hon. Friend the Member for Vauxhall (Mr. Strauss) for not being present when he began his speech. I wish to support him from a rather unusual standpoint, and in presenting my argument I may stray to the uttermost limits of order.

I have experience in the theatre in two countries—not as an actor but as a writer—in this country and in Germany. In Germany the theatre plays a far more significant part in social life than it does here. I was told recently by the burgomaster of a very important German city that he was delighted that his municipality paid as much out for the theatre as it did for its sewers, because these two things performed roughly the same function. He was talking about the purgative effects of theatrical performances. Anybody who knows Germany knows well that in so far as that country has come to terms with its recent tragic past, it has been through the instrumentation of playwrights rather than politicians. There has been nothing more moving in my life than to attend two performances in two cities in Germany of the play "The Diary of Anne Frank". The effect on German public opinion, particularly young German public opinion, was absolutely electrifying and salutary. I state frankly that I want the theatre in this country to fulfil the same social functions as it does in Germany.

As to my part in the English theatre, I have been associated with all sorts of enterprises, but my theatrical debut was in the satirical field. I was associated with the production of "Oh, what a Lovely War!". Mr. Bernard Levin, who is a very astute drama critic—although his views on politics leave something to be desired—said in a review of the play that it was satire at its highest peak and that it was a play which would drive audiences by thousands out of every theatre in which it was presented.

But, much to my satisfaction, the opposite happened. Why it happened is very instructive. It happened because all the people who participated in the production had different points of view which fed themselves into the production. Some of us wanted to satire something about a specific war, something about diplomacy and how wars begin by accident. Some wanted to satire a particularly bone-headed group of military leaders. But what emerged at the end—and this was appreciated by organisations like the British Legion—was a monument in words and music to the ordinary soldier of 1914–18. This, described as a savage satire, as something corrosive and something destructive, was, in effect, transformed during the building-up of the production into something quite different, something that was recognised as quite different by audiences who were expected to leave the theatre in droves when the play was presented.

In spite of my experience, I believe that there is a powerful case for censorship of the arts. But the trouble is that whenever the word "censorship" is used, people automatically think of the sexual act and its suggestion by film and its presentation in novels and the rest. Frankly, I think that nothing would drive this country back to Puritanism more than to give full freedom to presenting the sexual act on the stage and the screen. That is only a personal view.

But what I am concerned about is not the greater freedom which is now being exercised in the presentation of sexual problems. What really worries me about television, the screen and novels is the cascade of violence which is pouring into the public consciousness. Practically every play which I see on television these days—and I watch it quite a lot—has as its central theme the gunman. As we all know, in the cinema the gunman has become a public hero. He may be presented as a public villain, but in the minds of audiences he has emerged as a public hero.

There is a powerful case for even more rigid control of much of the stuff which is pumped into the public mind by one means or another. The classic case for censorship is presented by what is regarded as a classic film, D. W. Griffiths' "Birth of a Nation". In film terms, that was a masterpiece. The camera angles are quite outstanding. The close-up was introduced for the first time. To tell a story in that way was a magnificent job of work.

In cinematic terms the film is a work of art, but when it was presented it had disastrous consequences because what it presented so artistically was a view of life which was absolutely poisoned with the worst form of racialism. As we all know, one effect of the showing of that film in the earlier part of this century was to resurrect the Ku Klux Klan. A secondary effect was to produce racial riots in many cities in the United States of America.

What I have just said seems to restate what was once said by a learned American justice that although we should have as much freedom as possible, nobody should have the freedom to shout "Fire" in a crowded theatre. Consequently, there is a powerful series of arguments which can be levelled—and here I tend to form of kind of alliance with the hon. Member for Chelsea (Mr. Worsley)—for greater, more rigid control over some of the forms of mass entertainment.

In spite, however, of that general view which I hold, I still intend to support the Bill because whatever control is necessary over the theatre, I cannot feel that the archaic system of control which, in essence, was born in the 1730s because a gentleman who later became a famous novelist rather upset certain people in his prentice efforts as a dramatist, is suitable to the present age.

I am a very sensitive theatregoer. I am easily shocked. There are times when I see Shakespeare plays, for instance, when I feel chills running down my spine because the contemporary significance of so much that was written in the 1580s sometimes appals me. It is entirely possible that I may stray accidentally into a theatre not knowing what is being portrayed. I do this for the simple reason that I know many drama critics who occasionally give me free tickets, so I do not know what the play is about and I have not had the opportunity to read what the drama critics have written about it.

I am easily shockable but I cannot recall any theatre production which tended either to deprave or to corrupt. It may well be that I was depraved and corrupted before I started going to the theatre—that is arguable—but I cannot recall any theatrical presentation, and I have seen many of those which have been highly controversial, which tended to deprave and corrupt.

Because the performances are live, one gets in the theatre a rather different effect from that in the cinema. I have always found that whatever latitude has been extended to the playwright in any given play, apart from certain theatres—one obviously does not go to "The Desert Song" to study the Middle East problem—I rarely leave a theatre without feeling slightly better for having gone there, because I understand more and more of the peculiarities of human nature because I have been to see the production.

In those circumstances, I believe that the theatre can very largely be left to look after itself, subject to the provisions which have been frankly outlined by my right hon. Friend the Member for Vauxhall if offences are committed.

I find it very difficult to regard being satirised on the stage as an offence. I wish that some playwright would write "Mrs Fletcher's Diary". I wish that some playwright would get to work and present what would be a rather hilarious piece of stage entertainment. The fact that one is satirised is the clearest indication that one has arrived and is working one's way into public affection and respect. But I agree, however, that there are circumstances in which the courts would have to come into action.

Basically, however, because I believe that the theatre has a wider social function than merely entertainment, although that is important, and because I want to see the theatre exercising the same salutary and cleansing influence on our society which I have seen it do in Germany, I support the Bill. It is for this reason that I want the archaic system which the Bill seeks to abolish to be abolished as soon as possible.

I rise to make a brief intervention in support of the Bill as one of its sponsors. I would first like to say how glad I am to be able to support a reform, because in recent months I have been cast in the not entirely welcome rôle of the "abominable no-man". That is an accident of circumstances rather than a result of temperament because we have had certain reforms recently to which I had strong objection.

I congratulate the right hon. Member for Vauxhall (Mr. Strauss) on the way he has spoken today, on all the preliminary work which he did in the committee and, above all, his extraordinary diplomacy which enabled this potentially highly explosive subject to get through the Committee in a smooth and uneventful way and made a major contribution to our being able to produce a unanimous report.

I favour liberty and in so far as one can have progress in a society, progress constitutes a movement towards greater freedom. No argument of logic or of principle can possibly justify the continuance of the Lord Chamberlain's jurisdiction today. The principle of freedom of publications is embedded in our society. We are in agreement that in a free and liberal society there should be the widest possible freedom of publication, subject only to the restraints imposed by common law, reinforced occasion ally by statute.

Precensorship of literature as such is, however, something which we have long rejected. It has survived in only one vestigial form in the jurisdiction exercised by the Lord Chamberlain. The argument for precensorship is that it would get rid of bad books—and I dare say that it would—and would get rid of bad plays. But the argument against, which must carry the day, is that we get rid of the bad at the price of getting rid of the good, too. This is the nub of the argument. Those countries which have pre-censorship of books have found that it had precisely this effect. Ireland, which has pre-censorship of books, has a large list of censored publications which constitutes a guide to modern classics. All contemporary Irish writers of distinction appear on that list. So much for the argument of principle.

The only case that can be made against the Bill is contained in the practical arguments advanced by my hon. Friend the Member for Chelsea (Mr. Worsley). He feared that the effect of change would mean less rather than more freedom. This point occurred to the Committee con sidering the problem: that if we did away with the Lord Chamberlain's jurisdiction in this respect, we would in practice be opening the way to a more restrictive régime operated by the theatre managers. But that argument must give way to the argument of principle. Why should this form of literature alone be subject to pre-censorship? If the practitioners of this form of literature come forward and ask for the same rights as practitioners in other spheres of literature, what right is there to deny them that legitimate claim? The situation is analogous to the argument against self-government advanced on the part of Ireland and other countries: that they would misgovern themselves. That may be so, but people have a basic right to do that.

My only reservations about the Bill concern the representation upon the stage of living persons or those who have recently died. There are certain categories of people who can avail themselves of the protection of the law of libel. However, one does not go in for a libel action lightly, because it can be an expensive and hazardous business. But there are other categories of persons who do not have the protection of the law of libel in practice, whatever may be the position in theory. I am thinking particularly of the Sovereign and other members of the Royal Family who, for obvious reasons, cannot avail themselves of the law in this respect. The right hon. Member for Vauxhall rightly said that the Committee unanimously recommended that no special protection should be made for the Sovereign. I was doubtful about that recommendation at the time, but I suppressed my doubts, partly not to impede the progress of the Committee. However, having reflected again upon the matter, I feel that something should be done in this respect. The great difficulty is how it can be done effectively without creating a worse situation than was intended to be guarded against.

In many other States there is a form of protection by law for the head of State from insult. It should at least he considered whether the same should be done here. I think that there is a good case for forbidding the presentation of the Sovereign upon the stage. Satire should certainly be as free as possible. Nobody minds politicians being satired. Indeed, as the hon. Member for Ilkeston (Mr. Raymond Fletcher) said, many politicians would welcome being satirised as at least a form of advertisement of some kind. Yet there must be some institutions in any society which should be exempted from satire.

Why?

The hon. Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Michael Foot) asks why. There is a need in society not only for a satirical outlet, but also for an outlet for feelings of reverence. If one has every institution in a society satirised, those feelings can no longer be expressed. This is a loss to society and an infringement of other people's freedom.

The right hon. Member for Vauxhall said that public opinion would rise up and condemn any attack upon Her Majesty. I am sure that that would be so, but the question arises in my mind: could that fact, taken alone, prevent it being done? The right hon. Member for Vauxhall said that we could rely upon the good taste of the public. Of course we can. But we are not considering the good taste of the public so much as the good taste of the producer. Looking at some of the producers in our modern theatre, my reliance on their good taste is considerably less firm than that of the right hon. Gentleman. For example, Mr. Kenneth Tynan, who gave evidence before the Committee, supported the production of a play at the National Theatre which suggested that Sir Winston Churchill connived at the murder of General Sikorski. Can that be considered an example of good taste? Surely it was in the worst of possible taste, particularly in view of the survival of various close relatives of Sir Winston Churchill.

It is not only the head of the British State who has to be considered. One has also to consider other heads of State who find themselves in a similar position and cannot avail themselves of the law of libel. I would like to see an Amendment moved in Committee—if I am a member of that Committee I shall certainly consider moving one myself—forbidding the presentation of existing heads of State on the stage; alternatively —and this would be of broader application—that no living person should be presented on the stage without his or her consent. That would meet the point of the hon. Member for Ilkeston who said that he would welcome a suitable edition of "Mrs. Wilson's Diary" applied to himself. Others might not. This would meet the quite strong objection that one does not wish to single out the Queen for special treatment—despite reports in the Press, I understand that she does not desire it—but it would cover a wider field of objection.

My last point concerns the subject of theatre managers which was raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Chelsea (Mr. Worsley). He said that theatre managers favour the continued existence of the jurisdiction of the Lord Chamberlain. Of course they do, because it protects their interests. It is not in the interests of the free theatre, or of free literature, or of the advance of playwrights, but it is a situation which favours the theatre managers, particularly in what my hon. Friend referred to as the commercial theatre, because, once they have the imprimatur of the Lord Chamberlain, they can go ahead knowing that they are safe. They know exactly where they stand. But can we really put the interests of Mr. Emile Littler before the interests of free literature? This really is the clash of interest which is involved, and I have no hesitation in saying that the freedom of literature, the freedom of the playwright, must come first.

Would not my hon. Friend agree that if there were no theatre managers, there could hardly be a free theatre?

Of course I agree with that, because that is logical. We could not have a theatre without theatre managers, but perhaps I might put a gloss on what my hon. Friend has said. All theatre managers are not the sort of managers to whom he refers as commercial theatre managers. There are a number of theatre managers who do not want to put on the sort of play that Emile Littler puts on, but are interested in putting on other plays, plays which they think advance the discussion of social issues, and make the theatre a forum for ideas. Nobody could think that that was Mr. Emile Littler's main preoccupation.

There is considerable scope for the expansion in the English theatre of what I might call, on the analogy of the off-Broadway theatre, "off-West End productions". The off-West End theatre in London is suffering very much from the restrictions imposed by the Lord Chamberlain, although I must, in tribute to recent Lord Chamberlains, say that their jurisdiction has not been unduly oppressive, though there have been occasions of ill-judgment.

Subject to those reservations, I support the Bill. I congratulate again the right hon. Gentleman on having introduced it. It has my support, because I regard it as an extension of a legitimate freedom which all who are engaged in the service of literature, which is one of our greatest glories, should be free to exercise. With that unborrowed peroration, I end my contribution.

I did not wish to interrupt the hon. Gentleman, but he ought not, even briefly, to have referred to Her Majesty's opinion of any aspect of the Bill.

I join in the congratulations which have been offered to my right hon. Friend the Member for Vauxhall (Mr. Strauss), not only on his presentation of the Bill this morning—and I was here from the beginning, so perhaps I alone am really in a position to offer that congratulation—but also on his conduct of the Joint Committee on the Censorship of the Theatre, of which, like the hon. Member for Chelmsford (Mr. St. John-Stevas) I was a Member. My right hon. Friend conducted the proceedings of the Committee with extraordinary skill. When one looks at the membership of the Committee and sees the disparate elements which composed it, when one perceives that my hon. Friend the Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Michael Foot) sat down with the hon. Member for Chelmsford, one realises that it was a remarkable feat that at the end we came together in a unanimous recommendation on all points.

That was due not only to the skilled chairmanship of my right hon. Friend, but to the force of the evidence which came before us. At the beginning of the proceedings we were very much apart in our approach to this problem. It was the force of the evidence which persuaded us into an unanimity which was not imposed, but was genuinely arrived at from different points. I believe that if the hon. Member for Chelsea (Mr. Worsley) had been a member of the Committee he too, would have been brought to the same degree of unanimity by the balance of the evidence.

It was very clear, as we heard person after person from various parts of the theatre, that the objections which were put forward did not carry the same weight, had not the same quality, as the positive evidence which came before us. As we were shown in detail how the present pre-censorship works, as we were presented with ludicrous examples of the removal of one four-letter word, and the substitution of it by another four-letter word which was supposed to be slightly less objectionable, but which, to my mind, in some cases, was more objectionable, we saw that here was something which was too absurd for words, apart from being undesirable in itself. It was the evidence which brought the Committee to the conclusion that this was something which we must get rid of, because it could not be tolerated.

What we are talking about here is not censorship, but pre-censorship. If this pre-censorship goes, censorship will still exist. The hon. Member for Chelsea suggested two things: first, that the abolition of pre-censorship would bring a period of great caution. Secondly, that great licentiousness would break out. Both cannot be right. They may be right in different periods of time, but the point is that the whole matter ought to be put to the test. It is intolerable that this guard should be put down so that what can happen in a condition of freedom can never be discovered. The real objection to pre-censorship is that it imposes on the stage a special restriction on its freedom to experiment and discover. For this reason I support the Bill as a whole.

I hope, however, that managers—and here I refer to all managers, commercial managers, and the managers of the State-supported theatre—will be cautious and think twice before setting up an organisation of their own to grade and classify plays. I do not think that the classification of films, the creation of the "X" film into something which has a peculiar attraction, is a healthy development. If they decide to go in for this, I hope that they will do it on an all-managerial basis, and that we shall not have the position of some managers belonging to an organisation which will categorise plays for themselves, while excluding others, because this would create an extremely dangerous situation which should be avoided.

I believe that we ought to accept the proposal in the Bill. We must have liberty to find out what is going to happen, and we must no longer cocoon the theatre in a special little shell of its own. Managers will exercise their own censorship; the public will exercise its censorship, and various pressures which exist in other fields will be felt equally in the theatre. The play, as written by the playwright, as read by the producer, as looked at by the manager, and as presented by the director, will be seen by the public and the judgment will be taken after it is on the stage and not before. That will be the essential difference.

The hon. Member for Chelmsford referred to the position of the Crown. I was surprised that he took this point up. He will recall that the Lord Chamberlain was very doubtful whether it was wise for any special protection to be given to the Crown in this matter. He felt, rightly, I think, that to put the Monarchy into a category by itself would create an invidious position. For this reason I hope that the hon. Member will think again before deciding to move an Amendment in Committee. If he does it will be discussed there and we shall reach our conclusion upon it, but at the moment I am un-persuaded that it is a good idea.

Incidentally, I thought it odd that he was more worried about the Monarchy than about the leaders of the Church becoming the subjects of satire. Apparently, for this purpose he places the Monarch above the Church.

Is not that the constitutional position?

Indeed, but it refers only to the Established Church, and I did not know that the hon. Member was an authority on that.

Does not the hon. Member realise that in this ecumenical age one's knowledge of ecclesiastical affairs goes beyond one's own communion?

I bow to the hon. Member on this point; his knowledge on this subject is greatly superior to mine. I was merely commenting upon the fact that he had selected the Monarchy for this protection—unwisely, in my view. If it were possible, it might be desirable to permit the Crown to sue for libel. That would place the Crown in the same position as any other person. That might be a better solution, than putting cotton-wool round the Crown.

I welcome the Bill. I do so representing, in some small degree, perhaps, people who are concerned with the production side in the theatre. Some commercial managers have opted out of the general approval with which the Measure has been received. I believe that they will become used to it and like it. All commercial managers are not in the same category. There are some adventurous ones as well as some very cautious ones. Many will welcome the Measure.

This is a step which the House should take. The fears which have been held out about the creation of both excessive caution and excessive licence will, I am sure, prove to be illusory. I join in the general welcome that has been given to my right hon. Friend's Bill.

I have listened to all the speeches that have been made. If I had not already formed a view as to what my attitude would be I should have been charmed into support for the Bill by the way in which the right hon. Member for Vauxhall (Mr. Strauss) put his case. That is not to say that I do not have some reservations on particular points. Perhaps it is the Essex air which causes me to find myself in sympathy with the views expressed by my hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Mr. St. John-Stevas).

We must face the fact that the public's understanding of the Bill will depend upon the way in which it is presented. There is considerable apprehension about some of the performances that we see not only in the theatre but also on television, and in the presentation of subjects generally. The hon. Member for Ilkeston (Mr. Raymond Fletcher) referred to the wide-ranging portrayal of violence and such things. There is much apprehension on the part of the public in this matter.

It is, therefore, of vital importance that the point, so well made by the right hon. Member for Vauxhall, that the Bill does not give a licence for people to put on obscene plays and such things, but merely attempts to prevent the pre-censorship of plays, should be understood by the public, and that they should recognise that their right to protection against obscene performances will remain as part of the existing law. If they understand this these apprehensions will not long continue.

The memory of the hon. Member for Ilkestor is prodigious. He remembers with clarity "The Birth of a Nation". That is a long while ago. I used to be able to say that the last film I saw was "Ben- Hur", but that has been remade, and it has brought me comparatively up to date. I congratulate the hon. Member on his memory and the right hon. Member for Vauxhall on his peroration. True, it was borrowed from Lord Chesterfield, and I did not find it entirely in accordance with the terms of the Bill. The right hon. Member quoted Lord Chesterfield as saying that if people feel aggrieved, the King's courts are open to them. As I read the Bill, they are not, because Clause 8, which is headed "Restriction on institution of proceedings", provides that

"Proceedings for an offence under section 2, 5 or 6 of this Act or an offence at common law committed by the publication of defamatory matter in the course of a performance of a play shall not be instituted in England and Wales except by or with the consent of the Attorney-General."

Producers of plays will be able to do what they like, and only with the consent of the Attorney-General can the right of the private citizen to protect himself be exercised.

This seems wrong. I remember the occasion when, in the House, application was made to the Attorney-General to consider prosecuting the publishers of "Last Exit to Brooklyn". He refused to do so, not once but on three occa- sions, and it was left to private individuals to institute proceedings, which resulted in their objections being upheld by the courts. Lord Chesterfield said that power should not be in the hands of any one man to act in this restrictive capacity, but under the Bill power is put into the hands of one man. Only with the consent of the Attorney-General can proceedings be instituted.

My hon. Friend may be missing the essential point, which is that the right of private prosecution remains under the Bill, and that the function of the Attorney-General, although not specifically stated in the Bill—perhaps we can think about that in Committee—will really be to prevent frivolous or oppressive prosecutions.

Seldom have I had such a distinguished audience. I am glad that the Attorney-General is here, and perhaps I may detain him a little longer, because I have been referring to him in his absence. I hope that he will not take exception to what I said, but perhaps I had better repeat it.

I was saying that, under Clause 8, no proceedings may be instituted except by or with the Attorney-General's consent. This seems to give one man too much power, especially over obscene plays. The right hon. and learned Gentleman will remember that he was repeatedly pressed to institute proceedings over the book, "Last Exit to Brooklyn", and refused to do so, and that it was only by private proceedings that action was taken and the book was banned by the courts.

With the many burdens which the Attorney-General has, he should not face another over the right of private citizens who are aggrieved to take proceedings—

I think that the hon. Gentleman is mistaken. If anyone wants to sue a producer or presenter for slander, he does not have to go to the Attorney-General. An individual who is aggrieved—to whom the hon. Gentleman was referring to—has the right to go to the courts, and can, if he wants, get an interim injunction to have the play stopped.

I am not talking about slander, because the Clause refers to Clause 2, dealing with obscene performances, Clause 5, dealing with incitement to race hatred, and Clause 6, relating to provocation of a breach of the peace.

In the Attorney-General's absence, my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Huntingdonshire (Sir D. Renton) leaped to the defence of the law, and said that the Clause does not mean what it says. But it says:

"Proceedings for an offence … shall not be instituted … except by or with the consent of the Attorney-General."

If it does not mean that, perhaps the Attorney-General or someone else will explain what it does mean. It is a trap for the unwary when those trained in the law attempt to understand something which appears to be reasonably plain English. Perhaps some of my hon. and learned Friends can explain it to me in detail, if not in the House at some other time.

My apprehension is that the rights of the individual who feels aggrieved under any of these Clauses will be removed from him and vested in the Attorney-General. He usually shows himself a great and good man, but his views on what is or is not obscene are not necessarily those of other people. That is the case here. The decision that "Last Exit to Brooklyn", which he refused to prosecute, was obscene was made by the courts as a result of private proceedings—

It might help to draw the hon. Member's attention to the fact that there is a great difference between the function given to the Attorney-General under the Bill and that which he was required to exercise in the other capacity. In this respect, he is required to decide whether he himself will institute a prosecution, and, in the other case, his function was to decide whether a certain prosecution might be launched. We are saying that, in those circumstances, the Attorney-General would—I agree with what the hon. Gentleman said about Attorneys-General generally—exercise that function with the restraint and propriety which the hon. Gentleman would wish.

I understand that there must be a power to restrict vexacious and frivolous proceedings, but I want to be assured that the rights of an individual to institute proceedings in what he considers to be the case of obscene performances is still preserved. I do not see why they should lose it so as to preserve the rights of the theatre. Both should be preserved. If the Attorney-General can assure me that this right will not be removed, I will have no objection. The theatre should be liberalised, but not at the expense of the right of individuals to protect themselves against obscene productions or those which incite racial hatred and so on. I do not want that taken away and vested solely in the Attorney-General.

I do not want to disturb the quiet, not to say placid, atmosphere this morning, and will therefore say hardly anything. I will not even reply to the hon. Member for Southend, East (Sir S. McAdden). I appreciate the importance of his point, which we discussed in the Select Committee at considerable length: he can rest assured that the matter was considered in great detail and no doubt will be considered again in Committee. We are probably all grateful that he has declared his support for the Bill.

I will even resist the temptation to reply to the hon. Member for Chelmsford (Mr. St. John-Stevas) on the question of the Sovereign. We can re-fight the Civil War in Committee as well, and I hope that the outcome will be much the same as it was before. We can properly settle that in Committee.

I join others in congratulating my right hon. Friend the Member for Vauxhall (Mr. Strauss). I have never seen a Committee conducted as he conducted this one. It was a brilliant piece of chairmanship, and the passage of the Bill through the House today in this tepid atmosphere is a tribute to the way in which he reconciled awkward arguments on the Committee and persuaded us all to reach the same conclusion. Therefore, the theatre and the playwrights who have campaigned for so long for the removal of this imposition owe him a great debt of gratitude.

I think that he will agree that tribute should also be paid to the long campaign of the League of Dramatists, assisted in particular by an old friend of ours in the House, Mr. Benn Levy, who, ever since his own Bill went through the House at the end of the 1950 Parliament, has poured out a deluge of Shavian polemics designed to persuade people. The fact that no one is here to oppose the Bill is also a tribute to the power of the argument which he has presented and which he presented to many of us on the Committee. No one would deny that he has been the foremost advocate in this country of this reform and he deserves part of the credit.

I wish to underline two points relating to the Bill. It is a great error for anyone to think, if anyone still does, that the hardship imposed on playwrights under the existing system, which we propose to remove, is a small one. It is, in fact, very considerable. It is a hardship which not only prevents them from presenting their product to the public in the same way as those who write books or produce films, but also deprives them, sometimes, of their livelihood and the possibility of earning a living.

We had evidence from one of the foremost playwrights of our time, Mr. John Osborne, that if it had not been for the existence of the Lord Chamberlain's censorship, his first play might have been performed in London four or five years earlier. That makes a great difference to a playwright's career. Indeed, he had the greatest difficulty in getting his first play eventually performed, which is one of the answers to the argument of the hon. Member for Chelsea (Mr. Worsley), who lauded the present system. He underrated its present deficiencies and the injustices inflicted upon people who not only have a right to present their product to the public but play a great part in shaping the outlook of our society.

In my opinion a very powerful argument can be presented for saying that the whole liberation of our society which has taken place over the past 10, 12 or 15 years owes much to the playwrights who fought to get their plays put on, who had to fight the censorship to get them put on and who had to suffer severe economic losses in overcoming the controls of censorship. They managed to change the atmosphere in the London theatre, later were able to change the atmosphere in film production and later were able to influence the atmosphere of the B.B.C. and other forms of expression. In this sense, I believe, the theatre plays an especially crucial part in shaping the literary atmosphere or the cultural atmosphere of our society. Therefore, the imposition placed on playwrights can make us ashamed when we look through the record of the names of great men who have been restricted by this censorship, Bernard Shaw among them. This is an historic day on which we are to get rid of this imposition.

Another aspect which I would underline, which came out more and more in the evidence and which, in my opinion, was the most fascinating feature of the evidence presented to the Committee, was that which harks back to the original cause of censorship. People have forgotten that politics have been the main cause of censorship. From the way in which the matter is sometimes discussed it might be thought that alleged obscenity was the great danger against which the censor was supposed to guard, but the evidence presented to us, and in particular the evidence by the Lord Chamberlain, underlined that it was political fears which have sustained the censorship. It was political fears which persuaded the original introduction of the censorship and it has very largely been political fears which have sustained it ever since. Whenever an effort has been made to get rid of it by one means or another, in the House or elsewhere, political fears have stopped the change.

I pay a great tribute to the present Government in this respect. Of course, I look around for everything favourable that I can say about them. It is certainly commendable that we have no opposition from the Government today to this proposed removal of censorship and it is a tribute to them that there is a freer atmosphere generally. Certainly by the evidence given to us that the present Lord Chamberlain argued for sustaining some form of censorship because he believed that we are not sufficiently politically adult in this country to exercise full freedom. I am glad to say that it appears that the House will reach a different conclusion.

The hon. Member for Chelsea today presented the most powerful argument—the argument which involved the longest discussions in Committee, the argument that if we do away with this censorship we shall have a worse form of censorship in its place. I do not intend to argue the point now, because it was fully argued in the Select Committee, and if I tried to argue it now, I do not believe that I should persuade anybody. It is the central issue. But I would make one comment on it, not in reply to the hon. Member for Chelsea so much but partly in reply to his arguments and partly to those who presented a similar argument to the Select Committee. Sometimes this argument was presented by, some of the theatre managers and some of the commercial managers. When some of the commercial, managers came before us and argued, first in the name of freedom and secondly in the interests of the theatre, that we should retain the present Lord Chamberlain, I was rather surprised. There has been nothing quite like it since Shylock went through the streets of Venice crying:

"My ducats!—O my daughter !—O my ducats!

Fled with a Christian?—Oh my Christian ducats!—

Justice! The law. My ducats and my daughter".

I think that the theatre managers have been more concerned about their ducats than about their delectable daughter, the freedom of the theatre.

Surely the hon. Member agrees that if the theatre managers had no ducats there would be no theatre.

I must not be tempted to go into the argument. If I did, I should only stir up trouble—and I see trouble coming straight away. I will therefore not deploy the full argument on the point which no doubt we can present in Committee. Because it is necessary to have theatre managers in order to have a theatre does not mean that the theatre managers' view of how the theatre should be conducted is correct. We cannot have theatres without management and we cannot have theatres without the playwrights, and often the theatre managers have never understood that fact. It is the genius of the playwright which makes the English theatre one of the greatest glories of our land. I see that the hon. Member for Chelsea agrees with me in that.

So having restored to the House the degree of placidity which it had before, I sit down as quietly as I possibly can.

It may be convenient if I speak now before the spokesmen from the two Front Benches intervene.

I am in considerable embarrassment over the Bill because I have always opposed censorship of any kind and have opposed it in the House, and this Bill would have my wholehearted support if it stopped at the end of Clause 1. It does not stop at the end of Clause 1. It goes on to erect, in place of what is abolished, a censorship which I believe to be worse than that now experienced by the theatre. I cannot understand why the right hon. Member for Vauxhall (Mr. Strauss), when he set about doing a good and necessary job, spoiled it by going on to put Clauses into the Bill which are repressive and which inflict upon those connected with the theatre a greater degree of uncertainty and a much greater risk of serious consequences than that which exists at present.

I had the misfortune to miss some of the debate, for which I apologise. I overestimated the interest of the House in adoption. I apologise to the right hon. Member for Vauxhall. It would be wrong of me to go over the arguments against censorship in every form, because they are familiar to the House and have been set out by many of the greatest minds and the greatest writers in English literature, above all, I suppose, by Milton. It has always seemed to me that a civilised and adult community, mature in its institutions and secure in the law and order which it enjoys, ought to be able to have a theatre free of any censorship.

That being so, I find it surprising that the Bill is brought before us in this form. I do not know how flexible is the right hon. Member for Vauxhall on some of the Clauses, for example Clause 6 and, in particular, Clause 5. If he says that he would welcome the removal of such Clauses in Committee, I shall not wish to oppose a Bill which in general principle I warmly support, but I cannot see, for example, that Clause 5 can be justified on any basis. I know that the right hon. Gentleman has been upbraided about this outside the House and that he has said that this provision would be sensibly interpreted and would never be used repressively to ban the plays of Shakespeare, such as the "Merchant of Venice" or "Othello", but all that is merely the opinion of one person. The Bill contains a very rigid form of censorship in wording taken almost verbatim from the Race Relations Act. I was against the Race Relations Act, so I am not being in the least inconsistent now, but at least of that Measure it might have been said that we were dealing with a somewhat inflammatory situation. We were dealing with the publication of certain things, and dealing with them in a rather special way—

Or speeches.

Yes—or speeches.

Here, I might adopt the criterion that I then thought right. Things said in public to people who have not gone to hear them raise quite different considerations from those raised when people have gone to a private place and, in the case of the theatre, have paid for admission. These considerations of public policy ought not then to apply.

The situation is completely different from that created by someone who goes to Trafalgar Square, uses a loudspeaker, and says things that cannot fail to be heard by vast numbers of people who have no connection with him or, the event, and who may reasonably claim that they should not be insulted, provoked, or whatever it may be. Where people deliberately buy a ticket in order to see a set performance they should take what they hear: it is their business to behave themselves, and not to commit a breach of the peace—Clause 6—and not to be insulted, or whatever it is—Clause 5.

It is not enough for the right hon. Gentleman to say that there is always the defence of literary merit. I suppose that as a practitioner in the law I should welcome he provision made by the right hon. Gentleman for the calling of expert witnesses as to literary merit. That kind of thing could go on for days but, in practice, I do not think that it has been found very satisfactory.

Here again, I can claim consistency. When the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Birmingham, Stechford (Mr. Roy Jenkins) introduced a Bill to amend the law on obscene publication, I took what I am sure is the right view that we should do away with censorship altogether, and not try to continue it with this modulation of expert witnesses giving their views on artistic merit. I believe that to be a farce.

After all, what is censorship all about? I suppose that it is done, not because anyone believes in it but in order to placate a lobby in favour of the control of thought and expression. It is one of those British compromises. But I believe that the British people are sufficiently adult to read and to listen—and, in the theatre, to see as well—anything that anyone chooses to put before them. They are not children. If they see things that are coarse and obscene, they will not be made coarse and obscene by seeing them but will be made more refined.

I need not remind hon. Members of these things—they were all set out in imperishable language by Milton, and applied to children by him. All these considerations were anticipated, and splendidly argued. I have never heard an argument against them, but if I am wrong—or, more humbly, I would say that if Milton was wrong—why does not someone argue the opposing case instead of putting in Clauses concerned with treating people as though they were children?

It is part of the country's glorious Protestant tradition that we do not protect ourselves in matters of thought—and not only Milton but all who were in that tradition; Bunyan, perhaps, foremost among them. It was Bunyan who indicated that the place for Apollyon is straddling across the path, not fenced off as Bills like this would seek to fence him off.

It is because I hold those views that I regret this lost opportunity. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will have the courage of what I believe to be his convictions; that in the Committee he will accept Amendments to knock out some of these childish safeguards from the Bill, and boldly and simply abolish the censorship of the Lord Chamberlain, which is an anachronism that should have been abolished a long time ago.

I join in congratulating the right hon. Member for Vauxhall (Mr. Strauss) on his speech. I apologise that because the proceedings on the Adoption Bill did not last quite as long as I had expected. I did not hear the very beginning of the right hon. Gentleman's speech, but I heard the greater part of it. As one of the minority of hon. Members taking part in this debate who were not members of the Joint Committee, I congratulate the Joint Committee on a Report that has been condensed into a fairly small amount of reading but which puts the arguments—succinctly and clearly. I agree with the conclusions.

The debate has cut right across party lines. Practically every speaker has welcomed the broad principles of the Bill. Though I speak from the Opposition Front Bench, I must make it perfectly clear, as every other hon. Member has, that I express a purely personal view in supporting the Measure.

I give my support, basically, for two reasons. First, I believe, for reasons which were very clearly stated by the Lord Chamberlain in his evidence to the Joint Committee, that the time has come when the censorship of plays in this way should be removed from the Crown. Removal is entirely in accordance with our modern thinking on such a matter. Secondly, like my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Buckinghamshire, South (Mr. Ronald Bell), I am opposed to any form of censorship unless it can be clearly shown that there are reasons in the national interest why censorship should be imposed. In general, I am wholly opposed to any form of censorship, and for that reason I support, very broadly, the principles of the Bill.

My one major reservation, which was touched upon by the right hon. Gentleman and also referred to by my hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Mr. St. John-Stevas) concerns the position of the Royal Family in presentations upon the live stage. The right hon. Gentleman set out very clearly, as does the Report, the difficulties in dealing with this matter. First, he said, as the Lord Chamberlain also said, that it would be very difficult to draft a Clause which would cover the Royal Family. I do not believe that the difficulties would be insuperable. This is a matter which we should certainly be looking at if difficulties are the main reason. In his evidence, the Lord Chamberlain suggested that difficulties of drafting a specific Clause to cover this point could be overcome by imposing some other form of censorship, possibly by the Arts Council. I would not support that proposal, but this is something we should look at.

The right hon. Gentleman said that the second reason was that there was no such restriction upon publication in newspapers or books. I do not think that is an entirely valid argument. There is a difference in publication in books and newspapers. The difficulties are far greater in regard to live representation of the Sovereign upon the stage. The third argument the right hon. Gentleman used was that the public would not tolerate representation of this kind.

Offensive representation of this kind, personally offensive.

I wish that I shared the right hon. Gentleman's optimism, but I am afraid that I do not. This is an age when satire has enormous power. It is also an age when we destroy much more than we seek to create. I believe the ordinary remedies available to others in public life—politicians and the like—are remedies which can be taken at law and are not available in the same way to members of the Royal Family if we wish, as I think most of us do, to preserve the Monarchy as an institution. I do not want to pursue this matter further at this stage. I hope that when the Bill is considered in Committee, further consideration will be given to this matter which is of considerable importance.

That is the only major reservation I have about the Bill as it stands. Other points on which I hope we may have some enlightenment from the Under-Secretary refer, first, to Clause 5, which is concerned with the race relations aspect. I understand that that Clause very largely repeats Section 6 of the Race Relations Act, 1965. I hope I shall not trespass too far out of order on this. I understand it is likely that very shortly we shall have a race relations Measure which will amend the Act of 1965. I should have thought it much more convenient to have all the references to race relations in a single Race Relations Act. I hope that when the Government draft the Race Relations Bill to which the Home Secretary has referred, by a simple amendment of the existing 1965 Act, he will incorporate the intentions of Clause 5 of this Bill. That would be very much more convenient. It would enable Clause 5 of the Bill to be deleted if such an assurance were given.

I am not quite clear—perhaps the Under-Secretary could enlighten the House—about the need for Clause 6. I am open to correction by those who have a much better knowledge of the law than I have, but I should have thought that the situation sought to be covered by Clause 6 would be covered by existing law. I should be grateful if the Under-Secretary, in reply, would deal with that point.

On Clause 2 there is a point of very much more substance. Subsection (1) says:

"… performance of a play shall be deemed to be obscene if, taken as a whole, its effect was such as to tend to deprave and corrupt persons."

I think I am right in saying, although I have not checked up, that those are the words used in the Obscene Publications Act. I am not sure that they are wholly relevant to a stage production. When one is considering a book or publication "taken as a whole" may be applicable, although I remember that there was considerable debate about this when that Bill was passing through the House.

This is a point of substance. A play or stage presentation may have scenes or even incidents in it which could themselves be obscene and which should be erased from the production. I am not sure that this point is covered by the Bill. It was covered by the arrangements under the censorship of the Lord Chamberlain's office, I understand that the majority of work of that office consists in deleting particular sections or incidents in scenes from productions. I am not clear how this will be dealt with under the arrangements proposed in the Bill.

In this Bill we are proposing the abolition of a task which has been performed by successive Lords Chamberlain for 230 years. In recent years the system has been under increasing criticism. That is why we are discussing this Bill today. As we no longer inevitably have Third Reading debates on Bills of this kind, it would be appropriate to pay tribute to the work of successive Lords Chamberlain and particularly the work of the staff of the Lord Chamberlain's office. They have performed a very difficult task. Although there have been criticisms of particular decisions which the office may have made in the past, one thing which has impressed many of us is the very small amount of criticism there has been of many difficult decisions that the Lord Chamberlain and the office have had to make.

I hope that the Bill will have a Second Reading and will pass through all its stages without too much delay.

My one regret about the speech made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Vauxhall (Mr. Strauss) was that there were so few Members present to hear it because the Adoption Bill took such a short time. My right hon. Friend made a very eloquent speech and developed an extremely powerful argument in favour of the Bill. This showed how lucky it was that my right hon. Friend, who was Chairman of the Joint Committee, succeeded in the Ballot.

When the Committee's Report was published last summer, my right hon. Friend the then Home Secretary said, in answer to a Question, that the Government accepted the general principle of the Committee's Report and would introduce legislation when a suitable opportunity occurred. It was not found possible for a Government Bill to be introduced in this Parliamentary Session. Since, fortunately, my right hon. Friend was successful in the Ballot, the Government agreed to provide Parliamentary draftsmen to help him with the preparation of the Bill. No one is more fitted to undertake the piloting of this perhaps rather difficult Measure through the House than my right hon. Friend. The Bill certainly has the Government's support.

It can be said that the Joint Committee was not only representative of a cross-section of the House, but was, in some ways, representative of a cross-section of society, in that it included a former Home Secretary and a former Lord Chamberlain and numbered amongst its members such notable figures in the entertainment world, unfortunately absent at the moment, as the hon. Member for Chelmsford (Mr. St. John-Stevas) and my hon. Friends the Members for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Michael Foot) and Smethwick (Mr. Faulds)—notable for other things as well. This is a notoriously difficult subject, involving many contentious and controversial issues. The Report deals with these very clearly and eloquently and with much common sense. It also contains a valuable statement of the history and the law in relation to the stage.

I, like the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam (Mr. Sharples), want to pay a tribute to the present Lord Chamberlain and many of his predecessors for the way in which for so long they have performed a very thankless task, After all, the Lord Chamberlain was foremost in his enthusiasm for abolishing this part of his own occupation. The Joint Committee came to the conclusion that the time had come to put plays on the same footing as books and to leave them subject only to the operation of the criminal law. We support this principle. I hope that it will be generally recognised that this was a very difficult task for the Lord Chamberlain and that he did all he could to exercise his power with the maximum of tact and sensibility. Possibly this is not a field in which everyone could be pleased all the time.

The British theatre has an oustanding reputation abroad. In the light of that fact, whatever objections there may be to the Lord Chamberlain in principle, and whatever individual cases one may be able to cite where one would have reached a different decision from that arrived at by the Lord Chamberlain, it shows that the restraint of his censorship was not so oppressive that a vigorous and, in many ways, uninhibited theatre could not emerge.

I do not altogether agree with the point made by the hon. Member for Chelsea (Mr. Worsley) that it was because of this constraint that our excellent theatre has emerged. This is emminently a question of the prevailing talent amongst writers. This is something which can be seen elsewhere as well. I hope to return later to the point the hon. Gentleman made about the dangers which may be inherent in the abolition of censorship.

The test of obscenity in Clause 2 is, in many ways, the guts of the Bill. I shall return later to the point made by the hon. and learned Member for Buckinghamshire, South (Mr. Ronald Bell) that the Bill should have stopped short at Clause 1.

The formula for obscenity and the defence of "public good" have been lifted virtually intact from the Obscene Publications Act. Disquiet has been expressed, not only today in the House, but on other occasions, to the effect that there will be a danger of excessive licence. I do not believe that this is the major danger we face. It is true that in many respects a theatre performance can be much more dramatic than the printed word and can have an effect that perhaps the printed word would not have, but the formula incorporated in the Bill allows for this. The test is whether the performance as acted would tend to deprave and corrupt.

The law already takes into account the different effects which different forms of presentation can have. The courts are accustomed to take account of the more immediate impact of a picture than they are of a written description. I should have thought that even more so they would have no difficulty in taking due account of the impact of a live performance. There is nothing incompatible with a common law formula for obscenity that there should still be things one could describe in a book which one could not necessarily include in an illustration in the book, or that one could put something in a picture which one could not necessarily act out on the stage.

The hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam made the point that the Clause, taking the language of the Obscene Publications Act, refers to the performance of a play "as a whole". This is a necessary safeguard, because otherwise one might get individual incidents picked on in a particular way which would make sense as seen against the play as a whole but which would be objectionable in themselves. On the other hand, judging from the way that the courts have interpreted the Obscene Publications Act, it would not necessarily be a defence that because the play as a whole was moral a particularly objectionable section of it was therefore not something which could be proceeded against under the law.

To give one recent example from the world of books, though different views have been held about the rightness of the conclusion, in the case of "Last Exit to Brooklyn" the fact that the book as a whole may have had a moral purpose was not a sufficient defence when it came to the examination of particular sections of the book. It is necessary to consider the play as a whole. We believe that this part of the Bill should be there.

As to the various fears which have been expressed, I should have thought that there was much more substance in the fear expressed by the hon. Member for Chelsea that anxiety about prosecutions for an offence which must necessarily be somewhat imprecisely defined, because of the nature of the offence, might well lead to excessive caution. This is a possibility which I would not altogether discount, but I think that this is a case where the answer was to some extent given for the hon. Member for Chelmsford, that there is in any event an objection of principle to being dominated by this fear. I think that we shall just have to wait and see what happens and hope that neither of the two extremes to which I have referred emerges in practice.

There are ways in which the Bill differs from its model, the Obscene Publications Act. Hon. Members who have carefully looked at the original may have noticed a good deal of unfamiliar material in the Bill which is not in the crib, as it were. The House will not want me to take up a number of points which are essentially Committee points, but, putting it simply, these divergencies stem from the simple fact that the performance of a play is not at all the same thing as a book or a picture or a gramophone record. One might well echo the words of Prospero at the end of a play:

"… these our actors, As I foretold you, were all spirits and Are melted into air, into thin air."

Since we are making a criminal offence in certain circumstances of something which, to continue with the quotation:

"… shall dissolve And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, leave not a rack behind".

it has been necessary to incorporate a number of provisions into the Bill, notably in Clauses 9 and 10, concerning the script on which the performance was based, for which there was no need when it was a question only of dealing with a rather more substantial object like a book.

Apart from these differences, a number of particular points of some importance were made during the debate and to which I want to refer. First, the hon. Member for Southend, East (Sir S. McAdden) raised the question of the need for the Attorney-General's consent. To some extent, this point was anticipated and answered by my right hon. Friend the Member for Vauxhall when he pointed out that the Committee felt that it was necessary to have the Attorney-General's consent to prevent vexatious and frivolous prosecutions. It would be particularly oppressive if a prosecution were otherwise launched, when the financial effects of prosecution could be so considerable in the case of a play. Those concerned with the presentation of plays are entitled to the protection which the Attorney-General's consent gives.

There is a further justification for requiring the Attorney-General's consent. The position of the police would be most invidious if the question of prosecution were to be left to chief officers of police. Already, the police are sometimes put in the extraordinary position of acting as art critics and deciding whether a particular pictorial representation is obscene. It would be rather much to ask the police to act as theatre critics as well. One wants to secure some sort of uniformity of policy throughout the country. The Attorney-General's consent provides a valuable way of achieving that uniformity.

It is suggested in The Times today that, in effect, this is a kind of censorship: one gets rid of censorship or pre-censorship, but there is then censorship on prosecution. I suppose that it could be described as censorship, but that would be a rather odd use of the word. It is one thing to say that something is prevented from performance—this could, I think, properly be described as censorship—but it is another to say that one needs a person's consent to put the law into operation. To call the latter censorship is, I suggest, a considerable misuse of words.

I am not a lawyer and I like to have these things made clear. The Attorney-General's consent is not necessary for the institution of a prosecution in respect of an obscene publication, but it will be needed in respect of plays. Why the difference?

In the case of plays, one wants to have the same policy followed throughout the country. One wants the theatres in Manchester dealt with in the same way as theatres in London. Furthermore, the results of prosecution would be very serious in the case of a play, even more so than in the case of a book.

It was said that matters will still be in the hands of one person; we are replacing the Lord Chamberlain, one individual, by consent to prosecution on the part of the Attorney-General, another individual. There are differences. One difference, as has already been pointed out, is that the private person who is aggrieved has his remedy in libel. Second, the Attorney-General is responsible to the House. If he refuses to prosecute, as he did in respect of a publication on one occasion, his refusal to prosecute may be a matter of debate in the House.

I come now to the malaise expressed by several hon. Members on the question of the representation of living persons, and the representation of members of the Royal Family in particular. Obviously, there are reasons for the disquiet which is rightly felt, but I do not myself see that one can make an exception of the Royal Family in this connection. As the Lord Chamberlain himself said in his evidence, it would be rather difficult to make a special provision for them and for no one else. On the question of the representation of living persons in general, while one would wish to hear what arguments are advanced in Committee, I can see formidable difficulties and objections in the way of any kind of ban or limitation on the representation of living persons.

It was suggested that the consent of a living person should be obtained before he could be portrayed on the stage. But what is portrayal? How does one know that it is that person who is being portrayed? One would have to go into all sorts of difficult arguments if the name were changed or a few different characteristics were presented. These arguments are not unknown to practitioners in the law of libel, but this is a field in which the law of libel would afford much better protection than would be given by making it the subject of criminal prosecution.

What kind of portrayal would be prohibited? Presumably, it would not be all portrayal of living persons but portrayal only which was defamatory of a living person. If it was defamatory of a living person, again the law of libel would provide a remedy. There are obvious difficulties, as is recognised, for certain classes of people who one cannot expect to sue for libel, but to make exceptions for particular classes of people would, I suggest, be invidious and not really justified. However, this is a matter which we shall consider in Committee.

I was asked about the need for certain of the Clauses. The hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam asked whether Clause 5 would not be better included in a Race Relations Bill. I cannot anticipate the Race Relations Bill, but it is by no means clear that that would be the right place for further provisions about incitement, since I understand that the Race Relations Bill will cover a rather different field. Moreover, one can counter the hon. Gentleman's argument that this should all be in a race relations Measure by saying that everything which affects the theatre, or most of what effects the theatre, should be in a self-contained Bill about the theatre. There are a good many ancillary enforcement matters connected here also.

I was asked why Clause 6 is needed. The first answer is that Clause 6 was re-commended by the Joint Committee. It embodies a form of restraint which is at present practised by the Lord Chamberlain. It is one of the criteria which he applies and which it is felt should be enshrined in the general law itself. Earlier today, we had an eloquent speech from my hon. Friend the Member for Ilkeston (Mr. Raymond Fletcher), who talked about the emotive effects which certain kinds of dramatic presentation can have. He spoke about the dangers which can sometimes be inherent in a dramatic representation, mentioning the film "Birth of a Nation" and the incidents connected with the Ku-Klux-Klan. It would, perhaps, be unwise if a restraint which was felt to be needed in general on the provocation of a breach of the peace were altogether excluded from what is in many ways a public occasion. The new provision is needed—I say this in answer to the point raised by the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam—because, if one is to exercise this restraint at all, the present law would affect only the actor whereas, presumably, it should be directed not at the actor but at the clay as a whole.

The hon. and learned Member for Buckinghamshire, South argued that the Bill should have stopped at Clause 1. In my view, it would be difficult and unsatisfactory if the Bill had simply abolished the Lord Chamberlain.

There is no suggestion that the Lord Chamberlain shall be abolished. He will continue to flourish, but without his jurisdiction in the theatre.

I am sorry—it was a slip of the tongue. The hon. and learned Gentleman argues that abolition of the Lord Chamberlain's censorship should be the only provision—nothing else. If that were all there would be nothing like the sort of protection to which playwrights and those who present plays should be entitled. One would then be left with the law, without modification by Clause 2 and without any sort of defence of literary merit. If one simply stopped short at Clause 1, one would feel to a far greater extent the fear expressed by the hon. Member for Chelsea about restriction on the right to present plays, since the defence of literary merit would no longer be available.

I have dealt with some of the points which have been raised in the debate. Many of these questions must be dealt with in Committee. This is not as easy a Measure as some may think. The matters which have been raised today show that it is not, and the details will need elaborate scrutiny. As hon. Members said earlier, it is an important and historic Bill, and on behalf of the Government I commend it to the House.

The House is much obliged to the Under-Secretary of State for the light he has thrown on some of the details of the Bill and for his clear explanations. I hope that he will, as he seemed to suggest he might, keep an open mind about the position of living persons and especially the Sovereign. Genuine anxieties have been expressed by my hon. Friends the Members for Sutton and Cheam (Mr. Sharpies), Chelmsford (Mr. St. JohnStevas) and others about this. For commercial reasons, or some even less worthy and more obscure motive, people might pillory or parody others who are alive, and especially if they were to do so in the case of Her Majesty it would be a most unhappy affair. We must be careful. I am willing to fight the Civil War once again on this, but I shall be on the Royalist side and not on the side of a previous knight of the Shire of Huntingdon.

Strangely enough, Shakespeare anticipated the situation we might have to consider when in "Hamlet" he arranged for a play within a play. Hamlet stated its purpose when he said:

"The play's the thing Wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king."

We may have to consider serious matters arising in this context. Although I am a supporter of the Bill and was a member of the Joint Committee, I do not think that we should leave the matter just where it is today. We should consider it further, for among other reasons it affects the feelings of members of the general public.

Broadly speaking, the Bill has had a great welcome and I join the congratulations offered to the right hon. Member for Vauxhall (Mr. Strauss). Unhappily, the most I can say about his speech is that I look forward to reading it and shall do so with great pleasure, because, like others, I was caught unawares by the brevity of the debate on the previous Bill.

I did not agree with the hon. Member for Putney (Mr. Hugh Jenkins), whose part we all acknowledge in getting the Bill towards the Statute Book, when he said that the task of the right hon. Gentleman as Chairman of the Committee was made easier because of the evidence which was put before us. The truth is that we did not accept nearly all the evidence as he said, but only about half. Indeed, when we had all the evidence before us the issue was left wide open, and then with the help of the right hon. Gentleman we had to start making up our minds.

That is entirely true. I was trying to suggest that the weight and quality of the evidence was on the side of the conclusions which, with the help of my right hon. Friend, we eventually reached.

I go so far as to say that the weight and quality of the evidence was on the side of reason as the Committee generally decided eventually that reason lay.

I accept that.

The principal speech against the Bill deserves an answer, if I am capable of giving one. My right hon. Friend the Member for Chelsea (Mr. Worsley) referred to a risk in changing from the system of pre-censorship to control by the courts. But for too long it seems to me that theatre management has hidden behind the skirts of the Lord Chamberlain, and that has not been healthy for the theatre. Successive Lords Chamberlain have become uneasy about it, and I am very glad that we are getting rid of this system.

What are we putting in its place? We can best test it in the following way. Surely, the great majority of plays which people are most likely to want to produce are of the type which gave no trouble in the past to the Lord Chamberlain and will give no trouble in the future to the people producing them or to the courts. It is the plays in the twilight between what is clearly obscene and what is not, between what is blasphemous and what is not, and so on, which will give trouble. They will be a very small minority. Management will have to exercise its judgment, but I see no harm in that. Admittedly, it risks great sums of money and stands to lose them. But I do not think that the theatre, as one of our great expressions of pleasure, of art and of thought, will suffer as much as my hon. Friend expects. I believe that his fears were not well-founded.

One point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford very well summarises what we should be doing. He said that progress will be achieved by greater freedom, and as a postscript to that 1 would add that if in doubt we should give freedom a chance to work, and that is what the Bill will do.

My hon. Friend the Member for Southend, East (Sir S. McAdden) has been partially answered by the hon. and learned Gentleman on his one point of criticism concerning the Attorney-General's consent. But I think that it was not entirely answered, and I hope that I am not daring too much when I try to complete the answer. The Under-Secretary of State said that we must not place too big a burden on the police in this matter. I agree, but what I think is worrying my hon. Friend is not the possible police prosecution but the possible private prosecution. It is sometimes forgotten that the right of private prosecution is one of the basic liberties of our land so that we do not concentrate all the power and all the dispensing of power in the hands of authority.

This is admittedly a Committee point, but it is very important, and it might be worth trying to find ways to add to Clause 8 so as to define exactly what the Attorney-General's function should be when exercising his power. When I interrupted my hon. Friend on the spur of the moment—though naturally I had some idea of this point before—I said that the Attorney-General should be there to prevent frivolous or oppressive prosecutions. I think that that is just about it. Something on those lines could conceivably be added to the Clause.

My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Buckinghamshire, South (Mr. Ronald Bell) expressed what those of us who know him as well as I and many others do appreciate was a deep unhappiness about the Bill. He said that it should be confined to Clause 1. But he overlooked the unbelievable uncertainty and chaos that there would be if we were simply to end the Lord Chamberlain's jurisdiction and then leave the law as it stands to take its course. I cannot think of a greater harvest for the profession which he and I attempt to grace than to do that. The Bill has the great advantage that it would prevent many un-certainties which will undoubtedly arise if his suggestion were accepted.

What about Clause 5? I do not think that the common law would have any equivalent to that.

That was one point on which I had rather more sympathy with my hon. and learned Friend, knowing his views on the question of attempting to govern race relations with the aid of the criminal law. In any event, I think that what we must do when legislating in a particular context like this is to take note of the provisions which have gone before and which apply in a wider context—not ignore them but apply them if, for consistency, it seems necessary to do so in the narrower context in which we are legislating. That is why I somewhat reluctantly, like my hon. and learned Friend, feel it was right for the right hon. Gentleman to include Clause 5 in the Bill.

Nevertheless, I have some sympathy with the valid point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Sutton and Cheam. We can perfectly well apply Clause 5 to the theatres, but it should be done in general legislation relating to race relations. Frankly, I think that this is a matter of statutory tidiness more than a matter of principle, but the Statute Book is in such a frightful mess that there is no reason why we should not take any opportunity that presents itself to us of tidying it up a bit, and I think that is a good suggestion.

Ever since I was very young I have been a great lover of our theatre. I have always thought, however, that it was likely to fulfil its purpose and remain great much more as an expression of art and as a form of entertainment than as a medium of politics. I know that there are those who feel that the abolition of the Lord Chamberlain's censorship was necessary in order to get greater freedom of political expression, and undoubtedly that could be a result of the Bill. What I have to say has not really, therefore, much to do with the contents of the Bill or with what we should do about it: it is really, perhaps the House may think, too bold a hint to those who will be staging theatrical productions when the Bill has been passed into law.

I think that if the theatre becomes a medium for something more than art and entertainment, if it becomes a political instrument, then, although we may still see great acting, we shall not find that it has the public following that the theatre has today. I would very much doubt, following what my hon. Friend the Member for Chelsea has said, that theatre managements would then be prepared to risk the large sums of money involved. Certainly if political expression goes too far, there could even be risks of breaches of the peace arising, In all the years that I have been going to the theatre I can remember only one play that was seriously a development of political thought, and that was "Love on the Dole" in the 1930s, a very powerful and very moving play. It could have been said to have a political motive. I believe that it had some political effect, and a good political effect. But I think that we should render to the stage the things that are of the stage and keep politics where it belongs.

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

The Bill has two rather limited objectives; first of all, to authorise a sweepstake on a national scale, and, secondly, to authorise sweepstakes on a very much smaller scale in parishes and subject to the limitations set out in the Betting, Gaming and Lotteries Act, 1963.

Gaming and wagering have a very long history. As long ago as 1388 the first law on the subject was passed. It is interesting to note that the motive of the law was nothing to do with the morals of betting and gaming but to promote archery and military exercises by preventing men from wasting their time on games like tennis. That has a peculiar ring today perhaps. But the history only began then. Between 1566 and 1832 lotteries attracted a great deal of attention. The first big draw in England was as long ago as 1569 when no fewer than 400,000 lots were drawn and there were prizes in plate, tapestry and money. It seems that even in those days there were doubts about the possibility of devaluation of the coinage—which happened.

Later lotteries became a monopoly under various letters patent because it was seen that they were of considerable value. In 1698 all lotteries had to be authorised by Parliament, and they were, indeed, used by Parliament as a method of raising money for general Exchequer purposes, and sometimes for special needs as well, for it is interesting to recall that Westminster Bridge was one of the objects of a lottery and was built in consequence of it.

By 1802 the profit to the Government from lotteries was £520,000, a great deal of money for those days. It was not until comparatively recent times—1823—that the Chancellor announced the last lottery, and a little later, in 1836, an obvious consequence of that, the Lotteries Act was introduced to prevent the advertisement of foreign lotteries.

Various attempts have been made since then to revise the idea of a national lottery. At the end of the first World War, in 1918, the Lotteries (War Charities) Bill passed through the House of Lords and was defeated in the House of Commons by only the narrowest of margins, 81 votes to 77. It was certainly defeated only by a short head. The project was then dropped.

In more recent times two Royal Commissions have considered the question and arrived at somewhat differing conclusions. The Royal Commission of 1933 saw no objections to the idea on social grounds but described lotteries as "gambling in its easiest form with dazzling prizes". But the fact remains that the idea of lotteries has gone on in various forms and is generally accepted by the public.

At this point I should like to make clear that my Bill deals not with lotteries as a whole but only with sweepstakes. Sweepstakes are a limited form of lottery. Whereas a lottery depends simply upon a draw, a sweepstake depends upon a draw followed by a second, and ascertainable, event—very often a horse race.

Hon. Members may wonder whether my Bill is not similar to one to which the House has recently given a Second Reading, the National Lotteries Bill. It is only fair, therefore, to point out the differences. First, it deals only with sweepstakes, and of only two kinds: a national one, which must be based upon a horse race, and a small one, which will be available for parish councils for parish purposes.

Secondly, unlike the other Bill, my Bill sets up no new board with what might be described as a vested interest in the continuation of lotteries. It uses the existing machinery of the Horserace Betting Levy Board, which was recently set up under an Act passed by this House. No public expense would be involved because of the use of existing machinery.

It will be well known to every hon. Member that sweepstake tickets are widely bought and sold in this country, especially for two races, the Grand National and the Derby. Sweepstakes have a limited appeal, but there are a great many people who could not be described as gamblers, and who are certainly not what would be described as punters, who like to have a flutter twice a year on those big races. Very often they do not know how to set about it. There are already in existence the various sweepstakes to which people subscribe.

A national sweepstake under proper regulation and run by properly appointed people would provide much better prizes than exist at present and—an important point for prizewinners—there would be much lower running costs. The cost of running the national lottery in Spain is only 3 per cent., whereas that in Abyssinia costs no less than 40 per cent. in running costs alone.

The Royal Commission on Betting, Lotteries and Gaming, 1949–51 dealt at page 117 of its Report with national lotteries and said:

"We do not, however, consider that a lottery is a form of gambling which is likely to lead to excessive expenditure on the part of individuals".

Therefore, to those who ask whether the Bill would not encourage gambling, my answer is that I do not think that it would. I doubt very much whether it would do more than perhaps channel gambling into different directions, because under the Bill a sweepstake could be held only on the express authority of the Home Secretary, who, I imagine would not authorise a sweepstake on more than two or three races in the year. I do not, therefore, think that people would be encouraged to do anything which trey would not contemplate in any event. J t might, indeed, be made a little easier for them, and the object of any profit would be charity and it would be distributed in a properly supervised manner.

Other objections are raised against the idea of sweepstakes, including two which are completely contradictory. The first is that the State should not lend its name to a lottery. This ignores the fact that the State has often done so in the past and still does in a great many countries. Secondly, there is the argument that no lottery should be allowed on a national scale without the supervision of the State. Those two objections more or less cancel each other out. One cannot have it both ways. The important thing is to make sure that any large-scale lottery is properly supervised.

There may, of course, be religious objections, and I respect the objections of those who think that anything to do with chance is wrong and immoral and should he opposed. The objection might be made on social grounds that those who can ill afford to do so would subscribe to a sweepstake. I believe that there are sufficient opportunities for them to do so already and I do not regard that as a serious danger. That is why I suggest that the national sweepstake should be confined to only two or three races to start with.

If we look abroad, we see that the idea of a national lottery in a rather wider sense than envisaged in the Bill is used on a very large scale. That seems to justify the idea of State regulation and the State having something to do with the supervision. A number of countries can be listed, but I will give only a few: Belgium, Ceylon. Greece, Israel, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Turkey and West Germany.

In a speech in the House three weeks ago, the Financial Secretary to the Treasury said:

"It is difficult to suppose, in the light of that, that having a lottery is proof of a final descent into moral degeneration."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 2nd February, 1968; Vol 757, c. 1767.]

It is something which is being widely done and it has been done in this country in the past. I therefore find it difficult to accept the moral objection.

That leads me to the question of proceeds. It is important that any profit which is made should go in the right direction after fair prizes have been provided. Under my Bill, the proceeds would have to be distributed under the Betting Levy Board, which already has certain instructions but in the Bill I add the instruction that at least 70 per cent. of the proceeds must go to charity. It would be left to the Board's discretion to decide which charity should benefit. I would certainly hope that most of the proceeds would go for medical research. Private gain would therefore not arise.

It is true that the Betting Levy Board would not be in a position to undertake the actual promotion of the sweepstakes. The Board has, therefore, been given power in the Bill to delegate that function to the Totalisator Board or to other persons who may be duly authorised in writing by the Board. At the end of each year, the Levy Board is directed by the Bill to include in the annual report which it already has to submit to Parliament a description of what has been done in the national sweepstake, where the money has gone, what the expenses have been and the names of the charities to which subscriptions have been given. In this way the expenditure could be kept very low and the prizes would certainly be attractive to many people who at present probably subscribe to a foreign sweepstake if they want a good prize.

Having said that much about a national lottery in respect of which it has been necessary to amend the law considerably, I should like to turn to the question of the Betting, Gaming and Lotteries Act, 1963, which, on the whole, has worked quite well for small lotteries. Objections are sometimes raised to the 1963 Act, and it would be tempting to make minor alterations to it, but I do not consider that a Private Member's Bill is the right way to do it. The cost of printing, for example, would show a considerable rise but the amount allowed for this item might not be sufficient. It is subject to certain grievous restrictions such as posting and so on. We must frankly admit that some of the regulations, for instance not selling tickets to people outside a particular group or society, are not always observed.

I am seeking to add to the causes which these small lotteries can help with a maximum prize of £100. I refer to parish councils. It might be argued that Section 45(lc) of the 1963 Act includes parish councils. That does not appear to be the view of the parish councils. They are nothing to do with charity or with sporting activities. I want to make it clear beyond doubt that they are able to do this kind of thing.

In my own part of the world some parishes are very small. I received a letter the other day from one parish complaining that the product of the I d. rate was only £35 and that they are increasingly being asked to undertake certain duties: for example, putting up stiles in the countryside. They would find this a great strain on their resources. However, that is not what I have in mind. Very often, the odd seat or bus shelter would be extremely useful to a parish but, with high rates, the parish council would hesitate to vote money for anything like that. Here is a perfectly good way of raising money for the purposes of the parish, money which would be willingly given. Although the running of the sweepstake would be done by local helpers, the cost would be kept down to a minimum. They would be subject to a maximum prize of £100—which is probably more than they are likely to raise—and the other regulations under the 1963 Act. This is a good cause. They should be allowed to subscribe for the purposes of the parish for so many of the small things that these villages require.

This brings me back to the other half of the Bill, as it were, the national sweepstake. In Clause 3 I have had to make certain modifications to the existing law for it to work out. First, I have had to allow the posting of tickets, which is prohibited at the present time. Secondly, the limit of a prize of £100 would clearly be inapplicable if one had a national sweepstake on the Derby. Thirdly, the prohibition on advertising should go, although that is not a matter I would wish to insist upon in Committee.

I emphasise again that sweepstakes on one or two of the big sporting events of the year have long been something to which many people who have no real gambling instinct wish to subscribe. This Bill gives them the opportunity to do so on the largescale, with a remote hope of a good prize in a national sweepstake; or they could support their own parish pump politics by putting their 2s. 6d. into the sweepstake run for the benefit of the parish. No material encouragement to gamble is given. It is a certain regulation of existing facilities. Charities would stand to benefit very considerably from the big lottery. I have no doubt that the Betting Levy Board would know how to distribute the money. It is convenient to use existing machinery set up for a similar purpose, because we are only dealing with horse races, rather than set up a new body which would have a vested interest in more and more lotteries. I believe that adequate public supervision could be given.

Finally, I would stress that no national sweepstake can be held for this or that specific purpose without the authority of the Home Secretary. The power remains completely in his hands, so that he will be able to regulate the matter in the public interest. I, therefore, believe that, on a large scale and on a small scale, a certain amount of good can come of this Bill and I commend it to the House.

We are indebted to the hon. Gentleman the Member for Dorset, West (Mr. Wingfield Digby) for introducing the Bill. It gives another good opportunity for discussing the question of gaming. He has explained in great detail the history of gambling in this country which extends, I think he said, to archery and even to military exercises. In this way we have an opportunity to examine the various facets not only about the subject of gambling and lottery, but what provides the opportunity for the gambling instinct. The gambling instinct of the British is strong and flourishing and we are now investigating in detailed style precisely how we can channel this instinct to good end results. The hon. Member for Dorset, West has illustrated very well how it can be done.

I do not intend to speak for long. The hon. Gentleman's speech brought to my mind a number of things which I have been considering concerning gambling methods relative to horse racing in recent weeks. He said that largely the need for a lottery in byegone days came about to keep people's minds off other things. He mentioned lawn tennis.

Taking saddle racing as such, we have been drawn away not so much by the fact that we have horse racing as a means of sport or entertainment, but, in shaping the Bill, precisely what one does with it as an on-course event to attract the gaming instinct—indeed what is more important, the sport or the gambling.

The Bill raises two dangerous matters. The hon. Member for Dorset, West admits that the present powers of the Betting Levy Board would not be too big to contain even a large two-event sweepstake system per annum. My doubt is whether, if the powers were transferred to the Totalisator Board and Tote Investors Ltd. whether they would be big enough. I will inform the hon. Gentleman why. A number of my constituents—and even where I live in Kent—have made an effort to introduce and expand course racing activities with horses beyond saddle racing. I know that one small organisation in the North-West tried to open courses with trotting. Trotting is much older than saddle racing, because one can relate it to the days when there was racing with chariots. The history of that sport is quite strong and has deep roots. The point is that in approaches to the Totalisator Board and to local bodies, the people promoting trotting cannot find a niche in the present organisation of the totalisator system. They say they are overworked with organising on-course betting and not extending—

Order. We cannot discuss the various forms of horse racing, including trotting, on this Bill. It is a Bill about sweepstakes.

I am sorry. I agree I extended the debate. I will come to the point. The hon. Gentleman must take into account the heavy responsibilities of the Totalisator Board for organising on-course betting, and I think we should stop there. If we stop to consider the role of the Board we realise that we should not spread the opportunities for holding sweepstakes beyond the course. The Bill contains one weakness, in that under it would be impossible for the Home Office, in conjunction with the Board, to maintain what the hon. Gentleman recommends. I therefore oppose the Bill.

We are greatly indebted to my hon. Friend the Member for Dorset, West (Mr. Wingfield Digby) for bringing forward this Bill. It is a simple Measure, and so much simpler than many of the Bills which we have had to read of late.

The Bill contains two important items. First, as my hon. Friend rightly said, it suggests that we might be able to help the ratepayer and the taxpayer on a national scale; secondly, commendably, that we might be able to relieve the ratepayer on a smaller scale, in the parish council. It is to these two purposes that I shall address my remarks.

My hon. Friend was right when he said that way back in history Westminster Bridge was built as a result of a lottery. I wish that more modern buildings had been built as a result of money obtained in that way. If they had been, taxpayers and ratepayers would have benefited greatly.

Order. This is reminiscent of the previous debate on lotteries.

I find myself willing to support the Bill, particularly that part of it which deals with parish councils. Many parish councils in my constituency wish to build new footpaths, and to help in implementing the Countryside Bill when it becomes an Act by building stiles, by providing seats in bus shelters, and so on, but a penny rate in many of these councils produces very little indeed. My hon. Friend is to be commended for trying to make it possible for local people to support their parish councils in a practical way if they want to provide these facilities. I would like the Bill to go further and make it possible for a sweepstake to be held on a national scale to provide money to build hospitals, and to relieve the burden on taxpayers.

It is for those reasons that I support the Bill, and I congratulate my hon. Friend again on bringing it forward.

I propose to speak for only a few moments to warn my hon. Friend the Member for Dorset, West (Mr. Wingfield Digby) that although he has been fortunate enough to be able to promote the Bill, whatever happens to it today, I would not like him to be deluded into thinking that it will be translated into legislation in due time.

Mr. Speaker, you have said that we must not relate our remarks to the National Lottery Bill. Nevertheless, in introducing the Bill my hon. Friend gave us the history of lotteries from the beginning of time, and this encouraged me to believe that we might touch on it in passing.

It is fortunate for my hon. Friend that, so far as I can detect, there is no Treasury representative on the Government Front Bench. If there were, he would predict doom for the Bill, because my hon. Friend has surrounded it with the undoubted promise of money which might be used for charity, worthy causes, medical research, and so on. I do not know whether the Home Office representative will take the same view, but, unless there is a division of opinion in the Government, there is no chance of any money raised by this means being devoted to charitable purposes.

The Financial Secretary to the Treasury has made it clear that the Treasury has not deviated one iota from its tradi- tional line that we must not have part hypothecated taxation, and the Treasury will not allow money raised in this way to be earmarked for charitable or other purposes. Its disposal must be at the sole discretion of the Chancellor of the Exchequer and his advisers. I cannot hold out much hope for the Bill, but I nevertheless congratulate my hon. Friend on having got it this far.

The idea that we should have a national sweepstake because other countries have run them successfully is not borne out by the financial results. My hon. Friend quoted with approval the example of Spain, where about £30 million is raised by means of a national lottery, but the Government raise far more than that without a national sweepstake. They collect more than £70 million by various forms of taxation in this field. If they want to give money to charity, there is nothing to stop them from doing so, but they prefer to use it for other purposes. The Treasury takes the line that the revenue coming into its hands has to be disbursed by the Government of the day in a way which they think is appropriate. If my hon. Friend thinks that by this Bill, or by a national sweepstake Bill, great sums of money will be raised for charity, he is flying in the face of traditional Treasury practice. I wish my hon. Friend well with the Bill but I do not think that he is likely to get very far with it.

I was puzzled about why my hon. Friend talked only about parish council sweepstakes. Why not county borough sweepstakes, or city sweepstakes? Why does he propose to give this solicitous care only to parish councils? Will he consider extending this in Committee so that the Borough of Southend, for example, can raise money in this way if it so desires? I am not suggesting that it should do so, but I do not see why only parish councils should have this privilege. I think that it should be made available to other local authorities.

I wish my hon. Friend the best of good fortune with this Measure. I can only warn him that no matter what may be said by the Under-Secretary of State this afternoon, sooner or later the Treasury will catch up, and sooner or later the Bill will suffer death by a thousand cuts. Much as I wish it well, I do not see much future for the Bill.

I had not expected to rise for the third time today to give the Government's view of a Private Member's Bill. As the hon. Member for Southend, East (Sir S. McAdden) said, the Treasury is not here, but I do not think that he will find any division in the Government's ranks on this issue, or indeed on any other. Nor, I am afraid, will the hon. Member for Dorset, West (Mr. Wingfield Digby) derive any great comfort from the absence of the Treasury.

Many difficulties arise in connection with lotteries and, in particular, a national lottery. Royal Commissions, with decreasing strength of objection, have nevertheless turned their faces against the idea of a national lottery. In Paragraph 392 of the Royal Commission on Betting, Lotteries and Gaming, the Commission said:

"Our conclusion is, therefore, that there is no important advantage to be gained by the establishment of a national lottery and that there is no reason, in this particular case, to depart from the general principle that it is undesirable for the State to make itself responsible for the provision of gambling facilities."

In the next paragraph it goes on to oppose the idea of large-scale lotteries which are not conducted by the State. It has even greater objections to them.

Since the mild opposition of the 1951 Royal Commission, opposition to the idea of a national lottery has been further eroded—

The hon. and learned Gentleman must help me. We cannot repeat the whole debate that we had last time on a national lottery. We must refer to sweepstakes promoted by individuals in connection with horse racing.

I appreciate that, Mr. Speaker, but to some extent the principles then announced in relation to national lotteries are relevant to this Bill. To some extent objection in principle has been eroded by the votes which the House gave on the previous Bill.

There may be some support for a form of national lottery, but there is less support for the idea of the proliferation of lotteries, and I do not think that there would be general support for complete freedom, for all purposes, for all kinds of charities. The most that can be said is that if a lottery or sweepstake is run by an appropriate body for limited purposes the idea of some sort of national sweepstake could be re-examined.

The Bill proposes an amendment of the 1963 Act to make it lawful for the Levy Board to promote or conduct a public sweepstake on any horse race with the prior authority of the Secretary of State. It does not seem to me that the Secretary of State's authority being required makes the matter very much easier. It would be very difficult for the Secretary of State to know exactly on which occasions he should support and on which occasions he should refuse the idea of a sweepstake. There would be considerable pressure on him to do so on each occasion and, in the light of all the pressures that would be brought to bear, I cannot see how the Minister could exercise this discretion.

There are only that have tremendous and support in this the Grand National and is obvious that those the occasions on which he would be approached.

Yes, but undoubtedly pressure would arise in respect of other occasions, and for the proliferation of lotteries. It would be difficult for the authority of the Secretary of State to be effectively used to prevent proliferation of a kind which the majority of opinion might not be prepared to accept.

The third point is that the Levy Board would be empowered to delegate its functions to the Totalisator Board, Tote Investors Limited, or any other person. It is difficult to envisage the delegation of these rather important powers to "any other person".

Now I come to the nub of the Bill. Apart from the question of the parish council, it envisages that at least 70 per cent. of receipts from sweepstakes should be contributed to charity, at the discretion of the Levy Board. The Board is also to be responsible for determining the prizes. I assume that that figure of 70 per cent. relates to net profits rather than gross receipts. If it related to gross receipts it is difficult to see how sufficient return could be obtained—but that is a question of detail.

The real difficulty arises in establishing how far this variation of a national lottery could be regarded as acceptable. First, there is the question whether or not we should like to see the scope of the provisions limited to a form of national lottery used to confer further special benefits on horse racing, which already receives exceptional support from the totalisator and the levy on bookmakers. Certain persons who, in certain circumstances, might envisage a national lottery being permissible, would have strong objections to State participation in a lottery which was used for the further benefit of horse racing.

Even in respect of the 70 per cent. to be devoted to charities the Bill would place the Levy Board in an impossible position. I am not sure how far the Board likes the idea of being given this somewhat invidious task. I understand that it has not been consulted on this in detail, although it was, of course, sent a copy of the Bill.

But is it really the body to decide between one charity and another? The functions of the Levy Board are to apply the contributions which it receives to purposes conducive to one or more of the following: the improvement of breeds of horses, the advancement or encouragement of veterinary science and of veterinary education and the improvement of horse racing. A board constituted for those purposes is surely not the right one—it would be invidious to make it so—to choose between different charitable purposes, a choice which is difficult for anyone, but particularly so for this Board.

Indeed, why should the proceeds of a sweepstake be applied only for charitable purposes? There are many equally deserving causes which could benefit from a national lottery. If one takes the view, as one must, that the scope of national lotteries should be limited—if they are allowed at all—I should have thought that to limit them to give first, 30 per cent. to horse racing, and then the rest to charities only is not a principle which one would like to accept—

It is not limited to give 30 per cent. to horse racing. I put in the figure of 70 per cent. for charities, although I hope that it would be 100 per cent. The hon. and learned Gentleman will know the difficulty of including in a Bill a provision which is too rigid. There must be a little play in this figure.

These are terribly difficult decisions for the Levy Board. It would be under pressure to use the maximum permitted for the benefit of horse racing. We still face the difficulty of making it choose between charities and the objection in principle to allowing this for the benefit of charities only.

Lastly, there is the concession to parish councils, which also involves a very difficult point of principle. We discussed this to some extent when we debated the Gaming Bill last week, and few voices were raised for the idea that municipal authorities should be allowed to participate in gaming. On the whole, we have so far preserved the position that local authorities should not engage in these activities. If that is still generally maintained, I can see no logical reason why parish councils should be more favourably placed than any other local authorities.

I must, therefore, regretfully tell the hon. Member for Dorset, West that his Bill is not acceptable to the Government in principle and in any event is defective in form. For these reasons, I cannot ask the House to support the Bill.

I must first of all congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Dorset, West (Mr. Wingfield Digby) on having unexpectedly secured a Second Reading debate on his Bill, but I cannot congratulate him on the Bill itself. I am afraid that the liberal period which I entered earlier today on another Bill has not lasted very long, since I am not again opposing a change.

This Bill must be viewed against our general social background, part of which, regretfully, is that gambling of every kind is at present increasing. The question which one must ask, is, at such a time is it appropriate to add yet another form of gambling to an already overcrowded scene?

Does my hon. Friend think, then, that the Irish Sweepstake is morally wrong?

I do not think that it is for me to pass a judgment on the morality of the Irish Sweepstake. To do so would be to intervene unjustifiably in the internal affairs of the Republic of Ireland.

Does my hon. Friend realise that the majority of people who invest in the Irish Sweepstake are citizens of the United Kingdom? He therefore should pronounce on the morality of that sweepstake.

Yes, but that is a matter for them, and I would not pass judgment on the morality of any individual action as opposed to passing judgment on the morality of an institution, bearing in mind the comment, "Judge not, that ye be not judged". In any case, some of the people participating in the Irish Sweepstake may be constituents of mine.

I do not regard gambling as morally wrong in itself, but it is a question of moderation and measure. This is a situation in which gambling is on the increase. In that situation, my hon. Friend is advancing the argument that, since the situation exists, why not cash in on it for a good cause? That is an adaptation of General Booth's famous question, "Why should the devil have all the good tunes?" I see the force of that argument. It seeks to take advantage of a situation which one believes will inevitably continue. For those who regard gambling as immoral, such an argument will have no appeal, but I revert to the point of those who take the middle view and ask, is this the right time to introduce yet another form of gambling, even if it is a sweepstake of restricted application?

I agree with the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department that the Bill would place an almost impossible task on the Levy Board. It would be difficult for anyone to discharge the task of deciding, between different charities, which one is meritorious, and which is not. No guidance is given in the Bill how the discretion should be exercised. That places an undesirable degree of patronage under the control of the Levy Board, even if it be patronage which can be used for a good cause. We should beware of extending patronage in any form at this time when Government patronage, in particular, is increasing so rapidly. Given this difficulty of dispensing the money, one can hardly think of a Board less equipped to fulfil the task than the Levy Board. That constitutes an ineradicable weakness of the Bill.

The figure of 70 per cent. in the Bill is arbitrary. My hon. Friend explained that he had to fix some figure, but he did not explain why it should be 70 per cent. other than saying that he did not wish to be too rigid. I view the Bill with certain reservations. I fully appreciate the force of my hon. Friend's arguments, however, and I do not wish to bring myself into a direct confrontation with him. It is therefore my intention, if and when a Division occurs, to abstain.

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Dorset, West (Mr. Wingfield Digby) on being here when his Bill, which is third on the list, was called, and I commiserate with the Under-Secretary for finding himself in a similar situation.

My task is to try to answer some points raised in this short and interesting debate. While the hon. and learned Gentleman was working himself into a fine frenzy of disapproval, I was rather amused to see the face of his right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer appear round your Chair, Mr. Speaker, gaze sadly at his hon. and learned Friend depriving him of large sums of money, and then disappear all in the space of about 60 seconds.

The Under-Secretary has taken far too serious a view of Clause 4, which gives parish councils the right to run sweepstakes. This debate might have been a little more concentrated on the subject matter of the Bill if we had taken the word "lotteries" out of it and concentrated on sweepstakes. The two are quite separate.

The Under-Secretary worked himself into a great lather over the Bill in some respects. He said that his right hon. Friend the Home Secretary would be placed under intolerable pressures; that it would be quite terrible for the poor man to have to decide whether a sweepstake might be run on one or other of our races. With the greatest possible respect, I would say that Home Secretaries have proved fairly tough individuals and that every day they are confronted with pressures of one kind or another. I cannot seriously take it from the hon. and learned Gentleman that his right hon. Friend the Secretary of State would crumple and quail at the prospect of deciding whether a sweepstake was to be run on a race.

The Levy Board, which has been said during the debate to be overworked, was named in this Bill because it is publicly appointed. That does not mean that from among its own number it could not, if the Bill became law, appoint a sub-committee of members specially qualified to handle this work.

The figure of 70 per cent. which so concerned my hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Mr. St. John-Stevas) is one that my hon. Friend might be prepared to consider amending in Committee.

My particular interest in the Bill relates to parish councils. Though my hon. Friend the Member for Southend, East (Sir S. McAdden) looked on the Bill with an air of extremely gloomy foreboding and questioned the likelihood of its future being rosy, he suggested that the provisions of Clause 4 should be extended to county boroughs and, presumably, county councils and other levels of local government.

Parish councils are mentioned in the Bill for the simple reason that they are more impoverished than other levels of local authority. Some parish councils have a penny rate product which enables them to perform their functions well, but some in the course of years have found themselves responsible for recreation grounds, cemeteries, and other things they have not originally acquired but which have been left to them in trust. In the past they may have found that their penny rate product was more capable of enabling them to carry the burden than they can with present-day prices and responsibilities.

I was once chairman of a parish council whose penny rate product was all of £5 and no more. Had we had an election, the rate would have gone up by nearly 6d. We realised that we had to be as economical as possible in the interests of democracy. Many parish councils are in a similar position. Although re-rating of property has improved the rating capacity of those councils, they are still carrying heavy burdens. In any case, this is a tier of local government which is one of the more important under-used powers of local authorities.

They would not only benefit from the rate content suggested in the Bill in a purely financial sense, but the additional responsibility and additional work would give them new inspiration to look at life afresh. In all discussions of re-organisation of local government and the considerable debates about the future of county councils, regional government and what the regions will be, no one talks about parish councils. It seems that they will continue in future unaffected by any changes. This Bill could give them an opportunity for a new access to funds and the chance to take on a new lease of life.

My hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford generally disapproves of gambling. I think it fair to say that that was his attitude towards the Bill. Is it right, he asked, to introduce another form of gambling? What my hon. Friend for Dorset, West is seeking is not to introduce another form of gambling. Gambling in this country requires no encouragement at all, and the Bill would give it no further encouragement. All that the Bill would do would be to channel an incorrigible and irresistible instinct of the British people, built into our very beings over the centuries, confirmed and ineradicable, into some useful activity by which it could be utilised to a good purpose.

My hon. Friend does not even seek to try to determine in which way this should be channelled. This is flexible in the Bill, and it can be amended if necessary if the Bill goes to Committee. The Bill would not be an encouragement to gambling. Gambling is here, built into the instincts of the British people. Let us have some common sense about it and try to channel this instinctive activity and its by-product usefully so that the largest number of people can benefit.

I hope that the Government will be a little less pessimistic about the prospects of the Bill. I realise that the Government have had a strange series of experiences in the last 24 hours and probably they are looking on everything rather pessimistically. Nevertheless, I think this Bill gives hope. I do not think tare fears of the Under-Secretary are so well-founded as he suggested. He should remember the unhappy visit of the Chancellor to this Chamber and his return. If from the Under-Secretary he learned how more money could be raised

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

I take it that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Sowerby (Mr. Houghton) has resumed his seat, so that I have no need to move the Second Reading. He has done it with an eloquence which was unlimited if brevity be the soul of wit. None the less, I feel that a little more ought to be said about the Bill. I say at once that my object is to support it and in no way to impede its progress.

I am sorry that the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget), whose Bill this is, is not in his place. I sympathise with him. Looking at the Order Paper today and in this way, that would help the Chancellor. It should make him more optimistic about this Bill.

In intervening briefly in the debate I cannot resist the temptation to express my pleasure at seeing the Financial Secretary to the Treasury back in his place, and I am especially gratified to believe that it was the arrival of this Bill and not the arrival of the International Monetary Fund team which occasioned his return from his foreign travels.

This is a Bill of importance, but although I give it my warm support, I am a little uneasy about some of the special provisions relating to auditors. It seems to me that the rôle of the auditor in the Bill, and particularly the scope and appointments of lay and qualified auditors, is of the essence of the changes which the Bill would introduce. I have one or two misgivings about the Bill in respect of the auditors, and I am particularly disturbed by the very close definition in Clause 8 of the type of person who may be appointed, be he qualified or approved, as auditor for friendly societies.

The limitation placed on a qualified auditor by reason of his possible association, distant or near, with the kind of activities on which the society is engaged, may under certain circumstances be a disadvantage. I have particularly in mind the type of society which is springing up in the Metropolis and also in other parts of the country, where groups of well-meaning citizens have joined together to form local housing associations or housing trusts. I am a member of one such society operating in the Borough of North Kensington. Its activities are relatively limited but certainly very desirable. The society acquires and purchases small properties as they come on the market, does them up professionally and satisfactorily—or employs many voluntary helpers in that task—and re-lets the premises at reasonable rents for those who cannot rehouse themselves or be rehoused by local authorities.

For the record, it should be made clear that there is no such place as the Borough of North Kensington. It is the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea.

I take my hon. Friend's point and extend my apologies not only to him, but to the citizens he represents.

Returning to the general point, one of the problems of the small housing associations or societies is that, on the accounting side they need the assistance of gentlemen who are professionally qualified, in the terms of the Bill, who often give their services voluntarily. In one or two cases about which I can speculate, the situation arises in which the most valuable kind of auditor for these small societies is one whose professional employment might be in connection with a major building society. This would qualify him to be an auditor, whether approved or qualified, in the technical sense, under the terms of the Bill for one of the small local societies. As at present drafted, by the constricting definition of those who may be eligible to be appointed as qualified auditors, the Bill necessarily restricts the scope of appointment.

May I ask the Financial Secretary to elucidate one point, upon which I feel he is particularly expertly qualified to pronounce? On Clause 8(1,c) may I ask whether it is possible for a person to be "a body corporate"? Is this not a contradiction in terms? Is not a body corporate, in the nature of the definition, a plural rather than a singular concept? Can this phrase properly apply to persons under Clause 8(1)? No doubt, the Financial Secretary will be able to help on that point.

The special feature of the Bill to which I want to draw the attention of the Financial Secretary is the curious distinction drawn between a qualified auditor, as described in Clause 7, and the appointment of lay auditors in the case of exempt societies as defined in subsections (2) to (7) of Clause 4. This is a curious feature of the Bill. Apparently it is conceived that two lay auditors are tantamount to one qualified auditor. I would like reassurances that the doctrine underlying the inclusion of two lay auditors is that it is held that two people are naturally and necessarily a check and balance upon one another, or that it takes two good men to do what one qualified professional can do.

The particular aspect which then comes into play is whether the phrase "a lay auditor", as set out and defined in Clause 4, can or cannot include an off-duty qualified auditor.

Order. This is a Committee point.

I am sorry. I will present this question in the more general context of seeking the Financial Secretary's reassurance that the scope of auditors will not be unduly constricted by the application of Clause 7.

I move, at your direction, Mr. Speaker, to a point which emerges with some prominence and necessity from the special features of the Bill which relate to the appointment of auditors by direction—that is to say, direction of the Chief Registrar—be they approved or qualified, in the case of an exempt society. This seems to give rise to some confusion, and I think that we need some illumination on it. There is the curious situation under which exempt societies do not have to have qualified auditors, except in circumstances which it is rather difficult to anticipate, but under which the Registrar feels it is necessary to appoint a qualified auditor.

That raises complications in the matter of the annual meeting, because the Bill lays down that there is to be an annual meeting of a society to appoint or remove the qualified auditor. What would be the position of an exempt society which would not normally hold an annual meeting for the appointment or removal of a qualified auditor because such an auditor would not normally be an officer appointed to such a society? What will be the position in the event of such an exempt society having an auditor appointed by direction of the Registrar? Will it have to hold an annual meeting under the terms of Clause 5? If an exempt society to which a qualified auditor, has been appointed by the Registrar has to hold an annual meeting, will it be empowered to reject or replace the auditor, or will that replacement have to be sanctioned by the Registrar to whom the qualified auditor owes the appointment?

These are one or two rather special features of the Bill which strike me, as one who is interested in the whole question of audit, particularly in its wider applications, as requiring elucidation from the Financial Secretary.

I am sorry that the hon. and learned Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget) cannot be with us this afternoon to explain the Bill, but a Master of Foxhounds, or even a Master of Foxhounds elect, has considerable duties at the weekend during the winter.

Order. The hon. Member must come to the Bill.

I am sorry, Mr. Speaker, but I have several questions which I hope will be answered.

I should like to try to help my hon. Friend the Member for Barkston Ash (Mr. Alison) who wanted to know what the definition of a person was. I think that it is the Interpretation Act, 1889, which says that a person is almost anything, and certainly includes a local authority.

The exemption limits in Clause 4 seem rather strange. The Clause says that the assets of a friendly society shall be £5,000, and that its turnover shall be £5,000. Below that figure it can claim exemption if its membership is below 500. This seems peculiar when one realises that, in relation to a housing society such as that to which my hon. Friend referred, there would be no question of the figures rising as high as that. How have the figures been arrived at?

Clause 9 deals with the auditors report. Will it be the sort of report which the auditor merely certifies at the bottom that he has inspected the accounts and found nothing wrong with them?

The hon. Gentleman is doubtless aware of the time, and of the enthusiasm with which the Bill was greeted by his hon. Friend. Is he anxious to see it become law, or does he want to talk it out?

I have no desire to talk it out. In that case I shall sit down.

Object.

Object.

Object.

Object.

Object.

Object.

This is the first occasion on which I have sought your permission, Mr. Speaker, to raise on the Adjournment a matter within the responsibility of a Department of which, for some years, I had the honour of being the head. I want, therefore, at the beginning to say that in raising what I regard as an issue of major public importance within the responsibility of that Department I am very anxious not even to appear to criticise the staff of that Department.

I know that, especially on the war pensions side, the staff discharge their difficult and multifarious duties in a humane and civilised way, and I have often thought that the way in which they handle war pension problems might well be the prototype from which could be developed social administrative techniques which could be spread into the civil field—above all, perhaps, for the long-term disabled and sick.

What I have sought permission to raise on the Adjournment is not that; it is a decision of the Government—I suspect that it is a decision of the Government as a whole—which I regard, using as moderate language as I can, as callous, indefensible and dishonourable. I refer to the decision to reduce—in effect, by one-seventh—the war pensions paid to war pensioners in all countries abroad except the small minority which devalued with us. I shall try to put the case as quickly as possible, because I want to leave the Minister as much time as possible to reply.

The decision is an astonishing one. I wonder what would have been the response of the House to any Minister who had said that pensions paid at home were to be reduced by one-seventh from 21st-22nd November last. I doubt whether that Minister would have lasted for 24 hours. I should have thought that the same indignation which I would have felt in those circumstances ought to be felt by all hon. Members when a similar cut is imposed, on war pensioners of all people, who happen to reside abroad.

I am certain that the right hon. Lady, the Minister, must have intensely disliked this decision. Had she thought fit to follow the example of her predecessor, who refused to remain responsible for decisions which she disliked, hon. Members on both sides of the House would have felt a great deal of sympathy for her.

This matter arises, of course, from devaluation. Last November, the Government took a step which some of them described as a defeat and others as a giant stride to Socialism, and devalued the £ thus automatically reducing the value abroad of payments in sterling except in that minority of countries where devaluation on the lines of our own was carried out simultaneously. There is no dispute that to maintain the purchasing power of those pensions at their level before 21st November, it is necessary to increase them in terms of sterling by 14·3 per cent. or one-seventh. Similar steps are being taken by the Government in respect of certain other categories and I thought that they would be taken above all in the case of war pensioners.

The Parliamentary Secretary will recall that I asked a Question before Christmas about what it would cost to increase pensions sufficiently to compensate pensioners for the cut which was being imposed upon them. I was told that it would be, provided that it were kept to them, no more than £750,000 a year. Of course war pension payments have this peculiarity, that, because the pensioners are getting older, this figure, unlike other figures of public expenditure, automatically diminishes with the years.

Nothing was done, so on 29th January, I asked a Question of the right hon. Lady:

"… whether she will now adjust the payments made to war disability pensioners resident overseas so as to restore the value of their pensions in terms of the local currency of the places in which they reside to the level at which it was prior to the devaluation of the £ sterling."

The right hon. Lady replied:

"No, Sir. War pensions are payable abroad in sterling and there is no power to vary them upwards or downwards in accordance with changes in the relative value of the local currency. As the right hon. Gentleman knows, the War Pensioners Welfare Service is there to help any pensioner who may experience hardship."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 29th January, 1968; Vol. 757, c. 861.]

The first half of that Answer is disingenuous. The right hon. Lady and the House know that one can alter war pensions by Royal Warrant without any Parliamentary procedure and hardly any delay. I do not think that the Parliamentary Secretary will say that there would be any technical difficulty in his right hon. Friend today making a submission to Her Majesty for an amendment to the Royal Warrant to increase these pensions by 14·3 per cent.

She also referred to the War Pensioners Welfare Service, for which I have the greatest regard. But that cannot operate as effectively abroad, where it has no offices or bases, on the whole, as it can and does most effectively in this country. I believe that only in Dublin and Ottawa does the right hon. Lady have art office, and that in all other countries where British war pensioners live, the work is done for her Department most admirably by the local administration. For example, the Government of the Union of South Africa do this in Pretoria; they give a fine example, and most helpful to British war pensioners. I am sure, therefore, that the Service will do its best, but I do not think that the House can take that as anything like equivalent to a restoration of the value of the pension.

What is hardship in this context? For any disabled man, generally an ageing man, to have his pension cut by one-seventh at a time of rising prices is surely hardship in itself. If the right hon. Lady meant that hardship in that sense would be relieved by the welfare service, why not take the perfectly simple step of increasing the pension and saving everyone trouble? If, on the other hand, she meant—as I think she did—something a good deal less, that is no answer to my complaint on 29th January which caused me to give notice of my intention to seek this debate. Why not make this provision by Royal Warrant now?

I will put the arguments quickly. First, it has always been accepted that this country has the highest obligation of all to those who were injured in its service. We are dealing with people who were young, fit men when they went into this service and who, as a result of that service, in some cases came out so mutilated that most of the joy of life had gone from them, or who, in the majority of cases, were able to lead normal lives but with a handicap, a disability and sometimes with constant pain. We have said that such people who incurred such injuries in the service of this country, indeed in saving the life and freedom of this country, were entitled to the highest consideration from the country which they helped to save. That is why Governments of all kinds have said that we gave priority to war pensioners. What does priority mean in this context other than doing what I am asking the hon. Member to do?

War pensions have in many ways been treated differently from other pensions—not as income in the ordinary sense but as compensation for physical disability, quite apart from its effect on earning capacity. That is why they have been given unique treatment in not being regarded as income at all for Income Tax purposes. That is why, when they are drawn in this country, they are altogether free of British Income Tax—for the double reason that this is not income in the ordinary sense but compensation for physical injury, and that these pensions are thought of as being in such a special position that it would be wrong and oppressive to tax them at all. We are talking about this kind of payment, which has always been treated on that basis and regarded as entitled to special treatment.

War pensioners abroad fall, in my experience of the Department, broadly into two categories. There are those whose homes were abroad before the war in which they came to fight, and who came to fight here, as volunteers coming across the world to help this country in its extremity. They range from the young Americans who joined the Eagle Squadron and who performed such prodigies of valour in 1940 to people from villages in West Africa or remote towns in the West Indies who volunteered to join the British forces to help us in our hour of strife and danger. In addition, there were those of British origin, resident abroad, perhaps working in business in South America, subject to no compulsion to come here, who came across the world to fight for us and, having fought for us, went back to the countries from which they had come. The other category includes those who have since emigrated. In some cases they have emigrated because the nature of their disability make our climate particularly difficult for them—for example those with chest complaints resulting from gas attacks in the First World War—while others, possibly because of their disabilities, have sought a different opportunity of life in another country.

These are the two categories, both of whom are receiving this cut and will continue to receive this cut unless, even now, we can press the Government to take action to restore their pension to its previous value. I ask the House to reflect on the effect of this cut abroad, in the places where these people live. It will be seen in New York offices and West African villages alike that this great country is apparently going back on its obligations, and quite suddenly imposing a cut on people for whom it has long admitted an obligation. There is not only the effect on these individuals but on their friends and relations, and it is not a nice effect for anyone in this House or in the country to contemplate.

We come to the question which the hon. Gentleman will no doubt pose; can we afford it? Can we separate it from the other cases and claims? I am an old Treasury Minister and I tend to look on proposals for public expenditure with an eye lacking in enthusiasm. But here we are talking of a diminishing figure of £¾ milion a year, and against the background of a Vote on Account for public expenditure rising this year by £1,000 million.

I agree that in this case we are talking of overseas expenditure across the exchanges, but this is a question of priorities. Earlier this week, I saw in the Press an announcement of an interest-free loan of £½ million to Indonesia. There are, no doubt, good intentions behind that, but if we really are in such difficulties with our balance of payments that we cannot even maintain—never mind, improve—the pensions we pay to people abroad who have served us, I would not have thought that we could afford to make an interest-free loan to Indonesia, a country which—one re- calls it without ill-feeling, but it is the fact—has only recently caused us very great trouble and some loss of life, and a country which, when it was properly managed by the Dutch, was highly prosperous through its own natural resources and did not need outside aid. Can the Parliamentary Secretary justify saying that we cannot afford to make up this money for our own people but can, even this week, find an interest-free loan—no one knows when or if it will be repaid—to Indonesia?

Another aspect is that of setting a precedent. These are not the only payments made abroad, and I put it to the hon. Gentleman that some of them are being increased. I am delighted to understand that pensions payable to the Gurkhas are being increased and perhaps the Parliamentary Secretary can confirm it. This is the Service pension paid to the Gurkhas—those splendid troops to whow we owe much. I do not grudge them a penny of it. But does that increase apply also to war disability pensions, or is it just their Service pension?

Again, we are increasing the allowances at present paid to those now serving in our Forces abroad. I do not object to that—indeed, as the father of a serving soldier, I suppose I have an interest in the opposite direction. The fact remains that we are increasing their allowances. We are increasing the allowances paid to our diplomatic representatives abroad to make up for devaluation.

All these things are no doubt sensible and right but, if they are being done, as I know they are, it knocks the bottom out of the argument that we cannot pay an increase to war pensioners because that would set a precedent and be an unfortunate example. The fact is that it is being done at the moment, and rightly so, for those in the present service of the Crown—and done also, I have no doubt, because the Government know that if it were not done they would find themselves in a great deal of trouble.

But does not that lead one overwhelmingly to the view that if we do that to those at present in our Service, knowing that there would be a great deal of trouble if it were not done, but have not done it for those who are not in a position to make trouble, who have no connections here, no organisation here, who are no longer in this country's service and who, from the Government's point of view are completely helpless: this is particularly shameful. The very fact that they can do nothing to embarrass the Government or make things more difficult for them ought to be a most powerful argument for the Government to be generous in their case.

I feel very strongly about this matter. The maintenance of the full value of our war pensions to our pensioners abroad is a matter of honour for this country, and of justice. Fortunately, in financial terms, the amount involved is so small that no Minister can say that our national economy would be over strained by acting as I suggest. I therefore hope that the hon. Gentleman will give himself the pleasure—for such I am sure it would be—of doing the right thing, and of saying that a draft Warrant will be submitted forthwith to Her Majesty to right this wrong.

I begin by paying tribute to the right hon. Member for Kingston-upon-Thames (Mr. Boyd-Carpenter), not merely for the way in which he has presented his case in a cogent and forthright manner—that is something we have come to expect from him—but for the work he did as Minister in the old Ministry of Pensions and National Insurance, and in particular the work he did on behalf of war pensioners.

As one now associated with the Ministry, I was grateful that he saw fit in his opening remarks to pay tribute to the staff in the Department who administer war pensions.

I assure the right hon. Gentleman and the House that my right hon. Friend and I are very concerned to look after the best interests of war pensioners as far as is humanly possible. We approach this problem in a desire to look after them in the way they deserve to be looked after. That approach we intend to continue.

As the right hon. Gentleman said, this debate is about the personal financial effects on pensioners overseas living in countries which have not devalued in consequence of the devaluation of the pound sterling. Broadly, war pensioners living abroad in those countries which did not so devalue have in effect a pension cut of 14·3 per cent. The right hon. Gentleman claimed that it would be practicable to restore the value of the pensions to war pensioners only. In saying that, he advanced the argument that this would cost £750,000. It is true that it would cost that amount; that is the amount we stated in response to his Question. It is also true that £750,000 would be a diminishing amount because war pensions gradually tail off by virtue of age and dying.

I am not so sure whether the right hon. Gentleman's sanguine approach to the containment of this exercise would be correct. I doubt very much whether the position could be held at the point of merely restoring the war pensioners' cut. I want to be careful about what I say because I should not like anyone, whether a war pensioner or anyone in the community, to misconstrue a single word that I utter. I am vitally concerned that we should give war pensioners the maximum we can afford. When I said that we would merely restore the cuts I did not mean it in the sense in which it might be construed.

There are many pensioner recipients of sterling abroad. Although I do not want to talk about police, civil servants, teachers and others, I want the right hon. Gentleman to recognise that there are two sections of pensioners who are of great significance. There are the National Insurance pensioners and the Industrial Injuries pensioners as well. It is pertinent to the argument that once we made a concession in one field, it would be inevitable that pressures and demand would grow for the extension of the concession to the National Insurance pensions and the Industrial Injuries pensioners as well.

Would not that argument apply equally to the already existing differential over Income Tax? Yet Income Tax has always been imposed on retirement pensions, and no difficulty has ever arisen in connection with that.

I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will not intervene again. He knows that when there is plenty of time I never refuse to yield. He spoke for over 20 minutes. I have 10 minutes in which to reply.

I do not think that that is a fair analogy, because three separate sets of pensioners are affected by what I expected the right hon. Gentleman to describe as a conscious act of the Government. If the cut were restored to one section, the demand would inevitably grow and would cost about £¾ million straightaway.

Twenty-one thousand, six hundred war pensions—17,000 disablement pensions and about 4,000 war widows' pensions—are affected. I accept that there are the three categories of pensioners involved as outlined by the right hon. Gentleman. I want to make it clear that the overwhelming majority of the 26,000 war pensioners living abroad are persons who have emigrated from Britain taking their pensions with them. Almost all of them were resident in this country and are native to this country. Although I accept in toto that they responded to the call in the country's hour of need, I want to make the clear distinction that we are not dealing with people who volunteered from other countries, because, with only a few exceptions, the volunteers from the Commonwealth and other countries were embodied in their own forces in about 1941, and, in consequence, have been assimilated in their own countries' systems of compensatory payments.

I want to change the format of my speech, because I want to put clearly on record how we intend to deal with this problem. I take it out of context solely because of the time. It was not fair of the right hon. Gentleman to write down the welfare services we have in other countries. We have made our agents fully aware of what we want them to do. The organisations in this country and elsewhere which are representative of ex-Service personnel are fully aware of what we intend to do. We intend to ensure that wherever possible the welfare services make certain that no hardship accrues to any of our pensioners who are caught on the question of devaluation.

By far the greater proportion of war pensioners have disabilities below 30 per cent. I accept that war pensioners whose pension constitutes the greater proportion of their income will be terrifically hurt by this cut. I give the assurance that these are precisely the people we will try to look after to ensure that they are not hurt too much.

The question whether there can be different rates of pensions for different countries is very difficult and cannot be glossed over. Pensions are expressed in sterling. If there were a differential rate for various countries, and if those rates in certain instances were higher than rates paid to pensioners in this country, although we might get over the initial stages within a short time we should be faced with the demand, "If you can pay high rates of pension to people resident in Canada and the United States, why should not you pay the same rates to us, because some of us actually pay taxation in Britain to make up for the pensions?"

On the question of upward adjustment of rates in countries where devaluation has not taken place, do we reduce the rates in countries like New Zealand where devaluation has been greater than that here? There are all sorts of factors which interfere with the true value of the pensions—