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

I am sure that new clause 1 will be welcomed by the whole House, especially by those right hon. and hon. Members who were members of the Committee. It requires the Secretary of State to lay before each House of Parliament particulars of any proposals to make a designation under clause 4. That will not be by way of statutory instrument, but the Secretary of State's proposal will be subject to a procedure that is similar to the negative resolution procedure. The Secretary of State is not permitted to make the proposed designation within 40 days of laying his proposals or at all if, within 40 days, either House resolves that he should not do so. Subsection (3) of new clause 1 describes how the period of 40 days is to be computed.

In Committee, several right hon. and hon. Members, including the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Small Heath (Mr. Howell), my hon. Friend the Member for Hampstead and Highgate (Sir G. Finsberg) and the hon. Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Mr. Maclennan), expressed anxiety that the Bill as drafted gives the Secretary of State carte blanche to appoint a person or persons as the designated authority without the need to seek parliamentary approval. My right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary has made it clear all along that if Parliament grants him the necessary powers he proposes to designate the principal officers of the British Board of Film Censors. That has been the subject of extensive debate during the passage of the Bill, as I am sure everyone is aware.

My hon. Friend the Minister has proposed several changes to the constitution and structure of the board. If it was a case of having power only to make that one designation I would doubt whether there was much point in making it subject to a specific parliamentary procedure as my right hon. and learned Friend's proposals will have been thoroughly aired during the Bill's proceedings. However, clause 4(4) empowers the Secretary of State to make a fresh designation. As I said in Committee, I have a good deal of sympathy for the view, which was shared on both sides of the Committee, that any such designation should be subject to parliamentary scrutiny. My hon. Friend the Minister undertook in Committee to look into the possibility of incorporating in the Bill a parliamentary procedure for the first and further designations. That is what new clause 1 achieves. It ensures that Parliament has the opportunity to play a part in any designation under clause 4 and as such responds to the understandable anxieties expressed by several right hon. and hon. Members in Committee. I am pleased to commend it to the House.

I am grateful for the opportunity to speak on one of the two fundamental parts of the Bill. On Second Reading I was happy to be a sponsor of the Bill. That is still the case, but I have serious reservations about parts of it and parts of the procedures that it will provide. I am aware that, in Committee — I was not a member of it — there was perhaps most debate on the body that would do the censoring of videos. It has always been clear that, if the Home Secretary were to support the hon. Member for Luton, South (Mr. Bright), the body would be similar to the British Board of Film Censors.

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I and others are worried that new clause I will allow the Bill to go through without the House knowing what type of body will later have the power, having been designated by the Secretary of State, to ban certain videos in certain conditions. We are worried that it will be only at a later stage that we shall have the opportunity to discuss the composition of that body. I do not object to the body's composition being discussed at suitable length. That is good, as it is important that it is regarded as the best and most appropriate for the decisions it must take. However, to pass the Bill now and so take it two thirds of the way down the road to approval, only the censoring body remaining to be put in place, would be rather like writing a blank cheque. There is a danger that, if legislation on the statute book requires only an order to implement its final parts, it is far more likely to be implemented. The House has sovereign authority to reject the Home Secretary's proposal and to send it back to the drawing board, but I doubt whether that would happen.

I am worried about whether the British Board of Film Censors, even in amended form, is suitable to perform the functions that the Bill contemplates for it. At the moment, the BBFC has a responsibility for censoring by way of approval or disapproval at a preliminary stage films for showing in licensed premises that are ultimately the responsibility of local authorities. It is for those elected bodies — local authorities — to take a decision. The BBFC therefore has no legal, statutory or final say and it was regarded by the Williams committee in 1979 as a body with very little official status. The problem with putting the same body into a similar position with regard to videos is that we shall set up a body which must censor material that will be shown in premises that are licensed for the purpose and which local authorities have a duty to control and material that will be sold over the counter and shown in people's homes. I want to be assured that the body that does that censoring is representative and accountable to the public.

Bearing in mind the fact that we are anxious not to add an ill-defined extra category to the law that defines what is obscene, the best analogy that I can find—I recognise that there are practical difficulties — is the jury of 12 adults who determine a suspect's guilt or innocence. That at least is a random selection of people who can therefore be regarded as impartial. Depending on the criteria of what can be banned, such a body would have the virtue of not being comprised of experts, quasi-experts or nominees, which is what I fear the BBFC or its equilavent would be.

Many people are worried that the Bill seeks to do something fairly new—to intrude into what adults can purchase and take into their homes. We are aware of the danger to children, and no one would wish to do anything that harms them, but given that the responsibility for children and their behaviour must rest with their parents or legal guardians, we should be reassured that the body that will have such powers is properly accountable and decides fairly in a way that is representative of the community on whose behalf it is deciding. I and other hon. Members will wish to be satisfied that giving the Home Secretary the power to lay before the House an order setting out the details of the body will not guarantee that the body is a selection of appointed or designated nominees under criteria that do not have proper regard to the democratic and accountable requirements that exist in the licensing for public performance of films in cinemas by local authorities.

We cannot give more power to the state in relation to videos than we do in relation to cinemas. I seek reassurance from the Minister or from the hon. Member for Luton, South about the way in which this problem will be tackled when, if this clause is passed, we come to discuss the composition of the designated authority.

I have some sympathy with the views of the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes), who has echoed many of the thoughts that I expressed in Committee. However, I am sure that my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State can give us the assurances that he sought, and I look forward to hearing what my hon. Friend says.

I wholeheartedly support my hon. Friend the Member for Luton, South (Mr. Bright). We have not always seen eye to eye on the way in which the Bill might achieve its objective, although we completely agree about the objective itself. I pay tribute to him for being ready to listen to argument and to accept that some changes would have to be made. He handled the Bill in Committee with surefootedness, and I am delighted to join hands with him today in support of this new clause and other amendments.

I concede that there are more ways than one of achieving the Bill's objective. If our amendments are accepted, the Bill will deal effectively with a grave and growing social evil that no caring and civilised society should tolerate. From the outset of our debates on the Bill, I have been worried about two matters. The first is how to stop in their tracks those who make, sell or hire video material portraying excessive violence, sadistic cruelty, explicit sex, including every form of deviancy, and the sexual humiliation and degradation of women, for viewing in the home where it can be seen and is being seen by young children and adolescents. Bearing in mind the warning of the Lord Chief Justice a few weeks ago, we should not forget that such films are also seen by many unstable adults.

My second worry is how we can ensure that, whatever machinery the Bill provides to check this filthy and pernicious trade — I refer to only a small part of an exciting, growing and important new activity—the body appointed to certify video recordings as being suitable for viewing in the home or elsewhere is answerable to Parliament and takes heed of public opinion.

It is much to the credit of the members of the Committee that we reached broad agreement on both counts. The Committee accepted my amendment requiring the designated authority to have specific regard to whether video works are suitable for viewing in the home. I demonstrated to the Committee's satisfaction that video recordings such as I have described not only disturb young children — teachers, paediatricians and psychologists have repeatedly warned us of the damage being done—but are affecting adolescents who are fed an unremitting diet of such material—sometimes, incredible though it may seem, encouraged by their parents. One parent recently bleated to a court that he had thought the experience might help his son to grow up, after the boy had been convicted of a grievous attack upon a woman when he turned his fantasies into reality. The fact is that fantasies encouraged by videos are being acted out in vicious and brutal assaults upon women. I mentioned in Committee several cases that have been brought before the courts, and in no instance was that challenged. That is not surprising, since I had the full support of the Magistrates Association.

In Committee, a trial took place at the Old Bailey in which a husband and wife pleaded guilty to committing acts of gross indecency and indecent assaults upon their son aged 10 and their daughter aged 11, after jointly viewing pornographic videos. The father admitted incest with his daughter, aided and abetted by the mother. The parents were sent to prison and the children were taken into care, and the judge described the videos as

"a vicious and evil intrusion into the family home."

Can my hon. Friend tell the House whether that pornographic film was hired or purchased from a videogram shop as we are talking about in the Bill?

I cannot tell the House that, and I do not regard it as relevant, although the police have given me some information about the films. This is only one example of many cases, and if the House wishes, I could give it a whole list——

Order This is only the first new clause of the Bill, and we have many amendments to cover. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will relate his remarks more directly to the new clause.

When my hon. Friend the Member for Gravesham (Mr. Brinton) has been in the House a little longer, he will know about the rules of Report stage. It is not that I cannot answer his question, but that I should be out of order if I did so.

The second direction in which the Committee moved was to tighten considerably the machinery for certifying video material, and the new clause takes the process further. The House might ask why it is necessary to tighten the machinery. In Committee my hon. Friend the Member for Luton, South and my hon. Friend the Minister said that they believed that the British Board of Film Censors should be the authority that determined whether a video recording should receive a certificate for public or restricted showing, or whether it should be rejected.

I must tell the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey that some of us had grave doubts about that, since the board is not a statutory body. For historic reasons, it is appointed by elements in the film industry. It has no set rules or criteria and has presided over a deterioration in the standard of films to the point where excessive violence, explicit sex and obscene language now pass for entertainment. Whether this merely mirrors the decline in standards and the growth of violence in society as a whole, or whether both are the product in part of this weak, ineffective or permissive system, I leave hon. Members to decide for themselves. I do not disguise from the House that the track record of the BBFC did not inspire confidence in me. Up to a year ago, as the hon. Member for Gower (Mr. Wardell) told us, the Government took the same view.

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However, when my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary explained to us that the Government had come to the conclusion that, instead of appointing a new statutory body it would be best to build on what exists, he did so in a convincing way. Our criticism was met. There is now to be proper accountability. The new clause ensures that the members of the board will be appointed at the pleasure of the Home Secretary. That is good. My hon. Friend assured us that the board is to have additional examiners to deal with the increased work. That is good, too. There is to be an advisory or consultative council which will be representative of the community as a whole, and that is essential. There is to be an additional requirement that the designated authority will have to publish an annual report. That is the subject of a later amendment, and such a provision is essential if proper parliamentary scrutiny is to be maintained.

Taken together, all these welcome safeguards have disposed me to support my hon. Friend's new clause. I commend it to the House.

I begin by declaring my interest. I am a consultant for the British Videogram Association, and because of the breadth of this Bill I had better make sure that I mention that I am a director of a company called Airtime Publicity (Newsflash) Limited and a consultant to Communications Strategy, a public relations firm. Neither of these latter firms will be affected by the Bill at the moment, but I see that they might be in the future because it is so wide.

I welcome the new clause. I listened carefully and with great sympathy to what the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) said about it, and he made one or two telling points. However, here we have at least half a loaf where we had none before. On Second Reading, I expressed considerable anxiety about the wide powers designated to the Home Secretary under the original terms of the Bill and I felt strongly that there was a lack of accountability to Parliament. This will be remedied in part by the new clause.

I mentioned criticism, and my anxieties are well known to my hon. Friend the Member for Luton, South (Mr. Bright) who has done well in trying to steer this difficult Bill through the House. When I criticise, I hope that I shall always try to do so in a constructive and sensible manner. I have no wish to kill the primary objective of the Bill, which is basically to rid this country of the completely impossible video nasty and to put some guidance in the hands of parents and other adults as to what they are purchasing or hiring in video shops. My criticism is that, as it has progressed, the Bill has gone considerably further.

Like my hon. Friend the Member for Luton, South, I wish to achieve broad consensus as the Bill goes through its stages. Consensus was there in Committee, but it was a consensus that lacked two important voices. The first was the voice of the ordinary customer at the video shop, not the extreme, unusual person looking for the perverted films that my hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point (Sir B. Braine) referred to, but ordinary people who use videos. The other missing voice was that of not just the video trade but the whole trade of television and film production. There are technical matters involved in advancing towards classification and censorship which were not fully considered in Committee. Therefore, I welcome this new clause, which will give Parliament another chance to look in detail at the sort of designated body that will be doing this job.

I tabled an amendment, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and I do not seek to challenge your ruling about it. It suggested that we should make the designated body any other body but the BBFC, but I do not wish to pursue that too far. One point that made me feel that way, and which again makes me welcome the new clause, is that it is clear to me from the Committee proceedings that one of the greatest difficulties for the trade and production of films is the decision by the Committee —I believe that it will go through today—that there will be different standards of censorship for the home from those for the cinema. I know the arguments, and I do not wish to pursue them now, but if we are to have different standards, I ask my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary to consider in the intervening period whether, when he comes to Parliament as the new clause suggests, he should designate a different body from the BBFC because the issue would be plain and clear to everyone in the trade and the potential user of the videogram. I support the new clause.

I welcome the new clause. I do not agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point (Sir B. Braine), and I am sure that it cannot be what the Lord Chief Justice has in mind, that we should have a system of censorship designed to ensure that nobody of unstable mind is disturbed. If we had such a censorship, that would rule out much of our art and literature.

I point out to the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) that, although most of us agree with some of the reservations about the wide leeway that the Bill leaves the Government to appoint whatever board they choose, the new clause is designed, at least in part, to meet those anxieties by allowing the House to look at who it is that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has in mind, and to say yea or nay. For that reason I welcome this new clause, and for similar reasons I welcome the amendment that we shall be debating next.

I support and welcome the new clause, which takes note of a point debated at length in Committee. What it proposes is the right way to do this. The BBFC should do this job because it was evident when we debated this matter in Committee that there is no evidence to prove that if any other body were designated it would do the job any better than the BBFC. We could end up setting up another body that would be just as much criticised as the BBFC. That would be nonsense. The Bill gives the Minister the opportunity to change the body at a later date if it should become evident that it was not doing the job as it should.

It is also important to recall, as the hon. Member for Gravesham (Mr. Brinton) said, that there are two different standards. In one of the amendments passed in Committee, there was an important compromise. It was added that videos should be looked at in the context of the fact that they are viewed in the home. That is an important criterion. If that sets a dual standard, it is right to do so, and that was the overwhelming view of the Committee.

I welcome the new clause and shall vote for it.

May I start by saying that, in my judgment, the Committee stage of the Bill was one of the most constructive in which I have taken part in my long service in the House. It applied itself most excellently and with common sense to a modern evil that has been growing and causing considerable concern. The Committee refused to be stampeded by noises off from the direction of the Home Secretary speaking in Northumberland, and refused to allow the Bill to become one of general censorship, which is what some people wanted. We have not got it entirely right, but we should nevertheless congratulate—and I do so at once—the hon. Member for Luton, South (Mr. Bright) on the leadership that he has shown throughout the Bill.

May I also say—and I shall never say it again in this Parliament—that I congratulate the Minister in charge of the Bill, who was extremely helpful at all stages in getting the Committee to reach the workable compromises and agreements that were necessary. Lastly, I thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for allowing us a few minutes on this first new clause to express some general sentiments. We have all established, as it were, our credentials.

We have made considerable progress—such progress, indeed, that most of the offensive, sadistic, nauseating and sexually degrading videos have already been removed from the shelves in most video dealers' premises. That is a considerable achievement, before the Bill has even reached the statute book.

However, we must not be complacent. I am critical of the video trade. It seems to be re-emerging. Now that it thinks that the heat has gone out of the Bill, and that public opinion has perhaps been assuaged, it seems to think that it can start campaigns by intimidating Members of Parliament. I exclude, of course, the hon. Member for Gravesham (Mr. Brinton) from my strictures.

Nevertheless, I want to draw attention to an extraordinary letter that we all received, telling us—it is important to get the matter on the record straight away—that there is to be an all-night showing by a arm called Palace Videos of a large number of the most objectionable videos. The firm completely failed to understand that the Bill has nothing to do with the Obscene Publications Act. If the Director of Public Prosecutions wants to prosecute, as he certainly should, some of the terrible obscene publications — if they were made here they would be a disgrace to the British video film industry, but it emerged in Committee that most of them were made overseas — he must retain the right to do that quite independently of who the designated authority happens to be.

That underlines the importance of the new clause. The hon. Member for Luton, South meets a point that I raised rather strongly, and I am grateful to him for doing so. It is important that the designated authority should be known to Parliament and subject to debates. One of the films that is to be shown all night is the subject of a prosecution, so it would be out of order for me to say much about it. It is called "The Burning". A number of others are listed, but I shall not give them the benefit of free publicity by naming them. There are about eight or 10 of them, and they are quite disgraceful.

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There are other organisations — again, I do not believe that the hon. Member for Gravesham was speaking on their behalf — such as the Video Retailers' Association, which was mentioned in the Birmingham Evening Mail last night. I have already had letters on the subject. The paper says:

"The Nottingham-based Video Retailers' Association, with 150 members in the West Midlands, claims … that many films on general release will no longer be available for home viewers".

That is completely untrue. It is a campaign based on a deliberate falsehood. Moreover, some of us have told retailers who have written to us from our constituencies—I have, anyway — that they must know that it is a falsehood. There will be nothing that can be shown in cinemas that cannot be shown in the home.

I shall come back in a moment to the British Board of Film Censors, but the fact is that the board will refuse a certificate for the evil videos that all of us here believe should not be shown. Everything else in the Bill is about classification. That is what the Bill is about. Anyone will be able to buy or rent a classified video for showing at home, although it must be said that 18R videos, as I understand, will have regard to the fact that some sexual films will have to be bought or hired in a shop that is specially registered for such films. If people want to do that, they can still do it. People are not prevented from seeing those films. I object to the Video Retailers' Association putting out falsehoods about what is to happen, and urging their members to get their clients to write to Members of Parliament. I give due notice to any constituents who write to me that they will get a strong reply, and the dealers who put them up to it will get an even stronger one.

The right hon. Gentleman said that all films classified for showing in the cinema could as a result of these classifications be seen in the home. If the standards of censorship are to be different, however, some must go out of the window at the 18R level. So it is not all films. The question is which films?

The hon. Gentleman told us that he is a consultant to the trade, and I hope he will not mind if I say that he has sat through all our Committee proceedings and clearly still does not understand what we were doing. We said that, in the classification, the category, the British Board of Film Censors should have to have regard to the fact that videos might be seen in the home by everyone in the neighbourhood, including children, but that that is not the case when one exercises one's right to see the same film as a film in a cinema. That must be right, and we shall come back to the matter later.

It must be right for Parliament and the designated authority to have regard to something that has not been universally shown in the home hitherto, but is now available for that, as distinct from being shown in a cinema where it is available only to people of 18 or more. It cannot be right that something which up to now has been restricted to adults in a cinema should be universally available in the home without our taking cognisance of that fact, and that is what the Bill does.

Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that there is a difference between showing a film in the controlled atmosphere of either a public cinema or a registered sex cinema, and seeing it in the home, where a child can stop it and linger over certain scenes, because that is what they do? There is the world of difference between the two things. There should be two standards. The home must be protected.

I do not go all the way with the hon. Gentleman because I am glad to say that the children in my home do not do that. I do not know what happens to the children in the hon. Gentleman's home. I agree with him, of course, that if there is universal availability, we have to have regard to that fact.

The hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) cast doubts on the BBFC. Some hon. Members started out wondering whether that would be the appropriate organisation but we made much progress in that matter in Committee as well. Some of us have been to see that body at work and we have now learnt that those who make the classifications will be widened. Although that body has existed for many years, until now it has been the creature of the film industry. It will now have a measure of accountability to the Home Office, and through it to the House as a result of this amendment. That is a satisfactory safeguard.

I listened to the hon. Gentleman with great interest. I hope that he will not mind if I say that his speech represented an impractical libertarianism, or an impractical liberalism. If the hon. Gentleman were to have a look at the work of that body — I hope that he will — he would see that it has to classify hundreds, indeed probably thousands, of films. If there were no BBFC there would have to be a body remarkably like it. With great respect, the work could not possibly be done on the jury system. However attractive that would to a libertarian, it is not really in the realms of possibility.

I am concerned not so much about which body does the work, but who is on that body. Many are concerned that when such bodies become state quangos they are filled with the great and good who are not representative of the British public because they are specialists in the film or video industry. I hope that we shall be assured that the composition of the board will reflect the ordinary views of people who are probably slightly less intellectual than the present membership of the BBFC.

I agree with the hon. Gentleman. It is always difficult to remember one's own speeches, but if I remember rightly I referred in Committee to the membership of that body as the sociologically motivated members of our society. There was not a single trade unionist on it. As far as I could see, there was nobody who had been in industry. There were no managing directors or managers. That seemed to be a deficiency. If that is what the hon. Gentleman is saying, I have some sympathy with him. Nevertheless, when we looked at the list it was obviously a big improvement on what had gone before. However, I am sure there is room for further improvement and I hope that what we have said will be considered by the BBFC, as I am sure it will be by the Home Office. Therefore, we have no alternative but to say that a re-jigged BBFC, wider in its concept already, is yet another step in the right direction that has been achieved by the Bill.

I advise my hon. Friends to support the Bill and the constructive amendments that are coming forward to meet the points raised in Committee and to help the Bill make as much progress as possible today.

First, may I thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for giving us latitude in the course of the debate, it being the first occasion on which the Bill has returned to the Floor of the House after a highly successful Committee stage. May I say on behalf of the Government how grateful we are to my hon. Friend the Member for Luton, South (Mr. Bright) for his work. We have boundless admiration not only for the skill, determination and authority with which he dealt with the Bill in the House and in Committee, but for the tireless way in which he met the various interest groups and put across to a wide public, through the press, what his Bill is about. If I had a hat to take off, I should take it off to him this morning.

I join the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Small Heath (Mr. Howell) in saying that, although I have not sat in the House for anything like as long as he has, it will be many years before I sit on a Committee where the atmosphere is as conducive to a sensible, common sense consideration of the Bill as it was on this measure. All who participated in the debates benefited enormously. We all learnt something, not least myself. It is encouraging that several hon. Members, who although they agreed on the principles diverged on the details, have come together on a number of crucial points. That is very helpful.

I am glad to see many Committee members here this morning—the hon. Member for Burnley (Mr. Pike), whose contributions contained robust common sense, and with which I almost always found myself in agreement, and my hon. Friends the Members for Teignbridge (Mr. Nicholls), for Lincoln (Mr. Carlisle), for Richmond and Barnes (Mr. Hanley) and for Harlow (Mr. Hayes)—all of whom played a leading role in the Committee. My hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point (Sir B. Braine) has freely admitted that he changed his mind on a number of points in Committee, and I am grateful to him for that. My hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, West (Mr. Parris) raised crucial points on several clauses with cool eloquence. We should have been diminished as a Committee if he had not done so and I am glad that he has returned to the Floor of the House as a supporter of the Bill.

The Committee provided the opportunity to thrash out a number of detailed points that will be recognised in amendments that are being tabled today, and obviously I hope that they will commend themselves to the House. It also provided the opportunity to thrash out a number of points that have caused concern. For instance, there was the question whether the BBFC should be designated and, as has been evident today, a wide-ranging agreement was achieved.

One thing that the Committee did not do — I look menacingly at my hon. Friend the Member for Gravesham (Mr. Brinton), because I do not want him to be able to find a plank for his opposition to any part of the measure that does not exist—was materially to change the Bill. The Bill returns on Report in pretty much the same form as it took on Second Reading. There was one important but purely declaratory amendment adding the three words "in the home", to make it clear on the face of the Bill what we all knew we were doing from the outset, which was to decide what standards should be applicable to material that would be widely circulated in our homes outside of age-restricted cinemas. There was also one purely drafting amendment. If my hon. Friend wants to take issue with the Bill, let him do so as it was originally conceived and drafted. There is nothing to add fuel to any flame that he wishes to set alight in the House. We looked at areas where the detail of the Bill should be polished up, and that was enormously valuable.

Let me pay the warmest tribute to the constructive attitude of the right hon. Member for Small Heath, who had it in his power in Committee, as the Opposition spokesman always does, to be difficult. Where he needed to make a point he did so with the vigour that we all know and that he has deployed this morning, but he always made it clear that he was looking, as we were, to find an effective measure that he could take back to his constituents, just as we could take back to ours. He has played a major role in ensuring that the measure proceeded as it did.

The hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) made a good speech. I am aware that the Bill gives a good deal of power to the Home Secretary. My right hon. and learned Friend and I are extremely anxious to ensure that the House is left in no doubt at any stage that that power should be exercised responsibly and is to be hedged around with all appropriate safeguards, including the deference to the overriding power of Parliament to veto what we do.

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As I was aware of just how much power was being given to the Home Secretary in giving him the right to designate a body to carry out perhaps the most difficult and sensitive task in a free society —that of censorship—I felt that I should lay my cards on the table at the earliest stage. Although it was a much more controversial proposition then than happily it is now, that is why I said on Second Reading that my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary would designate the BBFC, and that remains our view.

As a result of the points made in Committee and of meetings that are still going on between us and the BBFC, I was able to lay a structure before the Committee to meet a number of the important points raised about accountability. The BBFC should materially reconstitute itself, not because of any criticism about the way in which it has performed its task, but in recognition of the fact that it is being given a substantial extra task. I do not wish to repeat all that I have said in Committee, but we have it in mind that the board should be expanded to take on at least two vice-presidents in addition to the president and the secretary, and that all the officers should be acceptable to the Secretary of State, who will obviously look for a wide range of experience when agreeing to their appointment.

There is then the question of increasing the number of examiners and ensuring that they are as broadly based as possible. When Parliament speaks in a triple alliance, and when representatives of the three major parties all agree that the examiners should be drawn from as wide a range of experience as possible, I know that the BBFC will understand that it is prudent and advisable for it to take heed. I know that it will do so and achieve as broad a range as possible. We shall make every endeavour to ensure that that is so.

I thought it extremely important to take up enthusiastically the BBFC's suggestion that there should be an advisory council containing representatives of the wider community of local authorities, as well as people of independent worth and representatives of the industry to whom the BBFC could put various points of interest, and who would themselves be able to make any points of principle to the BBFC which they thought important about the way in which that body carried out its task. Finally, an independent appeals procedure would ensure that there was no arbitary interference with the rights of the commercial company to distribute perfectly acceptable material.

I hope that I have fully met the points raised. I am aware that there is a significant parliamentary dimension to the debate. Throughout our proceedings on the Bill the Home Office will make clear exactly how is chooses to use its powers. We believe that there is a role for Parliament and that the Secretary of State should give Parliament the opportunity—if hon. Members so wish—to debate the formal designation once the Bill is enacted. If the Secretary of State should ever subsequently feel that he has to use his powers to designate another body, that should be the subject of the same parliamentary procedure. Later, an amendment will be proposed that an annual report must be laid before Parliament so that hon. Members who are greatly interested in such matters can know what is going on.

I take issue on one small point. It cannot be said that something that is under the control of the Home Secretary, and through him under the control of the House, is in any sense less open to democratic control than something given to the local authorities. It would be a perverse view of our system of representative democracy to suggest that something controlled by Parliament was less democratically accountable than something that went through the local authorities. Indeed, I suspect that in many instances the contrary might well be the case.

My hon. Friend has spoken about reconstituting the BBFC to take account of the Bill's provisions, but will he make it clear now to those of us who were not privileged to serve on that Committee what money will be made available from private rather than public resources to pay for the increased number of staff and the changes that he envisages? That is an important point, and hon. Members would welcome it if my hon. Friend took an early opportunity to make the position clear to the public.

Discussions are still going on about the precise arrangements that will be made, but it is envisaged that, as at the moment, the BBFC will be self-financing and will charge a fee for considering videos. After all, most of the videos that it will consider are being distributed in the hope and confident expectation of substantial financial gain. Indeed, that expectation is normally realised. Thus, there seems to be no reason why fees should not be charged of the type that are already charged for cinematograph exhibition. We do not envisage any cost to public funds as a result of establishing that system.

I support the new clause, which has obviously been brought forward after careful discussion with my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary. We support the new clause and in doing so demonstrate once again my right hon. and learned Friend's good faith in seeking to give the House the maximum opportunity to make its view clear on such difficult matters. In a sense, we are adding an extra parliamentary hurdle to the Secretary of State's exercise of his discretion. That is important and significant, and I hope that the House will accept the new clause in the spirit in which it is being offered.

I do not wish to delay our proceedings, as I should like us to progress as quickly as possible, but I had hoped that my hon. Friend would be a little more specific in his reply to my question. I am grateful for his assurance that the public will not have to pay for the increased costs involved. However, I wonder whether he can be more specific about the amount of extra money that is to be charged to the purchasers of these items as a result of these provisions. Perhaps we could have some idea of the percentage increase. I know that in recent months such matters have been thoroughly gone into. By now it surely should be possible for the Minister to tell us how much more these items will cost in the shops. If my hon. Friend can help us on that point, it will reassure the public.

I wish to raise one point in response to the Minister's helpful and, I hope, welcome public exposition of some of the points that he made in Committee——

Order. We are on Report and not in Committee. The hon. Gentleman has already spoken. Was he intervening in the Minister's speech, or had the Minister concluded his speech?

I had concluded my speech — not, I suspect, before time.

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

This new clause also is moved in response to requests made in Committee. I could have moved it formally, rather than making a speech, but some latitude was given to hon. Members when speaking to new clause 1.

I do not intend to thank hon. Members now, because I hope to be able to do so later, but I thank them for what they have said about me. I am very grateful for the support and encouragement that I have had. The new clause ensures that the designated authority produces an annual report on its activities. It answers the point made in Committee in particular by my hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point (Sir B. Braine), although he kindly withdrew his amendment. I assured him then that I would table an amendment on Report. This is it, and I commend it to the House.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Luton, South (Mr. Bright) has explained the reason for the new clause, I will be brief. I am grateful to him for honouring an undertaking that he gave in Standing Committee. However, one additional point might be made in support of the amendment which I think is relevant.

One of the arguments used against the Bill outside the House, as my hon. Friend will know, is that, although its motivation may be unimpeachable, it is in effect a form of censorship on what is allowed to be seen in the privacy of a citizen's home. This point must be met head-on. It is, of course, nothing of the kind.

Nobody has a prescriptive right under the law physically to maltreat, terrorise, starve or neglest a child. If the authorities have reason to believe that this is happening—and of course it does happen—they descend upon the home, investigate and, if necessary, take the child into care. Sometimes the investigation, as some hon. Members know only too well, arrives too late to save the child.

All we are saying in this Bill is that no child should be exposed to the risks of an assault upon his mind by the horrific, filthy and damaging video material that is currently circulating, and which teachers throughout the country report that their pupils, even of 10 years of age, and sometimes younger, are watching. What is more, under the existing law, the British Board of Film Censors already certifies such material as suitable for showing only to persons over 18 in licensed sex cinemas. That is the present practice, and it is, of course, a safeguard for young persons.

We are only at the beginning of what I am sure will prove to be an exciting video revolution. Handled responsibly, it will entertain and brighten people's lives; it will educate them too, but it can have, and it is having now, serious adverse effects. With the advent of cable and satellite television, we need to monitor the impact of this technology on our society.

The requirement that the designated authority present an annual report — the point was made by the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) in his excellent speech earlier in the debate—which must be laid before both Houses of Parliament, provides an opportunity which does not exist at present for Parliament and the public to discuss developments and trends with knowledge and understanding. That must be good. One cannot talk, therefore, of censorship, or of restricting personal liberty, where a freely elected Paliament takes unto itself the right to scrutinise, to express a view and to act.

I commend the new clause to the House.

Although I am almost disarmed by the kind remarks that my hon. Friend the Minister has made, I must warn the House against a somewhat unsavoury note of self-congratulation that is beginning to creep in at this very early stage of Report. This is a pretty ropey piece of legislation. It is a bit of a parliamentary cop-out. It is a short Bill which simply gives all the power to make all the decisions that we think need to be made by a quango, accountable to a quango. Nobody who thinks about it is very happy with that.

Most of us have been just about persuaded, by the diplomacy and evident good faith of my hon. Friend the Member for Luton, South (Mr. Bright), that this is the only way of doing things. However, there is a feeling of unhappiness about the extent to which Parliament henceforth disclaims responsibility for this important area of state censorship. The new clause takes one small step in the direction back to parliamentary accountability, and it is, for that reason, welcome

I support what my two hon. Friends have said about the Bill, and the new clause. I should like to emphasise the need for the new clause by underlining some of the things that are happening, which I know of from my own experience, and from the observations of no less a person than Miss Sigley, who is a producer of children's programmes for Thames Television. She has produced children's programmes in the United States for 10 years, and really knows her subject. She and I, and others, have been into schools to talk to children, and to see what they watch on television and how they respond to children's programmes. I have discovered that children rarely watch programmes early in the evening at the time at which children's programmes are transmitted. Children are more likely to watch something at 7.30 or 8 or 9 o'clock or even later, and they therefore turn for their entertainment to videos. The children who are watching are under 10 years of age. Their ages go down to seven and even six years of age.

I confirm from my own research and observation that the first thing that people with redundancy money buy is a video. Videos are a priority in the homes of probably as many as 60 per cent. of the working population of the country. They are often a higher priority in the homes of people who are not particularly articulate, and who do not read books or listen to music very much. In some homes, videos even take priority over food and furniture. That is the situation with which we are dealing. From my conversations with children in this situation, it is clear that many parents take no interest in what their children are watching. That therefore places an extra responsibility upon the House, and we must disharge that responsibility. Parents tend to go upstairs where they have a separate television of their own, retiring from where the children are. The children are then left with the video to put on what programmes they like, and they stay there, either until they decide to switch off and go to bed, or until they fall asleep, and sometimes they are still there the following morning. The situation is therefore very serious.

I am not sure that the House is being strong enough about this matter, particularly in the light of what I am saying. The fact that children can obtain from one another, and from other sources, what material they like to put on the video, entirely unobserved by their parents, is a serious matter, as is the fact that some parents would even observe their children, allow them to do this, and not be concerned if they put on depravity and some of the terrible videos about which we all know. Is it not appallingly serious that families are prepared to go without the necessities of life, like furniture, and sometimes even to restrict their diet, in order to have videos?

The House must take a strong line on this matter, and new clause 2 is the minimum that we can do. I welcome it on those grounds, but I put down a marker that I should like to see something tougher.

Much as I admire my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, West (Mr. Parris), I am afraid that I cannot agree with him that the legislation is either a parliamentary cop-out, or a particularly ropey Bill. I do not believe that that view will be shared by the overwhelming majority of people in the country — particularly parents who are concerned that, if the evil to which the Bill is directed is left to go unchecked, it could in time seriously undermine the fabric of our society. The matter is as serious as that. The contribution which my hon. Friend the Member for Luton, South (Mr. Bright) has made is, therefore, a considerable one, as are the contributions that all members of the Committee have made.

My concern is to follow up the point that I have made, obviously inadequately, on two previous occasions. I hope that the annual report will contain some reference to the prices that are being charged as a result of the extra costs that are inflicted upon the British Board of Film Censors, so that people know that the purchase of 18R videos is an expensive business. Sometimes, the purse is as good a form of censorship as any other control—if not better. Those who wish to indulge in the purchase of such material, and those who wish to indulge in its manufacture and distribution, should have to pay a high price for doing so.

If that is a feature of the annual report, the public may be more greatly reassured about the useful effects of this legislation than if, without it, the Bill had passed through its stages, modified to some extent and subject to a large number of qualifications.

I ask the Minister to give the assurance that he will require the costings to be shown in the annual report.

As the hon. Member for Derbyshire, West (Mr. Parris) said, we are taking a further step in the censorship of what people do in their homes. It is, therefore, right that we should be careful to pay attention to what is done on our behalf by the BBFC.

The board could take two courses. It could become progressively more liberal and permissive, with the result that we would all become increasingly concerned about the effects of videos, or it could become progressively less permissive and more restrictive and begin to censor something that is certainly not obscene under the present obscenity law. That censorship would provide a second tier of check — a certificition procedure that prevents certain videos from being shown in the home. For that reason, every possible means of checking and monitoring the work of the board must be taken.

When we debated new clause 1, the Minister responded to the concern expressed that there should be as much accountability as possible. I hope that I made it clear that I believe that that is best done through local authority representation. There must be an opportunity for the House annually to debate the way in which the BBFC is operating, how it controls videos and how it decides what is suitable viewing in the home.

We should agree to the new clause as a sign of our concern not to allow anybody to become over-censorious and that we intend to be especially careful that a report is made. We must not find that the civil liberties on which we pride ourselves are being eroded. Of course, we do not want youngsters to be harmed by the worst form of video nasties, but we must be the guardian of the liberties of our fellow citizens.

For that reason, the regular opportunity to debate the report of the BBFC should be welcomed. The new clause improves the Bill.

I know that the House will want to make progress, so I shall be brief. The annual report is intended as a way in which the BBFC can, through the Secretary of State, give an account of its stewardship. I hope that it will deal with all possible aspects of the board's activities.

Obviously, tariffs are an important matter. Discussions are not yet finalised, and I shall bear in mind the remarks of my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Burton (Mr. Lawrence).

I can only tell my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, West (Mr. Parris) that I feel like a vet who, having stroked an alsatian, has his hand bitten off. Perhaps if I had said that my hon. Friend's contribution to the Committee had added a new dimension to the concept of turgidity, he might have said that it was a wonderful Bill. But had I done so, and had he so responded, he would have been more accurate than I.

I beg to move amendment No. 1, in page 1, line 8, leave out from 'means' to 'any' in line 9.

With this we may discuss the following amendments:

I shall be brief. The amendments have been tabled in response to a detailed discussion in Committee, and they refer to video games. Most video games are exempt, but it is possible for a video game to include violence or sex.

Hon. Members may be aware of The Sun campaign for Harrods to stop selling one such game as it included scenes of killing and raping a girl. The amendment will catch that area.

I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point (Sir B. Braine) for bringing this matter to our attention in Committee, and I am honouring the commitment that I gave then.

The amendment is to be welcomed, for the reasons explained by my hon. Friend the Member for Luton, South (Mr. Bright). It was suggested in Committee that the provision in clause 1(2)(a)

"produced electronically by the use of information contained on any disc or magnetic tape'

might be overtaken by technology. Video games might be produced which do not make use of information contained on a disc or magnetic tape. Therefore, the Bill needs changing for that technical reason.

My hon. Friend may have already considered this problem——

The matter has been considered, and will continue to be considered. We are obtaining expert advice and we hope to deal with the matter when the Bill goes to another place.

I am reassured by my hon. Friend's remarks.

I rise briefly to ask for reassurance on one matter. I am glad that my hon. Friend the Member for Luton, South (Mr. Bright) has tabled these amendments to cover video games. Can he reassure me that the interactive video game will also be caught by these amendments? His remarks did not make that clear.

I can give my hon. Friend that assurance.

I beg to move amendment No. 2, in page 1, line 12, at end insert

"or as a series of still pictures".

The amendment has been tabled to cover a matter that has caused me some concern. It appears to be possible to get round the Bill with a series of still pictures which, when put together and associated with a commentary and music, could defeat the Bill's purpose.

During my discussions with the BBFC I have discovered that that happens in some parts of the world, especially in America. The gutter press take masses of pictures of murders and accidents, put them together and then add screams, noises, music and offensive commentaries. The amendment is tabled to take care of that problem.

I do not know what attitude the hon. Member for Luton, South (Mr. Bright) and the Minister will take. I hope they accept that it is a serious problem and, therefore, will accept the amendment. If they do not do so—which I should very much regret — I hope that at least they will agree to take further advice on the matter and return to it in another place so that this serious problem can be dealt with.

We are always faced with difficulties when considering where the line should be drawn. We decided a few moments ago to bring within the ambit of the Bill computer games that can pander to violence. That is an important step. It widens the Bill, but everyone agrees that it is appropriate.

I am in a more difficult position about the amendment proposed by the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Small Heath (Mr. Howell). I understand that those who make a great deal of money out of a trade will not easily be frustrated by the House and will make every effort to circumvent legislation. That is why the Standing Committee took so much care not to make the exemptions in clause 2 wide enough to allow pornographers to drive a coach and horses through the Bill.

We have looked carefully at the problem raised by the right hon. Gentleman, and we are not persuaded that it would be appropriate to recommend an extension of the Bill. We see difficulties in accepting an amendment which might catch innocuous material and lend credibility to the charge made in some quarters—wrongly, I believe—that we are using a Bill dealing with video nasties to go too far and to exercise control over a number of areas that no one had in mind when the Bill was introduced.

However, because the right hon. Member for Small Heath takes the matter seriously and has discussed it with others, I do not wish to throw his amendment back in his face. My hon. Friend the Member for Luton, South (Mr. Bright) and I will look into the matter and write to the right hon. Gentleman. There will be opportunities in another place for an amendment to be brought forward if necessary.

At present, the evidence does not suggest that the matters about which the right hon. Gentleman is worried would be a major source of trouble, especially compared with the undoubted difficulties that his amendment would cause to a number of people involved in innocuous film making. We must remember that one of the principal reasons for the legislation is that moving pictures have a different vividness and impact from the written word and photographs.

I should need a lot more persuading to agree to broaden the Bill in the way proposed by the right hon. Member for Small Heath. However, I know that the right hon. Gentleman has thought carefully about the issue and I do not wish to trample on his amendment. I hope that I have, with proper candour, made clear my present inclinations, but perhaps the right hon. Gentleman will agree that the subject would benefit from further discussion.

I find no difficulty in resisting the amendment. The right hon. Member for Birmingham, Small Heath (Mr. Howell) is, in effect, talking about the technological equivalent of a slide show. Once we have the BBFC censoring slide shows, it will not be long before someone suggests that single slides and photographs should be censored and we shall have a British board of photographic censors. The Bill draws the line in the right place.

I support the amendment, but I am prepared to accept the Minister's assurance that he will look at the matter again.

The Laservision video disc system can be viewed picture by picture and frame by frame. That could defeat the object of the Bill. Normal video tape recorders cannot be used in the same way, but I hope that the Minister will pay attention to the potential problems presented by laservision discs.

With the leave of the House, may I say that I welcome what the Minister said. I am happy to accept his undertaking to look at the matter again. There is genuine anxiety about the problems to which I referred and I am sure that the Minister will take advice from the same people who advised me.

I do not agree with the hon. Member for Derbyshire, West (Mr. Parris). He was exaggerating the effect of the amendment by claiming that it would lead to censorship of single photographs. It proposes nothing of the kind.

I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

I beg to move amendment No. 58, in page 2, line 10, at end insert—

'(c) it exclusively contains material broadcast over the transmitters of the Independent Broadcasting Authority or the British Broadcasting Corporation in respect of which the programme contractors to the Independent Broadcasting Authority under the Broadcasting Act 1981 or the British Broadcasting Corporation own the copyright or otherwise are the makers of the film within the definition contained in section 13(10) of the Copyright Act 1956 and which is material previously approved for broadcasting over such transmitters by the Indepedent Broadcasting Authority or the British Broadcasting Corporation respectively.'.

With this we may take the following amendments: No. 14, in page 2, line 19, at end insert—

'(3) Nothing in this Act shall apply to any work intended and supplied solely for the purpose of reporting and commenting on current affairs.'.

The amendments raise matters of considerable importance, but I shall be brief because we all want to ensure that the Bill gets through today.

The amendments deals with the work of the BBC and the IBA and its associated companies. I am grateful to the IBA for supplying me with a great deal of information.

I can sum up the issue by asking whether all the news programmes and other videos put out by broadcasting authorities after being seen by the public will have to go before the new authority. If so, the authority will be swamped. Is the BBFC really to be expected to look at 2,000 episodes of "Coronation Street"? Heaven forbid! Such a suggestion shows the absurdity of not protecting the broadcasting authorities. Without the amendments, a considerable bureaucracy would have to be built up and enormous costs incurred. The broadcasting authorities are entitled to protection.

The IBA has made an excellent case, especially in the letter sent to a number of hon. Members on 2 December. Because I wish to be brief, I shall not read out the letter, but I know that the BBC shares the IBA's view.

The IBA also referred to its late night shows and suggested that its own self-imposed censorship, especially on bad language, is likely to be more stringent that the new classification arrangements of the BBFC. I do not think that the IBA has managed to reach any sort of agreement in its discussions on that aspect.

Many people are concerned with problems arising from late night viewing on television programmes. The television authorities have adopted stringent standards for themselves. If those standards were to be relaxed in any way, that would be a cause for concern. I hope that we shall shortly agree to include in the Bill standards of classification for the showing of videos in the home. Television is, of course, viewed in the home. Much as we might regret it, large numbers of very young children stay up late at night—far too late in many cases—to watch television programmes. This problem must be thoroughly considered and I confess that I do not know the answer to A. I have tried in my amendment to answer it as well as I can. If the Minister thinks that I have not got it right, I hope that he will consider the matter and come back to it in another place.

I said in Committee that in television news programmes I see more violence, killing and obscenity than can be seen on most videos. That is now a fact of life because of the sort of world in which we live. Television news programmes are seen in almost every home in Britain frequently during the day. No one has suggested that those news programmes should be censored in any way. I suppose that the television authorities are doing their job to the best of their ability.

Over many years I have been concerned with the problem of football hooliganism. Unfortunately, when instances of it are shown on television there is an immediate increase in the amount of football hooliganism. Obviously there is a direct relationship between the showing of such news items and the incidence of football hooliganism.

I have always taken the view that we cannot reasonably censor the television authorities, which have to show in their news programmes the sort of world that we live in, but a dilemma arises. Having allowed the television authorities to show their news programmes, we now have the problem that those programmes will be produced on videos. That will happen increasingly as cable television comes into operation. It would be absurd to subject such news programmes, which have already been shown on television, to some form of classification or censorship once they are in video form. That would be unnecessary bureaucracy and would create two different standards.

If the copyright of a film such as "Straw Dogs" is acquired by television companies and is then shown late at night on television, it may be recorded on video. That video will be exempt for the purposes of the Bill. But if the film "Straw Dogs" is distributed as a video in the video hiring shops, it will probably be given the worst classification. As a result, it may not be available unless the shop is restricted to adults only. But if a home video copy of "Straw Dogs" is made, the copyright having already been acquired by the television company, it will be a totally exempt work. Does my right hon. Friend agree?

I do not think that my hon. Friend is correct, but I shall not go into the matter now because we are trying to make progress. I said earlier in our proceedings that very few people will be prevented from showing anything in their homes. We are talking here about classification, and that is very important. The films that will be prohibited will, as I understand the position, be prohibited in the cinema and on television and elsewhere.

If the film to which I have referred gets a classification certificate, it can be shown in the home. I understand that. The difficulty is that one version, prerecorded at home, where the television company has the copyright, will be exempt, whereas the identical copy, purchased or hired through a video shop, will need a classification certificate. Does my right hon. Friend agree?

I suppose that theoretically my hon. Friend may be correct, but he seems to be suggesting that the television companies will show an offensive film of that nature.

They do it all the time.

I do not believe that they do, therefore I do not think that there is any substance in my hon. Friend's point. He is right in saying that the Bill does not deal with original material made for the purposes of television showing, but I do not think that there is any substance in his main point.

I hope the Minister will agree that, although film programmes are often horrific in the sense of showing scenes from wars and conflicts throughout the world, they should not be subjected to the new procedures outlined in the Bill.

As one who did not take part in the Committee stage, I congratulate the Committee on its achievement in maintaining the objectives of the Bill and improving it to a great extent.

When I spoke on Second Reading I touched on the subject of this amendment and said that at present it is not of very great practical importance, in that there are only about 100 tapes on the market which originated in the broadcasting field. But that is only because the BBC and ITV companies have not yet come to an agreement with the trade unions on videograms. Once such an agreement is reached, it is likely that their share of the market will increase considerably. The problem that we are discussing is therefore potentially an extremely important one.

The right hon. Member for Birmingham, Small Heath (Mr. Howell) has cited the absurdities which will arise — for example, the censoring of 2,000 copies of "Coronation Street". Equally absurd will be the fact that if one misses a programme on BBC or ITV and later purchases a videogram of it, that programme will have had to be passed or classified by yet another authority.

The right hon. Gentleman referred to a possible lowering of standards in the BBC and ITV. The people who work in those organisations know perfectly well how to categorise their programmes. They know the audience that they are aiming at. They know what sort of programmes should be shown after 10 or 10.30 pm. Once this measure comes into force, the problem may arise that a programme produced by the BBC or ITV for showing after 10 pm could be given a much less severe categorisation and eventually could be widely seen in the home. That would be bound to lead people in the television companies, in deciding on their categorisation, to be more lax and less disciplined.

The Minister, in Committee, mentioned the masterly simplicity of the categories laid down in the Bill. In other words, anyone going into a shop knows exactly what he is buying or renting because of the category displayed on the package. That is a strong argument. However, I do not think that it would add to the complication very much if we had one additional category, "TV after 10.30."

Everyone picks the example of "Coronation Street" because obviously it is both popular and good, easy, family entertainment. Even if it went to the British Board of Film Censors, I do not suppose for a moment there would be any difficulty with it. But what about such programmes as "The History Man" or "The Borgias"? Are we to say that, whereas a film which dealt with exactly the same material would have a 15 or an 18 certificate in the cinema, the mere fact that it had been shown by the BBC, rightly or wrongly, should mean that it could be circulated without any kind of classification? Can that be right?

I have just suggested that there should be a classification. That classification should be "TV after 10.30." That would be easily understood.

I see no reason why in principle the BBC and the IBA should not be covered in the Bill.

I am a strong believer in the Bill. In some respects it is very late. We have delayed for a long time in operating on this menace in our lives. A great deal has already passed through the BBC and the IBA which would not have passed had we got the higher standards that we now seek to impose. The BBC and the IBA have got away with murder in that they have portrayed on television scenes which most of us would not wish to see ourselves, let alone want our children to see. I do not believe that any provision such as that suggested in the amendment and by my hon. Friend the Member for Boothferry (Sir P. Bryan) is sufficient. The amendment will not improve the Bill or benefit us generally. I oppose it.

I have not previously spoken in any debates on the Bill. I start from the proposition that the burden of introducing censorship lies upon those who want to introduce it rather than the other way round, and in my view we should be highly critical of any measures that introduce censorship or supervision. From experience we know that a great deal of nonsense and inconsistency has been introduced into our law whenever there has been any censorship. But let me make it clear that I do not want to see the minds of young children corrupted. There has been a recent case reported in the South London Press of the most appalling depravity and crime committed inside a family, and the evidence pointed strongly to the corrupting and depraved video recordings shown to young children in the home.

Having stated my own position I must point out that the amendment is introducing inconsistency and nonsense into the law. There is a good deal of controversy about what is shown on television. I was once a member of the advisory committee of the Independent Television Authority. From time to time, we saw and discussed highly controversial programmes. Whenever we decided that they ought only to be shown very late at night since they were a danger to children and on the borderline of whether they should be shown at any time on television —my conclusion often was that they were appalling bits of television—they had mass audiences as a result of the notoriety attracted to them by the discussion of their classification. What is more, they guaranteed a massive child audience when the children would otherwise have been in bed. We have to be very careful when classifying these matters and giving not an imprimatur but the opposite of an imprimatur — a warning about the classification of material.

That is why I am deeply concerned about a classification being attached to material which, according to the Bill, is suitable for viewing in the home but is only suitable for hiring from a sex shop or from a shop which admits only people over the age of 18. That seems to put a gloss on material of that sort and it gives an attraction to productions which should not be seen by children at all. Either it is suitable for seeing in the home or it is not. If it is so depraved and corrupting or so likely to shock if it gets into the hands of children, it should not be produced at all. The idea that it should be hired only from a shop to which adults have access is a mistake. It will invite more attention to that type of production.

I return to the narrower point — [HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear."] I will not say very much more about this. I have no intention of delaying the Bill. But it seems to be slipping through on the quiet, and in my view some of these comments should be made.

This amendment illustrates the danger of classifications which go beyond what is suitable for viewing in the home. I am wholly in favour of having a look at all video productions and giving them a classification certificate. That is right. It provides certainty for those who hire videos. I know that it would be out of order to table an amendment to try to link this Bill with the Obscene Publications Act. However, once material has been given a classification certificate, it should be exempt from prosecution under the 1959 Act.

My hon. Friend will have realised that in these amendments I am not trying to introduce a new classification. I am trying to exempt material from classification. I am trying to exempt television material, although I understand and to some extent share my hon. Friend's views.

In case it is thought that there is any difference of opinion, let me stress that I support my right hon. Friend's amendment. I am in no sense being critical of a long-standing colleague. I am not in any sense attempting to create any cracks or fissures. However, the fact that my right hon. Friend has to move the amendment and to provide in the Bill for an exemption from classification for those works which are shown on television illustrates, underlines and emphasises that the only form of classification should be whether material is suitable for showing in the home. In other words, the test which is to be applied to the production of video works should be almost exactly the same test as that applied by the governors of the BBC and the Independent Television Authority. That is my view. I shall say very little else about the Bill, but I wanted to put that on the record.

Some of the very real difficulties to which I alluded earlier are beginning to come out of the woodwork.

I support the two amendments tabled by the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Small Heath (Mr. Howell). I hope and pray that I have understood them correctly. They seek to exempt programmes which have already been transmitted into the home by the BBC and the IBA.

If, after consultation, Parliament does not accept some notion of that kind, the real danger which is emerging as a result of the laudable attempt by my hon. Friend the Member for Luton, South (Mr. Bright) in his Bill is that the ultimate censor of good taste on the screen in broadcast television, in the cinema, ultimately in cable television and in direct broadcasting by satellite will be the standards set in the Bill for the viewing of videograms in the home. I believe that that would be unacceptable to many right hon. and hon. Members if they thought about it properly.

The BBC and the IBA have their system of pre-censorship. It might lighten the hearts of right hon. and hon. Members slightly to learn that many years ago, when my stomach was not so large, I was the first nude newscaster on commercial television. It was a horrifying sight. That programme went out at 6.45 in the evening. Although it was a slip of the hand of the picture mixer which caused this awful scandal, there were meetings of the IBA and its board of directors to decide whether it was suitable for showing. They displayed great courage, and that is why I can claim that record. If my hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point (Sir B. Braine) were here, he would be shocked beyond belief, but it happened.

In a different way, the IBA, the ITCA companies and the BBC all take immense care. The programmes selected for late night viewing are viewed very carefully, and it is a sensible proposal that there should be a record on the videogram of such a late-night programme of the fact that it has been transmitted by one of the networks after 10.30 at night. That would be in line with the suggestion of my hon. Friend for Luton, South that classification should be a guide to the customer. That guide would then be available on the tapes of television programmes which had been broadcast.

11.30 am

The amendment in my name seeks to achieve the same aim in the case of news and current affairs. Thankfully, on the occasion all those years ago to which I referrred, I was not reading the news. But as a crumpled old newscaster, I am conscious that, except in wartime and in times of international emergency, news in this country is not subject to censorship. Film newsreel has never, I believe, been subject to the British Board of Film Censors. However, I believe that, under the Bill as it stands, any legitimate attempt at a videogram version of the Spectator, the New Statesman, the Daily Express, or the Daily Worker would have to be presented to the designated body. In practical terms, that would mean that it would probably be out of date when it because the designated body would it for many weeks at a cost—I am informed- £4 a minute, and would decide whether or Material was suitable for distribution.

Genuine news can indentified and separated from some material claimed to be documentary. Hon. Members will seeing a brief clip of a poor monkey being decapitated in the name of documentary, when an attempt was being made to stimulate our interest in the Bill. My amendment would cover only legitimate news and current affairs that could be identified as such.

I do not intend to press my amendment too far, but I hope that my hon. Friend and the Minister will reconsider these issues.

The Bill is designed to outlaw video nasties such as "Driller Killer" and "Zombie Neck-Eaters". However, we find ourselves discussing whether programmes that have appeared on television should be subject to a second round of censorship. That shows what a quagmire such legislation can lead one into.

In Committee I put forward an amendment designed to do almost exactly what is proposed in the amendment tabled by the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Small Health (Mr. Howell). It was not clear to me at that time that I had the right hon. Gentleman's support. I am glad that I have that support now. It was the hon. Member for Burnley (Mr. Pike) who expressed the matter best in Committee when he said that unless we exempt televised material we shall establish a dual standard. There will be those who have video recorders in their homes and can record anything on television at any time and play it back to anyone at any time, and there will be those who do not. They will have to buy that material as it is packaged by the broadcasting authories, and it will have been censored.

Nobody believes that material put out late at night on television will not be seen by children. We all know that it will be seen by a great many children, although perhaps by fewer than may watch earlier in the day. The television authorities therefore take great care over what they broadcast. They would not broadcast the sort of thing that would be covered by a cinema X certificate, except with considerable cuts.

The hon. Member for Boothferry (Sir P. Bryan) was right when he said that we should exempt television material from the ordinary classifications such as "PG" and simply ask the broadcasting authorities to attach to cassettes that they sell the same advice about showing them as would be given when the material was shown on television—for instance, "Not to be shown before 10.30 at night" or "Not for people of sensitive disposition." If we do that, we will achieve all that is necessary.

The right hon. Member for Small Heath has repeated three times that the Bill is not designed to stop people from seeing things at home, but is simply about classification. He is wrong. The Bill is about stopping people from watching things at home. There is to be a dual standard, and there will be some things that one cannot see at home but one can see in the cinema.

What are they?

It was agreed in Committee that there will be two standards. If we take a film which would be given the 18-plus classification in the cinema and if, with our amendment "in the home" we have a different standard of classification for home viewing, what is given an 18-plus classification for home viewing may be different from what is given an 18-plus classification for cinema viewing. One may not be able to see in the home what one can see in the cinema. It may be that that is necessary, but the right hon. Gentleman cannot have it both ways. He cannot suggest that this is not censorship.

That is not so. The classification will have regard to what is seen in the home, but the only things that cannot be seen will be those films or videos which the board has decided may not be shown anywhere. Everything else will be subject to classification and may be shown in the home.

The right hon. Gentleman is wrong, but I do not intend to press the point.

The amendment of my hon. Friend the Member for Gravesham (Mr. Brinton) seeks to do in a more limited way what the right hon. Gentleman seeks to do — to exempt broadcast material about news and current affairs. That is unexceptionable, and I wonder why the Home Office resisted such a measure in Committee, and seems to continue to resist it.

I shall play my proper part in the debate by rising to do what my hon. Friend expects me to do. I hope that I shall carry the House with me, as my hon. Friend the Member for Luton, South (Mr. Bright) and I carried the Committee. There are strong reasons of practicality against my hon. Friend's suggestion. The logic of the situation is directly contrary to the point that he has made, although in truth, and on the substance of the matter rather than the legal framework, I suspect that we are not far apart.

The essential starting point for these discussions is to understand the present framework of control in relation to broadcasting, the cinema and videos. Some material may be interchangeable between the three mediums, but there are crucial differences.

For 70 years the BBFC has carried on a task which by law belonged to the local authorities. It has done so with the minimum of interference from the local authorities. It has had to determine whether a film should be shown in the cinema at all. On a number of occasions it has rightly decided that certain material should not be shown at all. For 70 years the BBFC has acted to protect not only children but adults as well by deciding in some cases that a film is not even suitable for the 18-plus category.

A great deal of other material is classified according to whether it is expressly designed for children, suitable for children, suitable for children with parental guidance, or suitable for people who are over the age of 15 or 18. There is also a specific small category which can be shown only in licensed sex shops or cinemas. That is the 18R category, which was introduced in 1982. It has had the effect of very materially improving what is shown in those premises. That measure was not part of what some call the liberal backwash. It was a very valuable cleaning-up operation.

That is the framework for the cinema. It is important to recognise that if the cinema were doing rather better than I understand it is, and if the BBC or ITV companies decided that such was the success of one of their programmes that, rather than distribute it again free over the airwaves they would sell it for distribution through the cinema, the programmes would have to be categorised by the BBFC. If the cinema were in a happier state, I can imagine some of the more successful and widely praised programmes produced by the BBC and ITV companies being so distributed. The arrangement for such material to be passed by the BBFC has been in place ever since television was invented. No one has questioned that. I hope that the logic of why the same rule should not apply to video is recognised.

With regard to films, there is the overriding law embodied in the Obscene Publications Act 1959, which means that, in some circumstances, a film that has been given a certificate can be prosecuted, because nothing that the BBFC does can or should, in my view, give any exemption from that Act. The BBC and ITV companies, however, are not liable to the Obscene Publications Act, but, through their respective charters, which are enforced with great care by the governors of the BBC and the Independent Broadcasting Authority, they are required to have regard to standards of taste and decency that are formally embodied in the arrangements that establish both of those bodies. Great care must be taken in deciding what should be shown. There is, of course, more laxity at one end of the time scale than at the other. One is likely to see late into the evening material that one is unlikely to see in the early evening. We all understand that, but the proposed amendments do not recognise that there will be such a distinction.

Perhaps I did not give my hon. Friend the Member for Gravesham (Mr. Brinton) sufficient credit in my intervention. I apologise for that—I was trying to do two things at once and had not fully grasped that he was proposing a variation on the theme that he later expounded. He accepts that it is not possible to lump all television material into one category and that there should be a residual category to cover material that is suitable for showing only late into the evening.

With regard to video, at the moment we have only the Obscene Publications Act and all the difficulties of enforcement with which we are familiar. It takes a great deal of time to bring forward proceedings. They can be unduly delayed by going to trial and so on and offensive material can de distributed in the meantime. We know that the consequence of that is that much material is available in video form but would never be shown on television or in a cinema because it goes beyond anything that the BBFC would license, or which the television companies would allow to be shown, or it is such rubbish that no one would want to watch it unless he had gone through the entire gamut of available material at his local video shop and, in sheer desperation, had turned to some grisly piece of pulp celluloid to take home and be "entertained" by.

Because the video industry is becoming a significant part of entertainment, it must be subject to the same controls as those that determine what is seen in the cinema or at home on television. I do not believe that the case for that is diminished by the arguments that have been made. I have always tried to make it clear in supporting what my hon. Friend the Member for Luton, South is trying to do that there are two crucial elements in the Bill. The first is that there should be a classification system that enables the true video nasty to be outlawed. That is a film which would never be shown on television and would never be acceptable to the cinema.

I have also tried to make it clear—I hope that this can be taken care of, because I know that it has given rise to some anxiety— regard the Bill as in any sense an attempt to mainstream cinema or television material video form. Far from it. Indeed, we have great care, with the help of Parliamentary at the Bill says. My hon. Friend the Member for South is proposing some amendments, but I am that the Bill does not mean that mainstream cinema material cannot be shown. However, regard must be paid to section 1 of the Obscene Publications Act, which provides that the context in which such material is shown affects judgment about whether the material is obscene. That is why one or two of the borderline 18-rated films have found themselves in some difficulty on video cassette.

rose——

It might be helpful to my hon. Friend if I make my point and if he remains like one of those figures in a Frankie Howerd film on ancient Rome coming out from time to time, saying, "Woe, Woe." I shall have to let him do that. I hope that he will let me set out my stall, and that I might persuade him. Bearing in mind the recent state of the video market, the aim of the Bill is to exclude video nasties and to bring into the video shop the classifications that are commonly understood and respected in the cinema so that everyone knows where he stands. That should provide no difficulties. It might be that, at the outer edges of certan categories, the odd snip or a different classification will have to be made to take care of the fact that the material will go into the home, but broadly the same material that is available in the mainstream cinema will be available in the video shop. That is right, because in no sense should the Bill be used to pull back what has become the accepted standard for the mainstream cinema.

Television drama and light entertainment obviously differ in quality and in the types of scenes that are shown. Some are more violent than others. Although the BBC and ITV companies do their job well under the proper supervision of the board of governors and the IBA, some controversial material is shown. The proposition advanced by the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Small Heath (Mr. Howell) in perfectly good faith is that once material has been shown on the television it is not necessary to classify it in accordance with what would be required in the cinema and that it can be available on the basis that it has been shown on television. With the greatest respect to those who hold that view, I find that argument unacceptable because it does not draw the necessary distinction between a range of material from "The Wooden Tops" to "The History Man". I thought that "The History Man" was an excellent novel and a very good television series but I would not want my younger children to see it.

What is the real nuisance involved in requiring the BBFC to categorise that material on video just as it would have to do if it were shown in the cinema? My hon. Friend the Member for Boothferry (Sir P. Bryan) recognised that if material were shown late at night it is different from that which is shown earlier. Therefore, a blanket exemption of television material would not help the consumer to know what "The History Man" was—he might not have read the novel. We are merely saying that it should have the category 15, or 18, or PG, so that the customer knows where he stands.

I have been somewhat encouraged by what my hon. Friend has said. He has gone a long way towards supporting the statement of the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Small Heath (Mr. Howell), in that people who buy videograms will be able to see everything that they could have seen in the public cinema. Is he prepared to go as far as that as that would imply, that everything that is seen in the public cinema will be available on videogram 18? I shall be interested to know if that is the case.

I have made it clear that, although it is not for me to usurp the function of the BBFC, I believe that, with the minimum of difficulty on the borders of classification which it must consider, what exists in the cinema will be carried across into video. There will be some difficulties at the outer edge of 18, not because of this Bill, but because of section 1 of the Obscene Publications Act. I am more than happy to say—if it gives comfort I shall say it even more loudly, although I have said it throughout the passage of the Bill—that this does not interfere with mainstream cinema.

This is an important matter that deserves consideration. If the broadcasting authorities decide to market a product, they should go through the same hurdles as do Walt Disney Productions or any cinema company. The effect of asking them to do that will not be too burdensome, because I cannot believe that the BBFC will look through 200 episodes of "Coronation Street" to find out whether they contain a video nasty. That is nonsense, and it is almost as nonsensical to imagine that anyone would wish to hire 200 episodes of "Coronation Street". If they produced the best of "Coronation Street", or the least bad bits of it, in an hour-long video, that would be fair enough and could be handled with the minimum of fuss.

News is also important. No one wishes to interfere with current events, but I urge my hon. Friends to bear in mind a real problem. The most objectionable of the video nasties in many people's eyes was one called "Faces of Death", which purported to deal with real death rather than faked death, and claimed to be the better for it. When the Advertising Standards Authority took umbrage at a similar production about death and violence in Asia, the distributors reacted with some acerbity, suggesting that the film should not be objected to since it showed what was going on.

We must be sure that we do not create exemptions that enable people to ride roughshod over the Bill's provisions. We addressed our minds to the problem, and my hon. Friend the Member for Luton, South will bring forward an amendment to clause 2 to ensure that responsible documentaries will be exempted. I hope that, on that basis, my hon. Friend the Member for Gravesham will accept that if XYZ productions, the BBC or the ITV companies wish to enter a different market and sell or hire their programmes in cassette form, they should be subject to the same rules as everyone else. There is nothing magical about broadcasting. The broadcasting companies do not keep full records of everything that is shown, so they could not guarantee that what was being sold on video was exactly the same as went out over the airwaves. It is just as important to the Bill that if films are categorised 15 or 18, penalties are attached to selling or hiring that material directly to children. That cannot apply to "10.30" material and it would not be helpful to perpetuate those categories.

I hope that my response has been helpful. I did not wish to detain the House, but it is important and I did not wish it to be said, as my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, West implied, that we are being perverse or that the stupid old Home Office is trying to be difficult with the BBC and the IBA. There are real grounds of principle in taking the stand with which I hope my hon. Friend the Member for Luton, South agrees, as he has until now.

Will the Minister deal with the valid point made by the hon. Member for Derbyshire, West (Mr. Parris)? If a programme is shown on television and is videoed at home—that is the way in which most people acquire videos — will there not be a double standard? If one category of classification of videos purchased from a shop would ban that television programme, although it can be videoed at home because it is shown on television, is not the remedy to reform the Obscene Publications Act to cover television, as opposed to dealing with it in this way by resisting the amendment of the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Small Heath (Mr. Howell)? Should we not ensure that there are no double standards?

The hon. Gentleman is building his house on sand, because he believes that it is conceivable that the BBFC would ban something that had been shown on television. That is an utterly fanciful, incredible and nonsensical notion. Of course, the BBFC will not do that. It will do exactly what it would do if the material were submitted to it for showing at the Roxy cinema in the high street. The board would examine it and give it an appropriate certificate so that customers in the video shop, who had not videoed material off the television, could see the categories applying to every video on sale in the shop. That has a certain symmetry and fairness that should be appealing. Why multiply the categories by including, "To be shown before 9.15 pm" or, "To be shown after 9.15 pm"? There is no special magic in television material.

If the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) remains resolutely of the other view, I can do nothing to persuade him. However, I urge the common sense of saying that if we are set, as I hope we are, on having a sensible mechanism for showing the consumer in the video shop what he is getting by way of certificates that are widely understood in the cinema context, we must apply it to all material. There should not be exemptions simply because it is alleged that some special magic attaches to television material.

Anyone can make bricks without straw. My hon. Friend the Minister can do so, and he has made an excellent job of his case on this amendment. I am heartened to hear him say that he does not believe that the BBFC would wish to examine every episode of "Coronation Street" because it already knows what is in them. The next time that I submit my car for an MOT, and the mechanic knows that it will pass the MOT because he works on it regularly and will need to do no further work before giving it the MOT certificate, I shall look forward to a reduction in his fee, since he will have taken no time or trouble.

My hon. Friend the Minister said that the BBC and the IBA are not subject to the Obscene Publications Act. Of course, had we been arguing about whether they should be subject to that Act, my, hon. Friend's argument that they should not be treated differently from anyone else would be a good argument in favour of the proposition that they should be subject to that Act. The reason why they are not subject to the Act is that my hon. Friend and my right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State have satisfied themselves that what will appear on television is unlikely to contravene the Act, so it is unnecessary to subject them to it. The reason for the exemption is not that anyone supposes that material that could contravene the Obscene Publications Act can be shown on television, only that it will not be shown on television. It will not be shown on television because self-censorship already exists and there is no reason for a second round of censorship.

My hon. Friend said that, were television material to be shown in the cinema, it would be subject to ordinary cinema classification. That is true, and the logic of that argument impels one to one of two conclusions: either television material should also be classified for video production, or television material need not be classified for a cinema showing. If television material were regularly shown in cinemas and if certifying it caused a nuisance to anyone, I suggest that it would be unnecessary to certify it for display in the public cinema.

I was greatly heartened when my hon. Friend said that in no way should the Bill be used to pull back what has become the accepted standard for mainstream cinema. If he and the BBFC will stick to that, a considerable victory has been won. I shall not press my amendment No. 14 to a vote.

I add my point to what my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State has said, and I agree with him. I am delighted that my hon. Friend the Member for Gravesham (Mr. Brinton) has accepted at last what my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary and I have been saying for weeks, not only in the House but in the media. I welcome him on board. Many of the programmes produced by television would be exempt anyway, because they fall into the educational category or are news programmes. I shall be moving some amendments to deal with news programmes in a moment and these will help significantly.

We have talked a lot about particular programmes produced by television companies, such as "Coronation Street", although I cannot imagine that anyone would want to buy a video of "Coronation Street" after having watched it on television. Nevertheless, the BBFC will not have to crawl over "Coronation Street" or "Dr. Who". I take the point made by the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Small Heath (Mr. Howell). However, the BBFC will need to come to a sensible and pragmatic arrangement with the broadcasting authorities for dealing with their products. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman agrees with that, because that is the nub of the whole thing. I am sure that a specific arrangement can be worked out, and this important point will be looked at again.

I stress again that it is important to have an overall classification. Once we have other classifications, the simplicity of the Bill is taken away. To have classification, it is necessary to keep records; the television companies have not kept and do not keep the necessary records.

With those few comments, and the pledge that we shall look at this again to see whether some special, pragmatic arrangement can be brought about, I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will withdraw his amendment.

As it is 12 o'clock, and I am anxious to get the Bill through and make progress, I shall not press my amendment to a Division. I am not happy with what the Minister said. I am more happy about what the hon. Member for Luton, South (Mr. Bright) said about this being looked at again. I hope that they will do so, especially in the other place. On that understanding, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Object.

I must put the Question if the objection is sustained.

(seated and covered): On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I understand that this Division is taking a protracted time because people are deliberately holding up progress in the Aye Lobby, with the intention of frustrating the Bill by improper parliamentary means. Can you cause inquiries to be made, so that the Division can take place with due speed?

I shall have any necessary inquiries made.

I beg to move amendment No. 8, in page 2, line 12 after 'any', insert 'significant'.

With this, we are to take the following amendments: No. 9, in page 2, line 12 leave out 'or otherwise deals with'.

No. 11, in page 2, line 18 leave out from 'any' to end of line 19 and insert

'significant extent to stimulate or encourage anything falling within paragraph (a) or, in the case of anything falling within paragraph (b), is designed to any extent to do so'.

These amendments relate to the word "significant". In Committee, we had a lengthy discussion about the exemptions that the Bill gives and about the fact that they would affect, in particular, newsreels. Under the Bill as drafted, newsreels would have been in trouble and would have had to be classified if they portrayed violence or sex.

rose——

We might have had newsreels put on videos and classified if they contained scenes of violence, even hooliganism at football matches, or if they contained the violence we see regularly on television in wars. This is particularly relevant at present, with the situation in the middle east.

I want to make a two-minute speaking rule. [HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear."] The amendments deal with that problem, and I promised in Committee that I would deal with the matter. I have therefore moved the amendment.

I rose a moment ago, but I failed to attract my hon. Friend's attention. The hon. Gentleman referred several times to the word "newsreels". Apart from a cinema newsreel, I do not know what my hon. Friend intends to embrace by the word. Does he mean news, as broadcast on television? Does he mean current affairs programmes, as broadcast on television? Does he mean features and documentaries, as broadcast on television? In other words, where does it start and stop?

Perhaps I should have said "straight news", because that is what the amendment is aimed at.

I welcome my hon. Friend's attempts to exempt that, provided the conditions are fulfilled. The amendment does not go as far as I would have wished, and in the debate on the last amendment I exemplified my view on the matter. However, I am grateful to my hon. Friend for what he attempts to do.

I want to put one simple question, which I hope the Minister can answer. What, in practice, will the addition of the word "significant" mean? I welcome a move in this direction, but we need to know what difference the insertion of the word will mean.

Very quickly, the best advice I have is that it will be possible—although, clearly, it is a matter for the courts, in the last analysis — to have news documentaries that cover, for instance, the war in Lebanon, and show people firing and other people being wounded, without having to be submitted for classification. It will not allow through films such as "Faces of Death". Indeed, we should be failing in our duty if we included an exemption that enabled people to pass around such material lawfully.

I beg to move amendment No. 10, in page 2, line 15 leave out

'torture or other acts of gross violence'

and insert

`or torture of, or other acts of gross violence towards, humans or animals;'.

We discussed the matter of animals in Committee. I told my hon. Friend the Member for Richmond and Barnes (Mr. Hanley) that we would look at this point, and we have. I believe that this amendment will satisfy those who are concerned about this aspect.

I am grateful to the hon. Member for Luton, South (Mr. Bright) for having moved the amendment which, as he has rightly said, followed a lengthy debate in Committee. I also moved amendments in Committee to seek to ensure that cruelty to animals would be covered. The hon. Gentleman found a nicely phrased way to tackle what was a genuine omission.

I beg to move amendment No. 12, in page 2, line 19 at end insert—

'(3) A video work is for the purposes of this Act an exempted work if it is designed for use in training for or carrying on any medical related occupation, or for carrying on the occupation of a clinical psychologist.

(4) For the purposes of subsection (3) above, an occupation is a medical or related occupation if, to carry on the occupation, a person is required to be registered under the Professions Supplementary to Medicines Act 1960, the Nurses, Midwives and Health Visitors Act 1979 or the Medical Act 1983.

(5) In subsection (3) above "clinical psychologist" means a person employed as a clinical psychologist by a health authority or in a special hospital; and in this subsection "health authority" and "special hospital" have the same meaning as in the National Health Service Act 1977.'.

There was much pressure in Committee, and in recent weeks through the media, concerning the British Medical Association. One of the problems has been to get the wording correct. This amendment is a fairly lengthy one, which ensures that all medical videos that are made for doctors by doctors—we specifically name people who are within the medical spectrum—are exempted. I hope that the amendment will satisfy them. I should point out that some films, such as those on sex education, would require a classification because they are obviously meant not for the medical profession but for members of The public. I am happy to say that when the Home Secretary puts forward the list of charges to be made that will be taken into consideration.

Once again, I express gratitude to the hon. Member for Luton, South for tabling this amendment which takes into account several debates in Committee. I think that the hon. Gentleman has got it about right, but I want to ask him a couple of questions. Does he believe that, under the proposed amendment, films used for sexual therapy will have to be certificated by the authority? Secondly, have all the representative organisations, including one with which I have a family connection—the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists —given their assent to the clause? I am sure that he is right to exempt from the clause the films to which he has referred. He has judged it nicely, but I should like to be satisfied that the professional organisations and the paramedical organisations have been consulted and agree with the thrust of his proposal.

I am not certain whether we have had a reply from the organisation that the hon. Gentleman mentioned. The matter has been discussed in general with the medical profession and the medical organisations, and in particular with the libraries that are responsible for lending such films. They were the motivating force behind this amendment.

I am happy that any film or video that is specifically made for someone within the profession can be viewed by that person. I am also happy that under medical supervision the films can be seen without being classified. But, as I said, there are one or two areas, particularly sex education, in general areas outside medical supervision, which will have to go for classification. I can give the hon. Gentleman the assurance for which he is looking in that respect, but I hedge specifically when he asks me about one organisation.

This is an interesting amendment, because it deals with not only the subject matter of the material which may be exempted but also seems to lay down to what use that material may be put having been so exempted. It would clearly be an offence to use material which had gained an exemption on medical grounds for audiences, or in circumstances, other than those which the amendment has in mind. I may be wrong——

I am sure that my hon. Friend is wrong. If he were not, that would be a difficulty at which we should need to look. The amendment says:

"A video work is for the purposes of this Act an exempted work if it is designed for use"—

It does not insist that that is the only possible context in which it is shown. It has to be bona fide intended for that use. That is the happiest way that we could find to express the exemption which I think all hon. Members would want us to make to avoid that unnecessary complication.

I agree with my hon. Friend. I was wrong. There clearly is the slight outside chance that material that has been exempted because it was designed for use for those purposes may be used for other purposes, but I do not think that is something with which we need concern ourselves. Much concern was expressed in Committee and I know that many hon. Members have received representations since the Committee stage about this. I think that the amendment will be welcomed.

I beg to move amendment No. 13, in page 2, line 19, at end insert—

`(3) A video work is not an exempted work for the purposes of subsection (1) above if, to any extent, it demonstrates or encourages the commission of crime'.

This amendment is designed to widen the list of video works which may not be exempted under clause 2(2). As the House will be aware, video works which are basically for educational or instructional purposes are exempted, as are medical videos. It is made clear in the Bill that to the extent that such works may deal with sex or violence they are not exempted and must be submitted to the BBFC. It struck me and other hon. Members, and I think the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Small Heath (Mr. Howell), that perhaps we should not extend this exemption to work which appeared to assist, encourage or instruct in the commission of crime in any way. After all, a video might be produced which was said to be educational about shoplifting, burglary or drug-taking, but which might in fact be designed to appeal to rather more prurient tastes on the part of the video-watching public and might be said to encourage those vices.

In Committee, I wondered aloud whether such work should be shown to the BBFC. After all, my amendment requires not that it should be banned but that it should be submitted to the BBFC for it to decide whether it needs to be classified. That is why I tabled the amendment. It is also associated with amendment No. 20, which stands in my name and which tries somewhat to restrict the BBFC's terms of reference to ensure that it is there only to censor for the purposes that the House has in mind and not, for example, for political purposes. If we restrict the BBFC to the terms of clause 2(2) we should widen that subsection slightly to provide for crime or anything that might seem to incite, encourage or assist in the commission of crime. In Committee, my hon. Friend the Minister did not seem to think that the amendment represented a helpful addition to the Bill. However, I think that the right hon. Member for Small Heath thought that it did. The whole thing was left in the air, and I hope that we can settle it now.

I rise briefly to resist the amendment. It is mistaken, because if the Home Office wished to make an educational video recording showing people how to avoid the risk of having their houses invaded by burglars—I. believe that such films have been made in the past—it would under the amendment be required to submit it to the BBFC.

On brief reflection, having listened to the hon. Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Mr. Maclennan), I am quite certain that it would be a good thing for the Home Office to have its films censored too.

I support the amendment. Earlier, I reflected that it might catch anyone who tried to misuse the previous amendment about sex films. If videos designed for a certain purpose were then flogged in the corner shop as having come from, for example, the outpatients department of the hospital, that might encourage the commission of crime. It would be a crime to sell an exempted cassette.

I look forward to hearing the replies of my hon. Friend the Minister and my hon. Friend the Member for Luton, South (Mr. Bright), as it seems that the amendment might close a loophole.

I shall be brief. The amendment draws attention to the fact that clause 2(1) is not all that satisfactory. Some people might be forgiven for thinking that a reference to something being designed to

"provide information, education or instruction".

was consistent with doing those things for criminal purposes. That subsection should therefore contain some reference to its being bona fide "information, education or instruction", if it is to have its real meaning.

I also agree with the criticism made of the amendment. In any event, the words "to any extent" would now have to be amended to take into account amendments that we have just made to clause 2, inserting the word "significant". Not to do so would leave two different forms of words applying to the same idea. I hope that between now and the Bill being considered in the other place my hon. Friend the Minister will consider just how useful clause 2(1) is, unless it exempts good information, good education and good instruction.

My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Burton (Mr. Lawrence) has made a most helpful intervention. My mind was running on exactly those lines. I cannot for that reason accept the amendment, and I was going to use exactly the same example as has been given. My hon. and learned Friend may well have been thinking of the manuals which apparently circulate in some quarters showing how to sniff glue or how to inject drugs.

Even though I must advise the House not to accept the amendment, I still believe, as I did in Committee, that we ought to tighten up that provision slightly. Perhaps my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Burton has given us the answer. However, given the assurance that we have not finished thinking about the matter and that I would welcome the opportunity to discuss it, I hope that my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, West (Mr. Parris) will agree that there may he a case for withdrawing the amendment now.

With that assurance, I shall be happy to withdraw the amendment. I make nothing of the argument put forward by the hon. Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Mr. Maclennan) that the Home Office might have to submit its videos to the British Board of Film Censors. My hon. Friend the Minister has made it clear that he sees no reason why the Home Office's creatures, the IBA and the BBC, should not submit their work to the BBFC. Similarly, if the Department of Education and Science makes a film of sex instruction for sex educaton classes, it will have to submit its work to the BBFC. It will not be exempted under clause 2(2). Anybody who makes films that may fall within the catch-all of the phrase will have to submit that work. To submit work does not mean that it will be banned, but simply that it has to be looked at.

This matter should be examined with slightly broader terms of reference in mind than the clause is presently drafted to include. I accept the Minister's statement that my drafting may be not quite correct. On that basis, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

I beg to move amendment No.18, in page 3, leave out lines 43 and 44 and insert—

'(9) The supply of a video recording for the purpose of submitting a video work contained in the recording for the issue of a classification certificate is an exempted supply.'

I point out that amendment numbers 39, 40, 41, 47, 53 and 54 are consequential to this amendment.

Under clause 3(9), as presently drafted, the supply of a video recording to the designated authority is an exempted supply. The House will be aware, however, that under clause 4 the designated authority is responsible for making arrangements for the classification of video works. It will not necessarily be the designated authority which will be classifying the works. Indeed, my right hon. and learned Friend intends to designate the principal officers of the British Board of Film Censors as the designated." authority, but it will be the board's examiners who undertake the classification process. It would be better, therefore, if the scope of the exempted supply which relates to the seeking of a classification certificate reflected this.

Moreover, clause 3(9), as presently drafted, does not exempt a supply to the classifiers by way of a third party, such as a trade association. Amendment No. 18, therefore, seeks to avoid any possible difficulty by recasting, clause 3(9) to provide that the supply of a video recording for the purpose of submitting a video work contained in the recording for the issue of a classification certificate is an exempted supply.

Why is it necessary to have subsection (9)? Is the matter not covered by clause' 3(2)?

I am advised not, by the legal advisers.

On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Would it be for the convenience of the House to consider with amendment No. 20 the following group of amendments?

Does the House have any objection? No, then we may proceed along those lines.

With this we may take the following amendments:

In discussion of the Bill in Committee, we had a very full and important debate on whether the classification of 18R material on video should be permitted under the Bill. As the House will be aware, members of the Committee voted in favour of the view, which I personally shared, that the designated authority and its examiners should be able to make use of this classification. But, during this same debate, we also considered an amendment tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point (Sir B. Braine) which added the words "viewing in the home" to clause 4(1)(a) of the Bill. This amendment was agreed unanimously by the Committee, and underlined that, despite differences of view on the question of 18R videos, we were united in our view that the Bill should make express provision to recognise the central purpose of the Bill, namely, the classification of videos supplied for viewing in the home.

In supporting this amendment, my hon. Friend the Minister advised that some tidying up of the provision would be necessary. As members of the Committee, including the hon. Member for Derby, South (Mrs. Beckett) pointed out, some videos are made for places other than in the home. Certain of them would not be exempted under clause 2 of the Bill and nor would they necessarily be suitable for viewing in the home. I am thinking, for example, of certain videos produced for use in family planning clinics or marriage guidance counsellors' offices and certain videos showing scenes of violence designed for use in the training of social workers or psychologists. Under the Bill there must, at least, be a risk that such material could not be classified and that its commercial supply would effectively, therefore, be banned. That is not, of course, the intention of the Bill, nor, I am sure, was it the intention of hon. Members who supported the amendment in Committee.

This batch of amendments fulfils the undertaking to tidy up the earlier amendment and it also carries through the earlier amendment to other provisions of the Bill, notably in clause 5.

Clause 5(2)(b) of the Bill in effect describes 15 and 18 certificates and clause 5(2)(c) 18R certificates. As the House will know, we shall be discussing later an amendment—to which I shall be giving my full support —from my hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point (Sir B. Braine), which will confine the supply of 18R videos to licensed sex shops.

As my hon. Friend the Minister has said, this Bill is not intended to roll back the video industry to the days of the Ealing comedies. Material in the 15, 18 and 18R videos will continue to be available once my Bill comes into force, as my hon. Friend the Minister has said. If the amendments which stand in the names of my hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point and myself are accepted today, the designated authority's examiners will be required, however, to have special regard to the likelihood of video works that they classify being seen in the home, and that certainly reflects the intentions that lay behind the original amendment.

I have to advise the House that amendment No. 22 tabled by my hon. Friends the Members for Derbyshire, West (Mr. Parris) and for Gravesham (Mr. Brinton) is defective. If refers to conditions which may be specified in a classification certificate, but neither clause 5(2)(b) which deals with the 15 and 18 certificates nor clause 5(2)(c) which deals with 18R certificates makes provision for conditions to be imposed.

In the context of the issue of a certificate, I am not at all persuaded that conditions would be appropriate, given that a breach would not lead to a certificate being withdrawn.

My amendment No. 22 reads:

"in accordance with such conditions as may be specified in the classification certificates described in this Act".

The classification certificates are described in the Act. It is not necessary to find the part of the Act in which the conditions that may be specified in the classification certificates are themselves described. The Act describes the classification certificates and my amendment refers to

"such conditions as may be specified in the classification certificates".

I have been advised by those who have considered the matter carefully. My hon. Friends' amendment and mine go the same way; I do not think that we dispute that. I know that my hon. Friends believe that their amendment is probably simpler than mine, but mine was drafted by legal people—which necessarily makes it complicated. I believe that my amendments will stand up and that they spell out exactly my intentions.

I believe that if the House accepts the amendments, my Bill will be a stronger and better measure and will make it clear to all who read it that the primary purpose is to provide for the classification of video material that is likely to be viewed in the home.

The amendments will also ensure that the Bill does not have the unwanted effect of preventing the classification of material that it was never intended to ban.

I support the amendment. My hon. Friend the Member for Luton, South (Mr. Bright) mentioned our debate in Committee about how we should control 18R material—films that can be shown only in licensed sex cinemas and to persons over 18.

We were faced with a dilemma. Such material cannot now be shown in public cinemas, and young people under 18 are not allowed to enter sex cinemas. We had to decide what to do about such material that was purchased by adults in ordinary video shops and taken home for private viewing. Not only is there a strong possibility of children and adolescents seeing such material and being disturbed, confused or even desensitised by it, but there is a difference between viewing in the home and in the controlled environment of a public cinema. In the privacy of the home, it would be possible to slow down a video, dwell on particular scenes and experiment, in a palpably unhealthy way.

Accordingly, with the support of the Magistrates Association and a wide range of reputable voluntary organisations throughout the country, including representatives of teachers and parents, I sought an outright ban on 18R material.

I did not carry the Committee with me. My hon. Friend the Member for Luton, South has explained that one reason for that was the feeling that one of my earlier amendments, to add the words "viewing in the home" to clause 4(1)(a) effectively required the designated authority to have specific regard to where a video might be shown.

I have concluded that my hon. Friend the Member for Luton, South is right. As it is the subject of the next batch of amendments, standing in my name, I shall not argue the case now. I hope that the House will accept my hon. Friend's amendment.

We give our full support to the amendments, particularly No. 20. If we are to control video nasties in the home, it is surely right that the authority should have specific terms of reference by which to control those videos. Clause 2(2), which spells out what we are trying to get at, is strongly supported by me and by my hon. Friends the Members for Caithness and Sutherland (Mr. Maclennan) and for Southwark and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes).

I support any attempts to define in more detail the amendment that the Committee resolutely pushed through. The inclusion of the words "viewing in the home" worried me and the British Videogram Association.

The lawyers have got me confused by amendment No. 21, though I have read it many times and I listened carefully to the explanation of my hon. Friend the Member for Luton, South (Mr. Bright). Many people criticised the original amendment, because it could conceivably result in the designating authority defining all homes in Britain where there were five-year-old children and thereby limiting the supply of classified material. [Interruption.] I exaggerate, as my hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point (Sir B. Braine) knows, but that is the sort of situation which could have occurred, conceivably or inconceivably.

If the lawyers who have advised my hon. Friend the promoter can confirm and if he can assure me that the words in amendment No. 21—

"classification certificates to be issued in respect of them, having special regard to the likelihood of video works in respect of which such certificates have been issued being viewed"—

put the matter right and made the designated body look to all the areas of classification, I shall be happy.

I have a couple of amendments to speak to but, as the House realises, my amendment No. 20 has been linked with the group of amendments that we are now discussing. I shall start with my amendment No 20.

Order. It might clarify matters if I remind the House that together with amendment No. 20 we are discussing amendments Nos. 21, 22, 25, 26, 30, 31, 32 and 33. The question before the House is, That amendment No. 20 be made.

Starting, then, with my amendment No. 20, the existing regulations providing for the classification of films for display in the public cinema are all derived from the Cinematograph Act 1909. The long title of that Act made it clear that the purpose of the Act was to prevent fires from breaking out in cinemas. It had no other purpose. Subsequent to that purpose, the Secretary of State was allowed to empower county councils to issue licences to people to display films, and it is from the issue of those licences that the whole apparatus of cinema censorship has arisen. So the House will see how easily a broad censorship measure can sometimes be based on what may seem to be very narrow legislative powers.

The Bill as presently drafted is far less narrow. It simply empowers the British Board of Film Censors to ask itself whether films are suitable. A board of censors which wanted to decide whether films were politically suitable would not be prevented from doing so by this Bill. A board of censors which wanted to decide whether films were heretical from the religious point of view would not be prevented from doing so by this Bill.

It did not seem to me to be an impossible task to lay down, in the broadest possible way, the sort of terms of reference that we thought the British Board of Film Censors should be taking into account when doing its censorship. I thought that the terms of reference were fairly well laid out in clause 2(2), which attempts to define all those ingredients which, should a work contain them, would result in its not being exempted on the ground of being educational, or whatever else it might claim to be. In other words, the subsection attempts to put its finger on those ingredients which may be so offensive to the public as to require classification of some kind. I understand that clause 2(2) must provide a fairly exhaustive list of those ingredients. If it does not, and if some element or other might be deeply offensive to the public but was not listed in the subsection, it is perfectly possible that a film containing that element, and claiming to be educational, would be regarded as an accepted work under the terms of the Bill, should it become law.

If anyone can think of anything so offensive that a work should not be exempted just because it is educational, it should go into subsection (2), because the Bill could be incomplete without it. If the subsection is made watertight in the way that I have suggested, the wording of the subsection can be used as the broad remit for the terms of reference of the British Board of Film Censors.

I have suggested in my amendment No. 20 that after the word "suitable" we should insert the words

"in relation to those matters referred to in section 2(2) above."

It seems to me to be a fairly unexceptional amendment. In Committee, it was registered fairly strongly, and the Minister seemed to suggest that it would be impracticable to list those things that the British Board of Film Censors should take into account, but I do not think that it is impracticable. As I said in Committee, I think that it is a matter of the Home Office being rather lazy.

We are not saying what decisions the British Board of Film Censors should take. We are not trying to lay down the criteria so precisely that we know what decision the board will reach about each film. We are only trying to say what the broad, approximate terms of reference of the board should be, so that it could never take it upon itself under another Government or under another Home Secretary to be a political or a religious censoring body. That is the reason for amendment No. 20.

In amendment No. 22 I suggest that after "viewing in the home" we insert

"in accordance with such conditions as may be specified in the classification certificates described in this Act."

I wanted to make it clear what my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State suggested in Committee and again this morning was already the case. I wanted to make it clear that the term "in the home" did not mean in the home in the sense of the log fire burning and the toddlers around the hearth. If that is what "in the home" means, the phrase will be unduly restrictive in the Bill. But my hon. Friend has made it clear that he regarded the term "in the home" as purely declaratory. I think that that phrase is a lawyer's way of saying that it adds nothing to the Bill.

There are two views about what the phrase "in the home" means. My hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point (Sir B. Braine), other hon. Members and a number of people outside the House think that by inserting the phrase "in the home" they have changed the Bill substantially. They think that, bearing in mind that phrase "in the home", the British Board of Film Censors may adopt a different set of criteria for classification than it might otherwise have adopted. I probably do my hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point no service in saying that he thinks that he has achieved something and changed the Bill by the insertion of that phrase. The Minister says that nothing has been changed and that the phrase is purely declaratory.

The Under-Secretary of State also says that almost the entire mainstream of cinema work will be viewable on video and that, to the extent that there are any dual standards, they will affect only work at the margins. By that, he said, he meant that they would still be subject to the Obscene Publications Act 1959, and that when judging any work under the Obscene Publications Act the jury had to take account of where the work might be seen and by whom it might be seen.

It is not necessary in the Bill to list all those Acts of Parliament to which the British Board of Film Censors is still subject in making its decisions. It knows that it is still subject to the Obscene Publications Act. If dual standards, to the extent that they exist, are only to be set up by the operation of the Obscene Publications Act, if the Act already operates, as it does, on the Bill, and if the term "viewing in the home" will not make any difference to the standards that the British Board of Film Censors adopts, the term "viewing in the home" is otiose. It does not need to be included. It adds nothing to the Bill. We shall get all the mainstream cinema except, as my hon. Friend said, that which falls foul of the Obscene Publications Act. We always knew that, and we do not have to tell the British Board of Film Censors that.

For that reason, it must be made clear that "viewing in the home" does not mean viewing in the sort of cosy and decent circumstances which might exclude certain material. In Committee, I asked my hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point whether he thought that Penthouse was suitable for viewing in the home. He replied that he did not and that he did not associate Penthouse with the home. According to one interpretation of the word "home", certain video works will not be suitable for viewing in the home.

We should direct our attention to the other interpretation of "viewing in the home"—viewing in the home in accordance with such certificates as the British Board of Film Censors may have laid down, certificates about 18, PG, 16, and so on. It is in that context of viewing in the home that the board can issue its certificates and make its decisions.

I have looked at amendment No. 21, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Luton, South (Mr. Bright). That seems to achieve 60 per cent. or 70 per cent. of what I want to achieve, but it leaves the British Board of Film Censors with the final decision about whether children are likely to see the work in the home. The board has to decide the likelihood of children seeing any work.

Taking as my text Luke, chapter 17—

"It is impossible but that offences will come: but woe unto him, through whom they come!"—

I look, for example, at the liquor licensing laws and I see immediately that the off-licensee who sells the liquor does not have to consider the chances of that liquor eventually getting into the hands of a child. The law accepts that, the liquor having been sold, what happens to it is up to the parent.

I should like the law to accept that, an 18 category video having been sold only to a responsible adult, what happens to it is up to the parents. It is not for the BBFC to try to arrive at a calculation of the chances of that video falling into the hands of children and to classify accordingly. For that reason, I prefer the wording of amendment No. 20 to that of amendment No. 21. However, I shall accept the latter amendment with ill grace and hope that no one will take exception to amendment No. 20.

I support what the hon. Member for Derbyshire, West (Mr. Parris) has just said, Many of us have struggled hard to reconcile the duty not to impose undue restrictions on adults with the duty to uphold the rights of the responsible parent, the parents' function to be responsible for what their children do and, in the case of some of us, clear Christian or similar beliefs that young people should not be harmed by the type of material which the hon. Member for Luton, South (Mr. Bright) is trying to prevent going into their hands.

It is unfair and ungracious for hon. Members to suggest that our attempts to do what I have outlined when we are trying to legislate for the country are not done with the best motives. All of us, including the Minister, are trying to tread a difficult line. I pay tribute to the work that has been put into the Committee stage by those who have tried to balance the concept of liberty with their duty to young people. It is important that we support amendments Nos. 20 and 21. Amendment No. 20 ensures that the BBFC does not have the word "suitable" as a wide and potentially over-wide definition, but relates it to the mischief with which the Bill is intended to deal.

Video nasties are not and never will be a large proportion of the total. We must ensure that we do not take a sledgehammer to crack a nut. We must deal with the problem but not impose a draconian measure. I hope that the House will accept amendment No. 21, because it helps us to be more clear that, when deciding how to certify videos, the BBFC or designated body will bear in mind the likelihood of children seeing that video. It is not necessary to imagine that such videos are going into homes in which five, 10 or 15-year-olds live. If a video is sold legally to an adult, that adult must take the responsibility for his conscience and the consequences of allowing youngsters to see such material.

There is no doubt that there are families and adults who are not exercising that responsibility properly. Our method of influencing them to do so is persuasion and argument and to give responsible parents support, rather than prescribe what they can do. These amendments help us in that regard. I support that and hope that the House will help those hon. Members who are trying, by amendment, to make the Bill better each time it comes before us.

I took exception to some of what the hon. Member for Derbyshire, West (Mr. Parris) said about the addition of the words, "viewing in the home" being of no consequence. That was not the intention of the Committee when he agreed that addition. He has misread what the Minister and others have said today if he believes that those words are of no consequence.

The addition means that when the British Board of Film Censors judges these videos for viewing in the home it may get a slightly different classification than it would have received in the cinema. I also understand from what the Minister said earlier today that small cuts or adjustments may be made in recognition of the fact that the material is for viewing in the home. However, it does not mean that these videos will not be able to be shown in the home.

1 pm

Since we voted on this matter in Committee I have received many letters expressing a variety of views on it. One strong organisation in my town has told me that its members will not vote for me again because I voted the wrong way on the 18R classification and supported the addition of "viewing in the home" as a better compromise.

This is a difficult area. It is a grey area. It is not the intention of the Bill, as I see it, to impose rigid censorship. The Bill is designed to impose a classification system so that people will understand what they are getting. It is not designed to take away people's civil liberties — their right to see what they wish. I accept what the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) said. In an ideal world, all parents would be responsible and reasonable people. We know that that is not necessarily always the case, but we cannot legislate to cover the behaviour of every parent. If we did so, we would have to act on very stringent lines and restrict the freedom of the vast majority of people in this country in order to deal with those who are not responsible and reasonable.

We have debated today the problems connected with recording material from the television. My children—who are now rapidly growing up—can preset the video recorder to record programmes at 11 o'clock or 12 o'clock at night far more easily than I can. I do not have the time to fiddle around with buttons, but they know how to do so. It is surprising how children aged 10, 11 and 12 know how to pre-set the video recorder to record the programmes that they wish to see. How can even responsible and reasonable parents prevent their children from recording programmes? This is a difficult area. I believe that the Bill and the amendments are on the right lines, but we must try to ensure that the Bill remains basically a measure designed to ban the video nasties, which is what it was on Second Reading, and that we maintain people's right to see the films they want to see.

We are discussing an important amendment which gave rise to a great deal of concern in Committee. It is not clear that the amendment of the hon. Member for Derbyshire, West (Mr. Parris) is necessary. Clause 2 deals with exemptions. It states that a video should not be exempt if, for example, it portrays human sexual activity, human genital organs, mutilation, torture or acts of gross violence. Nothing in that clause has anything to do with the general classification of what should be seen in the home. I acknowledge at once that amendment No. 21 achieves what we tried to achieve in Committee. I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman and presumably to the Minister for having given their attention to the matter.

I shall try to explain what I mean. If the right hon. Gentleman can think of anything that he believes should not be seen in the home, it should be referred to in clause 2(2), because if it is not referred to there, it can appear in any work purporting to be educational or instructive and will not need a certificate.

The hon. Gentleman is wrong about this, and there is a fundamental misconception in his thinking. I am sorry about that, because he was extremely helpful in Committee, although he did not always take a line similar to that of other Members, which is to his credit. The material that I wish not to be seen in the home will not be seen anywhere, because the BBFC or the designated authority will not give it a certificate. If such material is distributed without a certificate, its producers face substantial fines and, indeed, we had a long argument in Committee about whether they should be imprisoned.

Does the right hon. Gentleman accept that, even if amendment No. 20 is not accepted, something that was regarded as politically unsuitable by the BBFC could be denied a certificate and banned from sale except in special outlets?

I cannot imagine the BBFC deciding something on political grounds. I am not sure what the hon. Gentleman's point is.

Fascist marches.

The BBFC would not act because there was a political march by Fascists——

On video.

Even if it were on video, it would presumably be ancillary to the purpose of the film. It might be part of a story about the Jewish situation. The hon. Gentleman is taking us into the realms of fantasy, and I must not follow him. I am anxious to take issue with the hon. Member for Derbyshire, West about the meaning of "the home". I shall be brief, because I wish to finish the Bill and I do not want people to take up time by subterfuge to stop us concluding it.

In Committee the hon. Member for Castle Point (Sir B. Braine) put down an amendment stating that the Bill should be extended into what some of us regarded as the area of censorship. The hon. Member for Derbyshire, West did not agree, but he has since reconsidered the matter and I am delighted that he now believes that we probably got it right. We must have regard to standards set for material shown in the home. All that we have done, rightly, is to say that there must be a difference in standards of classification between films that people can see by going into a sex cinema or into a cinema open only to people aged over 18, and videos that can be seen in the home by all and sundry. That must be right; if it is not, we have wasted our time. If this filth is shown in the home, rather than in a sex cinema, it must be considered differently.

The right hon. Gentleman may be right, but if he is, he was wrong earlier to say that the Bill would not stop anyone seeing at home what could be seen in the cinema. It manifestly will do that.

I shall give up trying to do anything with the hon. Gentleman, whose lack of comprehension is astonishing. I am right. Although many people would criticise us for having the 18R category, such films can still be shown in the home. The point is that they must be classified as 18R and must be obtained in a special way, but that will not stop the hon. Gentleman perverting himself and his family if he wishes to. He must understand what we are doing. We are introducing not censorship, but a sensible means of classifying videos to be shown in the home. For that reason, I support the hon. Gentleman and thank him for meeting our point.

I agree with what the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Small Heath (Mr. Howell) has said, so I shall not repeat it. There was a genuine debate, in which feelings rightly ran high in Committee, on whether 18R category material, which can be shown only in sex cinemas or shops, should be available on video cassette. The Committee decided that it should in theory be possible for 18R material to be available on video cassette, provided that it was sold in segregated premises. The Committee also decided unanimously that it was right to understand that there was a difference if the BBFC was looking at 18R material in relation to its public exhibition within a cinema club. That is different from looking at it with regard to its distribution on video cassette, where it could go anywhere. The effect of that, as the right hon. Gentleman made clear, will be that the BBFC will have to think extra hard before any 18R material goes on video cassette, because it will go into the home, and it would be nonsense if that were any different.

Before my hon. Friend the Member for Gravesham (Mr. Brinton) emerges shouting "Woe, woe" once more, I should point out that this has nothing to do with the main argument about the mainstream cinemas, on which I have already made my position clear. I hope that it is surplus to requirement that I should have to do so again. I have the greatest respect for my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, West (Mr. Parris), but on occasion his forensic talents are used to mischievous ends. Why he feels the need to stir up trouble on an issue on which most of us, after a painful debate, came together and agreed, thereby showing the essential unity of the House, I do not know. There is no need to turn over the apple cart.

My hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point (Sir B. Braine) made a most handsome and generous speech, which is entirely in character, and in which he warmly endorsed the Bill, coming together with the right hon. Member for Small Heath and others. Why my hon. Friend now feels the need to say to the right hon. Member for Small Heath, "It is not what you think, you have got it completely wrong," I do not know. The Committee re-emphasised, in the words of the hon. Member for Ross, Cromarty and Skye (Mr. Kennedy), that we were setting out in a declaratory way what we expect the BBFC to do, and if we do not expect any board designated to look at videos to have in mind the fact that videos will go into the home, it makes nonsense of the business. On that basis, I commend amendment No. 21 and that which follows to the House.

If we accept amendment No 21, we must negative amendment No. 22, proposed by my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, West, and I hope that we shall do so. As to amendment No. 20, I agree with the right hon. Member for Small Heath that my hon. Friend is confusing, inextricably and to no advantage, two quite distinct clauses and two distinct things. Clause 2 deals with exemptions and is a way of ensuring that material which cannot, on any view, require a classification of 15 or 18 should not have to go to the trouble and fuss of going to the BBFC. We spent a lot of time working out how in making that as wide as is consistent with the aim of the measure, we could prevent it from being a Trojan horse through which pornographers and those who deal with this offensive stuff could escape the full rigours of the Bill.

Clause 4 sets up the designated authority and gives it, rightly, broad terms of reference. I should have thought that the last thing that someone with my hon. Friend's liberal position would want to see embodied in the law is the list system of approach to censorship, which is a crude mechanism for control. In the end, one should look at a film and say whether it is offensive and should not be allowed, or it is not and should be. What it depicts is difficult to define. Some films can depict something not explicitly or offensively, but somebody else could make a film on the same subject which was obviously out to titillate and to make people feel that they want to go out and commit a similar crime and so would plainly be offensive. I beg my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, West to realise that nothing could be more damaging to the Bill and to the cause for which it stands than for amendment No. 20 to be introduced. I wish to save it from that fate, and I advise the House to do the same.

Is it the case that there is an 18R category, but that certain 18R categories that will be allowed to go into the home are different from those 18R categories that will not be allowed in?

That is precisely the point. The 18R category is a hothouse plant which has around it a protective greenhouse of being shown only in the sex shop or the private cinema club. That is why—the BBFC accepts this—if it is shown in accordance with that certificate — a limited, greenhouse style certificate—it probably will not fall foul of the Obscene Publications Act. However, that does not give a guarantee more generally. That material cannot survive outside the greenhouse and will be in grave danger of being prosecuted under the Obscene Publications Act provisions if it is more widely distributed.

It was the Committee's wish — I was defeated in Committee but, as a democrat, I accept it—that the 18R material should be looked at on a case-by-case basis by the BBFC, having regard not to the fact that it will be shown in age-segregated premises, of which there are few in this country, but that once it leaves those premises it will go round on video cassettes to anywhere. That will mean material of a very different sort from that which is seen in cinema clubs at present.

I have made my point, and there is no point in making it again. If my hon. Friend the Minister does not understand the argument, he is a less intelligent man than I take him to be. I have sought to argue that 18R material certified for video viewing will have to conform with stricter standards than 18R material certified for cinema viewing. My hon. Friend the Minister has said as much, and so has the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Small Heath (Mr. Howell). As a consequence, there will be a good deal of 18R material of the type certified for cinema viewing that cannot be seen in the home. The first thing that the Bill will do will be to ban much of the 18R cinema material from viewing in the home. I do not say that that is wrong. I simply want to make the point that this is a censorship measure and that it will deprive people of seeing material in the home that they might be able to see in the cinema.

I do not want to waste time, but it is mischievous to suggest that we are stopping people from seeing things which they can see in the cinemas, as though that referred to the local Roxy in their high street. This material can be seen only in a few specially licensed cinema clubs and sex shops. That is quite different from the mainstream cine material about which I was talking, and about which we all agree.

From which people under 18 will be excluded. My hon. Friend has not grasped that.

So we move to the ordinary 18 classification. The right hon. Member for Small Heath suggested, although my hon. Friend the Minister has not done so, that in designating 18 certification we may want to take different standards into account for video viewing than we do for cinema viewing. There will be some 18-classified cinema films that people will not be able to see in that form in the home. I do not say that that is necessarily wrong, but we should admit it, and admit that to that degree this is a censorship measure. There is not much that I can say beyond that. It is clear that I shall not persuade the House of my view.

On amendment No. 20, I have tried, until I am blue in the face to explain the reason for the exemptions in clause 2(2) and why there should be a comprehensive list of the matters that the BBFC should take into account. If the House does not accept that argument, clearly I shall get not further with it.

My hon. Friend asks why I want to upset the apple cart. I do not want to upset the apple cart, and I intend to vote for the Third Reading of the Bill. However, I have one grave concern and I believe it is worth taking a little time to explain it. A set of dual standards will be set up and will cause people to believe that certification for video viewing is somehow softer than certification for cinema viewing. If that happens, we shall get a black market in videos which are the cinema versions of films, and they will be pirated and distributed for viewing in the home. It is therefore important for the two standards to be as close as possible.

My hon. Friend the Minister has said more than once that that is his intention. If I may say so, he had it both ways, both in Committee and with the Bill. When hon. Members questioned the judgment of the BBFC and suggested that it might not doing the right thing or doing it in the right way, my hon. Friend relied on what is no more than the truth—the statement that, in the Bill, we cannot tell the BBFC what to do. On other occasions, when hon. Members sought assurances about what the BBFC would do, my hon. Friend gave us those assurances and told us what he expected the BBFC to do and the standards that he expected it to maintain. I am sure that so long as he is the Under-Secretary of State those standards will be observed. However, we are dealing with an Act of Parliament and that is passed in perpetuity. Therefore, we must look carefully at the possibility of double standards and the emergence of a black market as a consequence.

Before the hon. Gentleman concedes that the House is not prepared to accept amendment No. 20, will he recognise that my hon. Friend the Member for Ross, Cromarty and Skye (Mr. Kennedy) did support it? It deals with a matter of major importance that was dealt with inconclusively in Committee. I reserved my position, although I did not try to force a vote. This matter cannot be regarded as having been concluded today. The Bill will have to make progress in another place and there will be considerable interest in this matter. The absence of criteria, with which the hon. Gentleman's amendment is attempting to deal, is profoundly important and raises the issue, which I debated at length, whether the Bill could run foul of article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights on freedom of expression.

Order. Interventions should be brief.

Yes, I recognise the help and support that I have had from the hon. Gentleman and his hon. Friends in Committee and now.

I was asked by my hon. Fnend the Member for Gravesham (Mr. Brinton) to give him an assurance. I have now taken advice and can give him the assurance for which he asks. That is the purpose of the amendment.

No doubt the hon. Member for Derbyshire, West (Mr. Parris) heard the Minister's comments on amendment No. 22. In the light of those remarks, does he wish to move that amendment?

No, Mr. Deputy Speaker.

I beg to move amendment No. 27, in page 4, line 35 leave out from 'premises' to end of line 38 and insert

`other than a licensed sex shop'.

With this it will be convenient to take the following amendments: No. 34, in clause 5, page 5, line 33 leave out from 'premises' to end of line 36 and insert

'other than a licensed sex shop'.

Amendment No. 42, in clause 10, page 7, line 31 leave out from 'premises' to end of line 41 and insert

'other than a licensed sex shop, a person who supplies or offers to supply a video recording containing the work on premises other than a sex shop for which a licence is in force under the relevant enactment is guilty of an offence unless the supply is, or would if it took place be, an exempted supply.'

Amendment No. 43, in clause 10, page 8, line 2, leave out 'this section' and insert 'subsection (1) above'.

Amendment No. 44, in clause 10, page 8, line 5, leave out from 'concerned' to end of line 8 and insert—

`(b) that the accused neither knew nor had reasonable grounds to believe that the premises were premises other than a sex shop for which a licence was in force under the relevant enactment, or

(c) that the accused believed on reasonable grounds that the supply was, or would if it took place be, an exempted supply by virtue of section 3(4) of this Act or subsection (6) below.

This group of amendments follows on naturally from those moved by my hon. Friend the Member for Luton, South (Mr. Bright). They confine the sale or hire of restricted 18 material to licensed sex shops. The amendments to clauses 4 and 5 deal with the change in the nature of the classification authority's determination and of the 18R certificate. The amendments to clause 10 deal with the offence of supplying, offering for supply, or possessing for supply, restricted 18 videos anywhere other than in a licensed sex shop.

The amendments have been drafted to ensure that 18R videos can be supplied to the public only in licensed sex shops. Therefore, it will not be possible to supply this material to the public in any areas in which the local authority concerned has not adopted in England and Wales schedule 3 to the Local Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1982, or, in Scotland, schedule 2 to the Civic Government (Scotland) Act 1982.

The amendments to clause 10 will make it an offence to supply or offer for supply a restricted 18 video on premises other than a licensed sex shop and to possess a restricted 18 video on premises other than a licensed sex shop.

I am as anxious as every hon. Member to get the Bill through, but it might be helpful to hon. Members if I were to describe briefly how we came to the conclusion that such provisions are necessary. I want to say something complimentary to my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, West (Mr. Parris). In Standing Committee he drew our attention to a valuable point, that the Bill was unclear as to where 18R material might be sold. Hon. Members on both sides of the Committee were uneasy about that. In response, my hon. Friend the Member for Luton, South urged that 18R material should be obtainable only from licensed sex shops. Indeed, that had been his intention from the outset. The ordinary video shop would be able to sell such material only if it obtained a licence from the local authority. Putting up a curtain or shutting off a corner of a video shop simply would not do. Anyone selling 18R material which was outside the mainstream supply of videos which were designed for the purpose of entertainment or education would have to satisfy the same requirements as a licensed sex shop. I completely reject the notion that that will somehow interfere with the rapidly expanding video trade. That point was put to us, so it must be dealt with. If the proprietors of video shops think that the loss of sales of hard pornography and video nasties of a kind that make normal people sick and which we know damage children and young people will ruin their businesses they are singularly lacking in vision. The general sale of video recordings will leap ahead.

1.30 pm

I hope that no hon. Member will argue that ordinary video shops should be permitted to sell 18R material. To do so would be to undermine the Bill. There are powerful arguments in favour of the amendments, but I shall be brief. The restriction to licensed sex shops effectively means that there would be no sale or hire to anyone under the age of 18 since any breach of that requirement would attract not only penalties but very heavy penalties. Moreover, with such establishments there would be no outward advertisements and such premises would usually be sited well away from schools and churches.

The conduct of such businesses will be more easily monitored by an elected local authority. So, instead of centralised control of what is sold or hired, the decision to license or not to license is left with local communities and their elected representatives. If a community wants a sex shop, it can have it. If it does not, there is nothing to compel it to have one. As a result, we may restore something of that respect for decency which most communities used to enjoy. More importantly, the amendment will ensure that democratically-elected local authorities are able, for the first time, to control what many of us believe to be an obnoxious and dangerous trade, thereby affording greater protection to our children and young people. From the very beginning, that has been the main purpose of the Bill.

I shall be extremely brief. The Bill would make 18R material unobtainable, for example, in my constituency which is coterminous with the district council of West Derbyshire. There are no sex shops in West Derbyshire, and there are unlikely to be any. I do not believe that West Derbyshire district council was, or should be, elected to tell my constituents what they should be able to see in their own homes. I shall oppose the amendment.

I rise to support my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, West (Mr. Parris). The notion that there is virtue in local authorities controlling the exhibition of 18R material is quite appalling. It introduces yet another censor. We have already discussed the terminal point of censorship——

I should not like my hon. Friend to work himself up on a false premise. At present that is exactly what the local authorities do. They control sex shops and private cinema clubs, which are at present the only places in which that material can lawfully be shown.

My hon. Friend has been of considerable help. That is why I should like the amendment to be opposed. I shall certainly oppose it.

I hope that East Staffordshire district council will not allow 18R material to be sold in Burtonupon-Trent or in the East Staffordshire district. That would be consistent with its policy so far not to allow sex shops either in the town or surrounding district. For that reason, I shall support the measure. The elected representatives of the East Staffordshire district council can be thrown out at the next election if the people of Burton-upon-Trent overwhelmingly believe that they ought to have the freedom to disseminate this filth in the towns covered by that district council.

I beg to move amendment No. 28, in page 5, line 12, leave out from second 'to' to end of line 13 and insert

`the person or persons designated under this section at the time of that transaction'.

This is a modest drafting amendment.

I beg to move amendment No. 29, in page 5, line 16, leave out

'by or on behalf of'

and insert

'in pursuance of arrangements made by'.

Again, this is a drafting amendment to tidy up matters.

I beg to move amendment No. 35, in page 5, line 40, leave out from 'of any' to 'to' and insert

'of the contents of any classification certificate'.