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

May I observe that, as the Bill has, I think, the general support of the House, if we are to cover all the work that is on the Order Paper, speeches will have to be brief?

Time may prove to be our keenest adversary in our efforts to complete the remaining stages of this Measure. I shall, therefore, be extremely brief.

In the Bill as originally drafted there was a Clause on chiropody services, but it was withdrawn to allow time for the drafting of a new and improved form of words. The effect of the new Clause is to require local health authorities in England, Wales and Scotland to provide the several Secretaries of States with information to be prescribed by them about chiropody services actually given to persons under the age of 65 who are chronicaly sick and/or disabled. Chiropody services are provided in England and Wales under Section 12 of the Health Services and Public Health Act, 1968, and in Scotland under Section 27 of the National Health Service (Scotland) Act, 1947, which provide general powers for preventive care and after-care services.

The latest published figures for England and Wales showed that 3,401 chiropodists—all except 422 on a part-time basis—were giving service to local health authorities or voluntary bodies acting on their behalf. Unfortunately, there were still vacancies in the establishment. Treatment was given in 1968 to 856,707 people and, of these, 807,425 were over the age of 65, many being either chronicaly sick or disabled. Of the remainder, most cases were in another priority group; that is, maternity cases. The total number of treatments was over three million.

When English and Welsh authorities were first enjoined to provide a service in 1959, the "physically handicapped" were among the priority groups to whom the authorities were invited to address themselves, but separate information about them has not since been collected. I hope that it will be accepted as desirable that this should now be done. There seems no great advantage in artificially separating the elderly into groups by illness or handicap.

The new Clause therefore relates to those under 65 and the term "chronically sick and disabled" is used to ensure that the cases covered will be sufficiently comprehensive. It will be easier, in administrative instructions, to spell out the variety of illnesses or handicaps, including mental handicap, to which reference is made.

I know from correspondence that I have had with Mr. Shipper, Secretary of the Institute of Chiropodists, and his colleagues, that they will be extremely pleased that we are now proposing to make specific reference in the Bill to chiropody services. The hon. Lady the Member for Tynemouth (Dame Irene Ward) joined me in Committee in emphasising the real importance of these services to the sick and disabled and I know that she, too, will be pleased to see the new Clause. I thank the Joint Parliamentary Secretary and his officials for all their help in a matter which is of genuine concern to many organisations which are working for the welfare of disabled people.

It is very important that the Bill should provide for information about chiropody services. A great deal of investigation and up to date administration would be very helpful. It is important that the services for these people should be adequate in all parts of the country.

The new Clause will provide very useful information. It is important that the Bill should contain special references to chiropody. The indication of the importance of the work is the fact that nearly 1 million people have been receiving over 3 million treatments. I hope that the House will feel able to accept the new Clause.

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

The idea behind the Clause is that it would be valuable to have a record of the children referred to so that effective steps can be taken for their care in the future. Children at school may develop defective hearing, eyesight, or the like, which has not been identified before and notified to the welfare authorities.

The Clause is in my name but I am not responsible for its phraseology. It is defective, in that it requires the local education authority to notify the local authority, which is the same authority. However, my hope is that its objective will be achieved by something done in another place.

I am loath to disagree with the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Stoke Newington and Hackney, North (Mr. Weitzman), with whom I have worked so closely, but it is surely a parent's duty to notify local authorities of these matters. The Clause would put on local authorities a duty to notify a disability which, strictly, should be the duty of any decent parent.

I have every sympathy with the motive behind the Clause but, as my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Stoke Newington and Hackney, North (Mr. Weitzman) has said, the wording is defective. It is not clear that one part of a local authority could be required to report to the rest of the local authority, and I believe that this defect is not susceptible to legislation. In any event, my belief is that most local authorities keep these records. Moreover, I am not sure that the Clause would achieve its objective. Its incorporation in the Bill might distract effort from what is really important, such as a regular flow of information between Departments at any time when co-operation is needed. I hope that my hon. and learned Friend will consider the matter again before the Bill reaches another place.

I recognise the difficulties, but the idea behind the Clause is important from the point of view of the various societies concerned with the welfare of the chronically sick and disabled. I therefore hope that that idea may be considered in another place. In the meantime, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Motion.

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

Many persons, to their credit, are engaged in important social work among the disabled, but the approaches of the various bodies are at present rather haphazard. It is important that their work should be examined and correlated. The Council for Training in Social Work is a statutory body established under Section 1 of the Health Visiting and Social Work (Training) Act, 1962, and it would be very valuable if this or some kindred body could undertake this work.

I share the views expressed by my hon. and learned Friend about the importance of this subject, and it is expected that the Council for Training in Social Work, which has played an important part in the past, will in the future play an increasingly central rôle. The Clause as it stands, however, presents certain difficulties and problems, one being the relationship existing between the council and other bodies involved. I want to be sure that in this or other areas covered by the Bill we do not shut away the chronically sick and disabled from ordinary life and ordinary work. We must remember that everything that affects other people affects these people also. There is hardly any form of professional or other work which is not thus, in part, work for these people.

It is not possible for me to contemplate a single body containing all the expertise required to cope with even a small part of such a wide field. I am not entirely happy about the apparent implication in the Clause as it stands that this one body would be given the duty to supervise, almost to instruct, other bodies which are doing very valuable work. That would produce very considerable difficulties among the various professions involved. One of the encouraging things is the way in which some professional jealousies and antagonisms which seemed to be the rule some years ago are now going by the board, and the people who benefit are those with whom the Bill is concerned. I could not ask one professional group to consent to being supervised by another.

I do not intend to suggest that in this connection we have not done a considerable amount, and do not intend doing more. Two years ago, my Department wrote to the postgraduate deans of medical schools emphasising the importance of the rehabilitation and resettlement of disabled persons into normal ways of life. It is our intention to keep before all those engaged in this work the importance of dealing with the special problems and difficulties facing certain sections. I can also assure my hon. and learned Friend that my Department intends reviewing—over a period, it is true, but not too long a period—the general position in order to see what practical action can be undertaken. The Clause as it stands could well be counterproductive and, perhaps, harmful.

I accept what my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary has said, but I must point out that at a recent meeting between members of the Standing Committee and the Council for the Rehabilitation of Disabled Persons I pursued the subject of disablement rehabilitation officers, who are admirable people doing extremely fine and dedicated work. From my questioning of Commander Henderson it became quite obvious that the council thought that disablement rehabilitation officers should have open to them avenues for proper training, and for secondment to a special kind of course to fit them further for this work. I trust that the Secretary of State for Employment and Productivity and my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary will bear that point in mind.

I am grateful to the Under-Secretary for what he said. I of course recognise that there are difficulties and also that an immense amount of work has been done by the Department. I was very pleased to hear the assurances my hon. Friend gave that the problem will be looked into carefully. In the circumstances, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Motion.

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

With this Clause we can also discuss New Clause 5:

"Mobility of disabled persons"

and Amendment No. 31: In page 7, line 9, leave out Clause 19.

This Clause would require my right hon. Friend to report on progress in research particularly in relation to equipment to improve mobility of disabled persons. Such equipment embraces all types of road vehicles as well as wheelchairs and limb prostheses. There is a very wide range of wheelchairs available to those who require mobility because of certain disabilities. The new, more powerful vehicle which we intend introducing in the latter part of this year would feature in such a report. It should be of particular value to haemophiliacs about whose problems I know hon. Members have been concerned. It will be of particular value to them because of the simple automatic transmission it incorporates. Because of its special design features it can cope with a wide range of disablement and offers much to the leg-disabled haemophiliac, seeing that any type of vehicle presents certain disadvantages to sufferers from haemophilia.

The Clause, which would replace Clause 19, makes the Secretary of State responsible for reporting because he is primarily concerned with research and wholly responsible for its application to the National Health Service. It limits the duty to report to work undertaken by Government because there is no power to obtain information from other sources at home or overseas. It does not preclude mention of activities elsewhere, when those responsible are willing. My Department keeps a very close watch on what is happening not only outside Government in this country, but in other parts of the world. In many respects we lead the world in this provision. It is hoped that important developments sponsored by others will be included by arrangement.

A small point in the Clause concerns not only the provision of vehicles, but the means by which people are recommended for supply of vehicles. At the moment this is a rather complex and involved matter entailing reference to a hospital consultant. Subject to consultations with the interests concerned, my right hon. Friend will be glad to give favourable consideration to an arrangement by which recommendations for the supply of wheeled chairs and powered vehicles could be accepted from general practitioners and local authority doctors as well as, or instead of, hospital consultants. This might be of considerable significance because for many of these patients it is difficult to make a special journey to hospital for a consultation and then to be examined by my Department. These difficulties are very real. If we are able to make this small advance, it will be of great help.

I do not want to open up the whole question of vehicles for disabled drivers, but I thank the Under-Secretary for what he has said about the recommendations which I am sure will be of great help. I am sure that the new three-wheelers which are coming out are better than the old and particularly useful for haemophiliacs, but a four-wheeler is much more stable in rough wind and bad weather.

I hope that there will be no censorship by the Secretary of State of reports coming from other Ministries. I hope that he will so organise reports that they can be printed absolutely without censorship and that on reports from the Ministries of Technology and Transport there will be no "fiddling".

I welcome the approach made by my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary to this problem. One of the difficulties which has faced those who have been working in this field has been a lack of information and knowledge. Although we shall have a report, it is a feature of this House that we have reports and do not debate them. I should like there to be a situation in which we have a report about equipment for disabled and debate it annually. That would enable publicity to be given in the Press and it would probably enable voluntary societies which have worked so well with us on this Bill to use the information contained in the report and spread it among their members.

My hon. Friend said that it was not possible to get information from outside sources. Mr. Duncan Guthrie, of the National Fund for Research into Crippling Diseases, has signed a report on research and development for the disabled. It would be useful if the Department, in addition to its own activities, could take account of the work done by such voluntary societies.

I emphasise the last two points which have been made particularly about the work done within the Department and the large amount of work in hospital units for rehabilitation. The Department has not published the studies, however. I wish to make sure that there is full coverage within the hospital services.

The New Clause—"Priority seats for chronically sick and disabled persons"—to which I put my name, has not been selected. I should like to know whether the effect of the Clause which we are debating can have impact on the Ministry of Transport with reference to public transport. There is considerable trouble for the perhaps less seriously disabled in using public transport. This matter should be looked into carefully.

Will the new vehicle be available for war disabled?

I assure my hon. Friend the Member for Willesden, West (Mr. Pavitt) that we are very conscious of the need to co-ordinate information available from various sources. I take the point which he made.

On the question of information from overseas and non-Governmental information raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Eccles (Mr. Carter-Jones), all I intended to say was that my right hon. Friend has no power to obtain such information but this does not mean that we shall not attempt, and probably succeed, in obtaining it. We have no power to obtain information from private organisations in the way in which we can obtain it here for the Government machine.

Would my hon. Friend be prepared to accept information from voluntary associations before producing a Report each year?

I should be prepared to consider any information put before us from any responsible source such as the voluntary organisations.

The hon. Member for Aldershot (Sir E. Errington) asked me about new Clause 4, which has not been selected. It covers a rather different subject. New Clause 6 deals with equipment designed to improve the mobility of disabled persons.

rose—

Order. The hon. Member for Aldershot (Sir E. Errington) must not pursue the Clause, which I have not selected. I allowed him to refer to it delicately.

With respect, Sir, I was only going to ask a question about the less seriously disabled. The Under-Secretary did not answer that point.

I attempted to answer the question. As I understand it, the problem which is concerning the hon. Gentleman is rather different from that which we are discussing on new Clause 6. However, if he has a special point on which he would like to write to me about transport facilities for disabled persons, whether they be less seriously or more seriously disabled, I should be willing to look into it.

The hon. Member for Leominster (Sir Clive Bossom) raised the question of the provision of the new vehicle for the war disabled. It is hoped that this new vehicle will eventually replace the three-wheelers which are being provided to disabled drivers, whether they be civilian-or war-disabled. I am sure that we shall look seriously at the problems, not only of the civilian disabled, but especially of the war disabled. We have always given special consideration to this group. They will certainly be considered for the issue of the new vehicle as and when it becomes available.

I suggest that with this new Clause we discuss new Clause 17—"Access to, and facilities, at, premises open to the public"—and the following Amendments: No. 16, in page 3, line 35, leave out Clause 6.

No. 17, in line 37, leave out from '1936' to end of line 41 and insert:

'shall have the duty, in considering the design of those premises, and in particular the parking facilities to be available, the sanitary facilities to be provided and the means of access both to and within the premises to make provision, so far as practicable, for the needs of disabled persons visiting those premises'.

No. 18, in line 42, leave out Clause 7.

No. 20, in page 4, line 5, leave out Clause 8.

All of these Amendments deal with the same topic in a variety of ways.

I beg to move, that

"Local planning authorities, when considering planning applications under the Town and Country Planning Acts 1962 to 1968"—

Order. Perhaps the hon. and learned Gentleman would move that the Clause in his name be read a Second time. He need not read the whole of the new Clause. We all have a copy of it before us.

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

I was reading the terms of the Clause to explain exactly what it provides. In my view, Mr. Speaker, it is essential that I do this. The Clause deals with the requirement

"for the erection of buildings to be used for the accommodation, refreshment or entertain- ment of the public, shall, in the event of planning permission being granted make such grants subject to a condition that the applicant so far as practicable makes provisions for suitable access, sanitary and parking facilities and accommodation for disabled persons under the circumstances make it impracticable or unreasonable for such provision to be made."

Everyone will recognise that in places and buildings provided for the public, particularly for refreshment and entertainment, libraries, museums and art galleries, it is a great handicap for the disabled where there is no suitable access or where there are no sanitary or parking facilities. It is time that something more was done about providing such facilities.

The Clause would impose upon local planning authorities the duty of giving real consideration to this point and ensuring that the conditions where practicable, were met. I am glad to say that the Ministry of Housing and Local Government has recognised the force of this demand; and the Joint Parliamentary Secretary has readily responded by tabling new Clause 17. I shall take a certain course about that: it is an excellent Clause, which goes even beyond the requirements of my Clause. I take it that some discussion will take place on this Clause to show how very necessary a provision of this kind is.

Mr. Speaker, will you guide me as to the procedure?

The hon. Gentleman can speak fully about new Clause 17, which we are discussing with new Clause 9. The same issues arise on both Clauses. There are differences which the hon. Gentleman will no doubt point out.

I am not certain at what point I move new Clause 17 formally.

Order. The hon. Gentleman will move new Clause 17 formally at its proper place on the Order Paper.

Perhaps I can now proceed with what I was about to say.

I will repeat briefly what I said in Committee about the planning Clause. Without going into a great deal of detail, I indicated in Committee that there were difficulties in seeking to make planning law applicable to special classes of the community and that there were also difficulties in that planning law did not concern itself, except in a general sense in relation to the control of the design of buildings, with the detailed layout of the interior of buildings but more with matters of land use, siting, density, and relationship to other buildings—in other words, the general external relationships of buildings as well as their use.

It will, therefore, be difficult and almost ultra vires to build into planning law these proposals, whatever the objective of my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Stoke Newington and Hackney, North (Mr. Weitzman). I will not go into further detail now, because my views on this were set on the record when we discussed this question in Committee.

However, as my hon. and learned Friend has said, I did not object to the proposal in so far as its intention goes, and I do not do so now. In Committee I undertook to look further at this point, as well as at other matters which were raised in Committee and which were related to it. It was for this reason that I was able to table new Clause 17. Had there been a lengthier period open to me in the Department prior to the presentation of the Bill and its going to Standing Committee, it is likely that something like new Clause 17 would have been produced earlier. I am merely recapitulating the circumstances, not being in any way critical. I am enthusiastically in support of the general intentions of the Bill, as my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Wythenshawe (Mr. Alfred Morris) appreciates.

As a result of the situation, one dealt with a number of factors as they emerged and sought to introduce effective new Clauses in Committee. On further consideration of the point relating to planning aspects in the design of the building and the coverage we were seeking to make, however, I have found in the Department that it is easier, more comprehensive, more specific, and more effective, to have one Clause dealing with all these matters—that is, the question of access to and within buildings for the disabled; the proper provision of sanitary conveniences within buildings and accessability to them; the provision of parking facilities; and the duties being imposed on all persons in the community, whether they be local authorities, statutory bodies, or private persons, in relation to facilities they are providing which are available to the public. I decided that all these matters could be covered more effectively by this much more Comprehensive Clause. It is tabled with the intention of making it clearer and more effective to achieve the objectives that we are seeking.

Clause 6 places a duty on any persons providing premises covered by Section 89 of the Public Health Act, 1936—that is, inns, restaurants and so on—to have regard, so far as is practicable, to the needs of disabled persons when providing sanitary conveniences in those buildings.

Clause 7 places a similar duty on public bodies when erecting buildings to which the public will have access. Clause 8 places a wider duty on local authorities; in considering the design of any of their buildings to which the public is to be admitted they must take account of the needs of the disabled in relation not only to sanitary facilities but also to means of access to and within the building and parking facilities.

As I undertook to do in Committee, we considered the possibility of strengthening and extending these provisions by introducing a positive obligation to make provision for the needs of the disabled in place of the duty which I suggested originally in my Clauses, merely to have regard to such needs, and also by applying car parking and access requirements to all buildings visited by the public, whether provided by local authorities or other persons.

The new Clause seeks to deal with the considerations which we discussed in Committee and with which I was in sympathy. Since no distinction is to be made as to the sort of facilities which would be provided, it is unnecessary to have separate Clauses dealing with different types of providers of buildings. In the private sector it would be illogical to single out restaurants and licensed premises as opposed to other buildings regularly visited by the public; such as shops, supermarkets and so on. Hence, the new Clause is drafted to apply to anyone undertaking the provision of a building or premises to which the public will have access. This would apply to both new construction and to the conversion of existing buildings.

Another undertaking I gave in Committee—I repeated it on several occasions—was in relation to advice on the design of buildings. In Committee I referred to the fact that the Ministry had already given advice in a circular issued in cooperation with the Department of Health and Social Security. That circular, issued in 1965, drew the attention of local authorities to a pamphlet outlining the practice already adopted by the Ministry of Public Building and Works in the design of new Government buildings.

The circular is still extant and suggests that authorities should where appropriate, ensure that the needs set out in the pamphlet are taken into account in the planning of their public buildings. At the same time local authorities were requested to bring the pamphlet to the notice of private developers in appropriate cases; where, for example, they approached local authorities about their requirements under the building byelaws or regulations. Another circular, 33/68, deals in detail with the design of public conveniences with facilities for the disabled. Both circulars have been useful in these matters.

As I indicated in Committee, we have had the fullest co-operation of the statutory bodies in recent years, and I instanced some examples of the work done in this context at new railway stations and airports in line with the advice we have given in the circulars.

It is fair to say that, in view of the advent of the Bill and in the light of my new Clause, which has a more comprehensive approach to these matters, we should review the form which our advice has taken and consider whether we can circulate information more effectively to local authorities and within the Government to ensure that the principles we are seeking to achieve in the Bill to assist the disabled will be introduced wherever it is practicable and reasonable to do so.

I hope that the House will accept that my approach in the new Clause is more effective than the approaches put on the Order Paper in other forms.

rose—

Order. I remind hon. Members who have recently entered the Chamber of what I said at the beginning of our proceedings today; namely, that we have a lot of work to get through and that I hope that speeches will be brief.

New Clause No. 17 contains the phrase

"Any person undertaking the provision of…"

The Minister said that that meant new construction or conversions. That is not clear from a reading of the proposal and I fear that, to the layman, this provision will seem ambiguous.

It will be right to emphasise in the circular, which I gather is to be sent out, that shops and other places to which the public is admitted should have provision made for the disabled. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will agree that, particularly in respect of sanitary conveniences, while those providing hotel and catering facilities may rightly be more stringently required to provide these facilities than, say, a small shopkeeper, some people may become nervous about the meaning of the new Clause, perhaps thinking that these sort of facilities must be provided in a small shop.

I welcome the new Clause and one can hardly conceive of a matter more important to disabled persons than this, as hon. Members are aware from the representations made to them by their constituents.

What is the effective sanction in new Clause 17? Is it to be just a homily on the Statute Book or will there be some way to enforce it? The advantage of the new Clause standing in the name of my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Stoke Newington and Hackney, North (Mr. Weitzman) is that it would contain a built-in enforcement procedure by tying the provision to planning law.

Does the Minister mean that if a planning authority sought to impose a planning condition so as to give effect to new Clause 17, that condition would be ultra vires, unenforceable? In consideraing the best way to achieve enforcement, we are not asking for penal sanctions but an administrative procedure to ensure that the provision works.

When the hon. Gentleman said that his new Clause would apply to conversions and the construction of new premises, I take it that he was referring only to conversions where a premises which is not at present open to the public is converted to a different user, so that the public is admitted. However, if a building is already open to the public—for example, a shop—and a conversion of the building is made, will that be covered by the Clause?

I, too, welcome new Clause 17, which is designed to replace several new Clauses to which I had tabled Amendments. I am grateful to the Minister for explaining his proposal so clearly and I agree that it is a comprehensive new Clause which covers all the objectives I had in mind in my Amendments.

All hon. Members are anxious that provision for accessibility should be extended as widely as possible to all public buildings, not only so that disabled people may visit them as customers but that some of them may seek employment in them. I therefore welcome the breadth of the new Clause and thank the Minister for having given further consideration to substituting the words "make provision for" for the original phrase "having regard to". This strengthens the provision.

While appreciating the Minister's argument in favour of new Clause 17, as against new Clause 9, I think that the House would be failing in its duty if it did not make it clear that we should regard new Clause 17 as defective if it did not constitute a planning requirement. There are obviously severe limitations on what can be done in converting existing buildings to make them ideally suitable for access for disabled persons. These limitations obviously do not exist in the case of new buildings being designed and planned. These are the buildings which are open to examination by local authorities and by welfare authorities and which particularly have the needs of disabled persons in mind. It seems to me that if we call any structure which does not have suitable means of access for disabled persons a public building, that is tantamount to saying that a disabled person is not a member of the public, and that should be an intolerable proposition for the House to consider.

New Clause 17, which my hon. Friend intends to move formally, represents the view of all of us who considered the Bill in Committee and is a major step forward for disabled persons in this country. It is an attempt to normalise the lives of those who are disabled. I hope that the House will accept that my hon. Friend the Joint Parliamentary Secretary of State has been of enormous help to the sponsors of the Bill in matters of drafting. I know that it was his intention to make this Clause as effective as it can possibly be in terms of opening the doors for disabled people. As the same time, I know that he will have taken carefully into account all that has been said by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Stoke Newington and Hackney, North (Mr. Weitzman) and my hon. Friend the Member for Barrow-in-Furness (Mr. Booth).

We warmly congratulate the Minister on the efforts which he has made to get a comprehensive and satisfactory Clause. I want to put on record that I fel that this is just the beginning and that there will be imposed upon the Minister—who presumably will take the lead, as it is his Department which will instruct the local authorities who will have to try to implement the new Clause—a tremendous amount of work. We are very grateful to him for having undertaken this. But an enormous burden is imposed if we are to achieve what is desired by the new Clause.

I should have liked to see much more detail in the new Clause, but it is a beginning. But I should like to put on record that it is only a beginning and that it will have to be pursued in many directions before it becomes a satisfactory basis for dealing with what the Committee wants to achieve for the benefit of the disabled. That does not mean to say that I am in any way critical of the Clause, because I think that the Minister has done very well to produce a Clause. But one must think of the difficulties of the disabled at airports, for example, where the toilet facilities are often situated a long way and involve a great amount of walking even by people who are in possession of their limbs. The same applies to railways. I congratulate the Minister but I hope that he is aware that he will have to fill in a great deal of detail before the Clause can operate satisfactorily.

If I may have leave, Mr. Speaker, I wish to make some observations on the points which have been put to me. The first point raised was the anxiety that the new Clause, being so comprehensive and more wide ranging in its applicability to providers of buildings, might produce difficulties for small shopkeepers, restaurant owners and café owners. That point was discussed in Committee and I appreciate it. While we are seeking to have a much more effective practice introduced to help the disabled, we do not want to create a situation in which there is unfairness for the small shopkeeper, restaurateur and the like. The new Clause uses the term

"in so far as it is in the circumstances both practicable and reasonable".

This is one of the reasons why that phrase was used, and the element of reasonableness refers, among other matters, to elements of cost. It would be a matter to be sorted out between the local authority and the person concerned if there were difficulty on that score.

Another aspect is that if, for example, a shop or a café were next door to some public facilities which could equally well be used, it would be unreasonable in many circumstances to enforce the introduction of facilities because the cost would he unreasonable. That is the kind of example which we had in mind and that is why I put that phrase in the new Clause.

I was asked about the meaning of "conversion". "Conversion" means not just an alteration from one type of use to another. That is covered by the phrase "change of use". "Conversion" also includes turning a small café into a big café or a small shop into a large supermarket by taking over several premises. "Conversion" means conversion of all kinds and not just "change of use".

A point was made—and it is important—about enforcement. First, the Clause goes beyond the planning requirements and seeks to cover all requirements. As I indicated earlier, the first and main difficulty is that planning law does not distinguish persons; it distinguishes only in respect of different kinds of use of buildings and special classes of buildings. The other difficulty to which I referred was the distinction between planning control which is broadly applicable to the land use and external planning and design of buildings as distinct from the detailed internal arrangements. There has always been some difficulty legally in interpreting this in a theoretical sense but in practice it would be open—as I understand it—to a local authority to take matters of this kind into account when it had applications before it.

I undertake in looking at the Circular and the advice which we will need to consider, following the introduction of the Bill, personally to ensure that we look carefully at the aspect of the advice and not just the design aspect so that there will be some kind of sensible administration by local authorities and so that we do not get departmentalisation, with planning applications being dealt with separately and other procedures for other purposes. In this way we can meet the kind of difficulties and anxieties about which concern has been expressed.

May I join in saying how grateful we all are to the Parliamentary Secretary for putting down what is a good and effective Amendment. I recognise the criticism which has been made. I am glad to have the assurance that it will be looked into. In those circumstances, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Motion.

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

Section 3(1) of the Parliamentary Commissioner Act, 1967, reads,

"The Commissioner may appoint such officers as he may determine with the approval of the Treasury as to numbers and conditions of service."

My new Clause seeks to add

"and one such officer shall deal specifically with complaints affecting chronically sick and disabled persons as defined by this Act".

We all recognise how valuable is the work done by the Ombudsman, but his powers are limited in a number of ways. For example, he cannot deal with complaints about the health and welfare services of the hospitals or with complaints about local authorities. My new Clause does not seek to remedy that but it will enable the Ombudsman to deal specifically with complaints which emanate from chronically sick and disabled persons. They might not be large in number but it is felt that these claims ought to be dealt with in some special way.

I know that the Government have said that they propose that a local government commissioner shall he appointed to deal with complaints about local authorities, but that still leaves the problems with which my Clause seeks to deal. I draw attention to it because it is felt by the associations connected with the chronically sick and disabled that their complaints ought to be dealt with specifically.

I warmly welcome the Clause, which was initiated by Mr. Duncan Guthrie of the Central Council for the Disabled. I welcome it because it makes provision for a special category for the disabled, and if there is one section of the community which requires the special attention of a Parliamentary Commissioner it is the chronically sick and disabled.

My only regret about the Clause is that it specifies "one … officer". I should like to place on record my hope that if the demand is as great as I think it may be, the one officer will be regarded as a minimum and there will be a possibility of other officers being appointed to look into what I regard as the wide range to be covered.

I therefore welcome the Clause and express the hope that it is only the beginning of investigations into the special complaints of disabled people.

I find myself in some difficulty in speaking to the new Clause because I am privileged to sit on the committee which is allied with the work of the Parliamentary Com- missioner. While I see the advantage to the disabled of the provisions of the Clause, I doubt very much whether the present terms under which the Parliamentary Commissioner operates would enable the Clause to be effective.

The Parliamentary Commissioner's job is to deal with complaints relating to maladministration. The new Clause would cover complaints in respect of local authorities, public bodies and individuals who have not acted to relieve the position of the disabled, and I doubt whether that would be included in the term "maladministration". It might include lack of judgment or a failure to meet the needs of the disabled, possibly because some request had been refused, but it does not necessarily follow that there would have been maladministration. It is an ingenious Clause which attracts my heart, but I do not know that it attracts my head.

The matter has never been brought before our committee, nor have I had the advantage of hearing the Parliamentary Commissioner's views on the Clause. The Parliamentary Commissioner has had very great success in the way in which he has handled some of the problems which have been legitimately presented to him, and it may be that the time is coming when we should reconsider his terms of reference. That would perhaps be a more suitable opportunity to widen the powers of the Parliamentary Commissioner, and we could include in a Bill dealing with that matter a new Clause along the lines of that under discussion.

I feel in an awkward position in having to comment on the Clause, but I do not see how it could be brought within the meaning of the term "maladministration". Perhaps someone who is interested in the new Clause would explain that point to me. I am not at all certain that the Clause does not ask the Parliamentary Commissioner to undertake work which it would not be within his power to undertake. In any event, it might be possible to seek his advice. If he thought it right to include this new Clause in the Bill, it could be introduced in another place after we had had the opportunity of a discussion of the subject with the appropriate committee and the Parliamentary Commissioner.

My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Stoke Newington and Hackney, North (Mr. Weitzman) drew attention to the fact that it is intended to overcome the difficulty that the Ombudsman cannot investigate local authority matters. I hope that the Minister will look at the Clause from the point of view that the whole question of complaints by sick people—not only the chronically sick—is under very serious consideration by the Government.

The Standing Committee has been anxious not to make a separate category of the disabled and chronic sick—to have compassion for their problems but not to label them or to put them into categories separate from other people. We therefore hope that when the Minister considers the Clause he will keep in mind the need for every citizen to be entitled to have complaints dealt with on all questions affecting health.

It is useful that we are having a short debate on the new Clause, which has drawn attention to the value of the work which has been performed in recent years by the Parliamentary Commissioner. As my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Stoke Newington and Hackney, North (Mr. Weitzman) said, that work is limited in some respects.

The new Clause would specifically give the Parliamentary Commissioner power to appoint one officer to deal with complaints affecting the chronically sick and disabled. The Clause is technically defective in one respect, in that it refers to sick and disabled persons

"as defined by this Act".

The phrase "this Act" means the Parliamentary Commissioner Act, 1967, which, in fact, does not define sick and disabled persons.

But the defect which I find in looking at the Clause is more than just technical. I am prepared to receive communications from hon. Members on the subject, but we have no evidence that chronically sick and disabled people are at any disadvantage or face any particular difficulty in respect of having their cases referred to the Parliamentary Commissioner by hon. Members. There is no evidence which would warrant singling out this group of persons for special treatment. The problems which the chronically sick and disabled may face tend to fall outside the remit of the Parliamentary Commissioner as it is at present defined.

Complaints one would anticipate would often concern the health and welfare services of the local health authorities and the hospitals and other services in the National Health Service. There are accepted means by which complaints of this sort can be investigated, and consideration is being given to alterations or extensions of the means by which complaints can be investigated. The Government have announced that a local government commissioner will be appointed to look into complaints concerning local authority services. As my hon. Friend the Member for Willesden, West (Mr. Pavitt) has said, the Green Paper on the future structure of the Health Services promises consultations with professional and other interested bodies about the possibilities of establishing a health commissioner in the reformed N.H.S.

These two possibilities obviously cover a large proportion of the area of particular concern to the chronically sick and disabled. It would be premature for us to consider making special legislative provisions in the Bill to handle these complaints at the very moment when consultations on more far-reaching proposals are in hand. I endorse the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Willesden, West that we do not want to single out particular groups of people, more especially the chronic sick and disabled, any more than we have to. The Act under which the Parliamentary Commissioner operates does not specify the type of people whose complaints are to be examined. If we were to amend it and to specify that a particular group of complaints should be examined it would mean that other classes of complaint would be left out and a distinction made.

We have deliberately put no limitation on the type of people who may bring a complaint to the Parliamentary Commissioner, through their Member for Parliament, and no preference should be given to one complainant over another. When those who are disabled and chronically sick think about this I am sure that they will not want any preference, but will want to be in the same position as others. It is essential that we should maintain this absence of preference between one group and another. It is an essential part of the fairness of the Parliamentary Commissioner system which I think hon. Members on both sides would agree is by and large working satisfactorily. I hope, having put these points, that my hon. Friend will feel able to withdraw his new Clause.

I recognise the difficulties that this new Clause involves. I would say to the hon. Lady the Member for Tynemouth (Dame Irene Ward) that there was no intention of getting round the limitations of the Parliamentary Commissioner. This new Clause deals with complaints of the chronically sick and disabled, which lie within the present powers of the Parliamentary Commissioner with regard to maladministration. I am impressed by the fact that the Central Council for the Disabled is very anxious to have a power of this kind inserted because it feels that such complaints should be specifically dealt with.

With the leave of the House, perhaps I could take up the point made by my hon. and learned Friend. If he would approach me and put the evidence before me which suggests that the chronic sick and disabled have been treated in any way differently from the community at large in respect of cases going to the Parliamentary Commissioner I will be pleased to look into this. As the new Clause stands, it will not help the situation, and there are technical difficulties.

I hope that we shall keep the new Clause. It is no reflection on the Parliamentary Commissioner but simply a recognition that the chronically sick and disabled have special problems. My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Stoke-Newington and Hackney, North (Mr. Weitzman) is quite right to move it. It makes no difference whatever to the existing responsibilities of the Parliamentary Commissioner. What it does is to encourage disabled people to make complaints, which they tend not to do because they lack the confidence. This new Clause will be a definite incentive to the chronic sick and disabled, and I hope that it will be passed.

rose—

Order. We are not in Committee. We do not want a series of speeches, even from the mover of the new Clause.

I shall be glad to accede to what my hon. Friend has said, but there is great insistence that this new Clause ought to be included and the Government could perhaps look in another place at the difficulties. As there is no certainty about this, I shall have to press it.

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

I am anxious not to delay or disrupt the smooth passage of this excellent Bill. The suggestion that a disablement commission should be set up to keep under review the financial needs of the disabled has had a somewhat chequered career. Two attempts were made to introduce such a Measure, first by the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent (Mr. Ashley) and a little later by my hon. Friend the Member for Moray and Nairn (Mr. Gordon Campbell), who I am glad to see is with us today.

It is no secret that the Bill originally included a similar provision in its original draft but that was later dropped because it proved to be controversial. This clause is of a non party, character having strong support from all three parties. There is little doubt that on a free vote it would be likely to be carried by a large majority. Based on my Bill, which is due for a Second Reading today, the new Clause is supported in spirit, if not in the strict letter, by all the sponsors of my Bill, including the right hon. Member for Llanelly (Mr. James Griffiths) who has written me a note saying that he is sorry that he is not able to be here today because he is not fit. He says:

"Dear Tufton, I wish I could be there to support your Bill."

I have also had a note from the hon. Member for Liverpool, Kirkdale, (Mr. Dunn) who has his name on the new Clause and who would like to have been here today.

To my deep regret and for reasons which I cannot fully fathom, the Government are determined yet again to block this proposal. I do not intend to divide the House on this new Clause—party politics should have as small a place as possible in the way in which this House approaches the problems of the disabled. The last thing I wish to do is to inject any unnecessary controversy into our discussions.

When poverty is coupled with severe disability, life can often be intolerable. When a man—or woman—is unable to earn at all or to earn only a nominal income, and so cannot afford those things which make life more than a question of survival, there is precious little pleasure, or self-respect either. A few flowers, new clothes, a small present to thank a neighbour for being kind, a book, a glass of beer to offer to a friend, these are some of the small things which mean so much to those who are denied so many of the joys which most of us take for granted.

The Government have based their refusal to accept this proposal mainly on the ground that the National Superannuation and Social Insurance Bill goes some considerable way towards meeting the financial needs of the disabled, and indeed it does. Certainly it is a stride forward, but the Minister of State, Department of Health and Social Security, had to admit in Committee that the constant attendance allowance would not benefit a large number of people who need it, and he reiterated this in a long letter to me explaining why the Government were opposed to my Clause.

Whether a disability arises from war service, an accident at work, or in a car crash or whether it is congenital, or caused by illness such as multiple sclerosis, is irrelevant in considering how much financial help is needed. Yet at the present time there are ten—no, hundreds—of thousands of severely disabled and chronically sick, many of them housewives struggling against great odds to keep their homes going, who are left out of every financial benefit scheme.

That is why I strongly urge the Government to think again about the merits of the Clause which is complementary to this Bill. The Clause is simple and self-explanatory. It is also, I suggest, eminently sensible. It seeks to establish a commission of not fewer than four, and not more than six members, on an unpaid voluntary basis. They would keep under continuous review all pensions and benefits for the disabled, whether payable under Act of Parliament or Royal Warrant, and report every two years to the Chancellor of the Exchequer and to the Secretary of State for Social Services. The Chancellor of the Exchequer would be bound to lay that report before both Houses of Parliament within a month of receiving it.

No doubt other hon. Members, as I do, often hear of cases where useful citizens are rendered more helpless and unhappy, and more costly to public funds than they need be, or wish to be. I had an example of this only two days ago in a letter from the Chairman of the League of Friends of Hellingly Mental Hospital just outside my constituency. They are trying to get patients out of hospitals into a half-way house between hospital and a fully independent life, in a Group House as they call it, financed by voluntary subscription and run largely by voluntary effort.

It is one of a number of highly promising experiments all over the country. It has only just started. Out of six ex-patients, all with a history of 20 years in hospital, two have returned to work. Their constant worry in this experiment is money. Whereas it costs at least £18 a week to keep a patient at Hellingly Mental Hospital—I should have thought that it would have been more—the allowance under Social Security regulations to live out is only £6 11s. a week, of which £2 10s. has to go on rent, leaving only £4 1s. for heating, lighting, clothes, food, other expenses, pocket money, and so on. One is left wondering how many more thousands of patients in hospital could be discharged if only homes such as that one could be made available for them. This really is a case where parsimony does not pay, and I am sure that it can be multiplied, nation wide hundreds of times.

It is in ways like this that an independent commission could shed some badly needed light on a problem clouded with confusion, and sometimes by a lot of muddled thinking. Unlike a Departmental inquiry, which is provided for in the National Superannuation and Social Insurance Bill, the commission would view impartially the financial needs of the disabled, no matter how the disability arose, and without any distinction whatsoever between one group and another. As the Financial Times said yesterday in an excellent editorial:

"…there is still some way to go before we can say that the chronically sick and disabled are cared for in a way that they ought to be in a wealthy, advanced industrial society."

I would add that there is still a long way to go—and this was a point made once by the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South (Mr. Ashley)—before we catch up with practice in most countries in free Europe.

Let us not sweep the financial worries of the disabled under the carpet. Let us bring them out into the glare of publicity, so that whatever party is in power will be under constant pressure to do what is right, instead of what is, all too often, in the short-term expedient. Passing this Clause would have just that effect. Let us pass it today. I beg the Government to have a change of heart.

I support the case made by my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Lewes (Sir T. Beamish). What particularly attracts me about the Clause is that it ensures that the financial needs of the chronically sick and disabled are looked at automatically every two years. In recent years I have got the impression that, under both Governments, it has become policy for pensions for the disabled Service pensions, and all kinds of pensions, to be looked at in the context of a two-year period. Certainly the pensions for the Services have come within this category as a result of many debates in the House.

It seems to me that it would be helpful to all those who are interested in the chronically sick and disabled to know that, arising out of the appointment of this type of commission, there will be an automatic examination, so that no Government can say that they would very much like to have a debate and consider the situation, but parliamentary time does not permit. If there is an obligation on Parliament to consider an issue at specific times, this must be helpful to those whose cause we are trying to promote.

So often Ministers, in all Departments, want to help sections of the community for whom they are responsible, but behind the scenes they get no support from the Chancellor of the Exchequer. We know how difficult it is for Ministers who have a real interest in progress to defend the lack of progress without saying that they have spent quite a long time trying to bring the Chancellor of the Exchequer round to their way of thinking. If they lose the battle behind the scenes, in public they have—to make it look as though it is their decision, and I think that part of the good side of the Clause is that the Chancellor of the Exchequer will not be empowered to interfere with what Parliament has decided to do for this special section of the community.

I am glad that the hon. and gallant Member for Lewes (Sir T. Beamish) has moved this Clause, which I greatly welcome. As he implied, it is based on a Motion which I put to the House some two years ago. I am strongly in favour of the concept of a disablement income commission, because in the long run it will improve the economic standard of disabled people. I make no secret of the fact that I regard such a commission as an instrument which would lead to the payment of a disablement income to all disabled people, particularly disabled housewives. I regard it as an instrument for removing some of the many anomalies between the industrially disabled and the "civilian" disabled.

However, I am glad that the hon. and gallant Member does not intend to press the Clause. That does not show any lack of enthusiasm for the concept. If this proposal had been made in a separate Bill and not in a Clause of this, I would have voted against the Government if necessary and on future occasions I will, as I did on the last occasion. But this is not a concept which has come only from hon. Members opposite. It is not a political issue. Throughout our discussion of the Bill, hon. Members opposite—the hon. Member for Banbury (Mr. Martin), the hon. Member for Newbury (Mr. Astor), and their colleagues—have shown a firm determination to refuse to make party politics out of the Bill, and I am sure that they agree with me that there are no party politics in the matter.

But I am glad that the Clause is to be withdrawn, because the Bill is not the place to press it. My hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Wythenshawe (Mr. Alfred Morris) had the Clause in his original Bill but he withdrew it partly on an assurance of the Government that some of its consequences would be embodied in the National Superannuation and Social Insurance Bill, which is now before the House. However, I am delighted that the hon. and gallant Member has been able to deploy an argument which I warmly support.

As the new Clause is based on a Bill of mine in the last Session, I should like to add my support to what my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Lewes (Sir T. Beamish) has said. My Bill was based in turn on a Bill introduced by the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South (Mr. Ashley) less than two years ago under the Ten-Minute Rule procedure. Because the Government then seemed to give it support, I was encouraged to go ahead with my Bill. I was surprised when it ran into opposition from the Government more than a year ago.

But the pressure which we and our colleagues on both sides of the House have managed to generate in this way has led to some results inasmuch as there is something in the Government's National Superannuation and Social Insurance Bill; and Clauses 9–15 of this Bill will ensure that there are representatives on various advisory committees with special knowledge of the problems of the disabled. We may say that some attention has been paid to the matters which we were pressing and that there has been some progress.

However, we should still have liked to have had a disablement commission, because the financial side is not covered by the Clauses 9–15. I am sorry that the Government do not agree with our preference for a disablement commission, but at least some progress has been made.

The Clause would do one extremely useful thing—it would bring together the Treasury and the Department of Social Security. Whatever happens to the Clause, the problem will remain, and I hope that hon. Members on both sides of the House will continue to press for the tripartite approach—the two Government Departments concerned and the people affected.

It is high time that the Government appointed a Minister with sole responsibility for the chronically sick. If we can have a Minister for Sport, we can have a Minister charged with that responsibility. We now have nine Ministers concerned with the problem. It is possible for the Minister for Sport to move from Department to Department while still keeping overall responsibility for sport, and it ought to be possible with this much more important subject of the chronically sick and disabled for the Government to take action along the lines urged in the Clause.

I hope that in his reply the Under-Secretary will take up the point which has just been made by the hon. Member for Willesden, West (Mr. Pavitt).

In some way, the Clause is not an addition to the principle of the Bill as Clauses 9 to 15 to some extent deal with representation on the bodies which will decide pensions among other things, but it is an addition to the general thinking in that it implies that civil disability should have the same status in cash benefits as any other form of disability.

I hope that the Under-Secretary will comment on the idea of a special commission to make expert recommendations to the Chancellor of the Exchequer. This would not commit the Chancellor or force him to do what the commission recommended, but careful study is needed to show the relative effectiveness of cash benefits and other forms of care for the people concerned.

There may be a conflict between the other Ministries and the Treasury, but it should be remembered that in some cases this proposal would result in a net saving over a period, rather than any increase in cost to the taxpayer, and at the same time it would provide benefits and help to the disabled.

The Clause would make a good Bill even better. As the commission would be permanent and reporting every two years, with attendant publicity and opportunity for debate, it would be a further psychological encouragement to the disabled, and for that reason above all others I hope that the Government will have second thoughts.

I would like to confirm what my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South (Mr. Ashley) said. At the proof stage of my Bill there was provision for such a commission. The two Clauses that have been transferred to my right hon. Friend's National Superannuation and Social Insurance Bill were Clauses 11 and 30 of the original Bill. Clause 11 said:

"The Secretary of State shall establish an advisory council of not more than twelve persons to supervise the administration of an attendance allowance for the severely disabled and to advise on its extension to other categories of disabled persons".

Clause 30 sought to make special provisions to help the wives of men who have been drawing sickness benefit for more than 28 weeks. It concerned the earnings rule which applies to the wife of a man who is long-term sick.

It has been useful that we should have a short debate on this subject, which has been aired in the House on occasions over a number of years. It was my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South (Mr. Ashley) who first raised it, and I think that we can say that the very fact that he did so is one of the reasons why we see provisions being made in Government legislation which to a considerable extent cover the field the Clause is intended to cover. I am inclined to agree with my hon. Friend, who implied that the Bill before us, being a Private Member's Bill is perhaps not the appropriate vehicle to bring forward these suggestions, whatever their rights and wrongs.

I was asked about distinctions that may or may not be made between the civilian disabled and the remainder. The present Government, like previous Governments, give special consideration to the war-disabled in view of their service to the country. I understand that the Opposition accept this policy, and I do not think that hon. Members on either side of the House would want it to be otherwise. This does not mean that we are not very conscious of the problems of disabled as a whole, irrespective of the origin of their disablement, whether a congenital abnormality or one acquired in an industrial or other accident. But there is the special group of those who have been disabled in the service of their country in the Armed Forces.

The new Clause would establish a commission with two main functions. The first would be to review the level of pensions and benefits for the disabled. However, this will be the statutory duty of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State under Clauses 36 and 37 of the National Superannuation and Social Insurance Bill. This duty covers the whole range of insurance benefits for all insured people, including the disabled, and I think that this will meet the hon. and gallant Gentleman's point. These Clauses of that Bill provide for up-rating at two-yearly intervals and for the Secretary of State to lay a draft Order before Parliament at least to maintain the real value of benefits. I hope that this will be a reason why hon. Members on both sides will support that exceedingly valuable Bill when they next have an opportunity.

The second function proposed in the Amendment for the commission is that of making recommendations about changes or additions to the existing system of benefits for disabled people. This is not covered in the National Superannuation and Social Insurance Bill. It is not a rôle that any Government could delegate. That Bill contains proposals for two new benefits for the sick and disabled—attendance allowance and invalidity pension. Changes like this, and of this order, could not and should not be made dependent on the initiative of an independent, part-time commission. I do not think that hon. Members, on reflection, would see that to be in the interests of the chronically sick and disabled.

I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Motion.

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

The Clause deals with a question of definition. Throughout our discussion of the Bill I felt that there was a defect in that it contained no definition of the terms "chronically sick" "disabled", "disablement" or "chronic illness". Obviously, those terms cover a very wide field for the seriously disabled as compared with those who may be suffering from a minor disability. Many Clauses speak for themselves with regard to the definition of those terms, but it is essential that there be provision for definition. The original words I put down were apparently not welcome to the Department, but I gather that it welcomes the Clause.

As my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Stoke Newington and Hackney, North (Mr. Weitzman) has said, we have had considerable difficulty in framing a Clause that would meet the need for definition that he has outlined, which is real though limited. The difficulty is that it is not possible to produce a uniform definition that is equally applicable to the large number of Clauses covering a wide range of services contained by the Bill. But it is a sensible precaution to make provision in a flexible way to deal with difficulties that experience shows may exist. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State would need to consult all the Departments involved—and there are a number—before making regulations as to any expression in any Clause.

The difficulty we face is that the terms "chronically sick" and "disabled" have no precise meaning. This is not to say that we do not know what we mean when we use those terms. But they do not in themselves indicate a need for service. Therefore, it is necessary to consider their consequences in terms of handicap. In the context of an appropriate service, "handicap" will itself take on different meanings. In relation to employment, it will be relevant only to those of employable age and will refer to inability to obtain or keep employment or work on one's own account; and the handicap arising from the same disablement will differ between occupations. Obviously, a severe handicap for a manual worker may be of much less consequence for a clerical worker. In relation to welfare services, handicap will refer to inability to carry out without help or supervision ordinary daily living activities at any age, even with aids and prostheses. In relation to schoolchildren it will refer to the need for special educational treatment and attention.

One could go on with examples. Other tests would apply in other contexts. This underlines the difficulty we have experienced in trying to frame a satisfactory new Clause. I think that now, with the cooperation of my hon. and learned Friend, we have succeeded, and I commend his new Clause to the House.

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

We can discuss at the same time the hon. Gentleman's new Clause No. 16 "Special educational treatment for children suffering from chronic dyslexia".

Thank you for your guidance, Mr. Speaker.

The purpose of new Clause No. 15 is to improve the provision for autistic children which at the moment is grossly inadequate. The National Society for Autistic Children has revealed some very interesting facts. Autism was first diagnosed less than 30 years ago. While the eyes and ears of children are normal, messages from these senses do not reach the brain properly because there is a fault with the link. This leads to disturbed behaviour and the children are unable to compre- hend a coherent picture of the world around them.

It is a common mistake to assume that autistic children are subnormal. It is an unfortunate mistake because many autistic children are of average or above average intelligence. Yet it has been estimated that 700 of the 3,700 autistic children are in mentally subnormal units who should not be there. Such children are helpless and bewildered, and they are deprived of hope. A sad situation is made into a tragic siuation because the effect on the child is catastrophic. Either the child becomes more withdrawn and totally silent, or it becomes even more severely disturbed.

Some visiting parents must watch the deterioration of their children with despair. Others who are driven to desperation and can stand no longer watching the degeneration of their children simply stop visiting, so that the child's last link with normality is lost.

What can be done? There is no medical treatment for autistic children. But there is educational provision, and there are technological devices which can be of considerable assistance. Trained teachers can help. If the provisions enumerated in the new Clause are enacted, autistic children will be helped to find the world a less puzzling and less terrifying place. Specialist attention in autistic units will enable autistic children to take their place in society.

It is astonishing that the education authorities list groups of children who are legally entitled to specialist education but that autistic children are not among them. To most education authorities, autistic children either do not exist or have to fit in to existing structures. This is a deplorable state of affairs. I hope that the necessary special units will be provided. At the moment there are only 23 units and about 100 are required. If the new Clause were accepted, all autistic children would benefit.

I turn to new Clause No. 16, which I hope will be accepted by the House. The subject of dyslexia is one of the most misunderstood disabilities in the realm of the disabled. The object of the Clause is to improve the provision for children who are suffering from dyslexia. There is some controversy about the term "dyslexia", and many learned treatises have been written about it. When I use the term, I mean children who suffer from special reading difficulties, although there is nothing wrong with their eyes or intelligence. Indeed, many of them have greater intelligence than normal children. Even though they have proper educational opportunities, they are unable to learn to read.

Some people call it word-blindness. Sometimes it is regarded as a minor medical disability. The educational, social and emotional effects can be quite catastrophic. The effect on a child who is unable to read, despite having an average intelligence, is predictable. Educational progress is completely blocked, and the scorn and ridicule of classmates can be a terrible burden, especially to a sensitive child. Once the spiral of fear, reaction, bad behaviour and truancy begins, there is no knowing where it will end. The whole of a child's school life can be transformed by a so-called mild disability into one of failure and misery.

Some educational psychologists refuse to admit that dyslexia exists. They say that children suffering from it form only part of a longer continuum of disability. It it now recognised by some, but not enough, people as a major disability.

I hope that the House will accept the new Clause. If it does, it will end once and for all the fallacy that dyslexia is not important. It will give statutory recognition to one of the most misunderstood disabilities and will lead to improved facilities and the early diagnosis and assessment of the problem. I put emphasis on early diagnosis and assessment because it is crucial to the solution of the problem from which these children are suffering. Above all, if accepted, the Clause will ensure that these difficulties are tackled early. Only by the early recognition of the problem can children be properly treated. I should like to think that by helping these children we would be rendering a considerable service.

I should like to quote a short passage from a book on dyslexia written by an American teacher who had dealt with dyslexic children:

"Looking back over the many years I taught, I always remember a handful of children I was never able to teach to read. I always felt badly about my failure and wondered what became of these youngsters. I only wish I had known then what I have now learned about dyslexia. I might have been able to help them."

Acceptance of the new Clause would, I believe, help dyslexic children in Britain.

I support the two new Clauses, which have been ably and strikingly spoken to by the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South (Mr. Ashley). The points which he made need no amplification because they were clearly and sympathetically set out.

I wish merely to refer to subsection (2) of the new Clauses:

"The arrangements made by a local education authority for the special educational treatment of children … shall, so far as is practicable, provide for the giving of such education in any school maintained or assisted by the local education authority"

There are in certain areas small independent schools with small classes and specialist teachers who can provide a service which may not be available under the State system.

I wish to emphasise that under the Clause a local authority is within its rights to pay the costs and make provision in independent schools for children who need special educational facilities which are not available through the local education authority's own schools. This provision is important and should be widely used in the small number of exceptional cases where it is necessary.

I should like to give an enthusiastic welcome to the new Clause moved by my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South (Mr. Ashley). Those of us who have been engaged in education are only too well aware of the problem of autism and dyslexia. As I mentioned autism on Second Reading, I am very pleased that my hon. Friend, who has the deep compassion that comes from his own disability, has taken up those two types of disability.

I am sure that in the very near future dyslexia will be recognised for what it is and that all psychologists will pay due attention to it. I am absolutely sure that every educationist will regard the new Clause as a major advance, and I hope that the whole House will support my hon. Friend.

Again, I shall speak briefly because we are anxious to get the Third Reading today. The new Clause illustrates much of the feeling underlying the Bill. If we talk about privileged people and privileged areas, we are not talking about the autistic child, because 18 of the 23 units throughout the country located in the South-East. This rather reveals that unless it is made mandatory upon a local authority to make provision for this sort of education, it simply does not happen. The Clause will, I think, go a long way towards ensuring that local authorities recognise the problem and provide the facilities.

It so happens that my constituency has about the only autistic unit in the North-West, or even in the North. That is mainly because it has a dedicated teacher and a divisional health education officer who are devoted to this type of work. Units should not exist in isolation. Provision should be made for all handicapped people, no matter what their disability.

Those of us who have healthy children can feel sorry for those whose children unfortunately suffer from autism. A mentally handicapped child can at least respond, smile or pat one's hand, but not the autistic child. The terror of this disease is that one cannot make communication. One can give love, devotion or help, but one gets nothing back. It is not, however, an incurable situation. There have been a large number of circumstances in which education has been possible in a special sense for the autistic child. I urge my hon. Friend the Minister of State to insist that all local authorrities make adequate provision for this type of disease.

My hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South (Mr. Ashley) has made an excellent contribution to the Bill, but he has performed no more important service than to draw attention to the needs of very small groups of specially deprived children in our society.

My hon. Friend has been a powerful and superb advocate of those groups. He drew attention to the children who suffer the dual handicap of being at once blind and deaf. He has today initiated what, I feel, will be a major step forward for autistic children and children who suffer from chronic dyslexia or word blindness. These are tiny groups of un- fortunate children, but their problems are no less important for that.

Time was when, as a new and young graduate of the University of Oxford, I had to learn rapport with children of the Manchester Grammar School. They were very bright and, indeed, fortunate children. My hon. Friend has addressed himself to the problems of children who may be bright but who suffer a great handicap. To have rapport between a teacher and a child suffering from any one of these grievous complaints is extremely difficult.

I hope that the House as a whole will recognise the tremendous service that my hon. Friend has done in seeking to provide for these three small but extremely important groups of children in our society.

I am very happy, on behalf of the Government to accept these new Clauses and I commend them to the House. We are all in the debt of my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South (Mr. Ashley) for drawing attention to the special needs of small, under-privileged groups. He has done a grand job on the Bill and, patently, he will not give up until the Bill has finally passed through all its stages in both Houses and every special need that can be catered for in such a Bill has been catered for.

I am advised that the first two subsections of each new Clause do not, in effect, add to the powers which the Secretary of State for Education and Science already has, since he already has general powers to require information from local education authorities. I am, however, sure that we would all agree that it is extremely valuable to draw attention to the needs of these special groups and to the need for information about them. That is why we welcome these two subsections.

To turn briefly to subsection (2) in each new Clause, perhaps I might say a word about autism and dyslexia. I am very glad that the Clauses are worded as they are, suggesting that the arrangements made by a local education authority for the special educational treatment of such children should, so far as is practicable, provide for the giving of such education in any school maintained or assisted by the local education authority. I say this for a specific reason.

Professional opinion is divided on the desirability of providing education in special units catering solely for autistic children. Many autistic children—or perhaps I should rephrase that and speak of children with autistic symptoms; there is divided opinion about the nature of autism. Some claim that there are many forms of autism. Very little is known about this handicap.

Many children with autistic symptoms appear to be suitably placed in special schools and units which offer special education to go with the stimulus of contact with other, more communicative, children.

Because there is still so little solid information about the most useful methods of educating autistic children, my right hon. Friend—the House will be glad to learn of this—has commissioned a research project to compare and evaluate educational treatment in three dissimilar units with the aim of shedding light on the type of education best suited to such children. I hope that this piece of research will produce valuable results to guide us in determining the right sort of education for these children.

Until the results are known, it would be a mistake to insist on all these children, without exception and from an early age, being educated in schools or units designed specifically for this one handicap. Many children of this type, isolated by difficulties of communication, may profit best from a type of education where they meet those not similarly handicapped. We therefore need a variety of provision because we must allow for the wide range of autism and difficulties of this nature, for the range of intensity of disability, and partly because it is only through such a variety of provision that we shall discover the most suitable means of educating these children.

I take it that the phrase "acute dyslexia" is here to be interpreted as referring to what are sometimes called "specific reading difficulties"; that is, those difficulties which are not self evidently related to a child's intellectual, sensory or emotional limitations, but, are thought of as having a specific and deep seated cause.

The trouble is that opinions still differ widely about the extent to which difficul- ties in reading can be considered specific in this way. But there is now a general view that there is small number of children whose reading difficulties are not the result of other disabilities, but who have specific difficulties which we refer to as "acute dyslexia".

What I have said about the education of autistic children applies, in part, to these children, but there is a point which one must make in regard to the education of this group. For the same reason that the difficulties that they experience in reading may not be paralleled by difficulties in other educational spheres, it is often important to ensure that their general education takes place in contact with the other children who are not suffering from this disability, while at the same time making provision for special education in reading for these children.

I therefore welcome the wording of the Clause. I admit that, at present, there is a shortage of facilities for teachers to give the sort of intensive help that these children may require. My hon. Friend has done a great service to the cause of the education of these children by bringing this matter to the attention of the House and ensuring that a provision is written into the Bill.

I welcome the remarks of my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Wythenshawe (Mr. Alfred Morris) and I appreciate the difficulties enumerated by the Minister.

Although I recognise the problems of special units and the need for association with other children, when authorities are dealing with the problems of dyslexic and autistic children they should appreciate that some children need treatment in special units and that those units should be provided even if the children may, to some extent, be isolated, since some of them cannot benefit from association with other children in school.

There are groups of children who need to associate with their fellow pupils. An intelligent assessment must, therefore, be made—it is a matter of judgment—and, in some cases, it may be better for the child to be with other pupils; for example, if it is not a chronic case or if the child is able to benefit in an ordinary school.

I wish to place on record my hope that a judgment will be made in every individual case and that these children will never be lumped together as a homogeneous group. They do not exist as a homogeneous group and an individual asessment is of crucial importance.

I beg to move Amendment No. 1, in page 1, line 8, leave out

'such steps as are reasonably practicable'

and insert 'the steps necessary'.

I suggest that it would be convenient for the House to consider at the same time the following Amendments: No. 2 in line 14, leave out 'they consider' and insert 'the Secretary of State considers'.

Amendment No. 3 in line 15, leave out 'general' and insert 'all'.

Amendment No. 4 in line 17, leave out 'in their area' and insert 'nationally'.

Amendment No. 5 in line 18, after 'area', insert:

', such information to cover all relevant aids and appliances available from the local authority or the National Health Service'.

My hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Exchange (Mr. Will Griffiths), in whose name these Amendments stand, has unavoidably been prevented from coming to the House today.

This group of Amendments seeks, consistent with the general intentions of the Bill, to strengthen certain aspects of the Measure, and I am sure that there will be virtually no difference between hon. Members about the general desirability of these proposals.

It is unfortunately a fact that, when the Bill becomes law, practice may vary according to the degree of enthusiasm of those whose job it will be to implement its provisions. This is inevitable, however we draft the Bill. Nevertheless, this group of Amendments will have the effect of minimising, as far as that is possible, this variation of practice.

Amendment No. 1 proposes to substitute the words "the steps necessary" for the phrase at present in the Bill:

"… such steps as are reasonably practicable …".

As drafted, the Bill leaves open to question one's interpretation of the steps which can be regarded as "reasonably practicable". Perhaps what one authority considers practicable and reasonable, another will consider quite differently.

The Amendment would indicate that all necessary steps should be taken, so that there would be a comprehensive register of all disabled persons. It should be considered in conjunction with Amendment No. 2, in which we ask that instead of each local authority considering what form of publication is appropriate, there should be uniformity of practice by all local authorities charged with responsibility under the Bill. The only way of achieving that objective would be for the Secretary of State himself to determine and to make clear to each local authority the precise form in which the information should be available.

That leads me to Amendment 3. I am a little puzzled why the word "general" ever appeared in the Bill, because it can have many interpretations. One might publish the minimum or the maximum of information. That being so, those who have tabled the Amendment are quite correct in suggesting that in order to avoid ambiguity, and the variations in practice to which I have already referred, the use of the word "all" would be much stronger and clearer.

I turn to Amendment No. 4. The Bill at present asks local authorities to publish information about the services available within their own areas. That expression may have a very real meaning to those well versed and practised in local government, but the average member of the public is often in difficulty in knowing where the area of one local authority ends and that of another begins. If local authorities are merely to publish information about what happens in their own areas it will not only deny information to someone living close to or just across a local government boundary but will omit from the information published the services provided under the National Health Service. As the House well knows, there is no coincidence between regional hospital board and local authority boundaries, while the hospital management committee catchment areas cut completely across existing local government boundaries.

Amendment No. 5 seeks to ensure that the published information is as compre- hensive as possible so as to make known to disabled people all the aids appliances and services available from any branch of the National Health Service and any any part of the country. If one is to tackle the problem wholeheartedly, it is sensible to make sure that a disabled person should be aware of everything that is available to him, no matter in which part of the country he may live or to which he may travel, and no matter which authority is responsible for providing those services. I hope that the House will accept that the purpose of the Amendment is to give to disabled persons a far wider and more comprehensive service than seems practicable under the existing provisions.

The intention of this group of Amendments seems to be to extend in some ways the scope of action to be taken by local authorities in providing information about their own services and, perhaps, to restrict their discretion in doing so. That raises some difficulties and problems, although I accept, as is implied in the Amendments, that in this situation it is not easy to spell out clearly exactly what one wants to achieve.

The intention of Amendment No. 1 appears to be to restrict the discretion of the authority. There is in the Amendment a minor drafting problem, and acceptance would make the Clause read somewhat inappropriately. Even if the Amendment were aptly drafted, its intention seems unlikely to be achieved, as no very great change in meaning can be attributed. The steps which are necessary in an area are, it can be argued, those which are reasonably practicable, and vice versa.

If one used a more limited interpretation and the word "necessary" was taken to have objective force, we could find ourselves in a somewhat anomalous situation because within the present local government structure there are very different local authorities with very different problems and resources. A situation could be created in which, for example, Rutland would have to deploy the same resources as might be available in the West Riding of Yorkshire or in Lancashire or, and perhaps more serious, the West Riding of Yorkshire or Lancashire might have to content itself only with standards that Rutland could afford.

The circumstances of local authorities vary—distances, communications, density of population, standard of development, resources, and the like—and what strikes me as I go round the country is that there are very different problems in different areas. One area has a special problem in regard to one form of chronic illness which may not present much of a problem in another area. That circumstance underlines the wisdom of allowing local authorities discretion in dealing with what, in the country as a whole, may not be a problem. There is much to commend an approach that allows local authorities freedom to judge from time to time, knowing their own problems in their own areas, what may be reasonably practicable.

Somewhat similar considerations apply to Amendment No. 2. The Secretary of State would be put in a position of having to set a general standard which would be beyond some authorities and too low for others, and it would be disastrous if we took steps which held back the front runners. Many hon. Members' interest in the Bill has been stimulated by the fact that their own local authorities are, and have been for many years, very progressive. It would be disastrous if we did anything to limit the activities of these front runners. One therefore wants to leave this degree of discretion. A much more serious consideration is that it could conceivably be that a Secretary of State might in future set standards practicable only for the poorest and most backward authorities, and such action would hold back not only the front runners but those areas with ample provisions.

In referring to Amendment No. 3 my hon. Friend mentioned the possible ambiguity in the use of the word "general". It is always difficult in legislation to find just the right word, but I think that, in the circumstances, the word "general" is the more suitable. There are two objections to the use of the word "all". First, the totality of the word would mean the provision of a lot of information about which, frankly, I do not think the supporters of the Bill are concerned about. Things like organisation and staffing, and many other aspects, are irrelevant and uninteresting in this context, and not the sort of information which they want to see provided.

Secondly, in relation to the services to be given to individuals—and I am sure that this is what is the concern of hon. Members—the word implies a great deal of detail, and there is a danger that this could defeat the object. Publicity is intended to attract, but most of us already get criticism about the voluminous provision of information which so submerges the unfortunate individual that he cannot pick out the particular bits he wants. What is required is what I think the Clause as it stands asks for. That is information which will plant the idea of a range of helpful services for people with individual problems in the public mind and leave those individuals to make further inquiries and to use those services appropriate to their particular problems and needs.

1.30 p.m.

I think there is a slight misunderstanding over Amendment No. 4. I do not think the Clause is as restrictive as my hon. Friend appeared to think. There is a little ambiguity about the possible meaning of the word "nationally". If it means "available from a central source" it presumably refers to the Secretary of State and is limited in effect to what from time to time he may do. His activities do not extend to the provision of any local service. On the other hand, it may mean "available in every area", which might have a limiting effect on the more advanced authorities. This Amendment, I think, does not achieve the aim which the mover intended.

Amendment No. 5 uses the word "relevant". We are in some difficulty as to the precise meaning of the word, but I think the effect is to impose a duty on the local welfare authority and therefore when the Seebohm legislation—the Local Authority Social Services Bill—becomes law, as I hope it will, it will place a duty on the successor social services department. In the circumstances this may be difficult and impracticable. The Secretary of State informs all general practitioners through the drug tariff of the items which they may prescribe. He informs hospitals of items on central contract.

I do not think we can make it the duty of a non-medical local authority to provide public information in a meaningful manner about medical services. Nor, since consultants are entirely free to prescribe outside the contractual range for a particular patient's needs, is it likely that they could readily ascertain with the certainty required by a duty what is available. This is the possible restrictive element in the Amendment.

There are probably two underlying assumptions to this and some other Amendments. The first is that the sick and handicapped need to be in a position to—"demand" is perhaps too strong a word—request any service. This is a concept about which one has to be a little cautious because the rôle of professional workers, particularly the increasing rôle of social workers, is very importnt. This sort of situation could be disruptive of professional work and certainly wasteful. In some cases it could be positively harmful to the patient or clinet.

I know from professional experience before I came to the House that while it is right and proper, and indeed desirable, that an individual should be able to express a view, it also requires someone with a professional background and experience in dealing with the problems which the individual has to link an individual with the service, aid or system most appropriate to his particular need. We do not want to lose this very important rôle which the professional worker fulfils. This is equally important in the social work as in the medical context.

The other assumption underlying the Amendments is that the respective authorities and medical staffs are insufficiently informed about each other's services to be fully helpful to patients or clients. If that is so, it is a problem of communications. It is something which could be, and should be, looked at very thoroughly when the social service departments are well-established after the legislation now in Committee comes into force.

I hope that I have given sufficient reasons to show that I see a number of practical difficulties in these Amendments, why I have considerable doubt about whether they might achieve the aims of the mover of the first Amendment, and why I feel fairly certain that there may be certain respects in which at least some of them could be limiting and potentially harmful.

Will my hon. Friend at least have a further look at Amendment No. 2? I should have thought that the substitution of the words proposed would mean that the Secretary of State would take account of the local circumstances and local needs. Will my hon. Friend have a look at the implication of the Amendment? One of the intentions is not to restrict the most forward-looking authorities but to ensure that the authorities are obliged to do this work to a minimum standard. It asks that discretion should not remain entirely with the authority but should remain with the Secretary of State.

I understand what my hon. Friend is trying to achieve, but I think there are real difficulties. In this exercise we are producing legislation. It is not sufficient merely to have the intention of achieving certain objects. We have to spell out legislation which will achieve them. I see the very real danger here that a Secretary of State at some time could set standards which would have the practical effect although this may not be his intention and certainly is not the intention of any of us, of holding back local authorities which in some cases have outstanding records in pioneering work.

The Amendment as worded gives rise to difficulties. It would certainly be the intention of my right hon. Friend before making an appointed day Order under subsection (3) to discuss with the authorities the range of and practical solution to particular problems in their areas. I hope that my hon. Friend will feel able to agree, for there are considerable difficulties in the Amendments as they stand.

I assure my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary that on Second Reading and certainly in Committee the problem of permissive legislation was dealt with extensively. I feel that areas of permissive legislation are undesirable.

I am sure that I speak for most hon. Members who were on the Committee in saying that when we raised this question with the Under-Secretary, time and again we were satisfied with his explanations. The explanation given today should give the assurance for which my hon. Friend the Member for Paddington, North (Mr. Latham) asked. It emerged in Committee that the Under-Secretary has very extensive pressure points which he can exercise through the Department. He can keep a very close watch on recalcitrant authorities and ginger them up when necessary.

I hope that if I seek to withdraw the Amendment my hon. Friend will undertake to give further consideration to the points which have been raised so that in another place some more suitable form of drafting can be considered. I accept that the undertakings were given in Committee, but I do not feel happy about the Department always having sufficient power to apply sanctions when authorities are not facing their responsibilities. If my hon. Friend will undertake to look at the matter in this way, I think the original sponsors of the Amendments would agree to their being withdrawn. I therefore beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

I beg to move Amendment No. 6, in page 2, line 10, after "wireless" insert "television".

I suggest that with this Amendment we discuss Amendment No. 7, in line 13, after "other" insert "educational and", and Amendment No. 8, in line 24, at end insert "including laundry services".

I thank my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary for the general tenor of the Clause; the sponsors are grateful to the Government, for making this possible. In discussions with the National Council for the Disabled four points arose on which we considered it worthwhile to table Amendments. Three of those Amendments have been selected by Mr. Speaker.

First, we believe that in subsection (1)(b) it is important that, in addition to wireless facilities, television facilities should be provided for the local authority. Wireless licences will soon cease to exist and will be replaced by television licences. It is much more valu- able for a person who is physically disabled and also deaf to have a television than to have a wireless. In any case, television is of greater value nowadays than a wireless to a disabled person because so much appears on the screen. Television enables a disabled person confined within four walls to participate in the affairs of the outside world. One way of overcoming that sense of complete isolation which is one of the most important problems facing the disabled is the provision of television sets.

Second, subsection (1)(c) provides for the provision of lectures, games or other recreational facilities outside the home. We would like the word "educational" to be added, because "lectures" is too restrictive. Today many more methods of imparting knowledge are being used. There is programmed learning. It may well be that classes are based on the principle of programmed learning rather than on the principle of the lecture. We would not want the disabled person to be debarred from assistance because of this technical point.

Third, in subsection (l)(e) we want to add "including laundry services" after "any additional facilities". We want to draw attention to those disabled people who are unfortunately incontinent. We want them to be able to obtain laundry facilities from the local authority, because the problem of incontinence leads to great problems in keeping clean.

I enthusiastically support the Amendments. All the provisions in this Clause which is central to the Bill make the House deeply indebted to the Central Council for the Disabled which has given so much help and guidance to hon. Members by presenting the story of what the disabled need. The fact that there are Amendments to the Clause does not detract from its value.

The Amendments seek to make additions. Each Amendment stands on its own feet or table. First, the television set is nowadays the obvious accompaniment to the wireless. Second, it is asked that educational facilities should be provided. The final and possibly the most worth while of the Amendments asks for the provision of laundry facilities. I hope that the Under-Secretary, who has been very flexible and helpful throughout the passage of the Bill, will be able to accept the Amendments and make the Clause even fuller and the lives of the disabled happier.

Amendment No. 6, which seeks to add "television", is in the nature of a clarification—a spelling out more clearly of the reality of modern mass media. I have no objection to this Amendment. It spells things out a little more clearly and more appropriately than the present wording. We are conscious of the important rôle that television can play in the lives of some disabled people. I am always struck by the value of the special programmes for severely deaf persons that appear on television; they provide information and entertainment to those who in other circumstances would be denied that enjoyment.

I accept the sense that Amendment No. 7 would achieve by the introduction of "educational". I should like to study the Amendment further to make certain that the wording in the Clause had the effect that my hon. Friends want and did not confuse the relationship with educational services. We are not talking about educational services in the narrower sense.

However, this is the only possible difficulty. I will study the point. If there were any danger of this, we would want to alter things slightly, and this could be done in the Lords. The point made by the Amendment is valid, but I do not want to be written into the Bill in such a way as to involve educational authorities in the narrow educational sense. I hope that my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Mr. Golding) will accept my assurance that I will be studying this question with a view to producing an unambiguous method of spelling this matter out in the Lords.

Amendment No. 8 introduces the question of laundry services—a very valuable service particularly for incontinent patients. This is yet another of the Amendments tabled in Committee and on Report which is in the process of being overtaken by Government legislation, now passing through the House. What the Amendment desires will be fully achived when the Local Authority Social Services Bill becomes operative. I hope that this will happen in the not too distant future. Although Amendment No. 8 has a very desirable object, it could cause confusion between welfare departments and health departments and a possible duplication of provision. The situation will be fully achieved when the Bill now in Committee becomes operative.

Before the Minister sits down. On the last question, would it be difficult, from a drafting point of view, to accept Amendment No. 8? Many of us may not be as knowledgeable as the hon. Gentleman about the provisions of the other Bill, so we should like to see this Amendment included, if possible. Alternatively, in the light of the progress made on the other Bill, will the Minister be prepared to look at this matter again with a view to making an Amendment in another place should the other Bill not go through as he expects?

I sincerely hope that the gloomy forecast about the progress of the Local Authority Services Bill that the hon. Gentleman makes will be proved wrong. I am sure it will, and I think that his Front Bench colleagues share my view.

The primary intention of the Bill is to draw together a number of different services into a social services department in the local authorities. This will avoid the possible ambiguity that I mentioned. I believe that this will meet the problem. I do not at this stage want to consider looking at this point again in another place. The Bill to which I have referred covers this sphere adequately. It is a matter for hon. Members.

I am delighted to hear that Amendment No. 6 will be accepted. It will be a great boon to the disabled, particularly those who have to live in isolation for any length of time. It is very good news.

My hon. Friend and I are not concerned with what is in the Bill, but what service is given to the disabled. I think that he was delighted when other Clauses of this Bill were transferred to the Government's legislative programme.

I am happy to hear what my hon. Friend said about Amendment No. 8. I hope that in another place Amendment No. 7 will be given serious consideration.

I was delighted to hear the general tenor of my hon. Friends remarks, and I am sure that the National Council for the Disabled will be equally pleased.

I beg to move Amendment No. 10, in page 3, line 19, at end insert:

(2) In the application of this section to Scotland for the words 'Part V of the Housing Act 1957', '91' and 'Minister' there shall be substituted respectively the words 'Part VII of the Housing (Scotland) Act 1966', '137' and 'Secretary of State'.

I suggest that it might be for the convenience of the House if, with this Amendment we discuss Amendment No. 11, in page 3, line 21, after 'by', insert:

'any of the following enactments, that is to say—

(a)'.

Amendment No. 12, in page 3, line 22, after '1936', insert:

(b) section 110 of the Burgh Police (Scotland) Act 1892, as amended by section 104(2)(b) of the Burgh Police (Scotland) Act 1903, or any local enactment having the like effect;

(c) section 29 of the Public Health (Scotland) Act 1897.

Amendment No. 23, in page 4, line 21, leave out from first 'to' to end of line 22 and insert 'Northern Ireland'.

Amendment No. 24, in page 4, line 25, after '1957', insert:

'or of the Scottish Housing Advisory Committee set up under section 167 of the Housing (Scotland) Act 1966'.

Amendment No. 25, in page 5, line 25, after 'hospital)', insert:

'and every Regional Hospital Board constituted under section 11 of the National Health Service Scotland) Act 1947'.

Amendment No. 29, in page 6, line 15, leave out 'and every such local authority' and insert:

(2) The Secretary of State shall take steps to obtain from local authorities having functions under the Social Work (Scotland) Act 1968 information as to the number of persons under the age of 65 who suffer from illness or mental disorder within the meaning of section 6 of the Mental Health (Scotland) Act 1960 or are substantially handicapped by any deformity or disability and for whom resi- dential accommodation is from time to time provided under section 59 of the said Act of 1968 at any premises in a part of those premises in which such accommodation is so provided for persons over that age.

(3) Every local authority referred to in this section.

Amendment No. 30, in page 6, line 39, at end insert:

'and in its application to Scotland means a way over which the public has a right of passage on foot only or a bridleway within the meaning of section 47 of the Countryside (Scotland) Act 1967:'.

Amendment No. 32, in page 8, line 40, leave out from first 'to' to end of line 41 and insert 'Northern Ireland'.

Amendment No. 35, in page 9, line 11, at end add:

(3) In the application of this section to Scotland for any reference to a local education authority there shall be substituted a reference to an education authority within the meaning of section 145 of the Education (Scotland) Act 1962.

Amendment No. 36, in page 9, line 13, at end insert:

(2) Sections 1 and 2 of this Act do not extend to Scotland.

Amendment No. 37, in page 9, line 15, leave out 'Scotland or'.

I hope that the House will forgive me if I appear a little disorganised. I have just seen the results of the South Ayrshire by-election on the tapes. The Labour Party has got in with a thumping majority of just under 11,000 votes. In the current euphoria I am prepared to grant to hon. Gentlemen opposite all the comfort that they can gain from the fact that, despite a drop in their vote, they have kept the Scottish Nationalist Party firmly in third place.

Only just.

This clutch of Amendments looks a good deal more formidable than it is. The intent is simple. The Bill as it stands excludes Scotland unless there is express provision to the contrary. It is to reverse this situation that the Amendments have been put forward.

I know that they have the support of my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Wythenshawe (Mr. Alfred Morris). He has been extremely helpful and has given an undertaking in Committee to extend the provisions to Scotland.

The original exclusion bore evidence of the pressure and the remarkable speed with which my hon. Friend got together a notably coherent Bill. He never intended to follow the all too common phenomenon in recent years of excluding Scotland from valuable Private Members' Bills because of the difficulties of drafting.

There is one important exception to the blanket nature of the provisions, as I have described them. Clauses 1 and 2 are not to be brought into effect in Scotland. That is not because the provisions are unimportant. They obviously are, as was made clear on Second Reading. It is vital that we should identify the nature of the problem for the disabled in terms of who is to get help and of disseminating the knowledge of what help is available. I have, however, been advised, and I accept, that there is no need to extend the provisions of Clauses 1 and 2 to Scotland, because they are covered by Section 12 of the Social Work (Scotland) Act, 1968. It is worth reminding those who have a cynical view of the progress of Scottish business that, while the English are still struggling with a Bill based on the Seebohm Report as a future possibility—almost certainly for another Session—the Scottish Office has got the Social Work (Scotland) Act on the Statute Book and it is now well established and in operation. There is a tendency sometimes in Scottish politics for a strange form of double vision to operate. We get plenty of examples of this when we fall behind the English timetable, because they are given a great deal of publicity. But on many occasions the expeditious way in which reform reaches the Statute Book through Scottish Committees is ignored.

There is no point in wearying the House with arguments. There is no conceivable reason why, apart from the exception with which I have dealt, the helpful provisions in the Bill should not extend North of the Border. We have the same kind of problems which have for so long attracted the interest and enthusiasm of my hon. Friend the Member for Wythenshawe. We have the same hard cases and problems. We come across them all too often in our daily round of activities. So often nothing could be done. It would be optimistic and unfair to pretend that in some way problems will disappear as the result of this legislation. However, they will be reduced, because the provisions in the Bill will provide a more helpful and sympathetic atmosphere for the disabled.

We have our severely disabled and young chronically sick who will benefit. We have people in council houses who rely upon local authorities to carry out the kind of adaptations which make life possible and allow them something nearer a normal existence. The War Pensions Appeals Tribunal is another example of a change being brought in which it would be monstrous and inappropriate to deny to Scotland.

We clearly have a long way to go in terms of helping the disabled. I am sure that many provisions could be suggested by all hon. Members at the drop of a hat but which would fall beyond the scope of anything which could be included in a Private Member's Bill.

As the Disablement Income Group said on the front cover of one of its recent pamphlets relating to the attendance allowance introduced in the National Superannuation Bill—"It's a start." Indeed, the measure before is a welcome start which we are anxious to see made in Scotland.

These Amendments have the support of the sponsors, and I understand that they have the eager support of the Scottish Office, for which I am grateful.

These Amendments, as the hon. Member for Aberdeen, South (Mr. Dewar) has pointed out, seek to apply various provisions of the Bill to Scotland. I welcome them for doing that.

As the hon. Member for Manchester, Wythenshawe (Mr. Alfred Morris) knows, there was some concern when this Bill first appeared because it applied to England and Wales only and it seemed to some in Scotland that the problems of the disabled in Scotland were being ignored. I knew very well that this was not the case and I knew of the difficulties which the hon. Member for Wythenshawe, who had introduced the Bill, was having at the time. He was good enough to discuss the whole matter with me when he was producing the Bill. I recognise that when one has the good fortune to be the first in the Ballot it means that a Bill has to be drafted and printed in a short space of time in order to be available some days before the Second Reading. I recognise that it was hard enough work for him others who were assisting him to deal with one system of law and to get the Bill in front of the House in time for that early Second Reading day. Apparently there was not enough time to take account also of the Scottish system of law too.

While the Bill was in Committee, as the hon. Member knows, I and some of my hon. Friends were contemplating assistance in the form of producing another Private Member's Bill. It would have been a Scottish Bill which would have applied the appropriate provisions of this Bill in the same way. Because the hon. Member gave us assurances, although we could not see any Amendments going down on the Order Paper, that there would in due course be requisite Amendments at the appropriate stage—now the Report stage—which would apply the appropriate provisions of the Bill to Scotland. We held our horses at that stage, and we are very glad to see the Amendments now before the House. This group of Amendments, I understand, represents what needs to be done to apply the appropriate provisions of the Bill to Scotland as well as to England and Wales.

At the risk of being controversial, I point out that this kind of Bill and this kind of Amendment always seems to come from this side of the House. Whenever a Conservative Member draws a lucky place in the Ballot he usually wishes to protect seals or to protect the right of some obscene characters to hunt deer and tear hares to pieces—

rose—

I am about to pay the hon. Gentleman a tribute. I hope that he will not distract me from doing that, because it is a very rare exercise. I was about to say that it would be churlish of me not to pay a tribute to the hon. Member for Moray and Nairn (Mr. Gordon Campbell), who is sitting alone on the Opposition Front Bench. It is a great pity that he was not as enthusiastic about these matters when he had the opportunity to influence his own Government in the 13 years they were in power. However, it is better late than never. The fact is that this kind of humanitarian Measure is introduced primarily and mainly by this side of the House as is evident—

rose—

I will give way in due course. The fact that this kind of Measure is introduced by this side of the House is evident by the South Ayrshire result in which the Opposition came a very bad second. However, having said that—

If the hon. Member for Fife, West (Mr. William Hamilton) had been here earlier he would have heard a whole debate taking place upon a new Clause in the Bill which represented a complete Private Member's Bill of mine in a previous Session on disablement. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will withdraw his remarks.

I understand that, but it was introduced when the present Government were in power and not in the 13 years when the hon. Gentleman's Government were in power and had the chance to accept it. If the hon. Gentleman had wanted that Measure on the Statute Book, he might have taken the opportunity of using the majority which his party had in those years. However, I shall not be further drawn on that line. I think I have made the point.

The purpose of all these Amendments is simply to ensure that Scotland enjoys such advantages as this Bill gives which at the moment exclude Scotland with the exception of Clauses 1 and 2 where we acted in advance—again under the Labour Government—of the proposals in this Bill in our Social Works (Scotland) Act, 1968. The House will recall that that revolutionary Act gave local authorities a general power to promote social welfare in their respective areas on a comprehensive basis—that is, all coming under the one umbrella, including services for the disabled. Local authorities in Scotland now have complete discretion in allocating their resources as between one disabled group or one under-privileged group and another.

When my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen, South (Mr. Dewar) and I tabled our Amendments to the latter Clauses we were unaware that so many consequential Amendments of a highly technical nature would need to be incorporated in the Bill. Because they were consequential, and because we were assured by the Scottish Office that they were, we readily accepted that they should be put down in our name, although we were helped in the drafting by the official draftsmen. I never cease to be amazed at the skill and astuteness—if that is the right word—of the official draftsmen. We shall still not be sure, however, that Scotland will benefit from all the contents of the Bill until we know at the end of this debate what its final state will be. I hope that the Ministers will give an assurance that where and when Scotland is excluded as a result of our deliberations today the Government will take the opportunity in another place of seeing to it that Scotland is included in all the benefits of the Bill.

I conclude by congratulating my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Wythenshawe (Mr. Alfred Morris) on piloting the Bill through all its stages. It has been an extremely profitable exercise for him, for the Labour Party and the Labour Government.

I am very pleased that this group of Amendments has been introduced. It represents a move towards uniformity in making provision for disabled people throughout the United Kingdom. I indicated in Committee that it was intended to apply the provisions of the Bill both to Scotland and to Northern Ireland where this was appropriate. As the hon. Member for Moray and Nairn (Mr. Gordon Campbell) fully appreciates, because I made a reference to him in the Second Reading debate, I wholly accept his concern to help those who are both chronically sick and disabled. I know that the hon. Gentleman appreciates why it was impossible at the outset to apply the Bill to Scotland. I have had a great deal of help from my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and from my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary. Very serious technical problems arise, as my hon. Friends have noted in their speeches, when it comes to applying to Scotland legislation originally drafted only for England and Wales. I am extremely grateful to all those who, formally or informally, have helped to make the Bill a Measure which will apply throughout the United Kingdom in the service of disabled people.

I welcome the opportunity of adding the Government's support to these Amendments, which have the effect of applying the provisions of the Bill, with the exception of Clauses 1 and 2, to Scotland.

It has always been the Government's intention that at an appropriate stage the Bill should be applied to Scotland. The principle on which we have worked and on which we shall continue to work is that any advantage which the Bill brings to the chronically sick and disabled in England and Wales will correspondingly be brought to the chronically sick and disabled in Scotland so that at the end of the day we have a situation in which the needs of the chronically sick and disabled are dealt with, legislatively, on the same basis in Scotland as in England and Wales.

The legislative background is inevitably different in Scotland. In particular, we have the Social Work (Scotland) Act, 1968. The corresponding English provision is not quite as far behind as my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen, South (Mr. Dewer) suggested, because the English Bill has already been published and debated this Session. Nevertheless, it is true that we moved ahead in this matter some time ago and that, therefore, Clauses 1 and 2 of the Bill are not necessary for Scotland since Section 12 of the Social Work (Scotland) Act, 1968 provides local authorities with a general power to promote social welfare in the community in place of the former fragmented powers.

If we were to apply the Bill as it stands to Scotland we should have the undesirable effect of making special provision for a particular category of people who need help by local authorities, separating them from the rest of the people who may need that help. That would be undesirable in principle. But I give an assurance that the powers which are to be taken in the Bill are already covered by the provisions of the 1968 Act, through Section 12 and also through Section 5 which makes general provision that local authorities shall perform their functions under the general guidance of the Secretary of State, and we shall see in the meantime that social work in Scotland in no way falls behind any measures which are taken elsewhere for the benefit of the chronically sick and disabled.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Fife, West (Mr. William Hamilton) said, a number of technical Amendments are necessary to apply particular Clauses to Scotland, and, as he told hon. Members, he has been given drafting assistance by the Scottish Office. The hon. Member for Manchester, Wythenshawe (Mr. Alfred Morris) spoke to me earlier in the course of the passage of the Bill about its Scottish application and I gave an assurance that the Government would support that application. My hon. Friends who have put down Amendments today, and a number of their colleagues have expressed interest in the Bill from the early stages. I was therefore happy when we reached an appropriate point in the Bill to give them the assistance which they required in drafting the various technical Amendments which we see on the Order Paper.

Already we have accepted further Amendments to the Bill and there may be other Amendments in another place. There will, therefore, require to be correspondingly more Scottish adjustments later in the Bill's progress. I cannot at the moment be explicit on what these Amendments will be, but I repeat the assurance which I gave earlier that the principle on which the Government will operate is that anything which is provided for the advantage of the chronically sick and disabled in England and Wales will correspondingly be applied to Scotland, so that at the end of the day we shall have what will virtually be United Kingdom legislation.

The Bill marks a considerable step forward in recognising the special needs of the chronically sick and disabled. I congratulate my hon. Friend the sponsor of the Bill on the considerable amount of work which he did in its preparation and which he has done since. I am very happy indeed that Scotland is associated with it.

I beg to move Amendment No. 13, in page 3, line 24, leave out from 'in' to 'the' in line 25 and insert:

'doing so, to make provision, in so far it is in the circumstances both practicable and reasonable, for'.

It will be convenient at the same time to take the following Amendments: No. 14, in line 32, leave out from 'notice' to 'the' in line 33 and insert:

'make provision, in so far as it is in the circumstances both practicable and reasonable, for'.

No. 15, in line 32 leave out 'have regard so far as practicable to' and insert:

'make provision, so far as is practicable for'.

Clauses 4 and 5, to which these Amendments relate, provide for a duty to be placed on local authorities, when providing public sanitary conveniences, to have regard to the needs of the disabled in considering the design and siting of those conveniences as far as it is practicable and also to apply the same approach where a Section 89 notice is served under the Public Health Act, 1936, in respect of the provision of sanitary conveniences in an existing building.

In Committee I undertook to consider the possibility of strengthening the Clauses which had been tabled at that stage by imposing a positive obligation to make provision for the needs of the disabled in place of a duty merely to have regard to them. As a result we have the Amendments on the Notice Paper in my name applying the principle on which I gave that undertaking.

The qualifications built into the Amendments need to be more than that of practicability, because there may be instances in which special provision is unnecessary or unreasonable. For that reason the Amendments extend the qualification to include reasonableness as well as practicability. Under the terms of the Clause as amended, the authority would need to provide, in so far as it is practicable and reasonable, the facilities which we are seeking in public conveniences. That replaces the requirement simply to have regard to the needs of the disabled. We think that that is a more effective way of achieving the objectives of the Bill.

We should again acknowledge the remarkable help which has been given by my hon. Friend the Joint Parliamentary Secretary. Throughout the Committee stage he listened carefully to every point put to him by the sponsors of the Bill, and again and again he gave an entirely positive and constructive response. He feels extremely keenly about the problems of access for those who are severely disabled.

My hon. Friend the Joint Parliamentary Secretary has earned the respect of the Joint Committee on Mobility for the Disabled and he has earned the deep respect of those who are associated with Access for the Disabled. Mr. Denly, who is a leader of both organisations, took particular pleasure in the fact that my hon. Friend was able to speak on the general theme of planning an urban environment for the disabled at a recent and very important conference held in London. What we seek to do is to allow disabled people to lead more normal lives. Doors now closed to them will be opened by the Amendment and the other provisions we seek to make. I very much welcome the Amendment.

I beg to move Amendment No. 26, in page 5, line 27, leave out 'under the age of 50'.

Order. It may be for the convenience of the House to consider with it Amendment No. 27, in page 5, line 28, after 'disability', insert:

'other than one admitted on geriatric grounds including precocious senility'.

and amendment No. 28, in page 5, line 43, leave out

'under the age of 50'.

As with the previous set of Amendments, I am moving the Amendment in place of my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Exchange (Mr. Will Griffiths), who is unable to be here. I shall move it briefly because the most important thing is not to impede the passage of the Bill.

The Bill as drafted makes a tremendous advance. In the past it has been possible for a person of any age to find himself, simply because he is chronically sick or disabled in some way, placed in a ward for geriatric patients which may well contain a majority of patients—if not all—who are not merely over 65 but well into their 70s and 80s. That that practice has occurred is nothing short of criminal, and we welcome the fact that the Bill seeks to remedy that to a large extent. But there is still the problem that, while it will not be possible for someone of 49 who is chronically sick to be housed in a geriatric ward, for a similar person who is just over 50 this practice could continue. I believe it to be just as criminal to put a young chronically sick or disabled person in his early 50s into a geriatric ward as those in the other categories which the Bill would preclude.

Amendment No. 26 would delete the words:

"under the age of 50"

and Amendment No. 28, which is consequent upon it, would delete a similar reference in line 43. It is acknowledged that there may be cases where it would be appropriate for a person ageing prematurely to go into a geriatric ward, even though he has not attained the age of 65, not as a direct consequence of his sickness or disability but as an indirect consequence, in that he has prematurely aged as a result of his incapacity or for some other reason.

I am in some difficulty because Amendment No. 27 includes a misprint or a mistake in drafting. I find the concept of

"precious senility"

as described in the Amendment rather interesting. One could perhaps make some amusing attempts to define exactly the condition of someone who is senile and at the same time precocious. I am sure that the word intended is "premature", and it is to that word that I have addressed my remarks. I believe that the rules of the House prevent me substituting "premature" for "precocious". Therefore, it is difficult for me to press the Amendment in the form of words on the Notice Paper. Perhaps my hon. Friend the Minister could give an assurance that the word might be amended in another place.

I understand that one of the objections to deleting the age limit is that it is thought that sometimes, purely for reasons of administrative convenience, advantage might be taken of this to describe a person as prematurely senile with the result that someone under the age of 50 could still find himself in a geriatric ward. However, I think that we must have some confidence in the way in which the medical profession will act after the passage of the Bill, and I cannot see any justification for making this very arbitrary distinction between someone just under 50 who may be chronically sick but very young in heart and someone in the same frame of mind who is just over 50. I ask my hon. Friend to try to offer some justification for that. It escapes me. I also ask him to consider very sympathetically the difficulty in which I find myself as a result of the use of the wrong word in Amendment No. 27.

The Clause is a very big advance in our social legislation. It has been brought about in great part by the activities of Mr. Marsh Dickson and his national campaign for the young chronic sick. Everyone is indebted to him for the enthusiasm with which he has pursued the matter.

We are all very conscious of the distance the Government have gone in accepting the Clause, and we are indebted to them for accepting an increase in the age limit from 45 to 50. Any criticism we make must be put in the context of that general acceptance and their willingness to increase the age.

2.30 p.m.

I hope, however, that this will be regarded as a starting point, because the important characteristic is not the degree of physical incapacity or the age of the individual. The important characteristic is the state of mind of the disabled person, and it will be equally undesirable for those aged 50 and over, if they are of an active disposition, to be in wards with geriatric patients.

This is something which the Government must consider seriously, either during the next week or so, or perhaps even in the months ahead. The important thing to do today is to emphasise that, although this is a great milestone in the treatment of the young chronically sick, and in the history of social legislation it is only a starting point.

I hope that the Minister will accept the Amendment. I was not a member of the Committee which considered the Bill, but on Second Reading I said that perhaps the origin of public concern about this matter was due, at least in part, to an article written in the Guardian in December, 1966, by a constituent of mine, herself a chronically disabled person, Miss Pamela La Fane, who was in a geriatric ward from the age of 16. She is a close associate of Mr. Marsh Dickson.

Miss La Fane drew attention to the problems and difficulties of people in her condition when they found themselves in wards with people with whom they had very little in common in terms of age and condition. Owing to the efforts of Mr. Marsh Dickson and his colleagues, and to her own bright intellect, Miss La Fane was able to leave the geriatric ward, and she is now living in Putney, though, of course, not alone. Incidentally she is a member of the Putney Labour Party.

Unless the Amendment is accepted, someone who was almost brought up in a geriatric ward but is no longer there faces the possibility, as she grows older and passes the age of 50, of being returned to that ward. I can see no reason why being a disabled person or being chronically sick should make it desirable for a person to enter a geriatric ward at an earlier age than any other person. It does not seem to me that the condition of being disabled makes it more appropriate that someone should be regarded as being old before his time.

I hope that my hon. Friend will accept the Amendment. If, for reasons of wording, or anything of that sort, he feels that it is undesirable that the Amendment should be accepted, I hope that he will accept the Amendment in principle and assure us that it is not the Government's intention to leave in the Bill a provision which will make a person of 51, 52, 53, 54 or 55 feel that there is a possibility of his being returned to a geriatric ward. I hope that my hon. Friend will be able to remove that shadow from those concerned.

Although it may be slightly out of order, I should like to take this opportunity, not having been on the Committee, of saying that I have watched closely the progress of the Bill through the House, and that I am filled with admiration for the way in which it has been conducted through its various stages.

That would he more in order on Third Reading.

We are discussing one of the most sensitive issues dealt with in the Bill and I have a disturbing case to mention to the House.

In Standing Committee I said that Mrs. Harriet Keeling, of 34 Warham Road, South Croydon, herself a sufferer from multiple sclerosis, had written to me about a younger person suffering from the same disease who had been admitted to a geriatric ward. She said:

"She is an attractive, alert young woman, suffering from multiple sclerosis. She is very unhappy in her surroundings. She says that it is fatal to become fond of any of the old ladies in the ward, because they die so very soon. At the moment there is no one interesting to talk to in the ward."

I contacted Mrs. Keeling to see whether it was possible to help this lady in advance of the enactment of the Bill. Since then there has been a whole series of inquiries to see whether we could find less unsuitable accommodation, and I have now heard from Mrs. Keeling to this effect:

"I am told that she"—

Beryl—

"is becoming vague and forgetful, in fact prematurely senile, at the age of 44."

This case has upset me deeply, because it seems to show that if fairly young people are wrongly placed in a geriatric ward they can soon degenerate mentally to the point where geriatric accommodation is the correct provision.

I have said before that if a chronically sick young person is admitted to a geriatric ward this can add not only anguish but mental distress to physical disability. As my hon. Friend the Member for Putney (Mr. Hugh Jenkins) said, many young people who have been stricken by such complaints as rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis, and other grievously disabling diseases, are people of lively intellect. Their lively intellects are imprisoned in crippled bodies. If these people are in their 20's or 30's, and even if they are in their 40's or 50's, they desperately require accommodation suited to their age group.

There has been a reference to Mr. Marsh Dickson. Hon. Members who served on the Standing Committee will recall that I quoted a letter from his wife, who suffers from advanced multiple sclerosis, in which she said:

"The idea of having to spend even three months in a geriatric ward … horrifies me."

She went on:

"I therefore beseech you … to ensure that this Clause is strengthened …".

Mr. Marsh Dickson has done a remarkable service on behalf of the younger chronically sick. The National Campaign for the Young Chronic Sick has played a leading rôle in drawing the attention of the general public to the great importance of this issue. However, Mrs. Marsh Dickson is herself 49 years of age.

It was said in Committee that my right hon. Friend the Member for Easington (Mr. Shinwell), for whom I have some affection, is at the age of 85 any- thing but geriatric. Were my right hon. Friend to be admitted to a geriatric ward, that might well do him mental injury.

I know that my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary, who is fully seized of the importance and sensitivity of this matter, recognises the difficulty. No one has been keener than he to find a solution which would be generally acceptable to those who have contributed to the debate. It may be that by excluding those who are "precociously" senile, we may find that some younger people in geriatric wards being classified as precociously senile so that the description of their condition will suit the accommodation. I fully recognise that there are tremendous difficulties.

I recognise two other factors. We have taken a great step forward in having Clause 16 as it now stands. We shall be putting this country ahead of many others simply because of that Clause. On his own initiative, my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary introduced Clause 17 which seeks to separate younger people from the very elderly in Part III accommodation provided by local authorities. I thank my hon. Friend and his officials for the great help which they have given me and the other sponsors of the Bill in that matter.

During the last five years, expenditure on hospital building has been doubled. This shows that the Government recognise the importance of modernising existing hospitals and building more hospitals. We need special units for the younger chronic sick. It may seem hard to press a Government who have doubled hospital building expenditure in the last five years, but we want even more.

I recognise the problems, but I ask my hon. Friend to look at this matter again. I know that he meets the problem with the maximum possible sympathy, but I would be grateful if he would agree to consider the matter again to see whether we can reach a position in which someone who is not geriatric shall not be placed in a geriatric ward, which is all we are arguing.

I pay tribute to the geriatricians, who do a remarkable job in helping very elderly people, but if a person is not geriatric, he should not be in a geriatric ward. I make this appeal to my hon. Friend knowing how deeply he feels personally about what is certainly an extremely sensitive, if not the most sensitive, issue in the Bill.

I should like to endorse the view of my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Wythenshawe (Mr. Alfred Morris) that this is one of the most sensitive and one of the most difficult issues in the Bill. I have listened with great care to the views of hon. Members in support of these Amendments. I fully understand their reasons for suggesting them and I appreciate the helpful way in which they have argued their case.

I have already acknowledged that it is unsatisfactory that action of the kind proposed in the Clause should depend, or may seem to depend, on the attainment of a certain age, but I must warn that if we abandon the age criterion now laid down in the Clause we must be certain that its replacement is superior. I am a little unhappy that the Amendments as worded may fail to achieve what I know to be the intention of the sponsors of the Bill, as it is my intention, that they may create problems not now apparent to the sponsors of the Bill.

The intention is to extend to the 50–64 age group the requirement in subsection (1) to use "best endeavours" and to make a report under subsection (2). It has frequently been said that many seriously disabled people in the 50–64 age group are far from senile and that it would be monstrous to imply that they could be best housed in geriatric wards. The difficulty is that the Amendments are not concerned only with geriatric wards, and their wording is therefore, open to certain objection. I share my hon. Friend's view that the state of mind is far more important than age. Chronological age is probably the least important factor in determining the most appropriate and correct form of care for a given individual.

May I outline how the Amendments would fail to achieve the intention? We are dealing here with a small band of people whose misfortune it is sometimes to spend long periods in hospital and who suffer from a progressive condition. Any Amendment must, therefore, take account of changes in the patient's condi- tion since admission to hospital—and, tragically, this may sometimes be a long period—changes which will influence the clinical judgment as to the most appropriate place for the patient to be cared for. The Amendment does not take that into consideration.

There is a more significant objection. One of the problems is that the Amendments would imply that a patient admitted to hospital for long-stay care above the age of 65 would be wrongly placed in a ward with others of his own age if his admission were not on geriatric grounds. It is far from being the case that all long-stay patients over 65 are geriatric, which is a rather imprecise word, or senile. In this context, hon. Members frequently quote colleagues on both sides of the House who are well over the age of 65, but very far from being geriatric or senile.

I have in mind when talking of admission to long-stay units for people with mental illness or handicaps or chronic disabilities needing prolonged orthopædic treatment. There is obviously no logic or sense in having legislation suggesting that it is most appropriate that these patients should be in geriatric wards. If this were laid down by Parliament it would be difficult for people in the hospital service to take it seriously because they would not be patients of the type that I have been talking about. If they do not take it seriously we would not see their "best endeavours", to use the phase in the Clause, being exercised in a realistic way.

I recognise that the use of an age criterion is an arbitrary and unsatisfactory division. I can see how easily there could sometimes be tragic result when certain cases fall on one side or the other of the age barrier. We do not want to be diverted too greatly by this theoretical view from what happens in practice now and what I hope will happen more in the future.

The truth is that doctors already use their judgment about the most suitable place for their patients. They are no more likely, for example, to say that a geriatric ward is a suitable place for a lively-minded patient of 51 when the Bill becomes law, and if it remains as drafted, than they are now, even though the Bill specifically mentions the age of 50. My right hon. Friend is prepared to issue advice which includes this thought and refers to this assurance.

The hon. Gentleman says that the doctor, quite rightly, will exercise his judgment as to where a patient should go, but would he not agree that the doctor is restricted in that he cannot always get his patient into the hospital that he would like? Is not this one of the main features in our discussions on this part of the Bill?

There is, of course, a real difficulty here. My hon. Friend the Member for Wythenshawe instanced the remarkable improvement in the hospital building programme in the last four or five years. This does not mean that we are complacent and do not believe that we still have a long way to go. There is the division of special units for the younger chronic sick. This is a valid point, but we have to concern ourselves with the Bill. There is the difficulty over accommodation, but I was underlining the point that we must have some confidence in the medical practitioner in these circumstances, and I have this confidence.

One of my hon. Friends referred to the use of the phrase "precocious senility" and asked whether this was not the wrong wording. Probably this phrase has been put in because it has a medical meaning. It is a medical phrase with a rather narrow technical meaning, and I am not sure that it is necessarily appropriate. I am not certain that it would cover all of the types of case which the sponsors of the Bill want it to cover. There are certain sorts of case, perhaps pre-senile dementia, which would not be covered by the use of this phrase.

These are some of the difficulties. I have given these matters careful consideration because I want to help the House. I feel strongly about this part of the Bill, and at all costs I do not want to write something into it that could make what is inevitably a somewhat difficult situation even more difficult.

I know that hon. Members would like me to give an undertaking that if the Amendment is withdrawn I will recon- sider the matter with a view, possibly, to introducing a suitable Amendment in another place. I give that undertaking, and I hope that it will be possible to devise a suitable Amendment which will ensure that the obligations in the Clause shall apply to all patients under the age of 65 except where, on clinical considerations, it would be inappropriate. It is a difficult task but we are united in wanting to be able to do this.

I hope that, as I have given this assurnace, my hon. Friend will feel able to withdraw the Amendment.

I am very grateful for that undertaking, and in view of it I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

There was some difficulty in Committee about the original Clause and this Amendment has been tabled to meet a commitment made by my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Wythenshaw (Mr. Alfred Morris). He promised in Committee, because of some rather mild misgivings expressed by the Minister, to table this Amendment. The point of it is to ensure that the evidence would be collated by one particular body. We did not have strong views as to whether it should be collated by the Secretary of State or the Medical Research Council. Our concern was to ensure that the evidence was collated. However, I now understand that the Government are now happy with the original Clause and I shall not therefore move the Amendment.

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

I said on Second Reading that this Bill was very much a collective essay. It has been much improved by the viva voce examination which it was given in Committee. It has been further improved by our detailed debates on Report today. We were extremely fortunate in Committee in that we had a team of Members all of whom were dedicated to ensuring that the essay was as felicitously worded as possible.

I have been enormously helped by the Parliamentary Group on Disablement. In particular, I received great support and assistance from my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South (Mr. Ashley) and the hon. Member for Newbury (Mr. Astor). They worked with other members of the Committee as a closely knit working force dedicated to the task of improving conditions for the chronically sick and the many disabled people in our community.

I have referred to the National Campaign for the Young Chronic Sick, to its officers and to the help which they have given from the outset in helping the Bill forward. Outside, as well as inside, Parliament there has been a consensus working in favour of the Bill. I know that every member of the Committee and other Members who have been associated with the Bill would say that the Central Council for the Disabled has given remarkable help and support. It is a federal body, representative of organisations working for groups of disabled people throughout the country. I pay particular tribute to Mr. Duncan Guthrie, the Director of the Council, and to Mrs. Phyllis Forman, who have done a great deal as individuals as well as representatives of an organisation, to ensure that the Bill is given every possible support, both practical and moral.

I am sure that my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South and the Member for Newbury would agree that I should refer also to the work done for us by Miss Mary Greaves, who succeeded the late Megan du Boisson as the leader of the Disablement Income Group. I know that Mary takes great delight in the success that we have had in pressing the Bill to a successful conclusion.

On a personal note, I owe a great tribute to my brother the hon Member for Manchester, Openshaw (Mr. Charles R. Morris), whose happy thought it was that my name should be included in the ballot. But it would be wrong of me not to mention that it was your hand, Mr. Speaker, which pulled my name out of the hat. Mr. Giles Ecclestone of the Public Bill Office has helped throughout in trying to turn what I called an essay on disablement into a Bill which was capable of being enacted. We have all been helped by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Stoke Newington and Hackney, North (Mr. Weitzman), who is so able when it comes to drafting provisions.

It is asked how many people will benefit from the Bill. The answer is 1,200,000. My hon. Friend the Joint Under-Secretary said that the best estimate—or guesstimate—as of now is that there are 1,200,000 chronically sick or disabled people in Britain. The Disablement Income Group says that the figure is nearer 11 million. I always emphasise, if asked who shall benefit from these provisions, that we are all potentially disabled. Prospectively, we are all beneficiaries of any Measure which sets out to assist those who are disadvantaged by ill-health and who are in special need.

It has been suggested by my hon. Friends—indeed, by my colleagues in all parts of the House who have been working on the Bill—that there should be a Minister for the Disabled. Originally, nine Departments were involved. After our debate today on the application of the Bill to Scotland, at least ten Departments are now involved. But I would say that we have had a Minister for the Disabled; indeed, we have had two joint Ministers for the Disabled since 5th December, 1969. My hon. Friend the Joint Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Security and my hon. Friend the Joint Under-Secretary of State to the Ministry of Housing and Local Government have together been acting as Ministers for the Disabled since the Bill received its Second Reading, because they have been coordinating the work of ten Departments. They have spoken on subjects previously unfamiliar to them, both in Standing Committee and in the House today. They have probably had more experience in government of coordinating matters concerned with helping the disabled than any of their predecessors. I very much hope that we shall as it were, keep the team together and make certain that the left hand knows what the right hand has been doing and that nothing goes by default.

There are so many provisions in the Bill as it now stands that on Third Reading one ought not, perhaps, to speak about any particular one. There is, however, one Clause which gives me particular pleasure as the son of a war-disabled man. My father died of war wounds when I was six years of age. I am glad that the Bill does three important things for people who are disabled through war service. I am especially pleased also about the provision which will help thalidomide children, that complicated Clause which gives access to the pavement for the vehicles of thalidomide children. I was speaking only last night to Lady Hoare, who has done such distinguished work in the service of thalidomide childen, who said that this was a great step forward for those children. She said that if we can conquer the problems of the thalidomide children, we can conquer disablement generally.

I have been reminded recently by Mr. Gordon Piller, of the Institute of Child Health, that the number of disabled children is increasing. Many more children now survive even the most grievous complaints. Only quite recently it was certain death for a child to suffer from any one of a number of complaints which many children now survive. Therefore, the problems of disabled children are extremely and increasingly important.

Another matter which I mention briefly is that of bringing technology to the aid and service of disabled people. We have not asked for annual report on what is done by technology in helping the disabled for the purpose of having yet another annual report. We are seeking in that Clause to excite new progress and ensure that every Department will ask itself what has been done in its sphere in the past 12 months in the service of the disabled.

Many of the Bill's provisions are important to local authorities and I am glad that we are making mandatory what is now in many instances permissive. A permissive society—my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer would call it a "civilised society"—is all very well in certain spheres, but in the sphere of local authority provision for the disabled I am rather opposed to it. I regard myself as being reasonably tolerant in moral questions, but I am against permissiveness in local authority provision if this means local authorities shirking their jobs.

I am glad that we shall now be basing local services on the standard of the existing best. We are applying the reverse of Gresham's Law, as it were, by helping the good to drive out the bad. Mr. Speaker, may I say again that, if we could bequeath one precious gift to posterity, I would choose a society in which there is genuine compassion for the very sick and disabled; where understanding is unostentatious and sincere; where needs come before means; where if years cannot be added to the lives of the chronically sick, at least life can be added to their years; where the mobility of the disabled is restricted only by the bounds of technical progress and discovery; where the handicapped have a fundamental right to participate in industry and society according to ability; where socially preventable distress is unknown; and where no man has cause to be ill at ease because of disability. I hope it will be felt that this Measure is of some importance in that context.

rose—

Order. A number of hon. Members want the joy of participating in this Third Reading debate. As the debate must conclude at 4 o'clock, speeches must be reasonably brief. Mr. Astor.

The sponsors of the Bill and those who had the privilege of serving on the Standing Committee feel it a real privilege to have been able to play even a small part in improving provision for disabled people.

People throughout the country, both individually and representing organisations, have contributed to the discussion and content of the Bill, but its main architect is, of course, the hon. Member for Manchester, Wythenshawe (Mr. Alfred Morris). We are greatly indebted to him for having chosen this as the subject for his Bill and for the excellent and delightfully-mannered way in which he has led the Measure through its various stages. As a private hon. Member, he took on a considerable task in seeking to legislate on this rather broad field, and I sincerely congratulate him and hope that the Bill will continue on its course.

I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will agree that a great deal of the groundwork had already been done by the Disablement Income Group, to which he referred. This movement was inspired by the late Megan du Boisson, whose work has been ably carried on by Mary Greaves, work which in the last five years has done a great deal to educate not only public opinion but parliamentary opinion and which has given us a greater understanding of what the problems of disablement really are.

It was against a background of this improved climate of opinion that the Bill has been able to make progress, with support from hon. Members in all parts of the House. I wish to add my thanks to that of the hon. Member for Manchester, Wythenshawe to the help which was given to the Committee by the Central Council for the Disabled and, in particular, to Duncan Guthrie, Mrs. Forman and Mr. Denly, who has been particularly concerned with the Clauses affecting access to buildings.

It was a delightful pleasure to serve on the Standing Committee, which was single-minded in its purpose to serve the interests of disabled people. I take the opportunity, albeit a rather rare opportunity from these benches, to pay a genuine tribute to the most helpful attitude of the two Ministers who have been primarily concerned with the progress of the Bill. The Committee has been greatly indebted to them for their helpful work and in seeking to meet requests made of them. I am sure that as the result of their work the Bill was greatly improved in Committee.

We have had an unusual degree of harmony, and I hope that the Bill will pass through its next stages in the same happy atmosphere, resulting in real benefit to disabled people. I believe that the Measure will do much to broaden their lives and increase their degree of independence. I hope that it will be implemented by local authorities and others concerned in the same spirit of good will as has been shown in our discussions. If that happens, as I believe it will, disabled people will have gained a thoroughly useful Measure, and we shall have done a good job.

It is right that my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Wythenshawe (Mr. Alfred Morris) should be congratulated on his Bill. He has earned the gratitude of so many disabled people, and his name will be remembered for a very long time by those whom the Bill will help. At the same time, we should pay tribute to sponsors of the Bill on both sides who have worked so co-operatively to improve it. There are often great political party differences in this Chamber, but in this case there have been hardly any political party differences on Second Reading in Committee or now.

The Bill is concerned with that section of the community whose members are faced with so many tremendous problems in their daily life. The various Clauses will help them in many ways, and it is our job to make sure than, when the Measure is enacted, it does not in any way become a dead letter. It must be implemented and, in time, improved upon. One thing about which we must be concerned is that its provisions should be implemented once it is enacted. At least we can be sure that the D.I.G. branches in our constituencies will continue to act as an effective trade union for the disabled.

New Clause 6 empowers the Ministry to lay before the House an annual report on the mobility of disabled people. All hon. Members can quote constituency hardship cases, but I want to refer to a case that has concerned me for some years. I have a constituent who is virtually disabled and in no condition to drive a car. He requires a vehicle for his wife. The couple have four children. For some time I have been dealing with the matter with the Ministry. I recognise that one of the difficulties is that Parliament has not yet given the Minister power to take this kind of action. My hon. Friend the Joint Under-Secretary wrote me a kind letter stating that he understood and appreciated my constituent's problems. He added:

"It would be misleading, however, to suggest that the provision of cars through the National Health Service for persons who, like"—

my constituent:

"would be unable to drive themselves is likely in the foreseeable future".

There is this need to provide cars for people who are themselves disabled but need them for their spouses. I hope we can make sufficient progress in the years ahead so that such people can be assisted. There are tremendous problems for those involved in cases such as that I have quoted.

There is no doubt that this Bill constitutes a landmark in the work of helping disabled people. Although much more needs to be done, I think we can say today with some satisfaction that Parliament has started to do its duty to those who have been asking for its help for a very long time.

The hon. Member for Manchester, Wythenshawe (Mr. Alfred Morris) is being so over-burdened with bouquets that he has found it necessary almost to leave the Chamber. I add my congratulations to him for the enormous amount of work that he has expended in steering this Bill through the House. Many of us have known of the meetings with delegations on the interview floor and the vast amount of literature and briefing that he has had. We all wish to congratulate him on this milestone in his Parliamentary career. I suspect that to whatever heights he may go in the long time he may be in this House he will enjoy no greater satisfaction than that which comes from having piloted this Bill.

The hon. Member was kind enough to mention the work of my hon. Friend the Member for Newbury (Mr. Astor), who has also been devoted to this subject for a long time. We also congratulate the Under-Secretary and the Minister of State and thank them for the help they have given. I do not know whether it is the experience of other hon. Members, but many people I meet in my constituency and elsewhere appear to think that sometimes our deliberations do not reflect their priorities and views about how the time of Parliament should be spent. I do not think any of our constituents would not rejoice that the time of Parliament has been spent in trying to improve the lot of the disabled. I think that this Bill will prove extremely successful.

We have been prompted to put our own House in order. We are grateful to the Serjeant at Arms and the staff for the survey they are carrying out to see whether the House can be made more accessible to disabled people so that they may come here as ordinary visitors and find it easier to attend debates in the Chamber and in Committee rooms. Although one may often have the feeling that ordinary life is a little boring, people do want to live ordinary and normal lives. When it has completed its further stages, this Bill will enable the 1,500,000 disabled people to do so more easily.

I join the hon. Member for Newbury (Mr. Astor) in expressing great appreciation for the work done, especially in Committee, by my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Wythenshawe (Mr. Alfred Morris). Those of us who worked closely with him know the tremendous strain that he has been under. On behalf of all disabled people, I thank him for selecting this topic when he had the luck to draw first place in the Ballot. I understand that the number of possible Bills sent to him by interested organisations was about 450. The fact that he chose this piece of legislation, which is full of compassion, is something of which he can be proud for the rest of his life.

Like the hon. Member for Newbury, I have found great pleasure in being a member of the Committee, where there was unanimity and determination that a first-class piece of social engineering should be done to try to help people who, not always deliberately, had been left on one side for too long.

The Bill must be looked upon as a springboard for further action. Yesterday the Daily Telegrah carried a critical but helpful editorial saying that we still have a long way to go. As much as could be done in a Private Member's Bill has been done. It goes quite a long way to our first goal of getting disabled people completely involved in society. They will no longer be behind locked dooors. Life will open up to them again. The community is accessible to them and, with its great kindness and tolerance, will welcome them. Those of us who deal with disabled people know that this tremendous feeling of isolation must be overcome.

Like other hon. Members, I am grateful for the dedicated work of the Joint Under-Secretaries of State. They have explored every avenue and bent over backwards to make every conceivable concession. They, too, will earn the gratitude of many people in this country.

The problem of accessibility has been partly solved by the Bill. It may take some time, but disabled people must have greater accessibility if they are to be completely involved in the community. They must have the right to work, the right to earn, and the right to the dignity and pride of contributing to the community.

The unemployment level for the general population is about 2½ per cent. For disabled people capable of doing some work and being completely involved it is 12 per cent. This situation cannot be tolerated in an advanced, civilised, wealthy country like Britain. I hope that, as accessiblity to buildings and so on improves, employers who do not fulfil their 3 per cent. quota of disabled employees—a duty placed upon them by the Disabled Persons (Employment) Act, 1944—will have the conscience to see that their quotas are fulfilled.

South Wales shares in the general problem of the disabled throughout the country, but it is overlaid by the special problem peculiar to mining areas, and particularly to the South Wales coalfield, of disablement not simply through accident but through diseases like pneumoconiosis and silicosis. My hon. Friend the Member for Wythenshawe I can say officially, I think, will have the opportunity of visiting South Wales to talk to the South Wales branch of the National Union of Mineworkers and to receive its most hearty thanks for his efforts in this matter.

I am happy to have taken part in the proceedings on the Bill. I hope that it will be the precursor to other Measures which will ultimately give justice to our disabled comrades in the community.

Although I was not fortunate enough to take part in the Committee proceedings, I am glad to take this opportunity to congratulate the hon. Member for Manchester, Wythenshawe (Mr. Alfred Morris) and the other sponsors of the Bill on their work. He and his colleagues know that although I have not taken part in the parliamentary discussion on the Bill I have attended their sub-committee meetings and put forward certain suggestions on how I thought they could help the building industry to implement the provisions.

The important thing about the Bill is that it has stirred the conscience of hon. Members who have been only too willing to admire the courage and fortitude of the disabled but have never felt it within their powers to help them as the Bill does.

I feel almost like an intruder speaking in this debate, but I wanted to congratulate the hon. Gentleman. I speak with the experience of having had the honour to introduce about seven years ago a Private Member's Bill of a similar nature. I am sure that the Bill will have a quick passage through the other place, but I think that the problem then will be to notify the authorities and the public about its provisions and stir the conscience of those who can contribute to those provisions and use them.

The Bill provides that local authorities shall have special powers. Representing a constituency which has more than the average number of elderly people, I appreciate the great advantages of this. I also understand the ignorance on the part of people who design buildings, roads and other things of the special needs of the individual disabled person

I hope that this short debate will provide more publicity and show the advantages that can be obtained from the Bill.

I had the privilege of serving on the Committee considering the Bill, and I, too, pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Wythenshawe (Mr. Alfred Morris) on introducing it and on the great work he has done in carrying it through its various stages. It is a charter for the chronically sick and disabled. The paramount consideration has been to help them to make their lives more useful and happier. If we have done anything in that direction we shall have achieved a great deal, and we owe a great debt of gratitude to my hon. Friend for his work.

The Bill contains important provisions concerning welfare, housing, facilities for sanitary needs and access, advisory committees and other matters. I should be out of order if I referred to matters that are not in the Bill, but there are a number of points that I hope will he considered in another place.

I would add a word of gratitude to the Ministers involved, who have done everything they could to help in the passage of the Bill.

It is with great pleasure that I support the Third Reading of the Bill. The hon. Member for Manchester, Wythenshawe (Mr. Alfred Morris) described it as a collective essay. Judging by the fairly drastic revision we carried out in Committee, he might consider it a serial story. Great improvements have been made earlier this afternoon, and there are perhaps more to come in another place and in further legislation.

The hon. Gentleman paid tribute to the work of many hon. Members on both sides as well as individuals and organisations outside. I was very pleased that he and my hon. Friend the Member for Newbury (Mr. Astor) referred to the work of Mary Greaves and the Disablement Income Group, particularly as the late Megan du Boisson was a constituent of mine. She was a person with whom it gave me great pleasure and pride to work, and she would have been pleased and encouraged by the progress of the Bill, particularly the provision of cash. She and the Disablement Income Group advocated this, with the same thought as underlay most of the Bill—not so much purely to help the disabled but to put them in a position to overcome their disability, to help them and their families, and to assist them to lead as normal, effective, useful and productive lives as their disability and handicap made possible. It is a great pleasure and source of pride to me to have taken a part, however small, in the work of the House towards that end.

The hon. Member for Wythenshawe was characteristically modest in his speech, and gave the impression that he had had hardly anything to do with the Bill, that it was all the work of others. I am happy that that has been remedied by those who have spoken since. If he had been absent I think that his ears would be burning—I hope with pleasure. I join in congratulating him, in particular, among all the others who have taken part in the discussion on the Bill. Finally, I assure him of the full support from this side of the House in this very considerable step forward. Perhaps we can do still more in future, and when it has been done people will look back and say, with gratitude to the hon. Gentleman, that it all started from the Morris Act.

On behalf of the Government I support the Third Reading of the Bill. I intend doing so briefly because I have spoken frequently throughout the Committee stage and the debate today and many hon. Members have heard enough from me on this Bill for a day or two.

But there are one or two things I must say in addition to welcoming the Bill on behalf of the Government. I add my tribute to those already paid to the Bill's sponsor, my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Wythenshawe (Mr. Albert Morris). He undertook a very ambitious project and put forward an exceedingly extensive and complex Private Member's Bill when he drew No. 1 in the Ballot. It would have been easy for him to choose a simpler, less complex and shorter subject, and I know that many people approached him at that time to do precisely that. Instead, he selected what I think is the Private Member's Bill of the year. Every year in Parliament there is one Private Member's Bill which goes down in parliamentary history. We can all think of some of the Bills which have passed through the House in recent years. In years to come people will remember this year as the year of the Bill to which we are now about to give a Third Reading.

A wide range of people all over the community will be helped by the Bill. It will help large numbers of people, although I do not want at this stage to enter into the numbers game. They include people with very differing disabilities—the children hon. Members have mentioned, the young chronic sick and the older members of our society. Each and every one of these people can feel today that a significant step has been taken.

The way in which the Bill has been handled in Committee, on Report and during Third Reading is a measure of the concern of hon. Members. There has at no stage been division or a semblance of party conflict. We have had differences of view on certain issues, as is right and inevitable. I pay tribute to all hon. Members who have played their part in getting the Bill to this stage. I also pay tribute to the help of those of my colleagues in Government who may not perhaps have played so noticeable a part as my hon. Friend the Joint Parliamentary Secretary at the Ministry of Housing and Local Government, to whom well deserved tributes have already been paid. I pay tribute to all those other departmental Ministers—and there are many of them—who have responsibilities and who have been exceedingly helpful to the two Ministers who have carried the major share of the work in Committee and subsequently. In order to solve these difficult problems, we need more than legislation. Of course, legislation has a useful and valuable rôle to play, but it can only partly solve the problems.

The Bill and the discussion of it have managed to achieve a shift in public opinion and an increase in the awareness of the problems and difficulties of a group in our society whose needs in the past have not perhaps been fully understood. I hope that this understanding will continue to increase for years to come, to the benefit of those who are burdened with chronic sickness or disability. We are concerned, of course, not only with those who are burdened in a physical sense; we should not forget those who are perhaps burdened in a mental sense. There is need for a continuing shift in public opinion. There is also need for Government legislation, and it is striking how many different parts of the Bill interlock with Government legislation already on the Statute Book or going through the House at the moment, or legislation which it is the Government's intention shall become law in the not-too-distant future.

I have paid tribute to those intimately concerned in the passage of the Bill, and I also pay tribute to the wide range of organisations outside the House who have been giving advice and help to all of us involved in getting the Bill to this stage. It would be invidious to pick out any organisation because each has had a particular point of view and a particular interest which it has expressed with enthusiasm.

This day is a milestone in the provision of care and in the attitude of the community as a whole towards those suffering from disabilities. I hope that the Bill will be as kindly treated in another place as it has been treated here and that it will not be mangled in any sense. Britain today is a compassionate and civilised society. The support which the Bill has obtained is an indication and measure of the extent to which it is a compassionate and civilised society.

I wish to add my congratulations to my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Wythenshawe (Mr. Alfred Morris). We have shared a personal friendship over many years. Secondly, we are both members of the Co-operative Movement—and this has been a co-operative effort throughout all the stages of the Bill. I congratulate my hon. Friend on his tenacity and on the enormous amount of hard work and time which he has given to the Bill.

I offer my thanks to those of the Disablement Income Group and many other bodies who have come to the House to assist us in our deliberations and I thank, too, the police and other servants of the House, because at practically every sitting of the Committee stage I was bringing into the House in wheelchairs such people as Mrs. Dorothy Marsh Dickson and Miss Pamela La Fane. From the moment they arrived at the gate the police and the attendants of the House made sure that they had the maximum amount of hospitality. Through you, Mr. Speaker, I thank all those servants of the House who in that way helped us to get the Bill through.

May I make a brief comment on Clause 24, which has been incorporated in the Bill, because I have an interest in this subject as a member of the Medical Research Council. It is not a financial interest; as a Member of Parliament I am the only member of that Council who is not allowed to receive money. But Clause 24 lays responsibility on the Department of Education. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South (Mr. Ashley) in this connection, because although the first stage of the Clause lay with me, and the second stage was acceptance by my hon. Friend the Member for Wythenshawe, the complete recasting of it was done by my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South who did so much work to get it into the Bill.

If it materialises as we hope, it will means that for the first time clinical research into forms of deafness, diagnosis, pure audiology, psychological acoustics and physiological acoustics, histology and temporal bone banks—of which we know very little in this country—electronic acoustics and the whole question of vestibular functions and engineering will be brought together in one central, apex organisation. I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South for the tremendous work he has done in bringing this problem to the attention of the country.

Lastly, I pay tribute to the work of the Medical Research Council. There are currently more than 20 projects for hearing under research. Since 1944 the work of, for example, Professor Hallpike has become world-famous. I hope that the acceptance of Clause 21 and the Bill's being accorded a Third Reading will not be regarded as any vote of censure on the work which is being done. It is an expression of hope that in future there will be a great increase in the application of the resources available to help those who, like our hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South and myself, are disabled with deafness.

I do not want to let this occasion pass without adding my welcome as one who was not on the Standing Committee. This Bill is a great step forward. I agree with the Under-Secretary that it fits in with other legislation—in particular, with the Local Authority Social Services Bill which is now in Standing Committee.

I applaud the fact that the Bill does not attempt to deal with different types of disability in a different way. The Under-Secetary said that mental disability should not be regarded in a different way from physical disability. One of the features of the Bill which I greatly applaud is that at no point are the different causes of disability separately treated. For this reason, I welcome the Bill.

I welcome the Bill, too, because it seeks to make the disabled more independent and self-reliant. This is the theme of all that is best in thought on this subject. Not only are the disabled happier if they are living full and complete lives, as far as possible, but they also place less train upon the community's resources. Therefore, it is better, not only for the disabled themselves, but also for the community, if they are more independent.

Finally, I welcome Clause 2, which attempts to spell out much more precisely than has even been done before the techniques by which the second of the objectives I have mentioned may be accomplished. I wish that the Local Authority Social Services Bill were more specific. Clause 2 of this Bill will be something of a charter for local authorities in the provision of social work. Up to now, the powers have been very vague and wide. Only within those wide powers have these techniques been developed. Clause 2 lists the sorts of things that local authorities can do.

For those three reasons, I join other hon. Members in warmly congratulating the promoters of the Bill and wishing it rapid progress through Parliament.

I welcome the opportunity to take part in this Third Reading debate. I believe that the Bill accomplishes more for disabled people than any other legislative enactment that the House has ever seen, and this is a fine accomplishment for a Private Member's Bill. I am sure that the House and thousands of people outside will want to express their appreciation to my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Wythenshawe (Mr. Alfred Morris).

The issues with which we have been dealing are those which affect the everyday lives of disabled people. My hon. Friend has had to deal with Members of the Government, with members of the Opposition, and with back-benchers of this side of the House. A number of hon. Members, whom I do not want to mention specifically, have helped in various ways. I mention only the hon. Member for Moray and Nairn (Mr. Gordon Campbell).

This has not been a party political Bill, and I should like to place on record, as my hon. Friend intimated, that the Government have leaned over backwards to give every conceivable assistance to this Measure. They have made every effort to accommodate it. All the work which has been put in by the Government has not been visible. It has been like a duck's feet. They have been paddling away like mad, but the work has not been visible in the House.

Who are the disabled about whom we are talking? "The disabled" do not exist as a homogeneous unit, except in the public mind. There is no such thing as a group of disabled. What we are talking about are thousands of individual men, women and children, each of whom has a disability. Some live in total darkness. Some live in total silence. Some cannot speak, and some cannot walk. Indeed, tragically, some cannot even think, they are mentally disabled.

Each individual bears his burden with all the pride, dignity, and independence that he can muster. It is a daily battle which each disabled person must fight. To that extent every man is an island, and one must disagree with John Donne. Every man must bear his own burden, but I believe that the moral which we must draw from recognising them as individuals is that public indifference tends to make this chasm into an unbridgeable gulf, and the great virtue of my hon. Friend's Bill is that it helps to bridge this gulf and this chasm. What my hon. Friend has done in the last few months is to dent public indifference and this is a fine achievement by any standards.

My hon. Friend's efforts have affected the disabled themselves. The Bill has given them a new confidence and self-reliance. This is not giving succour to the disabled. The purpose of the Bill is to help the disabled to help themselves. This is the major virtue of the Bill, and this is what it is accomplishing. The disabled are now fighting for themselves and you know, Mr. Speaker, better than anyone, that wheel chairs are now a commonplace in the House. They have become such a commonplace that after the business of the House is completed the police shout, "Who rolls home?". It is a splendid thing that disabled men and women should come to this House and fight for their rights. This is a wholly admirable increase in confidence, which will develop and be reflected in city councils and town halls.

The Bill enshrines new rights for the disabled. They are rights which have been specified in Committee and on Report. There may have been some arguments about details, but I cannot stress sufficiently the way in which the Government have helped those of us, on both sides, who have been anxious to implement these proposals. The Government's efforts are very warmly appreciated.

In addition to enshrining these rights, it has given new responsibilities to authorities, both national and local. I hope that it will make it clear to local authorities that, as from the moment the Bill becomes law, which I hope will be shortly, they will have responsibilities to disabled people which they have not had hitherto. I hope that in both local and national government we will see a tremendous difference in the facilities afforded to disabled people.

How do the disabled themselves regard the Bill? I think that I may speak for thousands and thousands of people in expressing their gratitude to my hon. Friend. The Bill is a new departure for disabled people. All too often specific questions about specific disabilities are dealt with in isolation. What the Bill has done, and this is another of its great virtues, is to focus the public mind and the minds of hon. Members on the general problems over a vast range of disablement. This is a considerable achievement.

Although I do not pursue it too far, I pose the question of where we go from here. I cannot go into that in any detail now, but what I claim is that we have now laid the basis for an entirely new departure and it is on this basis which has been created by the Bill that we shall see what the Americans would call a new deal. It is only a beginning, but it is a very important beginning and it is one that disabled people all over Britain much appreciate.

I believe that people all over the world will look to the Bill because it is a pioneering Bill, that it will set an example which will be emulated throughout the world. The House may be proud of it. Again I offer my compliments to my hon. Friend, not simply on having selected the subject, but on the highly skilful and tactful way he has dealt with many complicated problems. I add my appreciation to that of hon. Members on both sides of the House, and I commend the Bill as opening a new era for the chronic sick and disabled of Britain.

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I am grateful for this opportunity to draw attention to danger and disturbance to people in North Somerset, particularly in the village of Tickenham, owing to work on the building of the M5. I am grateful to the Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Transport for the attention which I know he is giving to this problem and for his presence today. I am also glad to see in their places my hon. Friends the Members for Westonsuper-Mare (Mr. Wiggin) and Bridgwater (Mr. Tom King), whom we warmly welcome, who I know are also concerned, or will later be concerned, with similar problems. My intention is not to apportion blame but to try to get some action.

There are two main reasons why I raise this matter. First, I am not satisfied that my constituents are receiving the consideration which they should receive or that their problems have had the prompt and effective attention which they justifiably require. To be fair, I must say that there has been a change of attitude recently which appears to have coincided with the time that I announced I would raise this matter in the House. Secondly, the terms of the Ministry contracts do not appear to provide adequate safeguards to individuals who are disturbed by the building of motorways.

My constituents who are involved are very reasonable people. They realise that the motorway must be built and that it will cause disturbance; they do not want to hold the work up. But they also realise that the work will be going on for anything up to 18 months. Meantime they are entitled to proper con- sideration and they must not be subjected to intolerable living conditions.

The problem arises because the route of the M5 is very close to the village of Tickenham. One house is less than 100 ft. from the boundary fence of the motorway. At this point, rock must be blasted away to make a cutting for the motorway, and substantial additional quantities of rock are to be removed for use on the motorway nearby.

There are four main points which I should like to make: first, danger from blasting; secondly, noise; thirdly, hours of working; and, finally, the possible use of polluted waste material in building the motorway.

I deal first with danger from blasting. On Saturday, 7th March, following blasting, pieces of rock weighing up to 3 lbs. rained down on the village of Tickenham. Some of the pieces were carried over about 400 yards. Some of them narrowly missed a number of people in the village, including children, and caused some minor damage to property. Fortunately, there were no casualties, but there could easily have been in an accident of this kind. I got in touch with the Minister and with the sub-contractors. The Minister promised an immediate inquiry, and the contractors have assured me that they have taken precautions to try to ensure that an accident of his sort does not happen again. I understand that it was caused by a pocket of clay.

Is the Minister satisfied that every precaution has been taken to ensure that this type of incident, this hazard to life in this area, is not likely to happen again?

I deal now with my second heading, noise? There is no doubt in the minds of myself and of the people most concerned that at present the noise is at an unacceptably high level. It has reached as much as 90 to 91 decibels in the area by the houses which are nearest to the work. The Wilson Committee, which reported on this subject some time ago, stated that 85 decibels for a prolonged period is likely to cause damage to ears and therefore to health.

It appears to me from the letter which the Parliamentary Secretary was good enough to write to me on 10th March in reply to my letter of some Months earlier that the Ministry does not have adequate control over noise levels and over safeguards against noise in the regulations which exist.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary told me that unless a person is affected through compulsory purchase of part of his property, nothing can be done to assist an aggrieved person. It depends entirely on negotiations which may have taken place with the contractor concerning the soundproofing of houses or whatever other feature may be desirable.

I understand from the contractor that he has now offered to help the individuals most concerned in this respect and that he has also called in accoustic experts to advise on the silencing of equipment and the working of plant to reduce noise to the minimum. I am grateful for this, and so are my constituents, but it is not satisfactory. In my view, the Minister should have power to protect individuals who are inconvenienced by contracts which the Ministry awards. I hope that the Minister will be able to assure the House that if there is a gap in the law in this respect, speedy steps will be taken to see that this weakness is remedied.

My third point is hours of working. At present, there is no working on the site after 8 o'clock in the evening. The contractor, understandably, wants to resume night working, with, he tells me, one machine but with no drilling or blasting. The Minister assured me, again in his letter of 10th March, that there would be no resumption of night working until

"the contract engineer is satisfied that the noise will be kept to an acceptable level".

I must tell the Joint Parliamentary Secretary that I am not at all satisfied with that assurance. In the first place, the contract engineer, with all respect to him, is an interested party in the working. It certainly begs the question of what is an acceptable level of noise. It is not defined in the Minister's letter to me. In my view, the Minister should be satisfied, after consultation with the Tickenham Parish Council and the Long Ashton Rural District Council and with me, before any extension of working beyond 8 p.m. is allowed. On behalf of my constituents, I shall most strongly oppose any extension of working beyond the existing hours unless we can have adequate assurances, after full consultation, that noise levels will be brought down to an acceptable level.

My fourth and final point concerns the use of polluted waste material in the building of the motorway. Substantial cattle losses have already been sustained in the Gordano Valley, particularly by one farmer, owing to fluorine pollution, which has resulted in fluorosis in cattle. This is a problem which has not yet been resolved, nor has the matter of compensation for the people concerned.

The point for this debate is the fear that if that polluted waste is used in the building of the motorway, it might cause more trouble through dust or through the material being washed into the surrounding streams in the event of heavy rain. The Minister, again in his letter of 10th March, has told me that he is satisfied that no danger exists, but I am bound to tell him that those concerned locally are not satisfied and I ask him to look again at this problem.

Those are the main points which I wish to raise. I summarise them by saying that I am not satisfied that my constituents are getting due consideration. They have been quite right to protest. They are eminently reasonable people. They do not wish to hold up the work on this motorway, which we shall welcome when built. But in the meantime—it will be quite a long meantime—they are entitled to consideration and to expect that work taking place close to their homes should not unduly interfere with their livelihoods and their enjoyment of the delightful part of the country in which they live.

I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Somerset, North (Mr. Dean) and to the Parliamentary Secretary for allowing me a few minutes of their valuable time to comment on the construction of this motorway which comes from my hon. Friend's constituency, right through my division, and will be going on to the area represented by my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgwater (Mr. Tom King), whom I should like to welcome today.

I wish to raise three matters. The first concerns the general issue of the responsibility of the Ministry for contractors and sub-contractors on this and, indeed, any similar contract. I had experience of motorway construction near my old home in Worcestershire where the M5 came through in the early 1960s. Time and again, when a complaint is raised, the Ministry claims as its excuse, "We are not responsible for what the contractor or the sub-contractor does. It is their responsibility." The frustration felt by complainants is the difficulty of pinning anyone down to answer their queries.

I raised this point with the county surveyor when discussing the motorway many months ago. I gained the impression that on this contract the consulting engineers would be answerable. Yet both my hon. Friend and I, in the cases that we have raised with the Minister, find that the situation is much as I have described, for the answer is, "We are not responsible".

I have raised the matter at Question Time, and I am glad to have this opportunity of referring again to the supply of stone. Each week 30,000 tons of stone are carried from Dulcote Quarry through the city of Wells in my neighbouring constituency and through the village of Cheddar, which is my responsibility, to the motorway. The Minister will be aware that this heavy traffic has already meant that the bridge in Cheddar has had to be closed for 24 hours, specially strengthened, and is now operating only one-way traffic. The expense of putting the bridge right and putting right the damage caused to the country lanes and small roads must in some degree be balanced against the advantage of getting the contract for the stone. In considering whether this contract was suitable, the Minister seems once again to have washed his hands of the problem and said, "This is nothing to do with me. It is up to the contractors".

I join my hon. Friend in saying that my constituents, too, in no way want to hold up the construction of this important motorway. It will be of great advantage to the area when completed. However, it seems unnecessary that the people should have to suffer this inconvenience.

Temporary traffic lights are blossoming like the blossom in spring around my district. This is inevitable with temporary crossing places, moving lorries, hold-ups, and so on. But does anybody—the county surveyor, the consulting engineers, the Minister's representative or possibly the police—have the power to see that those temporary traffic lights are properly sited and, above all, properly timed? I need not elaborate on the inconvenience that can be caused to traveler when temporary traffic lights are erected and mis-phased.

I hope that the Minister will be able to answer these three queries.

I am grateful to the hon. Member for Somerset, North (Mr. Dean) and to the hon. Member for Weston-super-Mare (Mr. Wiggin) for giving me this opportunity to explain these events which have taken place in connection with the construction of the M5 motorway in North Somerset, and to offer them and their constituents who have been affected my sincerest apologies for any concern they may have been caused.

Work is at present proceeding on three major motorway contracts in North Somerset. The first is in the Gordano Valley section, on which preliminary work has just started. On this section the motorway rises from the valley of the Bristol Avon to climb the northern face of the Clevedon Hills, with separated carriageways on the sloping ground. This contract calls for the excavation of some 1 million cubic yards of rock.

The second contract is the Clevedon Hills section, on which work started early in December last year. At the northern end of this section, excavation of 2 million cubic yards of rock has to be carried out where the motorway crosses the saddle in the Clevedon Hills. The remainder of this section passes over alluvial flats.

The third contract, the Mendip Hill section, also started in December last year. The northern part of this section will run through the Mendip Hills, and the remainder over the Somerset Levels, a large fen land. Approximately 11 million cubic yards of excavation will take place in the Mendip Hills.

The incidents which the hon. Member for Somerset, North has described arise from operations on the second of these contracts, the Clevedon Hills section of the motorway, and particularly from the difficulties arising from the excavation of masses of rock, much of which is of a complex folded and faulted structure.

Approximately 2 million cubic yards of rock in the Clevedon Hills at Tickenham have to be excavated. This rock consists mainly of limestone, but also includes some conglomerate and some sandstone. Initially, ripping of the conglomerate has been possible but it is necessary to use blasting to excavate the bulk of the limestone and sandstone.

We were fully aware of the difficulties which could arise as a result of the unavoidable use of explosives for excavating the vast quantities of rock arising on this contract. Very exacting provisions were included in the contract in an endeavour to safeguard against any injury or damage to persons or property, and to reduce disturbance to the minimum possible on a project of this size.

The background to the incidents described by the hon. Member is as follows. On the first occasion, at 5.30 p.m. on 16th January, an owner of property reported that fine fragments of material had landed on his front lawn. Fortunately, no damage or injury resulted, and no formal complaint was received. A month later, at 1 p.m. on 18th February, a complaint was received alleging that a single rock fragment had landed in another garden. No other rock fly was reported or observed, although the incident was thoroughly investigated at the time.

On Wednesday, 25th February, at about 1.30 p.m., further rock fragments landed on Hill Lane and an adjoining property, Camp Lane Bungalow, breaking two p.v.c. sheets on the roof of the property and a p.v.c. canopy in the garden. On this occasion, the contractor had removed all the loose material from the previous blast and the alignment of the shot holes was such that it resulted in a blast facing towards the bungalow concerned. The contractor was immediately instructed by the resident engineeer to maintain a cushion of previously blasted material in front of future blasting, and to turn the face of his blasting upwards and away from property.

The last, and, I think, the most serious incident, to which the hon. Gentleman referred occurred on Saturday, 7th March, at 1 p.m., when the blast again caused a scatter of material. Immediately, full and detailed investigations were carried out by the consulting engineers on our behalf, assisted by the main contractor, the sub-contractor concerned and an explosives expert.

In simple terms, their findings, were that the scattered material had come from just one of 11 shot holes which was restrained by solid rock at the side and where, unbeknown to the contractor, as the hon. Gentleman said, there was a clay pocket. This previously undetected geological fault was, apparently, the main cause of the incident.

To prevent any repetition, the contractor has been instructed to produce for the approval of the consulting engineer proposals for an alternative method of working based on the report from the experts who investigated all the incidents. In the meantime, in addition to redoubling our efforts on site supervision and control, we have laid down the following requirements: the permitted charge per hole has been reduced and holes will be fired only in single sequence; loosened material must not be removed until the next row of charges has been fired. This should provide a cushion against rock flying forwards if in future an undetected plane of weakness or clay pocket exists; in the vicinity of property, and wherever possible, the face of the blasting will be directed upwards, and blasting mats and all other precautions which can be employed for the protection of the public will be used. Arrangements have been made for an Inspector of Mines and Quarries to visit the site, and he will continue to make periodic visits.

The maximum depth of cutting at this point will be approximately 100 feet, and although the cutting will be in sloping ground, the motorway level will generally be below the level of the ground on the downhill side of the cutting in the vicinity of the properties in this area. This will afford some protection as excavation progresses. In the period since January this year, approximately ¼ million cubic yards of rock have been removed and it is expected that it will be another three months before the excavation level in the motorway cutting reaches the level of the ground on the downhill side in the vicinity of these properties. Excavation in the cutting is then expected to continue for a further nine months, but during this period it is expected that the noise level and any disurbance caused by these operations will be reduced by the slope of the cutting on the downhill side.

If hon. Members will bear with me, I will say something briefly about the general question of noise, which I know is of some concern to Members with major road works which are near to houses. First, I would like to emphasise that, with the co-operation of our consulting engineers, our contractors and sub-contractors, we are doing and will continue to do all we reasonably can to minimise any disturbance or inconvenience. I assure the House that any complaint about roadworks which are our responsibility brought to the notice of my Department will be investigated immediately to see whether anything can be done to improve the situation. On the particular contracts which we have been discussing this afternoon we have held public meetings in the area before the start of main works to explain the engineering works involved and to advise residents of the difficulties of excavating some 2 million cubic yards of rock in the area without some disturbance and inconvenience.

Another matter which has caused some local disquiet is the possibility that some waste material used in the works could cause pollution. The material in question, industrial waste slag, is being used by the contractor concerned to build a temporary rail siding near the St. Georges interchange. Before its use was authorised, samples were analysed by the Soil Science Section of the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, and an independent consultant. This established that the only possible danger was from dust due to the fluorine content, and the slag is, therefore, being used only in circumstances where it can promptly be covered with other filling material if conditions make the creation of dust at all likely. The analyst's reports confirmed that there was no danger of water pollution from this source.

May I also make it quite clear that importation of this waste material is confined to one approved source of supply and no fresh source will be authorised without the fullest chemical analysis.

The hon. Member for Weston-super-Mare has raised the question—which he has raised with me before—of construction traffic carrying rock fill from quarries south-east of Wells to the contract length between St. Georges and Edith-mead. Because of difficult soil conditions over the Somerset flats, some 1 million tons of material for drainage, layer and surcharge will have to be imported for this contract.

As I explained to the hon. Gentleman in reply to the Question which he put on this very point, in common with all contracts carried out under the Institution of Civil Engineers' Conditions of Contract, it is the contractor's sole responsibility to find and supply all the materials he requires for the works and to transport them to the site. If, contrary to the provisions of his contract, we were now to dictate to the contractor concerned where he should obtain his materials, the taxpayer would immediately be at risk financially—for example, in respect of cancellation charges on the contractor's existing contracts with quarries, and for any difference in cost between the contractor's own sources of supply and the ones we were seeking to impose on him.

The hon. Gentleman has also complained about traffic lights, traffic signals, and the delays arising. He has asked what consultations there have been with the police and the local council on phasing. Where these hugh 35-ton vehicles are using the motorway route as a haul route, of necessity they must cross local roads, and I should have thought that the hon. Gentleman would have been grateful for the positive type of control by traffic signals, rather than by flag men, that the contractors have instituted.

Nevertheless, I appreciate the hon. Gentleman's concern for his constituents in this matter of construction traffic. It has been fully discussed with all the local authorities concerned, the police, and other interested parties, and everything possible to reduce nuisance has been, and will continue to be done so long as the contract continues.

The construction of the M5 motorway constitutes the biggest civil engineering project of its type undertaken in the south-west, and on the contracts we have been discussing today the route has to be taken across two major ranges, the Clevedon Hills and the Mendips. When it is built it will bring tremendous benefits to the south-west. As I have said, however, when construction work of this magnitude is in progress unfortunately, but inevitably, some disturbance is unavoidable.

Once again, I would like to repeat my sincerest apologies for the incidents which have occurred on these contracts. I hope that what I have said today will assure hon. Members that we are very mindful of all our responsibilities and that we are taking, and will continue to take, all possible measures to prevent them from recurring and to mitigate any other effects, albeit temporary, which projects of this size must entail.

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for the answers he has given. However, he has not dealt with my point about hours of working. Will he give me a positive assurance that there will be no extension of the present hours of working, which go up to 8 p.m., until there have been full consultations, including consultations with me, and until he and the Ministry are absolutely satisfied that there will not be any unreasonable disturbances to residents?

I thought that I indicated earlier, when I mentioned the fact that other hon. Members were concerned about this problem, that the question of night working is one on which local discussions with the responsible local councils, and the police take place before any extension of hours is made. I am sorry that I cannot give the hon. Gentleman any firm assurance because, when the long summer days come, clearly, if we are to get our motorway finished as expeditiously as possible, we must, wherever possible, extend the hours of working.