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

The House will note that the Bill is supported by all parties, and that my distinguished sponsors come from the three major parties. I am especially pleased to see in his place as one of my sponsors the former Secretary of State for National Heritage, my right hon. Friend the Member for City of London and Westminster, South (Mr. Brooke). I am grateful to him for his support.

It may surprise hon. Members to know that the Bill seeks to replace a law that goes back to the middle ages, and that the medieval law of treasure trove provides virtually the only legal protection that currently exists for antiquities that are found in the soil of England and Wales. An eminent legal authority, Professor Norman Palmer, has aptly described treasure trove as a mediaeval lottery.

The account of treasure trove to be found in a manual on English law written by a mediaeval lawyer called Bracton more than 700 years ago, pretty much describes the current position. I suppose that, historically, it was Richard Coeur de Lion, anxious to finance his crusades, who wanted to lay his hands on any gold and silver he could get, because we were on the gold standard in those days.

This is an historic occasion, because to my knowledge it is the first time that the subject of treasure trove has been debated in the Chamber. The subject, which is important for all those who have an interest in our nation's heritage, has been discussed in the other place a number of times. I am delighted to raise the issue in our House for the first time.

What is the law on treasure trove, what does it do, and why am I seeking to replace it? Only objects made of gold or silver which have been deliberately buried with the intention of recovery and of which the owner is unknown can be declared treasure trove. Someone who finds an object made of gold or silver has always had a legal duty to report it to the coroner without delay.

The coroner will decide whether to hold a treasure inquest, and the jury at the inquest is asked to decide whether the object in question was likely to have been buried with the intention of recovery, or whether it was more likely to have been lost or abandoned. I need hardly say that that is often an impossible question to answer.

If a find is a hoard of Roman gold coins in a pot, it might seem fairly obvious that its original owner did not lose it or abandon it, but buried it for safe keeping, hoping to come back to recover it. But what if the find is a single item of gold jewellery or a prehistoric gold bracelet? How can we possibly expect to know how an object came to be deposited in the ground 3,000 years ago? But that is the question that treasure inquest juries are regularly asked to decide. To make matters more complicated, a substantial sum of money can often depend on the outcome, because, if the object is treasure trove, the finder will get the reward, whereas, if it is not, the landowner may be able to claim it.

When a find has been declared treasure trove, in law it is the property of the Crown. In practice, that means that a museum has a right to acquire it, but the finder receives an ex gratia reward equivalent to its full market value. Any objects that are not required by a museum are returned, normally to the finder, and an independent committee has the job of determining the market value of such objects. That system of paying rewards to finders based on the full market value works well on the whole, but there are some problems.

Responsible finders will have made an agreement to split any reward equally with the landowner as a condition of being given permission to search on his land, but not all of them do so. Hon. Members will be surprised to learn that the finder will still receive a full reward even if he has been trespassing. Under present law, under no circumstances are landowners eligible for rewards. Only if the finder has behaved dishonestly or improperly—for example, if he has concealed his find—will the Secretary of State for National Heritage pay a reduced reward or none at all.

My Bill will, for the first time, make both landowners and occupiers eligible for rewards. That is one of the reasons why I am pleased that the Country Landowners Association and the National Farmers Union support the Bill. Landowners and occupiers will receive rewards under certain limited circumstances—for example, if the finder had been trespassing. I want to stress, however, that in the majority of cases, where the finder has permission to be on the land, it is expected that he will continue to receive the full reward, as at present.

So what are the problems of treasure trove? As I have mentioned, the greatest weakness is the need to determine whether the original owner of the find concealed it with the intention of coming back to recover it later, or whether he simply lost or abandoned it. It is absurd and ludicrous to think that we can understand today the motives that led owners to bury objects such as gold torts several thousand years ago, yet that question regularly arises at inquests.

In any case, it is an irrelevant consideration when deciding whether antiquities should be preserved for the nation. My Bill would provide protection to all objects other than coins that are at least 300 years old and that have a precious metal content of at least 5 per cent., however they came to be placed in the ground. We have adopted a different definition for coins.

What is more, single objects, however important they might be, are seldom declared treasure trove, because it is generally considered that they are more likely to have been lost than deliberately buried. One good example is the Middleham jewel, discovered in Yorkshire with a metal detector in 1985, and the most important piece of mediaeval jewellery discovered in England this century. It was not treasure trove, as it could not be shown to have been deliberately buried with the intention of recovery, and it was lost to the nation.

Another such example is the famous Sutton Hoo ship burial in East Anglia, the most important Anglo-Saxon find in this country. That too was not legally treasure trove, because it could not be shown to have been buried with the intention of recovery. As a result, it was possible for the British museum to acquire that unique find for the nation only through the generosity of the landowner, Mrs. Pretty. She would have been within her rights to sell the whole find on the market, where it would have been dispersed, but, to her credit, because of her public spirit, she did not do so.

The second problem with treasure trove is that it includes only objects that contain a substantial proportion of gold or silver, so it affords no protection to the great majority of archaeological finds, even though they may be of great historical or cultural value. Despite a recent Appeal Court judgment that objects had to contain "substantial" amounts of gold or silver to qualify for treasure trove, each find that has occurred since then has been dealt with differently.

Several hoards containing gold and silver objects of varying degrees of fineness have been split into parts that have been declared treasure trove, and parts that have not. What is more, many entire hoards of Roman coins are currently not treasure trove, because they are made of base silver or bronze. As there is no requirement to report them, many are legally sold and dispersed before they can be recorded, and so are gone for ever. Thus, the information they contain is lost for ever.

Let me give the House one example. In 1986, a hoard of about 1,500 Roman bronze coins was found at Amersham. It has come to light only because the finder's mother wrote an account of its discovery in Take A Break. No record of it was ever made, because its finder sold it on the market and it was broken up shortly afterwards, all legally under present law.

Under my Bill, all hoards of coins that are at least 300 years old will be treasure, except for those that consist just of bronze coins, in which case there will be a minimum number of 10. However—I stress this, because I heard some misleading remarks on television this morning—single coins, which are common finds, will not be treasure.

Another anomaly of the current system is that objects that are made of base metal or other material receive no legal protection, even if they are found in association with objects of treasure. Therefore, the pots in which coin hoards are found are not declared treasure trove, even though they may be of considerable archaeological importance.

The engraved gems from the Roman jeweller's hoard found at Snettisham in Norfolk in 1986 were not treasure trove, and that was an important find containing silver jewellery, silver and bronze coins and a fine group of more than 100 cornelian gems. The precious metal objects were duly declared treasure trove, but the gems, the bronze coins and the pot were excluded. That is illogical. Under my Bill, the objects found with treasure would also be protected.

I want to consider the problems of enforcement. In the past few years, a number of cases have shown all too clearly how weak the law is. At present, a person who is found guilty of concealing treasure trove can be prosecuted for theft of Crown property, which carries a maximum penalty of 10 years' imprisonment. In practice, however, there have been few, if any, successful prosecutions for such concealment, because it is virtually impossible to prove beyond reasonable doubt that an object must have been buried with the intention of recovery.

The prosecution of a man who was apprehended with coins from an important hoard found in 1984 in Wanborough in Surrey failed for that reason. The result is that only a small part of the hoard has been preserved, and no record has been made of the coins, many of which have ended up abroad and been dispersed.

Another case concerned a group of nearly 600 Celtic coins, all of the same type, seized by Customs and Excise at Heathrow. An inquest was held to decide whether they were treasure trove. Two days were spent discussing such arcane matters as the religious customs of the ancient Celts to decide whether the coins had been buried with the intention of recovery, or whether there was another more probable explanation.

The poor jury decided that the coins were not treasure trove. It is significant that even the solicitor acting on behalf of the dealer was frustrated by the subjective nature of the question that the inquest had to decide. He has since gone on record as saying:

"Treasure trove is an anachronistic law … I hope this important inquest leads to a radical revision of the treasure trove law."

The lesson seems to be that it is virtually impossible to enforce treasure trove law, especially if objects had been removed from the soil and had entered the trade.

My Bill would have dealt with the problems thrown up by both those cases—first, by making the judgment whether a particular object was treasure a straightforward matter of fact; secondly, by making it an offence to fail to report treasure finds within 14 days without reasonable excuse.

At present, the law requires finders to report treasure trove promptly. If they fail to do so, they could, as I said, be prosecuted for theft of Crown property, but, in any case, it is likely that they will receive a reduced reward or none. If we are going to have a law that covers such finds—virtually every country does—we must ensure that it can be enforced. I am not saying that my Bill will deal with all the problems of illicit excavation—such as the nighthawks who steal objects from other people's land—but it will make a start by removing the most serious deficiencies of treasure trove law.

I have heard that some hon. Members are puzzled about why Scotland is excluded from my Bill. That is because it already has a far better arrangement, as one might expect. In Scotland, all newly discovered archaeological objects, whatever they are made of and however they came to be in the ground, belong to the Crown under the legal principle of bona vacantia.

Northern Ireland has the same treasure trove law as England and Wales, which is why it is included in the scope of the Bill, although there is a statutory duty to report all archaeological objects in the Province. In England and Wales, we provide less protection for our heritage of portable antiquities than virtually any other European country. Almost every other civilised country has passed laws to protect portable antiquities, and in all those countries, legal protection such as that proposed in the Bill is seen as completely normal.

The Bill is backed by the Surrey Archaeological Society and the British museum. It was first introduced, in a slightly different form, by Lord Perth in 1994 in the other place. His Bill obtained the backing of all those who took part in the debate, including representatives of all parties. However, it failed in this House, because it received no time for debate.

The Bill was drafted after consulting a wide range of interests and organisations, including representatives of the police, magistrates, coroners, landowners, district councils, county councils, museums, dealers and archaeological societies. All those organisations, including the Country Landowners Association, the National Farmers Union, the Council of British Archaeology, the Museums Association, the Museums and Galleries Commission and the main dealers' associations, have indicated their support for the reform of the archaic law of treasure trove.

I know that the National Council for Metal Detecting is still considering the Bill. I repeat firmly that the Bill is not hostile to metal detectorists. I know that, when the Bill's sponsors have been able to explain its provisions to detectorists, most of them appreciate that fact. The Bill contains no restriction on metal detecting, but simply clarifies what should and should not be reported.

Some metal detecting interests have, unfortunately, mounted a campaign against the Bill, totally misrepresenting it as a first step towards banning metal detecting. Nothing could be further from the truth. My noble Friend Lord Inglewood, the Under-Secretary of State for National Heritage, recently gave that assurance in the report of the treasury trove reviewing committee for 1994–95. He said:

"I want to emphasise that neither the Government, nor the European Union, has any plans to ban or restrict responsible metal detecting."

I hope that we may hear a similar reassurance from my hon. Friend the Minister today. I personally consider that responsible detectorists have an important role to play in bringing our national heritage to light for the benefit of us all. I believe that we can all work together in this respect.

I add my voice to Lord Inglewood's in congratulating all finders who report their finds promptly to the proper authorities. Without the co-operation of those finders, a great deal of valuable information about our nation's past would be lost. In recent years, metal detectorists have discovered many objects of great importance to the nation's heritage.

One of the best examples is the great find of late Roman gold and silver coins and other objects made at Hoxne in Suffolk in 1992 by Mr. Eric Lawes. The find was sensibly reported by Mr. Lawes on the day of discovery, thus enabling the Suffolk archaeological unit to excavate the site the following day. As a result, much valuable information concerning the circumstances of the hoard's burial was recovered which would otherwise have been lost.

That is an example of co-operation between metal detectorists and archaeologists at its best. I hope that my Bill will encourage the process by bringing both parties together to work out how to operate the system for everyone's, and the nation's, benefit.

I understand that officials from the Department of National Heritage have had a series of meetings with the National Council for Metal Detecting to discuss the Bill. After receiving a critique of the Bill from the council, three significant amendments were made to it. At a subsequent meeting, the council requested one further amendment to the Bill and clarification on another point, both of which the Department was able to give.

I had hoped to have a meeting with the council a few weeks ago, but it was not ready for one then. However, I am always available. Our discussions with the national council are continuing, and I am ready to meet it at any time and to hear any suggestions it might have, so that we can take another look at them before the Committee stage. I do not think that I can be fairer than that.

Lord Perth's Bill failed in 1994, and it has taken until now before the Treasure Bill could be reintroduced. I know, however, that the time has not been wasted, because the Department of National Heritage has been able to carry out discussions on the Bill with a range of interested organisations. Those discussions have served to reaffirm support for the pragmatic approach we are adopting. The Department has also been able to develop its proposals on the wider issue of the recording of portable antiquities which have now been published.

A recent survey by the Council of British Archaeology estimated that about 400,000 archaeological objects are found each year. To put the matter in perspective, we believe that the Bill may increase the number of cases of treasure from about 25 a year at present to between 100 and 200, and some of the hoards may consist of many individual objects. I know that the Government recognise that the Bill deals with only part of the problem, and I welcome the fact that the Department of National Heritage has recently published a discussion document on portable antiquities, which contains proposals for a voluntary scheme for recording all finds, not just those covered by my Bill. I believe that the two initiatives complement each other well.

I know that many people have worked hard on the Bill over many years. First and foremost, the name of Lord Perth springs to mind. Without his determination, his persistence and his refusal to take no for an answer, the whole project would never have got off the ground. He has been ably aided and abetted by Lord Renton and Lord Renfrew in the other place—both, happily, from the county of Cambridgeshire.

David Graham, Stewart Lyon and Lady Hanworth of the Surrey Archaeological Society have worked tirelessly on treasure trove reform for many years, and they have been assisted by Professor Norman Palmer of University college, London, to whom I referred earlier, and Doctor Andrew Burnett of the British museum. I take this opportunity to express my thanks to them all. I am especially grateful to Dr. Roger Bland of the British museum, who has given me enormous help in the matter, in which he is an acknowledged expert.

My Bill has three aims. First, it will change the definition of treasure by removing the need to prove that objects must have been intentionally buried, by making it clear exactly how much gold or silver objects must contain to be defined as treasure, and by including objects found in clear archaeological association with finds of treasure. Secondly, it will streamline the system by making it much simpler to determine what is treasure. Thirdly, it will make the law enforceable by providing a new offence for the non-declaration of treasure.

For finders, the Bill places no restrictions on metal detecting, while it safeguards their rights to continue to receive full rewards for their finds, except where they have been trespassing. The Bill provides landowners with the right to be informed of finds of treasure that have been reported from their land—they do not have that right at present—and it makes them eligible for rewards if, for example, the finder has been trespassing. Again, they do not have that right at present.

The Bill will require minimal additional resources, and it will make an important improvement to the legal protection afforded to objects found in the soil of this country, which are, after all, our heritage. I stress that no one will lose under the Bill—neither landowners nor finders—except the criminal element. No one now argues that we should keep the status quo. The successful passage of the Bill will have a symbolic importance far beyond the significance of its individual provisions, as it will represent the first piece of antiquities legislation ever passed in England and Wales.

We desperately need to do something now about the situation before all antiquities have been removed from the ground. Antiquities are a non-renewable resource, and they will be gone for ever if we do not act now. The Bill represents the best chance for making progress in an area that has eluded others for 150 years. I warmly commend it to the House.

When my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Cambridgeshire (Sir A. Grant) opened the debate, in his usual exemplary way, I wondered whether I was entirely alone in feeling a slight feeling of nostalgia and regret on hearing that a piece of legislation that had stood the test of time—for about 700 years—was to disappear. That may seem a strange thing for a legislator to say. However, I take the view that if a piece of legislation has lasted for a long time, it is not unreasonable to assume that it might still have some useful working life.

The idea that Members of Parliament, even those as distinguished as the gathering here today, will be able to produce a piece of legislation that is automatically better than something that has stood the test of time must be considered. I am sure that my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Cambridgeshire will not take it amiss if I say that, as a Conservative, I at least start from the assumption that 700 years' worth of established history suggests a pretty good basis on which to work.

People have said to me over the years that there is something particularly arcane about treasure trove. I am not sure there is. However it may work in practice, the law on treasure trove makes a degree of sense, and fits perfectly well with established legal principles.

As I understand it, it simply amounts to the following. Under the law of intestacy—if no will is made willing away property that has been left—the Crown automatically inherits property. That principle would apply today if one of us died and did not leave provisions. Our assets, and in some cases our debts, would be left to the Crown. It is a straightforward process that valuables without any apparent ownership should go to the Crown, and perfectly fair that the law should operate in that way.

We live in a somewhat cynical age, however, and I am sure that somewhere some journalist is already sucking his pencil and saying to himself, "What on earth is Parliament doing spending a whole Friday debating such a subject?" That is a fair point.

A whole Friday?

I hope that the hon. Gentleman is not being provocative. The question could apply to debating such a measure for just part of Friday.

The law relating to treasure trove in its apparent and even manifest inadequacies has not featured hugely in my life. I cannot say that my postbag is full of letters from aggrieved treasure seekers or treasure acquisitionists who are upset about the state of the law. Nor are my surgeries full of such complaints. Indeed, when I get back to my constituency—like the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central (Mr. Fisher), I hope that it is sooner rather than later—I do not expect to be regaled with complaints about the law relating to treasure trove.

The complaints will be rather more mundane. I shall encounter the usual traffic that comes to Members of Parliament, plus this week especially, the law relating to fish rather than treasure. Such things concern people rather more. Nevertheless, as my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Cambridgeshire said, the Bill deals with our heritage, in a sense our own memories, and it is right that the House of Commons should take time to consider them. It says much for the subject that we have managed to assemble a representation of the quality of the House rather than its quantity.

When I realised that my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Cambridgeshire was introducing such legislation, I wondered who it was aimed at. I like his idea that there would be no losers apart from rascals and only winners, but I always feel slightly worried when I hear such proposals.

Indeed, I have received at least one series of representations from a friend of mine over the years who is a detectorist. He has told me that he feels that legislation is inevitable, that it would be aimed against detectorisation—if there is such a word—and that it was all rather sad. I must admit that I would not have thought that of my hon. Friend, and I was reassured when I discovered that he was the Bill's promoter. I had wondered, however, whether there was not some incipient intellectual snobbery at work against strange people who put on their shell suits, take the whippet out for a walk and take a metal detector with them; that something was not quite right about them.

It also occurred to me that the Bill might be a result of an over-emphasis on the idea that treasure should automatically go to museums. I sometimes have difficulty with that idea, too. Most of us can remember as children being taken around museums, which 20 or 30 years ago in no sense stimulated one's awareness of the past and desire to know more about it—so many dusty covers on wet days to walk around and look at. All that is changed and I accept that. Museums are now entertaining places. If the driving force behind the Bill had been to ensure that oiks were not going round finding things and keeping them, and that instead articles could be safely locked up in a museum, I would have had some difficulty with it.

A great many things go into museums that never see the light of day again, because there is simply not enough display space. I therefore find it slightly difficult to accept that an item is lost for ever to the national heritage because it is discovered, sold and retained in private hands, rather than filed, categorised, archivised and locked away in a vault for ever to safeguard the national heritage.

That point was also made by the discovery of a hoard in 1985 in Normanby in Lincolnshire of no fewer than 47,912 base silver coins, to which my hon. Friend referred in passing. The briefing that I have says that it took several members of the British museum staff well over a year to clean and study all the coins. While reading that, I wondered whether it was so terribly important that all those coins should be filed away in a museum for ever instead of, perhaps, being sold on the open market.

Having said that, one appreciates the problem at once of ensuring that all the information that can be gleaned from a hoard is gathered, although one has to think what precisely is the point of confining all the coins in a museum. It is legitimate to question precisely what is behind the Bill.

I am also concerned not only as a legislator but as a lawyer about the fact that, the moment we try to cure one set of anomalies, we usually create another set. My hon. Friend the Member for South-West Cambridgeshire is a lawyer, and I know that he will also have paid particular regard to that.

We might need to consider the fact that the law of treasure trove concerns composition and depends on the degree of silver and gold in any items acquired, which is almost approaching the matter from the wrong angle. Since we are talking about the preservation of the national heritage, an item—my hon. Friend implicitly referred to it—can be of the utmost significance and interest even if it is not valuable in scrap terms if it were melted down and sold. We therefore have to be careful in changing the law, so as not to latch on to the conventional value of an item, because anomalies will occur.

I notice that, even in a relatively straightforward Bill, clause 1(1)(d)(i) is quite complex, because it states that something is capable of being treasure providing that it is found in association with other treasure. That suggests right away a degree of anomaly because unless there is one conventionally valuable item at a site, everything else will not be deemed treasure.

That concerns me greatly, because other examples can be cited. For instance, I understand that bronze coins will not qualify as treasure unless at least one conventionally valuable item is found with them. That suggests problems. Perhaps the Minister will be able to explain why that should be so.

I am similarly concerned that, if only one item were found, it could not be treasure trove. That points to a practical difficulty. One might not always know whether one has found just one item. If one finds one item in one field and another in another field, are they associated finds? Presumably not—that is an easy point. The far harder point to resolve is what happens if one finds one item, and 20, 30 or 40 yd away one suddenly finds another. One of the problems of trying to cure anomalies with legislative weaponry is that it creates other anomalies. I not quite sure what the answer is, and I can imagine that such situations will cause problems.

Although ownership is not a major shortcoming of the Bill, it needs to be addressed. My initial reaction to the Bill and the work that has been done on it was that, if we were going to take a fairly radical approach—if we were no longer to work on the basis that treasure deliberately hidden with retrieval in mind belonged to the Crown, and that, if it had merely been abandoned, the finder would be entitled to it—such an approach should reflect modern reality and common sense. That would surely mean dealing with the question of ownership. If an item or piece is found on land, the assumption should be that the person on whose land it is is the owner. That was the position from which I was originally coming.

To be fair, however, it can be seen there are difficulties with that approach. If the underlying intent or purpose of the Bill is to preserve examples of the national heritage, there may be a case for saying that the rights of property and ownership must be overridden so that the national heritage is to benefit. If we have to go that far, however, the assumption should still be that the person who would derive the advantage—the reward, perhaps—should be the owner of the land.

There have been extraordinary cases in which the owner of the land has not benefited. I think that my hon. Friend referred in passing to a case at Donhead St. Mary. A hoard of iron age gold coins was declared to be treasure trove. It was discovered by metal detection. The hoard was valued at £5,210. The Treasury decided to reduce the reward to £2,000 because the finder had been convicted for searching on a scheduled monument.

The person who received the ultimate reward had acted, by any stretch of the imagination, in a thoroughly meretricious way. Apparently, the landowner was aggrieved that he was not entitled to any reward. We can imagine that he might well have felt aggrieved. It surely defies any sense of justice and common sense that, if something is found, it is not the owner of the land who is rewarded but the trespasser as well.

An even more shocking case took place at Burton Overy, where 282 silver coins of the 17th century were found by an electrician while working in the loft of a house. The coins were declared treasure trove. In due course, it was the electrician who received the reward and not the owner of the house. That may appeal to some people's ideas of egalitarianism. It is the marvellous story of an electrician—a humble working man—who changes a plug and walks off with treasure trove worth £9,700.

That is slightly troubling. I would like to think—I hope that the issue will be clarified in due course—that the person who would benefit under the Bill in those circumstances would be the owner of the land, not the person who simply comes upon treasure trove.

These are matters that might be of interest, or almost of reassurance, to honest and reputable detectorists as against those who are not. There is no injustice in saying that it is the owner of the land who should benefit, not the finder. The relationship between owner and finder should be straightforward enough.

If someone goes on to someone else's land with metal detection equipment, he must ask permission to do so. If he does not request that permission, he is a trespasser, and should not be entitled to benefit from the fruits of his trespass. If someone wants to go on someone else's land with a metal detector, presumably he would say to the owner of the land, "I have a certain expertise in the handling of this detection equipment and I know where to look. If I come on to your land and I find something, can we split any reward that might be offered?" If the answer is "Push off', "No", "I want the lot", or "I shall not split it with you in that way", no bargain has been reached. In those circumstances the owner is not prepared to share the fruits of the other person's expertise, there is no contract, there is no problem and no injustice.

In any normal case, the assumption should surely be that the owner will derive the advantage, not the finder. The situation is entirely different, however, if no one knows where the owner of the land is to be found. I would have great difficulty if the only claim that someone had for reward was the mere fact of having found treasure trove, even though there was an owner.

Does my hon. Friend think that the enactment of the Bill might lead to some rogue metal detectorists going on to land without seeking permission, in the hope that they will retrieve some treasure and be able to make off with it, as opposed to going through the legitimate process of making a bargain with the owner of the land?

That depends on the person. I have no reason to think that detectorists belonging to a properly constituted and properly set up organisation will not try now to make a bargain or to arrive at some accommodation. If someone has no interest in the heritage and in doing things properly, or in recognising the rights of ownership, he is likely to go on to other people's land. That will be the position whether or not the Bill is enacted. I am troubled that, under current law, and conceivably under the Bill if enacted, someone who is trespassing—someone who is not present under the terms of any arrangement—will still be in a position to derive some advantage having found treasure trove.

What will be the balance of reward between the owner and the finder? The Bill does not make that entirely clear. My hon. Friend the Member for South-West Cambridgeshire said that there would be an obligation under the Bill for reasonable efforts to be made to find the owner of the land. I am not sure how significant that is in reality. In most instances, the identity of the owner of the land would be obvious. If there is an obligation to make some rudimentary inquiries, what would be the purpose of so doing? What is the balance to be between ownership and occupation?

It is clear that a great deal of work has been done in putting the Bill together. There is no doubt that the motives behind it are entirely lawful. The measure is designed to try to preserve the national heritage. Given that a detectorist has told me of his concern that Parliament would introduce legislation that would weigh heavily against detectorists' interests, I am heartened by what my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Cambridgeshire has said.

I have read the Bill carefully to discover whether it could be used against responsible detectorists. I have found nothing in my reading of it that should give concern to those people. I am grateful to my hon. Friend for saying, in effect, that he would make himself available to them at any time, anywhere, to meet their concerns.

At the same time, I have two abiding concerns. First, in linking the nature of treasure trove to things that are valuable per se or where there is a range of items including one that is valuable, it seems that we are creating an artificial barrier that may stop us protecting particular finds, hoards or acquisitions that could be of great interest to archaeologists, and have an interest far greater than their face value.

Secondly, if we, as Conservatives, are to overturn 600 or 700 years' worth of established law, and even if we are to stop country lawyers such as myself having an occasional day out to attend an inquest at which we can ask ourselves thoroughly obscure questions on treasure trove and recite our various Latin tags—in other words, if we are to upset arrangements that have stood the test of time—we should ensure that those who benefit are the national heritage and property owners.

There should be no more cases of people trespassing on other people's land and deriving an advantage from so doing. If I ever find that I have employed an electrician who once used to practise at Burton Overy, and that he ferreted in my house trying to find where my predecessors had buried their goods, I think that I shall be prepared to reach an accommodation with him. The idea that, having fitted a plug, he can go off with treasure and instruct a country lawyer to oppose me at a local inquest, claiming that he has a better right to the treasure than I have, offends my sense of natural justice. I think that it would appal my bank manager as well.

The Bill raises a subject of considerable interest to my constituents. Dover has the great advantage that we are always making new discoveries in the form of rare coins or rare pieces of Roman antiquity. In Dover recently, we discovered a bronze age ship that extends Dover's history back through some 4,000 years. When the House contemplates the millennium celebrations for the year 2000, we in Dover feel that the House has not got a true perspective. Dover has a much longer historical perspective.

There have been many local finds in Dover, especially those that go back to Roman times. Julius Caesar tried to land at Dover, but its fortifications, though built well before Dover castle, were such that he could not, and he had to scuttle up the coast to Walmer. We have commemorated the fact that he managed to get ashore there in difficult circumstances despite it being well defended by my former constituents. The defence was so good that many Roman soldiers lost possessions. Detectorists and others take great pleasure in discovering rare Roman coins and other artefacts on the beaches and around Dover and Walmer.

Excellent artefacts, coins and other antiquities that we have been able to secure locally can be found in the Dover museum. I hope that the House will not object to a small advertisement for Dover museum. Anybody interested in rare Roman coins and antiquities would do well to spend a weekend enjoying what is on offer at our excellent museum. It is situated by the White Cliffs Experience, which runs through the history of life in Dover over some 2,500 years. Many Roman coins and other local artefacts have been placed there for tourists to enjoy. I am sure that my colleagues will want, on their holiday trips that use our excellent ferries, to stop off briefly in Dover for a good visit to the museum.

Our national heritage is of unquestionable importance, and the Bill must be considered in that light. There will be concern about whether the rights of individuals will be limited and genuine freedoms that have been secured over many hundreds of years unfairly dealt with.

We must be conscious of those freedoms, to ensure that we do not discourage a legitimate leisure industry. Many people get much enjoyment from using metal detectors or other methods to discover the nation's antiquities and coins of Roman and other periods. It would be tragic if we passed a Bill that acted as a disincentive to such people, many of whom have served the nation well in discovering rare coins and other pieces that have ended up in our museums.

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Cambridgeshire (Sir A. Grant) on making a powerful argument. We certainly need better arrangements. Britain does not have codified law, and it is good that we do not. Most hon. Members find judge-made law much more satisfactory. Occasionally, Parliament must tackle situations such as this, which for hundreds of years have had no real statutory framework, and lay down some principles. There is a strong argument that the time has arrived to lay down those principles, especially if we can achieve a fairer balance between landowner, discoverer, owner—if he is still around—and the national interest.

Considerable concern was expressed about the previous Bill on this subject, which was introduced by Lord Perth. I received letters from detectorists in my constituency saying that it was too restrictive of legitimate private interests. That is why I was pleased to hear that my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Cambridgeshire has tried to work with the National Council for Metal Detecting, and that efforts are being made to accommodate its concerns and fears. Provided that the landowner agrees and has been consulted, it a respectable pursuit to go out and look for our antiquities and rare coins. I do not see why we should pass anything in Parliament that would discourage that.

However, we also have a responsibility to try to reconcile that freedom with the national interest, so that future generations can get the enormous pleasure that the many people who visit Dover museum and the White Cliffs Experience get from the rare finds on display, and so that we can increase the number of those finds.

I find nothing more intriguing than taking my young son, who at six is perhaps a little young fully to appreciate the Roman finds, to the museum and the White Cliffs Experience so that he can learn about the nation's heritage and the history of Europe. Such discoveries are one way through which we can teach young people about our history. He has been fascinated by Roman times, and we must do everything possible to ensure that there is a never-ending series of discoveries.

As my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Cambridgeshire said, many discoveries are made each year, and a considerable number of them, appropriately, end up in museums. I hope that all the principles that I have enunciated will be taken on board, and that the National Council for Metal Detecting and other organisations or individuals with legitimate concerns can be accommodated.

I congratulate my hon. Friend on clause 1, which is one of the clearest to come before Parliament in some time. It is clear that we are not talking about one or two minor finds, but that there would have to be at least 10 non-precious metal coins in a find before the legislation would apply. That is a good safeguard for people who make casual finds.

Clause 2 deals with the powers of the Secretary of State. I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister will comment on that, because considerable powers would be given to the Secretary of State by the Bill. I am pleased that clause 11 provides for a code of practice about the how the Secretary of State should exercise those powers. It is important that Parliament should have a clear understanding of the matter.

I hope that the Minister will be able, during the Bill's passage, to set the record straight in Hansard, so that everyone can be clear about how the powers will operate. We do not want them to change rapidly or become too onerous, based on a bit of advice about which Parliament might not have been informed. We should not always tie Select Committees by legislation into the operation of an Act of Parliament, but it would be helpful if the Minister could say that reference would be made to Parliament, perhaps through the Select Committee, before changes to the code of practice were made.

In clause 6, the Secretary of State has the right of disclaimer. That is an important provision that needs to be amplified. I hope that it will be covered by the code of practice.

Clause 7 talks about doing away with the jury. I notice that there are some 40 to 60 inquests a year by coroners. It would be interesting to know the Minister's thoughts on the way in which juries might operate in future. It would appear that a jury can be convened by the coroner if he or she feels that it is appropriate, but it is important that the coroner has a clear understanding of the circumstances which the Minister or the Secretary of State might consider required the convening of a jury.

I notice that clause 8 establishes a fine of £5,000 or up to three months' imprisonment for contravention of the legislation. Parliament tends to establish fines which are supposed to last 20, 30 or 40 years. Even at the low rate of inflation that we have now, £5,000 might not be high enough to act as a disincentive to people to breach the clauses of the Bill.

I suggest that it might be worth legislating for the future and perhaps considering allowing the fine to be raised to a more realistic figure. We must especially bear it in mind that people might contravene the legislation because they have made a very valuable find and do not want to go through the procedures. It is important that the fine should act as a disincentive. It clearly will not do so if someone decides to breach the legislation because his find is worth perhaps £100,000 and the fine is only £5,000.

I see that, under clause 10, the Secretary of State will be able to determine rewards based on a market value to be determined by the Secretary of State, as he or she thinks fit. I hope that that means that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State will set up some form of procedure under which experts are involved.

I think that our Secretaries of State are wonderful—of course I do, coming from this side of the House—but they might have some difficulties based on their previous experience in life in precisely determining a market value. I therefore hope that some experts will be involved who will understand how the right balance can be determined between the finder, the owner and the occupier of the land.

I look forward to reading the annual report that clause 12 requires. I am glad that legislation is now beginning to require annual reports. As an accountant, I have been used in business to seeing annual reports produced every year. Indeed, many companies produce quarterly or six-monthly reports.

One of the discoveries one make on entering Parliament is that the annual reports that Governments have produced over the years have not been so sophisticated or open in terms of providing information as one would have liked. It is good news that the Government have improved all the annual reports for all Government Departments and that those reports are in much better shape than previously. I hope that, when this annual report is produced, it will be a worthwhile one that will give a lot of information about some of the treasure finds over the previous year.

Perhaps at this stage, without straying off the subject, I might make a plea. The other day I went to the Vote Office and asked for the annual reports of each Government Department that are normally published in February. They are still not available. Those of us who like to get at the figures of Government make a particular plea that the reports do not become antiquities or treasure trove, and are not vastly out of date by the time they are published. I hope that Ministers in various Departments will take note of that request.

In conclusion, the Treasure Bill should, on balance, be advantageous and beneficial to the country. It should be seen as good news by pretty well all the interested parties here. I am sure that it could be improved still further with minor amendments, to make sure that the concerns of the National Council for Metal Detecting are taken on board. In that way, we can be certain that this Bill will adopt fairness between the discoverer, the landowner and possibly the owner, if he or she is still alive, of the property that has been discovered and, of course, the national interest. I welcome the Bill, with the proviso that we should try to maximise the number of people whose concerns have been taken on board.

I am grateful for the opportunity to make a small contribution to the debate. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Cambridgeshire (Sir A. Grant) on his success in introducing the Bill, which is long overdue—perhaps several hundred years overdue. The Bill will clarify some of the problems that have arisen, particularly in recent years. Unfortunately, I have no personal interest to declare in relation to the Bill.

It is important to ensure that we preserve our heritage. Tourism is the fastest-growing industry in the world, and Britain has more than its fair share of visitors—a number which is increasing at a massive rate. One of the greatest attractions of Britain to people who come from abroad is our history and the artefacts that have been gathered over a long period.

Britain does that awfully well. Museums are littered throughout the country—north, south, east and west. They attract people from all over the world to come and see some of Britain's real history. I hope that the Bill will lead to the discovery of more artefacts, and will enable people who use metal detectors to go out with more knowledge about what the law sayd, and without the uncertainty which has been the problem to date.

One of the main purposes of the Bill is to designate what is treasure trove and what is not. The Bill is right to make it clear that objects which contain at least 5 per cent. by weight of gold or silver and are at least 300 years old are treasure trove. Up to now, treasure trove has been defined as objects which contained "substantial amounts" of gold and silver. For goodness' sake, the position is problematic enough as it is. Who is to state what is substantial and what is not? The specific declaration in the Bill of what is and what is not treasure will be beneficial.

Then there is the problem of coins that do not contain 5 per cent. of gold or silver, but are discovered in hoards. My hon. Friend the Member for Teignbridge (Mr. Nicholls) said that there would be difficulties in defining a hoard. How close together would the coins have to be before they were so designated? If someone with a metal detector discovers a coin one day, goes back another day and finds a coin not too far from the first, and then on a third day finds another, will that be considered a hoard? There may be a problem there. I hope that, in Committee, the definition of a hoard can be examined again, so that everyone can be clear about it.

The magazine British Archaeology said:

"The Bill's main aims are to remove the obligation for coroners' juries to read dead minds".

That is right. It is problematic for a jury to work out whether someone buried something so that it would be discovered at a later date. It is right to remove that problem, and regard anything that is found as treasure.

The previous loophole has led to the loss of some treasure, including, as my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Cambridgeshire said, the Middleham jewel, which was worth £2.5 million. Other finds, perhaps not of such great value but of great archaeological interest, may also have been lost.

The Bill also clarifies what would happen with items found in association with treasure trove. As has been said, a number of coins could be discovered in a pot that is of great archaeological interest; the coins have to be designated as treasure, whereas the pot does not. In such cases, the find associated with the coins would be classed as treasure.

Has my hon. Friend thought of another problem? If one coin cannot be treasure trove, what will happen if there is a massively important find of artefacts with only one coin? The whole find would disappear from the ambit of the Bill, whereas one extra coin would have made all the difference. That is obviously nonsense, but nonsenses can arise. Is that the sort of thing that my hon. Friend wants clarified in Committee?

Yes. The Secretary of State will have flexibility to designate

"additional classes of object as treasure".

Let us take the case of one coin being found in association with a number of important archaeological artifacts. I am not certain whether the Secretary of State will be able to say, after the find has been made public, "I am going to reclassify all that as treasure."

I am not sure whether the powers will be retrospective and whether something that has already been found can be drawn within the ambit of the Bill. I hope that we will deal with that in Committee. However unlikely it is that a number of artefacts will be found in association with only one coin, it is possible, and the last thing we want is for such artefacts to be lost to the nation, or even taken abroad, which could be a problem. That needs to be sorted out.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Dover (Mr. Shaw) said, we need as much clarity as possible about the powers that the Secretary of State would have, so that everyone knows in what cases they would be used. We are delighted with our present Secretary of State, but one cannot judge who will hold that position in 20 or 30 years, so I hope that those powers will be clearly defined, and that we will know the constraints placed on that person.

Another main point of the Bill is that finds that are likely to be treasure must be reported to the coroner within two weeks, which is extremely useful. The maximum penalty for deliberately concealing the finds will be three months imprisonment, or a fine of £5,000, or both. That might sound severe, but it is absolutely right.

We are talking about preserving Britain's heritage. It is important for finds to be reported because there could be additional treasure in the area. I assume that people will know that archaeological experts in universities and museums will be notified of the finds. They might be attracted to the spot to find out whether anything else is there.

I have nothing against people who use metal detectors, but if the find is notified to the coroner and made public, experts who know a little more about the subject matter can become involved and perhaps even supervise more digs in the area to find out whether anything else is to be found. That could enhance the heritage and the archaeological finds in the area. I am pleased, therefore, that that provision has been included in the Bill. The more finds we can discover, the better it will be for everyone.

I am also delighted that the coroner will be able to make reasonable efforts to ensure that occupiers and landowners are informed of any reported find of treasure on their land. That brings me back to the case that my hon. Friend the Member for Teignbridge mentioned—the electrician who found coins in a loft. Any electricians who want to come to my house are welcome to do so—they would be lucky to find anything.

There are vast tracts of farmland in my constituency, as in many others, and some of the villages there are well known to archaeologists. In Ribchester, for example, if one wants to do anything to one's house, such as adding a porch or a garage, one has to notify the planning department, which notifies archaeologists at the neighbouring university, who have to decide whether they want to do a dig before any building takes place. That shows how problematic the situation is, but that is the right course of action.

It is therefore right that landowners should be informed of reported finds of treasure on their land. We have talked of trespassing, and it would be appalling if someone discovered treasure on someone else's land and was able to make off with it and be given its full value. That is absurd.

Even after the Bill is enacted—as I am sure it will be—we will not be able to rectify the problems caused by the rogue. People will still go on someone's land, find treasure and make off with it, and we will never be able to stop that, but at least we will know what the law is. I am sure that people involved in metal detection will want to ensure that any rogues in their midst are brought to book as quickly as possible, because they give all metal detectorists a bad name. That problem must be sorted out as quickly as possible.

Clause 7 would give the coroner the discretion to summon a jury to a treasure inquest, thus speeding up the process considerably. I believe that it might also reduce the cost of working out whether something is treasure. The Bill also clarifies the coroner's duties, thus making them somewhat easier.

The Bill requires that a code of practice be prepared to deal with rewards, after consultation with interested parties. Will those include metal detectorists and those in the archaeological community? It is right to draw up a code of practice, and the Bill will not become fully operational until that code is known. I hope that a number of associations and interested parties will be consulted.

People will want to know what the rewards are going to be. For example, if metal detectorists find something on someone else's land, they will know that they will get half the value of the find and the landowner will get half, or they might even reach some sort of deal whereby the landowner gets 75 per cent. and the finder 25 per cent.

That is the point. It is a question of reaching an arrangement. If one cannot come to terms—if the landowner would not allow someone to wander over his land with a metal detector if he does not get a big enough share—a deal will not be done. It would be wrong if no attempt were made to reach a deal, or if someone tried to rat on a deal and hang on to what they had found. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is a question of making an arrangement with the owner of the land and adhering to it?

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. I hope that the position will become far clearer with the passage of the Bill. I suspect that, because of the publicity that will result from its passage, many more landowners will be far more conscious of what they might have and be keen—one never knows—to invite metal detectorists on to the land to try to find something, but under the arrangement that, if they do find anything, the landowner gets half and the finder gets half. That will become far more transparent.

We have heard about some of the reservations of metal detectorists about the Bill, and I am delighted that my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Cambridgeshire made it clear that it is not anti-metal detectorist, but quite the reverse. We often see them operating in our constituencies—I find it slightly bemusing, but there they are, either alone or with the whole family, traipsing over fields and looking hopefully for some find.

I do not know whether they are lucky every time. I suspect that it is like fishing and one does not catch something every time. I have caught something on only one occasion when I have been out fishing. Metal detectorists probably have to make a massive investment of their time and, even after years, might find little, if anything at all. The Bill might encourage them to go out knowing clearly what is treasure, and the procedures for reporting treasure trove to the coroner and the landowner.

If the legislation leads to more artefacts being found, metal detectorists will be providing us with a great social and historical service, and we should encourage them to do so. My hon. Friend the Member for South-West Cambridgeshire said that he anticipated greater finds of treasure after the Bill's passage, which should be welcomed.

What about after the treasure has been found? Will museums have the ability to say, "We are very interested in this—it should be put on display so that the nation can enjoy this artifact or treasure"? I am concerned that, if there is a substantial increase in the amount of treasure found, museums may not be able to buy it. I am worried that the treasure will go on to the open market, be bought by someone abroad and lost to this country for ever.

If it is likely that there will be more treasure on the market, museums should be in a position to buy it. I ask the Minister to examine that issue, because I do not want to see the treasure leaving this country. Will museums be able to get funding or assistance from other bodies?

No one else has mentioned the national lottery. If museums were able to get access to some of the substantial sums that have been made available through the successes of the lottery, the country would benefit. I hope that that idea can be examined, although there may obviously be problems with capital and revenue purchases.

I return to the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Teignbridge: that we do not want to see the treasure going into museums and then being locked away. If that were to happen, it might as well have been left in the ground. I hope that museums will be imaginative with the type of treasure and artefacts they obtain. We want to see treasure put into museums as part of the living history of the United Kingdom, to show our youngsters how important history is and how we have developed. If museums can afford to buy the treasure, it will enhance everyone's life.

I have two questions on the Bill. The first is whether it will be a graverobbers charter. From what I can make out—perhaps my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Cambridgeshire would like to say something if I have it wrong—the current position is that graves are fully protected by law and licences are needed to open them, but gold and silver objects discovered at an unknown burial site might qualify as treasure. I hope that the position will be made absolutely clear. The last thing any hon. Member wants is for people to think that they can start digging away at known and designated cemeteries and burial sites; that would be dreadful.

My second question is whether the Bill will criminalise innocent people who fail to report finds because they did not know that they should have done so. That may always be a problem, but I understand that the Bill specifically states that any person who has a reasonable excuse shall have a defence against a possible prosecution for failing to report treasure. Obviously we need clarity in the system, but also some flexibility. We should ensure that there is understanding for a young person, for example, who is given a metal detection kit for Christmas, starts wandering around and finds something of great value, unbeknownst to him or her, fails to report it and is in breach of the law.

Once this Bill becomes an Act, perhaps metal detection kits should contain the code of practice as part of their packaging. As with electronic products, the instructions should be read before "plugging in". People could read the instructions before they go on to the land, and start to enjoy discovering some of Britain's hidden treasures.

I apologise to the House for not being present at the start of the debate, but I have been trying to follow it. I first congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Cambridgeshire (Sir A. Grant) on introducing the Bill. If it is successful, it will represent the first change to legislation on treasure trove since Richard the Lionheart first ruled that gold or silver that had been hidden with the intention of recovery by the owner belonged to the Crown.

King Richard's original purpose for that legislation was to line the Crown's pockets to make ready for battle. I can understand the Treasury's wish to boost revenue going into the Exchequer by any possible means, but I do not think that that is the reason why the current legislation remains on the statute book. Our currency is no longer gold-based—which some people may regret—and the legislation has now become a means by which we are able to afford at least some protection to our heritage, by ensuring that historic finds can be purchased by the Crown for cataloguing and display.

As some hon. Members have already said, the current law is substantially flawed and riddled with anomalies, with the result that much of our heritage is being lost as more and more relics are dug out and kept or sold without first being reported. That is happening, in part, because of the actions of unscrupulous individuals, but also quite frequently because people do not understand or are not aware of the current law.

We are exceptionally fortunate in this country because of the wealth of history and antiquity that forms our heritage, but much is still not known. The existing records and objects of the past have been studied and analysed, and they may still have some new surprises to bring forward, although it is much less likely now. To find out more about our history, we will have to depend on new discoveries, and the vast majority of those are likely to be found buried in the ground.

Some objects, when discovered, will immediately tell us more about their provenance and about our history. They may come from a certain period or have a marking on them that indicates their age, but many more will be something of a mystery. Crucial in interpreting the significance of those objects will be the location in which they were buried and their depth in the ground. Anyone who has been on an archaeological dig will know of the painstaking, enormously slow process that is involved in uncovering objects. The precise position in the ground of every revealed object and its proximity to other finds is carefully recorded.

When people come along who are not experts or who are not necessarily interested in the history of an object, but whose main motivation is simply to try to uncover a pot of gold, and they root around without paying much attention to the archaeological importance of their finds, the archaeological information is lost. All too often, they simply chuck aside anything that does not immediately appear to have a monetary value.

In recent years, there have been a number of attempts to change the law to deal with that problem. In particular, an enormous amount of work was done by the Earl of Perth in 1994, and by Lord Abinger in 1981. I can understand the frustration they must have felt, having devoted so much effort to updating the law, only to find that their efforts were unsuccessful, not because of opposition in either House but because of a lack of parliamentary time. I hope that they will feel that the work they undertook was not wasted, because it is of immense value today as we debate this bill.

As has already been said, the law currently covers only gold and silver objects that can be proved to have been stored for safekeeping and subsequently not recovered, and it does not necessarily take into account their historic worth. There is no proper penalty in law for those who do not report finds of treasure trove to the relevant authority, and landowners have no rights over those who make finds on their land. The Bill will deal with the inadequacies of existing legislation in three ways.

First, as we have heard, the Bill will apply to all objects which are found to contain at least 5 per cent.—or less for hoards of more than 10 coins—by weight of gold or silver, and which are at least 300 years old. Any items found in the same hoard will also be covered, regardless of the material from which they are made. For example, the pottery container holding the coins may often be of greater historical significance than the coins themselves, and it should, of course, be afforded the same protection in law.

Secondly, the need to prove that objects have been stored rather than lost is to be removed. Hoarding through burial was in times past a common event—anyone who has dipped into Samuel Pepys's diary will know that he and his father were unable to recover all their hoarded coins from the garden, because the coins had been dispersed in the soil—but it is often almost impossible to prove that objects have been stored rather than lost unless the find is too large to have been accidentally lost by the former owner.

Museums should have the opportunity to acquire any find considered to be historically important, regardless of how it came to be buried. It is the absence of legislation such as this that has allowed much of our heritage to pass into the hands of private collectors, many from abroad, without our museums having the opportunity to examine or catalogue the objects prior to their sale. Of course, that is not the case in Scotland, where all objects whose original owners cannot be traced are the property of the Crown, not the finder or landowner.

Furthermore, I understand that the Bill does not mean that our museums will suddenly be cluttered with all sorts of undesired objects. Finds will be passed to museums only if the museums wish to acquire them for their collection, and if they have the necessary funds to make the purchase at a market price. I am advised that no central fund for the acquisition of such articles will be established, and, should a museum not be interested in securing the article, or should the funds not be available, the item will be returned to the finder.

Thirdly, the Bill introduces for the first time a requirement that anyone who finds what he suspects to be treasure must report the find within 14 days. I understand that that is already the position in Northern Ireland. Failure to notify the authorities within that period will become a criminal offence. Thus, for the first time since the middle ages, the law on treasure trove will have teeth.

I understand that the Bill has received great support from the police, magistrates, coroners, landowners, councils, museums and archaeological societies, but I am aware that there is still some opposition to it, mainly from metal detectorists. I believe that many of the people who pursue metal detecting as a hobby are honourable people who wish to behave responsibly. Indeed, many of them make a valuable contribution by uncovering items that would not otherwise have been found.

The code of conduct laid down by the National Council for Metal Detecting is exemplary. It states that those who pursue metal detecting should not trespass, should ask permission before venturing on to private land, should report unusual historic finds, and should be aware of the law relating to archaeology. Such provisions are very welcome, but the difficulty has been that they have not always been followed by less scrupulous people. That is something that the Bill will at last deal with.

One or two other concerns have been expressed, and it would be wrong of me not to mention my constituent, Mr. Fearnley of Maldon, who wrote to me this week outlining his worries about the Bill. He suggests that the Bill would deprive landowners of what is at present their property. My understanding is that that is not entirely correct, that the Bill in fact respects the right of property and has, as a result, attracted the support of the Country Landowners Association and the National Farmers Union.

My hon. Friend is touching on an important point, which has especially concerned me. Does he agree that the assumption should be that the landowner rather than the finder should receive any reward, especially if the finder was not on the land with the owner's permission? Does he accept that it would be very welcome if the Bill made that very clear?

I agree. I think thet it is because the Bill covers that point that it has attracted the support of organisations such as the Country Landowners Association.

Although I welcome the Bill and the provisions that will clarify and extend existing protection considerably, I believe that there is a need to go still further. The Bill refers only to treasure, and treasure is very strictly defined. It must have at least some gold or silver content, and the Bill will clearly be a major improvement in respect of the protection of such items, but there is a need for a much more wide-ranging measure to cover all portable antiquities.

Some protection already exists in legislation covering ancient sites and monuments, but not all ancient sites and monuments have yet been discovered. By the time we have agreed that something is an ancient site that should be afforded protection, we may be too late and many of the artefacts there may have been lost. I hope that, in due course, we shall re-examine the law in this respect.

This issue is one in which I take a particular interest, like my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Cambridgeshire, and, indeed, the Minister, who is a close neighbour of mine. We represent areas rich in history. Maldon is, of course, famous as the site of one of the first battles, just over 1,000 years ago, but finds in my constituency go much further back. Recently, there has been a major discovery at Elms Farm of an iron age settlement that is around 2,000 years old.

English Heritage has given a grant of £1 million for the excavation of the site—the biggest grant that it has ever awarded. There has already been an enormous wealth of discoveries which have told us much about iron age Britain and, subsequently, about Roman Britain, because the Romans settled there later. About 20,000 artefacts have been uncovered, but the vast majority—indeed, practically all—are not made of gold or silver but of wood, pottery or stone. Unless one is fortunate enough to discover gold or silver objects, and thus be covered by the Bill, finds are still not adequately protected.

Only a few months ago, there was a find at the other end of my constituency of one of the biggest early Roman settlements. I understand that it is one of the very few places that Claudius visited when he came to this country. A temple and theatre have been uncovered there.

That site needs protection, and I hope that there may come a time when we can consider how best to protect our archaeological heritage, so that all artefacts that may have some significance are saved and it is not possible for those people who simply want to make a quick buck by uncovering some gold to trample all over such a site, do irreparable damage and destroy much of what could have been of enormous value in our attempt to uncover our history.

The Bill will extend existing protection, and will be enormously valuable in protecting some of our heritage. In due course, I hope that we can go further still and re-examine ways in which we can best protect that heritage and learn more about it for our children and grandchildren.

I am grateful for the opportunity to contribute to this interesting debate and to explain why the Labour party is happy to support the reasonable and constructive Bill introduced by the hon. Member for South-West Cambridgeshire (Sir A. Grant). I join the hon. Gentleman in paying tribute to the several people whose work has preceded the debate and the Bill's formation, particularly Lord Perth. I also join the hon. Gentleman in paying tribute to Dr. Roger Bland, without whose expert guidance and notes I suspect we should all be a lot less well informed than we are today.

As many hon. Members have said in the debate, the existing law dates back to 1195 and was introduced for totally different reasons. It is hardly surprising, therefore, that the law in respect of treasure is in a chaotic and illogical state. Many people feel that it is the worst and weakest framework in Europe—perhaps with the exception of the system in Belgium. If someone is digging in his garden, it matters in law whether that garden is in Scotland, or England or Wales. If someone discovers something, he owns it as long as it is not gold or silver. He need not tell anybody about it or bring it to a scholar's attention. He can put it on his mantelpiece, shove it in his garage, break it up and dispose of it although it may be of enormous archaeological, historic and cultural significance.

At present, there is no requirement for that person to respect the importance of his find or to do anything with it, which cannot be right. Equally, if the find contains gold, the position changes, which is illogical. The hon. Gentleman's Bill sensibly clarifies and reforms crucial elements of legislation.

I particularly welcome the clarification on the issue of intentionality. It is clearly impossible to say what somebody was intending 2,000 or 3,000 years ago. The intention is sometimes clear—for example, if the find is discovered in a burial chamber, where it was likely to have been recovered at a later date. But it is often impossible to judge intent: the intentions are buried underground—buried in time. It is impossible for us to detect the intent; it is unfair to ask a coroner's jury—of all the unlikely sets of men and women—to try, retrospectively, to judge the intent.

As a result of such difficulties, there have been idiotic cases such as that involving the Middleham jewel—the late 15th-century reliquary which was found in a Yorkshire field in 1986. The jury could not decide on the intent, so the find was not covered by treasure trove and was sold at Sotheby's for £1.43 million. The case was brought to a happy conclusion in terms of our cultural heritage only because the Yorkshire museum was able to acquire the find—all credit to it for doing so.

I welcome the hon. Gentleman's point about clarifying the precious metal content. In 1990, an amazing iron age hoard was found at Snettisham, but because it was a mixture of torcs, bracelets, ingots, coins and scrap metal—which had no huge value, but was important architecturally—it was not covered by treasure trove. The hon. Gentleman also referred to the important find at Hoxne which, because it included tableware, was in a different category.

Is there not a problem because, even under the present excellent Bill, a hoard that is immensely important in terms of our national heritage, will be beyond protection if it does not include the appropriate silver and gold content? Is that not the sort of issue that might be clarified in Committee?

I am sure that the subject will be discussed in Committee, although we have had an interesting near-Committee-stage debate today, with observant points being raised by Conservative Members. The issue needs to be clarified, although I suspect that some aspects will be covered by the Government's forthcoming code of practice.

I welcome the fact that the hon. Member for South-West Cambridgeshire recognises the problem of hoards that do not have gold content. Many hon. Members will remember the long saga of the Icklingham bronzes of Mr. Browning in Suffolk throughout the 1980s—the bronzes were stolen and eventually appeared in New York. Unfortunately, they were not covered by treasure trove because they were bronze, although they were important Roman bronzes.

The Bill's scope is important; reference has been made to the excellent work of the treasure trove reviewing committee and its very good annual report. An enormous range of finds come under the treasure trove, including bronze-age torts found in interesting circumstances when erecting a farm fence. A set of bronze age bracelets were found by two women called Mrs. Beatrice and Mrs. Ferguson while they were gardening—an interesting way of enlivening a Saturday afternoon's gardening.

I commend the interesting report to hon. Members; it mentions an extraordinary scattering of Roman coins all over the country. Silver denarii, radiates and brass sestertii have been found all over—in Suffolk, Gwynedd, Manchester, Leicestershire, Essex, Dorset, Lincolnshire, river banks, woods, moors, marshes and fields. Clearly, the Romans were careless about spreading gold and silver over their realm. The report is an amazing piece of work by the treasure trove reviewing committee: it shows how important the subject is; why we should improve the law and why the hon. Gentleman should be commended on introducing this sensible and constructive measure.

Hon. Members recognise that there has to be reform, but the question is: what sort? In his interesting contribution, the hon. Member for Teignbridge (Mr. Nicholls) took what can best be described as the small "c" conservative approach. He seemed to say, "It is working quite well, so we should leave well alone." We have not heard quite so much this morning from the libertarian wing about repealing all laws and leaving it to the finder-takes-all principle. I was surprised by that, but I wondered whether the hon. Member for Colchester, South and Maldon (Mr. Whittingdale) might be beginning to take that approach.

It would be an extremely dangerous approach to adopt, which would focus attention on the Sutton Hoo burial ship, which was not treasure trove. If we had a policy of finder takes all, the Sutton Hoo find could have been—were it not for the extreme responsibility of the woman involved—kept in a garage, broken up or sold off. Anything could have happened to something that was perhaps the most important Anglo-Saxon find of our generation.

The reformist wing includes the extreme radical position of those who believe that all the current measures should be scrapped because they are not working and we should introduce a new, comprehensive piece of legislation. That was the position adopted by the Museums Association at its 1994 conference. The approach was articulately and intelligently argued by Mr. Tim Schadla-Hall, the museums director in Leicestershire. It is a coherent approach which, to some extent, the hon. Member for Colchester, South and Maldon seemed to adopt; it can be intellectually justified.

It is arguable whether any Government would have the time and the ability to get it right from the outset. It is an intellectually respectable, interesting and logical position, but it would be difficult to get such a law right. When other countries such as Turkey and Italy have introduced such legislation, they have encountered enormous problems in enforcing it. Many people feel that, because such legislation is unenforceable, it drives more of the stuff underground in those countries. Therefore, although the policy is logical, there are genuine problems with it—but I do not dismiss it.

The hon. Member for South-West Cambridgeshire has taken a sensible, pragmatic, reformist position. He has recognised the cultural public interest and balanced it against private interest. Crucially, he realises that the measure needs to be workable and enforceable, and needs to balance criminality against good practice. I was a little surprised and confused by the hon. Member for Ribble Valley (Mr. Evans) who, in an interesting contribution, at one stage seemed to say that we should criminalise the fellows committing such action, but then to say that it would be terrible to criminalise them. I was a little confused about his position on criminality in relation to some of the issues, but his contribution was interesting.

The Bill should command general support on both sides of the House—it has support outside the House. The Labour party wants to associate itself very strongly with this position. The Bill is not hostile to metal detectorists. Indeed, the National Art Collection Fund's 1994 report paid tribute to the work of metal detectorists and said that 10 times as many important brooches have been found since 1988 because of such work than had been found before then—but it did not quite say that that period saw the rise of the metal detector in this area, the new technology working for archaeology.

Most metal detectorists are extremely responsible people and do it not out of gain but out of genuine interest. The Bill does not threaten them in any way whatsoever. The annual report of the treasure trove reviewing committee states that all but five of the 27 cases reviewed by it in 1994–95 were found by metal detectorists. It is recognised that most metal detectorists play an important role. The National Metal Detecting Association is only too aware that this debate was provoked because of the looting of Wanborough, and that, if it had not occurred, we would not be where we are today. That was an irresponsible, and damaging act—Celtic coins were looted. Not all people who work in this area act with good sense or with a constructive attitude.

I look forward to the Minister's speech. I hope that the Government will endorse the Bill. I hope that he will tell us a little bit more about the code of practice, which I understand is forthcoming. Will he tell us when the code of practice is likely to be put into effect and what areas it will cover? For example, will it cover guidelines on registration of a wider range of portable antiques or the obligation to report all finds? Will the code of practice go so far as to license all excavations, as occurs in Northern Ireland? Will the state have the right to claim any find of archaeological importance, as occurs in Scotland? Will the Minister, under a code of practice, encourage a network of designated museums and centres for reporting finds? We already have a network in Leicestershire, Norfolk and the museum of London. If that were extended, it would be helpful and constructive, and fit very well with the hon. Gentleman's Bill.

I hope that the Minister will also say something about the problems of enforcement. How will the Government react to that? How will they encourage people to act responsibly? Counties such as Norfolk issue leaflets, and there is clear and public guidance to people on how to react when they discover a find. That sort of constructive attitude, if supported by a voluntary code that the Government introduce, would be welcomed by the Labour party.

Will the Minister also put it into a slightly wider context and say something about the international context and whether, if ever, the Government will ratify the 1970 UNESCO treaty to put an international context on all this work? I hope that the Government publish a good code of practice as a codicil almost to the Bill. The Labour party congratulates the hon. Gentleman on his Bill, and hopes that it gets speedy passage through Committee.

First, I thank my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Cambridgeshire (Sir A. Grant) for bringing forward the Bill. He has done a tremendous amount of hard work—he has dug up detailed, esoteric and recondite work and presented it to us. I expect that he will have a hard and detailed time in the Committee stage. There has been a long, and not always satisfactory, history to this measure. A number of hon. Members have paid tribute to the work—which was frustrated—that was done in another place during previous attempts to get provisions of this nature turned into an Act. While it was frustrating at the time for noble Lords, their hard work has helped my hon. Friend prepare the Bill and it will shortly see fruition in an Act.

Secondly, I shall refer briefly to some of the comments that have been raised by my hon. Friends and the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central (Mr. Fisher), who spoke for the Opposition. Thirdly, I shall say something about the Government's position and take up the words of the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central and put it in a wider context so that, on Report, we will have in our minds the Government's discussion document on portable antiquities, the treasure trove reports and the consultations which will take place about the guidance that will fill in any detailed aspects of the Act.

I know that my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Cambridgeshire will want to comment in more detail, as this is his Bill. He made an extremely thoughtful contribution. There are a number of sides to this Bill: the interests of the finders, the interests of the landowners and the interests of the nation—which can be subdivided into museums, individuals and individual displays where the public may see the objects that were discovered. The objects should be recorded and their provenance should be ascertained and set down for future generations so that they know the importance of them.

My hon. Friend the Member for Teignbridge (Mr. Nicholls) said that it was right that not everything should necessarily go into museums when they are discovered, and it is the Government's intention that not everything should go into museums. As my hon. Friend's Bill makes clear, there will be times when museums are offered objects but do not want them. They will then be returned to the finder, who can do with them as he or she wishes. My hon. Friend also said that he did not want objects mouldering in the cellars of museums and never seen by the general public. However, he also said that museums have changed in the last few years.

Hon. Members will know that I am currently looking at a museums review, which the Government have not held since 1928. What my hon. Friend's Bill says about treasure and the consequences of the consultation document on portable antiquities will be fitted in with what we are hoping to do about museums. It will be put into a wide context.

My hon. Friend the Member for Teignbridge referred to the difficulties of defining when an object is found in association and when it is not. He asked whether an object found near where others were previously found—perhaps a field away—will be associated with the previous objects. These matters will be discussed in Committee, and they will be the subject of consultation. There are doubts and uncertainties about these matters. The hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central asked me to say something about a code of practice. We will ask the detectorists, the police, the Country Landowners Association, the National Farmers Union and landowners for their representations and about exactly how they think such matters should be best decided.

My hon. Friends the Members for Teignbridge and for Colchester, South and Maldon (Mr. Whittingdale)—or perhaps I should say the battle of Maldon—made an important point about striking a balance between the rights of the detectorist or the finder and those of the landowner. It is a difficult one to strike. A problem arises under natural justice. If someone is trespassing on someone else's land and finds something on it, does it not belong to the person who owns that land, even if he never knew of the find's existence and never knew that he owned it? Those are difficult questions and we must direct our minds to their solution. We shall do so the guidance.

I support what my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Cambridgeshire, the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central, the Opposition spokesman, and my hon. Friends have said about the Bill not being directed against detectorists. It should help the responsible detectorist. My wife is quite obsessive about detectors and I have more piles of rusty nails and old horseshoes than any man would wish to shake a stick at, but I certainly do not want to see her obsession in any way calmed down—within reason, at any rate. Let me add the Government's assurance that the Bill is not anti-detectorist. As the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central has said, the increase in the number of important finds in the past few years is in large measure due to detectorists. We should encourage responsible detectorists, and the Bill will do so.

Will my hon. Friend clarify one point? If an item of what used to be termed treasure trove is found on land, who will be able to claim compensation for it under the Bill? How will that be decided? I am sorry to be obtuse, but I simply do not understand it.

I do not think that my hon. Friend is obtuse at all. One cannot be obtuse about something which is not set down clearly. The matter has not been set down clearly in the Bill because it will be considered in the code of practice and the guidance. The matter will be clarified thereby; it is not intended to clarify it in the Bill, only to indicate that it will be clarified.

My hon. Friend the Member for Dover (Mr. Shaw) courteously apologised to the House for his absence now. He had a previous engagement arranged for later this morning, but he was keen to take part in the debate. I am sure that we are all glad that he did so. I welcome his welcome of the Bill and the fact that he agrees that we must not discourage responsible detectorists. In common with my hon. Friend the Member for Teignbridge, he asked how the Secretary of State's powers will be decided. I repeat that that will be a matter for us to consult fully on when the Bill has passed through the House.

My hon. Friend the Member for Dover also made an interesting point, to which no doubt we shall return in Committee, about whether a fine of £5,000 is too small. Common sense tells us that, if a man reckons he has his paws on £100,000-worth of Roman coins, he will not care very much about a fine of £5,000 or even a possible prison sentence of three months. We shall want to reconsider that matter and the necessity or otherwise of index-linking the value of the fine in later years.

My hon. Friend the Member for Ribble Valley (Mr. Evans) made an extremely interesting speech, in which he also referred to the Secretary of State's powers. I have already said that the extent of those powers will be a matter for consultation, but of equal interest to the House is that what the guidance then determines should be the way in which the Secretary of State behaves will be subject to affirmative resolution in the House. We shall therefore have a chance to return to that matter.

My hon. Friend the Member for Teignbridge also asked what might happen about any changes that are necessary. It is rather like the discussion about television sports rights and what is or is not a listed event. Similarly, decisions will have to be made on what is or is not treasure. If it appears to us that things have been left out which ought to have been put in, the Secretary of State will consider the matter and proposals will be put before the House and will be subject to affirmative resolution. We are not just building flexibility into the Bill, but building into it a flexibility about which the House will have the chance to say, "Yes, we agree," or "No, we do not agree." That element of choice should be included in the Bill.

My hon. Friend the Member for Ribble Valley and others expressed concern about a graverobber's charter and about whether the Bill will criminalise innocent finders. Those are extremely important points and I should like to make it clear to the House that there is no question whatsoever of detectorists being able to break into graves to inspect them. Graves are protected by other laws and they will remain so protected. I can give a total guarantee that the concerns that my hon. Friends have rightly expressed have been taken care of.

My hon. Friend the Member for Ribble Valley expressed natural concern that we must not criminalise innocent finders. That is so and why the Bill provides that if a discoverer has a reasonable excuse, it will be taken properly into account. For example, someone may dig a trench and happen to find a tort lying there. He may not realise what it is, put it aside and forget about it. Given that that person was just digging a trench and not looking for antiquities, he would have the type of reasonable excuse that would prevent him from being challenged for not reporting the find under the Bill. I am sure that the House may want to return to that in Committee, but I believe that my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Cambridgeshire has dealt with the matter.

My hon. Friend the Member for Ribble Valley suggested that detector kits should include a short statement on people's responsibilities when they find something. That was an extremely good idea and a good example of how such debates raise points about which no one had thought. Certainly I had never thought about that and I do not think that my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Cambridgeshire had thought about it, either. No doubt manufacturers will want to take account of my hon. Friend's very good suggestion.

My hon. Friend the Member for Colchester, South and Maldon spoke about the hard work done in the Lords. It is worth while to emphasise how grateful we are for that. I hope that their frustrations are now sublimated in the warmth they feel now that their hard work is about to produce something that looks as though it will get through the House. My hon. Friend also raised the important point of considering the Bill in the widest possible context, and I will come to that when I express the more general Government attitude to the Bill.

The hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central gave a general welcome to the Bill, and we very much welcome that. I am always impressed by the amount of extremely arcane information that he has to hand. He quoted that a find worth £1.43 million had been sold at Sotheby's. I do not know how he finds all that information, let alone remembers it. It is nice to have his support.

The hon. Member spoke about the illogicality of the Coroners Act 1988 and the fact that it related only to gold and silver. Not only that, but following a ruling from that splendid lawyer, Lord Denning, the Act relates to a "substantial" amount of gold and silver. When we are considering matters of law, we should always be careful about trying to pin down provisions to such and such a per cent. The exercise of common sense and judgment is something that lawyers should never subtract from their ability to shine upon any particular problem. However, possibly in this case saying that finds relate to 5 per cent. of gold or 5 per cent. of silver makes matters clearer.

I also congratulate the hon. Gentleman on his invention of the word "intentionality". I am not sure that I do congratulate him on that, but perhaps I should say I congratulate him on his ingenuiality on thinking up such a word. It is ridiculous to expect a coroner's court in 1996 to be able to say whether Ethelred the Unready meant to put a pot with 10 gold coins in the earth.

I thank the hon. Gentleman greatly for his general welcome of the Bill. I will cover in more tedious detail, starting right now, some of the points that he made about what other European countries do or do not do.

The Government very much welcome the Bill. It is a much-needed piece of legislation and I was greatly encouraged to hear the general support it received from all sides of the House. I noted, too, the particular welcome the Bill received from the Opposition. I hope that that means that it will have an easy passage in the sense of well wishing, but perhaps not quite such an easy passage. There are many details which I am sure the House will quite properly wish to look at more closely.

My Department has had responsibility for treasure trove for nearly three years and has been able to place it firmly within its overall responsibilities for archaeological and cultural property. We have made extra resources available for that responsibility, and the Department certainly accepts the need to reform this antiquated law.

If someone finds an object of gold or silver, he should report it to a coroner who will then decide whether to hold a treasure inquest. The coroner will take expert advice, usually from the British museum or the National museums and galleries of Wales or the Ulster museum. If it is declared treasure trove, the find is the property of the Crown. In practice, this means that a museum has a right to acquire it, but the finder is rewarded with its full market value. I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester, South and Maldon will be especially keen to hear that. He will know that in other countries in Europe, to which sometimes he has a slightly ambivalent attitude, do not always give full market value. However, under the Bill we shall continue to do so.

On average, about 25 finds a year are declared treasure trove, 90 per cent. of these being coin hoards, although there are also occasional finds of prehistoric gold torcs and Roman and mediaeval jewellery or plate. During the year April 1994 to April 1995, there were 27 cases of treasure trove. Of those, 25 were coin hoards, the other two being finds of gold torcs, and 16 of the finds were acquired by museums intact. In another five cases, all coin hoards, museums acquired a selection of coins, while in another six cases, once again all coin hoards, the complete finds were returned to their finders. Those statistics, tedious as they may seem, demonstrate to my hon. Friend the Member for Ribble Valley that sometimes museums get them and sometimes they do not. There is proper machinery to judge exactly what should be done

In 1977 the treasure trove reviewing committee was set up with the responsibility of advising the Secretary of State on valuations. The committee was established to provide independent scrutiny of treasure trove valuations and it currently contains four members drawn from universities, the trade and collectors. The committee's current terms of reference are

"to determine valuations for items brought before it which correspond as closely as possible, taking account of all the relevant factors, to what might be paid for the object(s) in a sale on the open market between a willing seller and a willing buyer; and to submit an annual report to Treasury ministers".

The hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central has already expressed his admiration for those reports and I concur with him.

Two changes have recently been made to the committee's procedures to instil the greatest possible public confidence in its working. First, finders are invited to submit valuation evidence of their own—they can thus commission their own valuations from experts—and secondly, the committee has established a panel of expert advisers drawn from the trade to whom it can turn in cases of difficulty.

We are in full agreement with the committee, the British museum and the National museums and galleries of Wales that the best way to encourage finders to report their finds is to ensure that the committee's valuations should not only reflect the market value of the finds in question but should be seen to do so.

A recent valuation case demonstrates how we aim to achieve that. In September 1993 the great find of Roman gold and silver coins and other objects from Hoxne in Suffolk was declared treasure trove and in the following November the committee agreed a total valuation of £1.75 million for it. The British museum's valuation report was some 50 pages long and the committee also obtained three independent valuations, which were all within 7 per cent. of each other.

There was some initial criticism of the valuation in the metal-detecting press. One tabloid newspaper put a £10 million price tag on the find before it was known what it contained, thus raising expectations unreasonably high. To allay those criticisms and to promote open government, the valuation papers were released publicly and they have received favourable comment in coin collecting and metal detecting magazines. We think that this method of determining the amount of rewards works very well, and it is not our intention to change it should the Bill be successful.

The Government believe that the treasure trove system performs a vital service in safeguarding for the nation some of the most significant finds from the soil of England and Wales, but the law is limited in scope in an irrational way. As my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Cambridgeshire has said, it relates only to objects with a substantial gold or silver content, reflecting its origins as a means of raising revenue for the Crown, rather than of preserving the most important archaeological finds for the nation. The objects are treasure trove only if the jury decides that they were probably buried with the intention of later recovery—a fact which may be virtually impossible to decide after 2,000 years or more.

Clearly, the current law cannot protect our archaeological heritage to the extent that we would like, and we support this effort to introduce a more appropriate system.

One of the most curious features of treasure trove is that the English law does not apply to the whole of the United Kingdom. I do not know why my brief states that that is curious, because the same pertains in hundreds of other matters. In Scotland, all newly discovered archaeological objects, irrespective of whether they are precious metal or regardless of whether they were hidden or lost, belong to the Crown under the legal principle of bona vacantia. I pronounce it slightly differently from my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Cambridgeshire, who I am sure got it right.

Although the Crown chooses to exercise its claim only in certain cases, this means that in Scotland all archaeological objects must be reported, and the Crown can claim those which it believes to be sufficiently important. The system works well and enjoys general acceptance.

Northern Ireland has the same treasure trove law as England and Wales, which is why it is included within the scope of the Bill, but there is also has a statutory duty to report all archaeological objects in the Province, and the Northern Irish law also states that one needs a licence to search for archaeological objects with a metal detector.

In the Republic of Ireland, for example, a law was passed in 1993 which made all archaeological objects the property of the state. It is an offence to own or trade in archaeological objects from the soil of the Republic and the law contained retrospective provisions requiring all privately owned antiquities found in the Republic to be reported within three months of the enactment of the law. Metal detecting is outlawed and metal detecting magazines are banned. Those measures might seem draconian to us, and they are certainly a long way from the Bill's proposals, but they enjoy widespread support in the Republic, where it is thought to be entirely right that the nation's archaeological heritage should be protected in this way.

Hon. Members have mentioned what happens in other countries, and it is interesting to know the geographical and historical background to the legislation. A survey of legislation in 17 other European countries shows that the legal protection afforded to portable antiquities in England and Wales is more limited in scope, more permissive and also more liberal in its treatment of finders than in virtually any other country in Europe. Only Belgium, as the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central said, has a weaker legal requirement to report finds and provides legal protection to a smaller range of objects than England and Wales.

In most countries, all archaeological excavation is controlled and metal detectors can be used only under licence, and those are not normally given to treasure hunters, the only exceptions being the Flemish-speaking part of Belgium and some of the Scandinavian countries. We have no controls on the use of metal detectors in this country—except on scheduled sites—and the Bill contains no restrictions on their use.

Lastly, as regards rewards, the practice in England and Wales of paying the finder the full market value as assessed by an independent committee, is more liberal than in most countries, in many of which the reward bears little relation to the market value. All these countries have passed laws to protect their heritage of moveable archaeological objects this century. They see that as a completely natural and proper thing to do.

When viewed against that background, the Bill will make only a modest change to our current law. It will make only a very minor adjustment to the current requirement to report finds; it will extend the rights of the Crown only in a very modest way; it will not impose any restrictions on the use of metal detectors, and it will not change the practice of paying rewards assessed at the full market value.

The Government view treasure trove reform, important though it is, as just one part of the problem. As my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Cambridgeshire said, the great majority of archaeological objects will still fall outside the scope of the Bill. A recent survey undertaken by the Council for British Archaeology on behalf of English Heritage has estimated that, every year in England and Wales, as many as 400,000 objects of archaeological interest are discovered. That is in addition to finds discovered during professional archaeological investigations. Such finds include not only coins and other metal objects, but fragments of pottery and other artefacts. Occasionally, those finds—known as "portable antiquities"—may have great monetary value, but, on the whole, their importance lies principally in their archaeological interest.

The Government believe that it is important to distinguish between the two aspects of the problem: the public acquisition of finds and the recording of them. Treasure trove provides a mechanism whereby the national and local museums have, in effect, the right of first refusal to certain finds, providing that they can find the money to pay full rewards for them to the finders.

On the subject of recording, there is widespread agreement that the reporting of finds, so that they can be properly recorded, is of key importance, more important often than public acquisition, but the Bill will make only limited adjustments to the classes of objects that are legally required to be reported—for example, hoards of base-metal coins—and there would continue to be no legal requirement to report other important categories of finds.

For that reason, last month, my Department published—the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central properly asked me about this—a discussion document on portable antiquities. It seeks views on possible measures to improve the recording of all archaeological objects, not just those covered by treasure trove law or its proposed replacement, in the belief that current arrangements are, except in one or two sectors, not working well.

The Government accept that there is an urgent need for action to record those objects as they are irreplaceable and of great importance for the nation's heritage. The discussion document considers the relative merits of voluntary and compulsory systems for the recording of finds. Under a voluntary system, the Government would draw up, in consultation with representatives of museums, archaeological organisations and metal detectorists, a voluntary code of practice for the recording of archaeological objects found in England and Wales. We believe that, if it is to be effective, the code would need to be accompanied by a campaign of education to encourage finders to report their finds.

One of the advantages of such an approach is that it would not require primary legislation and, thus, providing general agreement for it can be obtained, it could be introduced with minimum delay. There is evidence that a voluntary code of practice is the option most likely to receive the widest support. In the Government's view, in their way, those proposals are as important as my hon. Friend's Bill.

I would like to stress that the Bill places no restrictions on the use of metal detectors and the Government have repeatedly stressed that any detectorist behaving in a law-abiding manner will have nothing to fear if the Bill becomes law. I think that all hon. Members have said that that is the wish. My hon. Friend will be pleased to hear me repeat the assurance that he asked for recently given by my noble Friend Lord Inglewood in his foreword to the report of the treasure trove reviewing committee for 1994–95. Neither the Government nor the European Union has any plans to ban or otherwise restrict responsible metal detecting.

In that same foreword, my noble Friend noted that all but five of the 27 cases of treasure trove recorded in the report were found with the use of metal detectors and he congratulated all those finders who reported their finds promptly to the proper authorities. The report for the first time named the finders. Without their ready co-operation, a great deal of valuable information about our nation's past would be lost. The Government willingly acknowledge that, in recent years, metal detectorists have discovered many objects of great importance for the nation's heritage.

My hon. Friend has described the meetings that officials from my Department have had with the National Council for Metal Detecting to discuss the Bill. He has made a generous offer that he will discuss at any time or place, within reason, any point that it wants to make. I hope that we will have the benefit of that discussion in Committee so that no one will say afterwards that they did have a chance to say what they believed.

The Government view the Bill as a modest measure to extend the protection currently afforded to certain finds of gold and silver coins and objects to a slightly wider range of archaeological finds, and to iron out some of the anomalies of this mediaeval law. We are not aware of any reasoned case for the retention of the law of treasure trove, and none has been suggested during the discussions that have taken place on the Bill with the many organisations that have an interest in it, including the National Council for Metal Detecting—although we are still in discussion with it—and landowners. Under current law, it is necessary to prove the motive of an individual. As hon. Members have said, it is unreasonable to expect a coroners jury to decide that in every circumstance.

The Bill's main aim, therefore, is to clarify exactly what type of find should be reported and will be treasure. At present, that is unclear; my hon. Friend's Bill makes it clearer. The Bill strikes a fair compromise between the interests of finders and landowners, but we shall consider that further in the consultation paper.

Detailed guidelines on how the Secretary of State for National Heritage is to pay rewards will be set out in the code of practice provided in clause 11. That code will be drawn up in consultation with interested parties. As a further safeguard, the code will have to approved by each House of Parliament before the Bill can take effect. As I have made clear to my hon. Friend the Member for Ribble Valley, the Bill will not allow people to look for treasure in graves. Innocent finders will also be protected.

At the same time, the Bill has great flexibility because it contains a provision that gives the Secretary of State the power to add or to remove categories of object from the Bill. I hope that we are building in fairness, flexibility and an opportunity for the House to return to the matter. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Cambridgeshire again, and I look forward to the consideration of the Bill in Committee.

With the leave of the House, I will make a brief response because my hon. Friend the Minister has dealt with nearly everything that had been asked about. I am grateful for the support from both Front Benches and to all hon. Members who have spoken because they have all made sensible and helpful speeches, all of which will be extremely helpful in Committee. Nearly all the points have, I believe, been matters of detail and I assure my hon. Friends that I shall take them carefully on board.

Because of the warm response to the Bill, I hope that it will have a speedy journey through the labyrinth of procedure and will reach the statute book in the not too distant future.

My hon. Friend the Member for Teignbridge (Mr. Nicholls) rightly asked about what the definition of a hoard is and about how scattered it would have to be. We shall have to satisfy him about that in or before the Committee. He dealt with ownership. I emphasise again that the Bill is a change in the law. For the first time, landowners—whom he was concerned about—will have certain rights. Again, we shall consider whether they are adequate.

We should not forget someone else: the owner. My hon. Friend feared an electrician coming to his house and finding something of benefit. If my hon. Friend had a predecessor in title who said, "Hey, just a minute— all those coins are mine: I left them by mistake when I sold the house," his claim as the true owner, which he could prove, is established. That is covered by clause 4. The problem is that, in most cases, the original owners lived possibly 1,000 or 2,000 years ago.

I hope that my hon. Friend will forgive me for pressing him on this point. I do not understand how a code of practice or guidance can clarify what seems to be a fundamental point. It would have to be sorted out by statute. Where there is no predecessor in title, in the sense that the possibility is remote, it is wrong that a finder should have rights over and above the owner of the property in which that hoard was found. That should be clarified. It is a policy decision about whether the finder or property owner should have the right. I do not understand how such a fundamental point can be dealt with in guidance.

We will consider that matter carefully, but four factors are involved: first, the original owner, who can usually rarely traced in these cases; secondly, the rights of the finder; thirdly, the rights of the landowner or occupier; and fourthly, the rights of the nation. All those must be reconciled. To some extent, my Bill provides the framework for getting this right for the first time. The law has not been satisfactory for a long time. We shall consider closely what my hon. Friend says.

My hon. Friends the Members for Dover (Mr. Shaw) and for Ribble Valley (Mr. Evans), and my hon. Friend the Minister referred to the enforcement provisions. I was rather surprised because I had feared that someone would say that we were being too draconian. It seems as though we are being too lenient and wishy-washy. We will look at that point. However, I advise my hon. Friends that the issue of penalties gets entangled in Home Office regulations and standards, and in comparisons with other provisions.

Many years ago, I introduced a Bill on oil in navigable waters. We had a great struggle with the Home Office to get what we thought was an enormous penalty for people who discharged oil in navigable waters. We then discovered that it was totally inadequate and we trebled the fine. We shall have to see how we get on here; I was interested that people were concerned about the fines.

I reassure my hon. Friend the Member for Ribble Valley that there will be no question of being ferocious or savage towards people who have genuine reasons for not reporting a find. Clearly, our famous word in law, "reasonable", can be interpreted perfectly reasonably in such a case.

I am so glad that every hon. Member who has spoken has emphasised, as I sought to do, that the Bill is not an attack on the excellent activity of metal detecting. I point out the concessions that we have made to the national council since Lord Perth's Bill was considered in the House of Lords. I mention four items that the council raised on which we have made concessions. One is the number of coins with a precious metal content of less than 5 per cent.; we have raised the figure to 10 under clause 1.

The Crown will now have the power to disclaim objects that have been submitted as potential treasure under clause 6; that change is in response to the national council's request. Coroners will now have discretion on whether to summon a jury to a treasure inquest under clause 7. Coroners—this was the final request that the council raised—will now be required to inform finders if a treasure inquest is to be held and to ensure that they are given the opportunity to examine witnesses under clause 9.

All four concessions were made at the request of the national council and are changes made since the introduction of Lord Perth's Bill. It therefore cannot be said that we have been unreasonable in the way in which we have responded. If the council wants to make any other points, it has only to let us know. If the council lets me know, I shall meet members of it. If the requests are sensible and reasonable, we shall accommodate them in Committee.

I repeat that responsible metal detectorists have a great contribution to make in the future recovery of our heritage. In that spirit and because of the warm support given by the House to the Bill, I can say that this is a moment of history. If the House gives a Second Reading to the Bill, it will preserve our history for the benefit of present and future generations.

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

It gives me great pleasure to move the Second Reading this morning. I pay tribute to the many hon. Members, past and present, who have spent so much time trying to reform our leasehold law. I refer especially to Sir Brandon Rhys Williams, who was one of the first pioneers in the area and who worked so hard on behalf of many leaseholders in his constituency.

His work was subsequently taken up by the present holder of the seat, my hon. Friend the Member for Kensington (Mr. Fishburn), who I am delighted to see in his place today. His solution to the problem of commonhold was described, in that wonderful and admiring phrase used so often by civil servants, as an elegant solution. I am also grateful to the sponsors of the Bill, many of whom have joined me today, and to the hon. Member for Greenwich (Mr. Raynsford) who has been a great supporter of commonhold over the years.

I begin by explaining why the Bill was called the Leasehold (Reform) Bill. When I was successful in the ballot, I was very concerned about the position of leaseholders, and I wished to do something to help them. I am glad that the Government took up my concerns, and that they have included some measures to help leaseholders in the Housing Bill which is currently in Committee. However, the issue of commonhold was not included. It is an unknown form of property law in England and Wales, and I wished to pursue it. That is why the Bill, although called the Leasehold (Reform) Bill, concentrates entirely on commonhold.

All of us remember that the manifestos of the three main parties contained a commitment to commonhold. The reason was that so many of us had, for a long time, been aware of the problems facing leaseholders. I had many meetings with leaseholders in the run-up to the general election, and, as soon as the election was over, at almost my first surgery, the real problems faced by leaseholders were brought home to me in case after case.

As a seaside town, Hastings is not full of the large mansion blocks with which so many of my colleagues have had to deal. We have many smaller properties, where the freeholders have often been families who have decided to move out of the family home, and have divided the home into flats. Inevitably, time passes and the original freeholder dies. The estate decides to sell the freehold, and suddenly, the leaseholders find that they have freeholders of whom they have no knowledge.

The first case that came to my attention was very obvious. On the sea front in Hastings, scaffolding had been erected outside a house several months before I was elected. That scaffolding is still there. The lady who owned the first-floor flat has now had to leave a derelict building. She has lost all her savings, and she has lost her property. The reason was that the freeholder behaved in the most disgraceful way; the problem has not yet been solved.

Similar problems were raised at surgery after surgery. For a while, a steady stream of leaseholders came to complain that their freeholder had instructed the building society with which the leaseholder had a mortgage to increase the mortgage to cover the cost of repairs. Without a word to the leaseholder, the building society had agreed to the freeholder's request. People who had budgeted carefully to pay their mortgage were suddenly faced with huge increases in their monthly bills, yet there was no redress.

We also found that there were problems with insurance. In one case, the roof of a building was blown off in the 1987 storm. The freeholder got the insurance money, yet the flat is still not wind and waterproof. There are endless problems with maintenance and repairs. I will not go into the details of those problems, because I am sure that they are familiar to every hon. Member.

One problem faced by leaseholders as a group is that they have no control over the size of the bills for repairs that are presented to them. They often dispute the bills and get their own surveyors, who produce their own schedule of works, which is completely at variance with that of the freeholder. There is then an intransigent stand-off, which is of benefit only to the legal profession.

Because of the various problems that have emerged, our local evening paper, the Evening Argus, ran a series of articles. I am sure that London Members here could duplicate the campaign that was run in Hastings, and could give many more details.

One organisation based in Brighton controls 7,000 flats throughout the country. The residents of many of those flats are finding exactly the same problems as those I have described. When 7,000 flats are on one person's books, one is dealing with a major company, not just a small freeholder.

My hon. Friend referred to London Members, and cases that had come up in her surgery. Has she carried out any comparison with London Members—perhaps with those who have been in the House quite a long time, such as my hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet (Sir S. Chapman) and myself—to ascertain whether the extent of surgery cases about leaseholding, including leaseholding of flats, has at all diminished since the 1980s or the 1970s?

Despite the needs that she has described and that have given rise to her Bill, is it not possible that the number of surgery cases concerning leaseholding has diminished for the past generation? Perhaps in general the leaseholders' regime is already better than it was a decade or two back.

If my hon. Friend speaks in the debate, I am sure that he will say whether his caseload has diminished. As a new Member, I have certainly not found any diminution in the number of cases on the subject.

In fact, I had a gentle disagreement with my local paper's editor, who is not from Hastings, about whether an article that I had written on my Bill for the paper should be published. I suggested that he might find it very interesting if he published the article, because I assured him that it was a problem in Hastings. Much to my amazement, let alone his, for the first time ever, my article prompted letters addressed to me rather than to the paper. I have, as a consequence picked up at least another half dozen leasehold cases.

I am therefore not convinced that, in my part of the world, the problem has gone away. I very much hope that the amendments to the Housing Bill will help leaseholders.

I congratulate my hon. Friend on introducing this excellent measure. As my hon. Friend the Member for Twickenham (Mr. Jessel) has called me in aid, may I say that problems faced by leaseholders in my constituency have increased over the past year? The situation has no doubt been aided by the splendid campaign organised by the Evening Standard. I applaud my hon. Friend because, in a constructive way, she is trying to tackle problems, and I hope that she will get every support from Her Majesty's Government.

I am most grateful to my hon. Friend for that very helpful support. The exchange between my hon. Friends and myself has shown that there is a problem not just in London but wherever leaseholding as a legal form exists.

One of the much more dramatic problems that has emerged since 1993 for small blocks of flats in my constituency is the leaseholders' difficulty in purchasing their freehold. I have referred previously to Doreen Slennett, who has been trying to purchase the freehold from the freeholder, who happens to share the same address as the managing agents. That is just one of the loopholes in the law that leaseholders are finding more and more offensive. I very much hope that we shall begin to see an end to leaseholders' difficulties in asserting their legal rights.

I have described the problems that leaseholders have faced in my constituency, and I am sure that we will hear many more. Taken together, they show that there is a great deal of dissatisfaction with long leasehold as a form of property holding. That is recognised not only by those of us with huge surgery caseloads but by all the main parties. As I mentioned, they all supported commonhold in their manifestos. I have also had support from the Council of Mortgage Lenders and the British Property Federation, which I understand has been reassured by some of the larger London estates it represents that they support the introduction of commonhold.

The Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors also supports the Bill, as do leasehold organisations such as the campaign against residential leasehold abuse. I have received many letters from supporters—I know that some of them are here today—who are very keen that commonhold, as an alternative to leaseholding, is introduced, so that they can convert their leaseholds into a freehold in a commonhold association. Campaigns run by local and national papers have been mentioned—those run by the Evening Standard and The Times are known. It is accepted that the system of leasehold is under severe strain and that we should be introducing commonhold, which is the purpose of my Bill.

Commonhold exists in practically every other country in the world in one form or another. When I came south from Scotland, I was amazed to come across the leasehold system; it does not exist in Scotland. Scotland has managed for many years with a system of property law which operates in the notorious tenements of Glasgow as well as the blocks of flats in Edinburgh's New Town where I lived when I was first married—where, although common parts are held individually, everybody is responsible for them and knows precisely the extent of their responsibility. It has worked very satisfactorily. It is therefore a shock to discover the difficulties in England.

There is commonhold in Australia. Mr. Tim Sebbage, who is working in Germany but has a leasehold on a flat in London, has given me a great deal of advice on how the German system works. It sounds very similar to the Scottish system, and works very satisfactorily.

My Bill, which is fairly slim as Bills go, but probably quite thick for a private Member's Bill, sets out the principles of commonhold. It goes no further than that, because I very much wanted to be able to debate the principles of commonhold. When commonhold is introduced into English and Welsh law, it will probably initially be of most use to those who are building new developments. One of the criteria for a commonhold association will be that it can apply not only to domestic developments but to mixed developments.

There is often contention in developments where shops are underneath leasehold flats and it is not possible to enfranchise. If a developer wishes in future to produce a mixed development and sets up a commonhold association, each person who buys a freehold in that development will be able to work with others in ensuring that the management of the block is undertaken by themselves. That is a sensible way forward. It will encourage a diversity of developments instead of a monolithic approach. Given the long-term disfavour into which leaseholding is falling, it may be a way forward for freeholders who decide to get out of leaseholding and to establish a mixed development themselves.

Let us say, for example, that a block has ground-floor shops. The freeholder can sell the freehold to shops and the leaseholders can acquire their leaseholds. They can then together establish a commonhold association. We shall see long leaseholding as a form of property ownership wither on the vine.

Existing and successful leasehold associations would not necessarily wish to move to commonhold. I suspect that, in practice, there is not a great deal of difference in the way in which they would carry out their business. My Bill, however, would give them the opportunity to make the move if they wished to do so.

A key feature of the Bill is that it provides for both the setting up and winding up of a commonhold association. We are all aware that neighbours sometimes fall out—there has been some local newspaper coverage of that subject recently. Should an association need to be wound up, it is crucial that provision should be made for that process.

The system set out in the Bill is probably the most sensible way forward. If it is necessary to wind up an association, the effect of the Bill would be to convert each freeholder's interest in the association in a share. When the association is sold, in whatever way, the commonholder will have a share of any assets realised. At the same time, they would have to be liable for any debts of the association. One hopes that most associations would be run in a way that ensured that there would be no such debts.

I am conscious that I have attracted a great deal of support for my Bill today. That being so, I shall not talk for much longer. I shall merely say that commonhold is the missing part of English and Welsh property law. I accept that it represents a radical change. It may be regarded as unusual for a Conservative Member to introduce radical legislation—[HON. MEMBERS: "No."] I am glad to know that we are all awake. It is sometimes necessary, however, to produce a radical solution to a problem, and especially one that has dogged so many of us for so long.

I believe that commonhold offers hope to leaseholders. I hope that my hon. Friend will be able to promise me significant progress on commonhold. Not only many Members on both sides of the House but millions outside this place want to see the introduction of commonhold as soon as possible.

I congratulate the hon. Member for Hastings and Rye (Mrs. Lait) on introducing the Bill. It represents a progressive step forward, but, in my view, it is a conservative effort on the hon. Lady's part. I do not think that the Bill goes far enough in providing the rights that leaseholders need for their protection.

I shall comment briefly on the history of some of the legislation that has been introduced in response to the weaknesses of leasehold reform as embodied in the Landlord and Tenant Act 1987. In addition, the Leasehold Reform Housing and Urban Development Act 1993 was inadequate and ineffective. Many leaseholders have been disappointed by these reforms. High expectations have led leaseholders to demand clear and effective legislation from the Government.

Leaseholders are lobbying their Members to put pressure on the Government to introduce positive legislation. I have received many inquiries from my constituents.

Leasehold is a form of residential tenure. It is a throwback to feudalism, as every Member knows. It gives exceptional privileges and powers to landowners. It enables them to retain an interest in land and property, while at the same time selling leases for limited periods. At the end of each of these periods, the landowner can sell a further lease. By this means, a relatively few landowners have been able to accumulate substantial fortunes through the ownership of land. Leasehold has concentrated wealth in the hands of the few rather than the many.

The case for reform is overwhelming. Britain is almost unique in the world in retaining the leasehold system. In other countries, different and more modern arrangements have developed to achieve a better balance between the interests of landowners and those who occupy residential property and to enable individuals to enjoy the benefit of freehold, even where they live in blocks of flats.

Over recent decades, the weaknesses and injustices inherent in the British leasehold system have been increasingly highlighted, but reform has been a long time coming. The first—and to date the most effective—reform of the system was Labour's 1967 Leasehold Reform Act, which gave leaseholders living in houses the opportunity to buy out the freehold interest or obtain an extension of their lease. Many thousands of people have benefited from that Act. The 1993 Act involves such complex procedures and red tape that few, if any, leaseholders have benefited from it.

Is it not tragic that, when the 1993 Act went through, Labour Members, with one or two Conservative Members, repeatedly spelled out that it would not achieve anything like what the Government claimed that it would?

I agree with my hon. Friend. That shows that we have been more concerned about giving rights to the leaseholder than have the Conservatives.

The 1993 Act made so many concessions to the interests of the big landlords that its whole purpose was effectively undermined. As a result, only a few leaseholders have been able to buy out freeholds. The present legislation is complex, and difficult for the public to comprehend. Many of the people who come to my surgeries do not understand the law, and have to go to solicitors. They find it difficult to get satisfactory answers, even after paying large fees. We need the new commonhold tenure, which will extend to leaseholders new opportunities to own and manage their homes.

The Government's current leasehold reform proposals are inadequate and likely to end in disaster, as did the previous ones. This is another feeble effort by the Government to mislead leaseholders. The Government do not have the courage to confront the vested interests of large landlords, who are known to make donations to Tory party funds.

I have been listening with great interest to the hon. Gentleman. I am sorry that he is trying to turn the debate into a partisan shouting match. Matters relating to commonhold and leasehold are necessarily complicated. It is not as easy as the hon. Gentleman suggests.

Will he comment on the Government's five specific amendments to the Housing Bill which in large measure deal with many of the problems about which he complains? They would close the loophole of the right of first refusal, separate forfeiture procedures because of the dispute on service charges—

Order. It would be better if the hon. Member sought to catch my eye to make a speech later, because this is meant to be intervention.

I said at the beginning of my speech that I appreciated what was being introduced, but it does not go far enough, or provide the rights that leaseholders need. I am also aware that the five recommendations to which the hon. Gentleman refers have not yet been published.

Furthermore, the Government are adamant in their refusal to introduce commonhold as an alternative to the present rotten leasehold system. Although they pledged to do so in their last manifesto, that is yet another broken Tory promise. For too long, leaseholders have been treated in a shabby way. They have been right to demand that the Government take positive action to find a long-term solution to end their misery, rather than tinker with the present discredited system.

I am sure that many Members of Parliament have received letters from constituents who are worried about the demands made by unscrupulous landlords and managing agents for extortionate service charges. They are being intimidated, and threatened with forfeiture of their properties. There is widespread concern among leaseholders throughout the country about the lack of protection and safeguards against abuse under the existing legislation.

Some constituents of mine have written me a letter about the problem that they are having with their landlord. I should like to quote the relevant parts of the letter. Mr. David Thompson and Miss Yasmin Mirza wrote:

"Dear Mr. P. Khabra,

We are writing to you, as first time buyers who purchased the above property in November 1994, on a 125 year leasehold, with the hope that you may be in a position to help, or advise the best way forward with regard to us buying our freehold.

We purchased the property from Dao Heng Bank Plc, who at the time were also the freeholders. At the time of purchase we had been informed by the acting Estate Agents that there would be an opportunity in the future for us to buy the freehold. This was one of the main contributing factors for our purchase of the above property.

In June of last year, to our surprise we received notification from Dao Heng's solicitors … that the freehold had been sold to Cyril Freedman Ltd, alias our new landlord. Following on from this notification, we also received a letter from our new landlord, Cyril Freedman, requesting that we make an interim payment for the sum of £450.00, in lieu of 'service charges' …

The above property is in a building comprising of eight individual flats, converted in 1989, and hence all tenants are recently new to the property. Having discussed our concerns regarding the freehold sale with fellow tenants, it was apparent that the majority of tenants were also led to believe that they should of had the opportunity or at least had an interest in buying the freehold. After further discussions one of the tenants approached her solicitor for further advice.

The solicitor advised that, as tenants, we should have received 'First right of Refusal' for the purchase of the freehold, and that we should serve notice on Cyril Freedman Ltd under section 11 of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1987 … We were also informed by our solicitor that we had a requisite majority, ie) the names and signatures of four qualifying tenants, but if we wanted to formally respond under this Act we had to do so within 30 days of receiving notification of the sale.

Unfortunately due to these timescales we were unable to gain further signatures, as some of the tenants were on holiday, and the notice had to be served in a matter of days.

We have since received confirmation from the remaining tenants that, had they been available at the time, they would have been more than willing to put forward their names. Like most of the tenants we were at the time not aware of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1987, giving tenants 'First Right of Refusal'".

I must emphasise that the new Bill should contain a provision that full information should be made available to all leaseholders who want to buy their freeholds.

"On the 31st July 1995, having issued follow up letters through our solicitor we had still not received a response from Cyril Freedman Ltd. At this point we were advised and actually issued through our solicitor court proceedings, for a 'Declaration Order' namely that we have the requisite majority in respect of Qualifying Tenants and an Injunction Order requiring the Landlords to serve us with the requisite information under the Act …

The appointed management agent for Cyril Freedman Ltd is David Glass Associates (DGA), and for reference both Cyril Freedman and DGA reside at the same address!!

We have since received various threatening letters from DGA, chasing up the outstanding payment of £450.00. In one of their more recent letters they stated that they 'will serve proceedings for forfeiture of the lease and possession' of our flat. On the advice of our solicitor we have responded to these letters, explaining that we are taking legal proceedings under the Landlord and Tenant Act 1987."

What a scandal. I will not quote the rest of the letter, as it is not relevant.

I urge the Minister, therefore, to incorporate new clauses in the Bill, including: a right to manage; sanctions against the failure of landowners to abide by existing legislation; fairer and simpler valuation procedures; and streamlined rules for enfranchisement to cut through unnecessary red tape preventing leaseholders from buying the freehold of their homes.

Anything short of those measures will not give leaseholders the opportunity of freehold ownership. In other words, the so-called party of ownership should put its money where its mouth is.

Since I entered the House, eight years ago, I have introduced eight commonhold or leasehold reform Bills. In 1992, I was made "Radical of the Year"—to take up the phrase used earlier—because of that fact. "Bore of the Year" would have been a more appropriate title—[HON. MEMBERS: "No!"] It is certainly true that on none of those occasions did I match the eloquence and skill of my hon. Friend the Member for Hastings and Rye (Mrs. Lait) in bringing this legislation before the House.

My hon. Friend did not merely make a good speech—this is not an Opposition motion or the fluffing out of a ten-minute Bill—but presented a complete piece of well-thought-out, skilfully crafted legislation in a truly elegant Bill that shows many of the hallmarks of the work and effort put in by the Lord Chancellor's Department during the many years that we have been trying to get commonhold on the statute book.

I was slightly depressed by the previous debate on treasure trove, which was trying to put a mediaeval law right and bring it up to the late 20th century. We want a law on commonhold in the late 20th century to put an 18th-century law right—a single judgment on which all leasehold is based, which makes it impossible to enforce a positive covenant.

Now, some 200 years later, we are finally close to being able to allow the millions of our citizens who live in multi-occupancy flats and apartments to have the same rights of freehold as those living in suburban houses. The intention is to provide them with the rights that are enjoyed everywhere else in the world. It is extraordinary that, for example, the American system of a co-operative or condominium is not allowed under English or Welsh law. It is extraordinary that the way in which millions of Europeans live in apartment blocks—"copropriété" as it is called—is not allowed under English or Welsh law.

The Bill is in such a complete state that it could be passed as it is. It sets to rights the very real concerns expressed by many people living in leasehold property without the right of freehold. With only 38 clauses, it steers its way sensibly and clearly through a legal minefield—no other aspect of the law is more difficult than property law.

One has to ask why the Bill has taken so long and why, alas, we fear that it may take longer still. I hope that I shall not be described as cynical, but perhaps the answer is that the House enjoys adversarial politics so much that any measure that is not widely opposed does not get noticed. Perhaps if the hon. Member for Greenwich (Mr. Raynsford), who has done so much to advance the cause of commonhold, were to say that the Bill was an evil Tory plot to extend the rights of home ownership, Conservative Members would get a little more excited about it. However, I know that the hon. Gentleman would not say such a thing. Perhaps the proposal has been in the doldrums for so long precisely because no one is criticising it.

In 1987, the Law Commission came up with its review. It was the result of problems that had existed for 10 or 20 years and whose ferocity was mounting. The problems did not start in 1987, but it was the first clear sign that our Law Officers were unhappy with the law.

In 1991, the then Minister for Housing and Planning, my right hon. Friend the Member for Ealing, Acton (Sir G. Young), made a speech that lightened the hearts of many of us. He said:

"The Government have decided to introduce for England and Wales a scheme providing for the freehold ownership and communal management of flats and other interdependent buildings with shared facilities. This new scheme, called commonhold, was proposed in 1987"

by the Law Commission. He went on:

"It is proposed that commonhold should be available for all types of land use—whether residential or commercial … In addition to providing for the freehold ownership of flats and other relevant properties, the scheme would establish standard democratic management arrangements".—[Official Report, 12 July 1991; Vol. 194, c. 1239.]

That speech is a distant but clear echo of what my hon. Friend the Member for Hastings and Rye said today.

It is worth looking back to that 1991 debate because it underlines my point, which is that everyone is on the same side in this instance. The hon. Member for Hammersmith (Mr. Soley), who was then the Opposition spokesman on housing, welcomed the proposal; Sir Hugh Rossi, who was then the Member for Hornsey and Wood Green, welcomed it; the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) welcomed it, as did my hon. Friend the Member for Eltham (Mr. Bottomley), the hon. Member for St. Helens, South (Mr. Bermingham) and the hon. Member for Norwood (Mr. Fraser), who has long had an interest in the subject. Mr. William Benyon, who then represented Milton Keynes and who was a fierce opponent of much leasehold reform, welcomed the commonhold proposals.

That was an early sign of the extent of the agreement. Then came the party manifestos. Both the Conservative party manifesto and the Labour party manifesto contained a clear commitment to commonhold. I know that the Conservative party's manifesto contained that commitment, because I put it in myself. The hon. Member for Greenwich probably placed the commitment in his party's manifesto.

The measure is favoured by the big estates, which were my bitter opponents during the process of leasehold reform. Credit should be given where it is due: the first organisation to float a commonhold paper—before even the Law Commission—was the Grosvenor estate. It has said throughout that it is a sensible, progressive and overdue reform of the law.

The measure has been favoured by Back Benchers who were opposed to leasehold reform. In my last feeble attempt to introduce a commonhold Bill into the House on 17 May last year, I carefully gained the support, in a ten-minute Bill, of a number of hon. Members who had opposed leasehold reform, including my right hon. Friend the Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Mr. Jopling), who had spoken out with great effect against some of the measures in the leasehold reform Bill. He supported the commonhold measure, as did my right hon. Friends the Members for City of London and Westminster, South (Mr. Brooke) and for Chelsea (Sir N. Scott), my hon. Friends the Members for Fulham (Mr. Carrington) and for Carshalton and Wallington (Mr. Forman) and others.

It is important for Ministers to realise that there is a universal thrust in support of the measure. It is favoured not just by those hon. Members I mentioned but by Members of another place, who did so much to scupper the leasehold reform proposals. It is supported by academics and by building societies and the Council of Mortgage Lenders, which realise at first hand how much better it would be to be able to advance a mortgage on an apartment or a flat underwritten by a freehold—that is to say, a commonhold—than one underwritten by the dwindling asset of a complicated lease.

The measure is supported by developers—a point touched on by my hon. Friend the Member for Hastings and Rye—because developers who are building a project from scratch do not want to be left with a residual freehold once they have sold the leasehold; they want to be out of the property. They would much rather those people who had bought into the shops, the shopping mall and the flats above it were the owners of that property. The developers could make the development and be gone.

What went wrong? Why has the measure taken so long to reach this stage? There are two reasons: the first is that, the more the Bill was worked on—after the initial Law Commission report and the 1,000 replies, all of which supported commonhold, were sent to the Lord Chancellor's Department—the more complicated it became. I remember seeing the proposals for commonhold at one stage and they looked like two thick telephone books—they were, perhaps, bigger than the Scott report. Clearly, the matter had got out of control, as more and more people put in bells and whistles—80 pages were devoted to winding up commonholds.

It is quite remarkable that my hon. Friend has managed to produce a well-worked-out piece of legislation that extends to 38 clauses, in which the winding up of commonhold is reduced to 11 clear and legally apposite clauses. We have pulled back from the enormous wad of legislation that might have come out of the Lord Chancellor's Department had we adopted commonhold earlier. I know that the Cabinet Committees that look at these things always met the representative of the Lord Chancellor's Department with a sigh as he came in bearing the two enormous and heavy tomes that were to constitute such a simple new form of land tenure. This real difficulty has now been surmounted by the Lord Chancellor's Department, which has done so much work, and by my hon. Friend.

We also have not got as far as we should have because commonhold has been caught up with leasehold reform. My hon. Friend the Member for Hastings and Rye made it very plain this morning that, although we are here under the official title of the Leasehold (Reform) Bill, this is a commonhold Bill—therefore, it is a particular delight to see my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department in the Chamber, and not someone from the Department of the Environment. The Bill is about the law rather than about housing.

Commonhold is not a leasehold reform measure, although, in Standing Committee on the last Leasehold (Reform) Bill, the hon. Member for Greenwich and I made much play of the fact that we should have commonhold in it. We received many reassurances that it was not necessary to have commonhold in the Bill because it was to come along soon and would be on the statute book, perhaps even ahead of the leasehold reforms. However, that has not happened, and much progress is to be made.

As a result of the difficult battles over the leasehold reforms, when something comes to the Government's business managers with leasehold reform on it, they carefully—and quite understandably—shuffle it to the bottom of the pile and the danger signals flash. How many dukes will be leaving the Tory party if this measure goes through?

There are no such dangers in relation to this measure. As I said earlier, everyone—not least the landlords and the property industry—wants this measure. I hope that the message will go out clearly from this morning's debate that this issue should not make danger signals flash, but has the support of those who are interested in getting a proper form of property tenure.

The Bill has the support of the building society industry because it knows that commonhold is a better bet for lending money on than a diminishing leasehold. It knows that, once this measure is adopted, the market will work and that a commonhold flat that comes on to the market will command a premium over a leasehold flat. A first-time buyer will say, "Here are two similar properties—which would I rather have? Of course, I would rather have one that has a commonhold underpinning it, because I know that I will not have a diminishing asset." As Conservatives, we believe in the market—it is the market, not politicians, that will make this measure a huge success. It is our job to act as midwives and to ensure that it is legally possible.

The other great advantage will be that every commonhold property will have the same rights and—let us not forget this—the same responsibilities as every other commonhold property. Every leasehold property in the land has a different set of rights, responsibilities and small print. There will be an enormous simplification of the law.

Can my hon. Friend make it clear whether he thinks that the Bill would diminish the choice of those who want purposely to select a diminishing asset? Supposing a man aged 75 wanted to move to a smaller home and preferred to buy a flat with just 25 years to run on its lease, so that he could spend more in the remaining years of his life on expensive holidays. Would the Bill diminish the range of flats available for such a man to choose from?

No, it would not. There will still be a variety of leaseholds available, particularly in the shorter-term market, because leaseholds under 21 years will not even be covered by the enfranchisement rights in the Bill. Therefore, all leases under 21 years would tend to remain as leaseholds and would not become commonholds.

For the reasons I have already made clear, no measure is better designed for the last year of a Parliament than the Bill. No measure is better for inclusion in the Queen's Speech in the autumn of this year in the months running up to the election. The Cabinet fixes the contents of the Queen's Speech in May and early June each year, so this debate is opportune and well timed.

If we are able to show the Minister that both sides of the House would be happy to see the well-worked-out commonhold measure on the statute book and that it could pass through the House of Commons and the House of Lords in the necessarily feverish atmosphere before the general election, it is highly likely that the Bill will be adopted in the Queen's Speech. I look to the hon. Member for Greenwich to reassure us that, should such a measure be included in next year's legislative programme, his party will do its best to see it reach the statute book.

The Bill is now ready to be adopted. It is ready—perhaps 200 years late—to become part of British law, and I hope that it will do so.

First, may I make it absolutely clear that I greatly welcome the Bill? Although it is unusual to be keen to be here on a Friday morning, I was pleased to have the opportunity to listen to the speeches of my hon. Friends the Members for Hastings and Rye (Mrs. Lait) and for Kensington (Mr. Fishburn), who made a good case for commonhold.

Like many hon. Members, I have had to deal with the great difficulties of constituents who have experienced problems with the leases on their properties. From earlier debates, it is clear that, in many parts of London, the only way in which to buy property is to buy one on leasehold. That in itself is a reason for reform. Many of my constituents have come to my surgery and recounted the great difficulties they have had through high service charges and in buying their freehold under previous legislation. Like my hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet (Sir S. Chapman), I greatly supported the campaign by the Evening Standard to introduce further changes to the law.

I must confess, however, to a great sense of deja vu. When I first came to the House in 1992, one of the great measures of that Parliament was the Leasehold Reform, Housing and Urban Development Bill. It was an enormous Bill, and my impression was that it would solve all leasehold property problems almost at a stroke, and would give many rights to leaseholders. It is a matter of great regret that the experience of my constituents since then has revealed that, for various reasons, that Act has not succeeded in achieving its objectives.

I am not a lawyer, so I cannot say why the Act has failed its objectives in law. I know that there have been all sorts of debates about the extent to which the Upper House decided to dilute that legislation. Perhaps its Members should share much of responsibility for the failure of that legislation's objectives.

I re-read the Second Reading debate on 3 November 1992 to remind myself what was then promised. There was great optimism that the leasehold reform measures would achieve the desired objective. In that debate, the Secretary of State promised that there would soon be a commonhold Bill. My hon. Friend the Member for Kensington alluded to that. Why have we not had on the statute book a measure with such universal support? I echo the plea to the Government seriously to address that issue.

On Second Reading, the Secretary of State said that half of all leaseholders found problems with their freeholders. That is an astonishing proportion. If the measures in that Bill and in the current Housing Bill, which may be amended to strengthen the rights of leaseholders, and the measures in this Bill, take effect, they will go a long way towards redressing the imbalance.

I am not a lawyer, and I do not profess to understand the intricacies of property law. My hon. Friend the Member for Kensington spoke about two big volumes that almost equal the size of the Scott report and deal with one aspect of commonhold. I congratulate him on producing a Bill that is at least small. I confess that I do not understand every clause, because lawyers have a wonderful way of drafting legislation that makes it difficult for us mere mortals to understand. I suppose that that is why we pay so much when we seek their advice.

I understand that the property tenure of leasehold is unique to England and Wales. There is debate about why there is such a property tenure at all, but I understand that the Bill does not seek to abolish the tenure—perhaps it should. The Bill provides the opportunity in law for the right to have commonhold as a tenure, and that must be right, because the public are greatly confused. Many of those who first enter the property market buy a flat or a maisonette, and there is often no choice between a freehold and a leasehold property.

Back in the long distant days of 1972, when I got married, I sought to buy a property at a time of gazumping. What a difference there was in the property market at that time: I should not like to see the return of gazumping. Property prices were going up fast, and our only choice was a recently built maisonette in south Norwood. It was leasehold, and we paid ground rent. Fortunately, there were no problems, but we did not have the choice of buying freehold.

People come to my surgery and say, "I own my property but I have a terrible problem. I have a bill of £2,000 for repairs, and I do not understand it." When I hear that, I think, "Hang on, this person owns his property." I have to pinch myself to appreciate that, although he owns it, he does not, because someone else can put difficult obligations on him. That is why I strongly oppose leasehold tenure as a form of property ownership: it is neither one thing nor the other.

My hon. Friend the Member for Kensington introduced a ten-minute Bill last year, and I have read the excellent speech that he made then. His speech today was also excellent. My hon. Friend said that, if his ten-minute Bill had been passed, within a generation there would be no leasehold. I am not sure about the length of a generation, but I am sure that my hon. Friend was absolutely right.

I have a brief comment about a matter that is part of the general debate about leasehold reform. The Bill does not tackle the difficult problem facing the limited group of leaseholders who decided to purchase their local authority flats. I urge my hon. Friend the Member for Kensington to consider whether there might be a way of dealing with the problem.

In some ways, such leaseholders are in a much more difficult position than people who lease private flats. One of the distinct differences is that, when they lease a flat from the local authority, they are often in a minority in the block of flats; the others remain local authority tenants.

Unlike a private landlord, a local authority often spends large sums of money refurbishing the block of flats. I have two serious examples. In the first, the council is doing the usual work—putting in new windows, central heating, kitchens, bathrooms and the like—at a cost per flat of roughly £8,000 per year. For someone who has bought a £40,000 council flat for, say, £24,000 after the discount, to spend £8,000 against one's will on the property's refurbishment is an enormous burden.

The other example is even worse. In blocks of flats where, understandably, the local authority wants to put overcladding on the outside to keep flats totally watertight, with all the refurbishment, the cost ends up at a staggering £22,000 per flat. Some of my constituents are faced with such a bill. They cannot afford to pay that £22,000. It is unlikely that they will secure a mortgage, because the property is not worth much money. They are often in a worse position than leaseholders of private property.

Although it might be possible in law to strengthen their position dramatically and to give them many more rights, the matter needs to be considered, because, for leaseholders, such bills are unacceptable and make the concept of owner-occupation meaningless.

I hope to reassure my hon. Friend that, under commonhold, it will be possible, under certain conditions, for people whose freeholder is the social landlord to have commonhold, but the issue is more likely to be dealt with under the housing legislation that hon. Members are considering.

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that bit of optimism. It could be a big bit of optimism if the Housing Bill achieved that effect. I was pleased that, on 18 January. the Secretary of State for the Environment announced that he would introduce, I think, five measures to strengthen leaseholders' position. I do not mind whether changes to the Housing Bill or to a commonhold Bill achieve the desired objective, which must be that anyone who aspires to home ownership is encouraged to own a home, and, having acquired it, really owns it. They must not be in the crazy position whereby bills of a magnitude that they cannot afford can be imposed on them.

Those people have no control over those bills and, to all intents and purposes, the ownership of the property is meaningless to them. That must be changed. In that spirit, I warmly welcome my hon. Friend's Bill and hope that the Minister will be able to say when the Government will introduce a suitable measure to deal with that serious anomaly.

Madam Deputy Speaker, I am grateful to be called. I apologise for an overlong intervention on the hon. Member for Ealing, Southall (Mr. Khabra) and will do penance by making a short speech.

I join my hon. Friends in congratulating my hon. Friend the Member for Hastings and Rye (Mrs. Lait) on introducing this important and radical Bill. For reasons that she explained, she calls it the Leasehold (Reform) Bill. She need not worry. It has nothing to do with leasehold reform; it involves the new concept of commonhold.

The other week, the Government Whip on duty instigated a debate by moving the Adjournment of the House. At the end of the debate, the Government's supporters were encouraged to vote against the Adjournment of the House. We did. If my memory serves me correctly, we won the Division by one vote, and the Government Whip on duty immediately moved the Adjournment of the House. I am trying very hard to learn about the procedures of this House.

Constituents have raised three particular grievances about this area of the law. First, a number complained that they thought that, under legislation, they had the right of first refusal to buy their freeholds. In fact, the owner went over their heads and sold the ownership to another party. It is absolutely right that, as a matter of urgency, we should reinforce part 1 of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1987 to deal with that problem, through stiffer penalties or whatever.

The second principal concern that has been expressed to me by constituents is that there are sometimes two freeholders who affect the property in which they live. In one case, the building itself is owned by one freeholder, while the ground immediately in front of it—if the leaseholders do not get control over that ground, living in the property is nonsense—is owned by another freeholder. That problem should be addressed.

Perhaps my strongest criticism concerns cases in which a leaseholder tries to deal with a freeholder when he or she has been presented with what he or she regards as unfair service charges, and is then immediately threatened with forfeiture procedures. That is quite wrong. There are other problems, but those are the main ones.

I am especially pleased—my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon, North-East (Mr. Congdon) mentioned this—that, on 18 January, the Secretary of State for the Environment announced that he would table five amendments to the Housing Bill. The hon. Member for Greenwich (Mr. Raynsford) has reminded us that they have not yet been dealt with. Whether those amendments will be dealt with on Report or in Committee I do not know. I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister can enlighten us on that point. I know that the Government have acted.

I take up one point made by the hon. Member for Southall. Introducing legislation in this complex area means that we may find that there are still loopholes, or areas that have not been covered. I think that the Government are going about the matter in the right way.

My hon. Friend the Member for Croydon, North-East said that he would like the leasehold concept to disappear. I think that there is a case for leasehold, and I pray in aid my own humble property. I occupy the ground floor of a very modest property, and somebody else occupies the first floor. I would rather deal with a managing agent representing the freeholder than with the person upstairs. [HON. MEMBERS: "Name him."] That is not a reflection on the person who lives upstairs, whose sex I will not give. He—[Laughter.] He could equally say, "I do not want to deal with the gracious gentleman who lives downstairs, because he is not there 52 weeks in the year, and I may not know where to get hold of him." There is a case for leasehold; it has an important part to play. More importantly, leaseholders should have the right to buy the freehold or to enter the new concept of commonhold.

The Bill has 38 clauses. I very much took to heart what my hon. Friend the Member for Kensington (Mr. Fishburn) said about the complexities of these matters. They are difficult, and we must look at the whole matter carefully.

I join my hon. Friends—and, I am sure, the hon. Members for Greenwich and for Southall—in paying tribute my hon. Friend the Member for Kensington. I am told that he is not standing at the next election. That will be an undoubted loss for the parliamentary Conservative party, as I would like to think it will be for the whole House. I pay tribute to his skill and perseverance in proposing all the commonhold Bills over the past eight years. I am glad that his surrogate, my hon. Friend the Member for Hastings and Rye, looks as if she will achieve the aim of his hard work.

I back the Bill. It is timely. I hope that it is not the last year before the next election, to take up the point made my hon. Friend the Member for Kensington. I am very happy to remain in the House until well into May next year, and see a new Session, but that is not matter for me. I commend the Bill to the House.

I very strongly support the concept of commonhold and therefore the Bill. As far as I am concerned, the sooner commonhold is introduced the better. I regard it as a piece of unfinished business, not only because there is a clear and extant Government pledge to bring in commonhold but because I do not regard leasehold enfranchisement, important though that is, complete without commonhold. Indeed, I originally very strongly supported leasehold enfranchisement on the understanding that commonhold would be swift on its heels to make it a more effective and manageable innovation.

I am greatly impressed by the initiative shown by my hon. Friend the Member for Hastings and Rye (Mrs. Lait) in promoting the Bill. She is very assiduous in the House and is known to be so in her constituency. It is typical of her to use this opportunity to introduce a measure that will directly benefit her constituents and that springs from her experience of constituency case work.

To an extent, I have experienced the problem of heavy constituency case work arising from leasehold problems. It is somewhat ironic that in the first case that I handled—an elderly lady who faced a one year's service charge bill of more than £20,000 because of major works planned for the property in which she lived—the freeholder's company happened to be based in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Hastings and Rye, which of course I do not at all hold against my hon. Friend. The Bill is excellent and she is doing the House a great favour by introducing it.

There are two principal reasons why I support commonhold. The first springs from the cases that I have mentioned—Showing the clear inadequacy of leasehold and the necessity to find measures that can overcome such problems. The introduction of commonhold is therefore very important to the success of enfranchisement. It is also important to bear in mind the sort of problems that are increasingly emerging as a result of leasehold. Incidentally, I find that the weight of case work and other problems caused by it are increasing.

I certainly accept some leasehold arrangements work perfectly satisfactorily. Indeed, I was a leaseholder in a very happy arrangement with a managing agent and a freeholder who owned the property. The problem is that happy arrangements are dependent not so much on the operation of the law on the good will of the landlord. If that good will is not present, or if a bad landlord purchases the freehold, the whole happy arrangement collapses.

There are two particular sorts of unhappy consequence. One is where a rapacious freeholder simply buys properties to use leaseholders as milch cows to generate cash. There are many easy ways in which they can load unreasonable charges on leaseholders. There are many complex arrangements available to freeholders, which I shall not go into, to enable them to raise money from leaseholders. In such cases, it is not surprising that leaseholders wish there to be a remedy. It is unsatisfactory that the law as it stands cannot easily provide that remedy.

The arrangement goes wrong also when the freeholder is essentially a property speculator and buys a property because he or she—or it, if it is a company—sees an advantage in developing it. There was an especially good—or bad—example of that in my constituency. The firm of managing agents and the freeholder had a close relationship. Indeed, it was suggested by some that they were the same people. They bought properties because they saw the possibility of extending them upwards and downwards—in other words, developing basements and attics and adding on, as it were, to increase capital values and to generate the extra income that would ensue.

The only way of overcoming such problems is by radically changing leasehold law. Commonhold is one important way of achieving that.

My second reason for supporting the concept of commonhold so strongly is that I believe that English property law needs a new form of tenure. Commonhold answers that demand. I rather agree with my hon. Friend the Member for hon. Friend the Member for Croydon, North-East (Mr. Congdon), who said that he would like to see leasehold disappear. I regard it as an anachronistic form of tenure. Perhaps it should have withered on the vine along with socage, frankalmoin, serjeanty, copyhold and other forms of mediaeval property holding which eventually disappeared in 1660 or 1925, or at some stage in between.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Kensington (Mr. Fishburn) said, leasehold has been under a question mark for 200 years. Its origins, however, date back even further than that. It is necessary to bring the law up to date and tidy it by doing away with such a form of tenure. The introduction of commonhold would be a major step in that direction and would considerably improve and clarify the law.

There is another problem that might be taken up as we examine the Bill or through the tabling of amendments to it. It might also be taken up in another form of leasehold reform. The problem is that leaseholders may remain as a minority in a building, and are therefore unable to enfranchise and unable to take advantage of commonhold. In that situation, there remain significant weaknesses that we must try to remove. I compliment the Government on their planned amendments to the Housing Bill, which to an extent will address the problem. There are, especially, the problems of forfeiture and the ability of leaseholders to challenge unreasonable service charges that are imposed on them by freeholders. That is one of my basic reasons for supporting commonhold.

I remain extremely concerned about leaseholders of local authorities or, in the case of my constituency, of Broomleigh housing association, which took over the property in question from the council. That association has imposed extremely high service charges on a number of leaseholders—in some instances in excess of £25,000 for one year—for capital works. Such sums are often considerably more than the property's original purchase price. The people involved are incapable of paying such service charges, which are completely unreasonable. The matter has been handled badly. There is some evidence that, while the handling has been improved, the law behind it has not yet been adjusted accordingly.

Mechanisms are needed to prevent unreasonable service charges from being levied. Last year, I introduced a ten-minute Bill which proposed measures to deal with that. Some of them have been taken up by the Government's amendments to the Housing Bill. I was especially keen on capping the charge that could be imposed in any year. Reasonably set, that would enable landlords still to carry out their duties and exercise their freedoms but would also have protected leaseholders. I hope that that, too, can be considered as part of the overall reform of leasehold law, of which I believe commonhold is an important part.

For all those reasons, I strongly support this reform, which I regard as part of a package of leasehold reform measures, some of which have already been carried out and some of which are yet to come. It is a complex matter; property law always has been. My hon. Friend the Member for Hastings and Rye has made a valiant attempt to make it as simple as possible, on which I congratulate her. I hope that by this Bill, or through other means, commonhold will be introduced into law as quickly as possible.

I am grateful for the chance to speak in the debate and support my hon. Friend the Member for Hastings and Rye (Mrs. Lait) who has introduced this Bill to put right a wrong about which many hon. Members have spoken. The problems that leaseholders face are difficult, and often make their lives hell. It is right that the House should, as a matter of urgency, put that right. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Kensington (Mr. Fishburn) on his patience and determination in bringing up this matter in a sort of Brandon Rhys Williams memorial Bill. We owe it to our former colleague to ensure that Brandon's ideas are brought into law in full. That the matter is set out so simply in the Bill is a credit to all concerned.

It does not matter whether this is part of a great radical reforming agenda or rampant conservatism. I would take being accused of being a Conservative by the Opposition and of being a radical by a Conservative Member both as compliments. I can happily live with both. It does not matter whether this is part of leasehold reform or establishes a new agenda or form of land tenure. I regard it as reforming the leasehold land tenure system.

Hon. Members have come to the debate because they recognise that leasehold is not working in the way that it should. That has been going on for a long time. As hon. Members have said, the Government first recognised the problem officially in the late 1980s. Draft Bills of one sort of another have been appearing for nearly 10 years. Even lawyers should be able to reach agreement among themselves in that time. However, nothing astounds me about lawyers and they may want to argue about whether it is 10, nine or eight years. That could make it take longer for them to sort it out.

It has been said, rightly, that the Government are making valiant efforts to put right some of the wrongs. We know how leaseholders have been treated. It is sad in a way, because leaseholding can work perfectly well where there is good will on both sides. There would no need to detain the House if all landlords behaved reasonably, but it is clear that they do not. We need reform to make sure that people who are being abused by freeholders are protected.

I am impressed by the Bill. I started my London political career in Dulwich. Lewis Silkin had brought forward the Leasehold Reform Act 1967. I was the chairman of Dulwich constituency Conservative party—after it was brought in, but not that much after. My party gave up that seat because it put forward a candidate—who later represented another seat in the House—who supported the leasehold system. That was a lesson in my political life, and it should be a lesson to my colleagues in the Government that there is a need to take action. There are political consequences when we do not put right a wrong, and this is a wrong that must be put right.

In my constituency, I have seen the way in which the relationship between freeholders and leaseholders has broken down. Like other hon. Members, I have had case after case of abuse by people who have bought up freeholds so that they can squeeze the last drop of money out of innocent home owners who never expected that to happen to them.

One such example is Chapel court in Bush Hill Park in my constituency. Linkproud Ltd, Empress Management and the solicitors Paul Chevalier and Linda Malthouse deserve to have their names mentioned as much as possible, especially under the cover of parliamentary privilege in connection with their disgraceful activities. They have threatened and abused leaseholders and extorted money in the most disgraceful way. It should make us ashamed that our law allows people to behave in that way. They have used bullying tactics and threatened the full force of the law to try to seize properties when small parts of bills have not been paid, and have tried to load up mortgages behind home owners.

The Evening Standard in London has given publicity to that bunch of swindlers—that is the only thing that lawyers and solicitors protected by the Law Society can be called when they behave in this way. I am surprised that the Law Society, with its new management, has not decided to look carefully at the operations of swindlers who pretend to be respectable solicitors. I hope that the Law Society will try to redeem its reputation by looking into cases such as Chapel court.

I shall not detain the House, because other colleagues wish to speak today. It does not seem sensible to detain the Government in getting their act together any longer.

We have heard that other countries are perfectly capable of operating a system that is fair to home owners who want to own a flat. Australia, the United States and countries on the continent of Europe do so, as does Scotland. If Scotland can do it, surely England and Wales can get its act together and put matters right. I hope that we can. As an Englishman with a little Welsh blood, I do not like to see the Scots getting away with it. The Scots can be insufferable when they have got things right. The Scots can be insufferable anyway, as anyone can, but when they have got it right they are even worse, because we know that we should be doing the same as them.

I hope that, when the hon. Member for Greenwich (Mr. Raynsford) speaks on behalf of the Labour party today, he will give a commitment that Labour will support the measure and give full backing to the Government either by supporting the Bill today or by coming back as soon as possible with their own suggestions. The Government should do so before a general election. Opposition Members' reasons for wanting to reform the law are just as honourable as ours and they believe just as sincerely as we do that the law must be changed. There is cross-party feeling in the House that something must be done. We do not want to have to come back in the new Session to ask why commonhold is not included in the Queen's Speech. It must be included.

It has been shown that it is easy to introduce commonhold and that it is not controversial. We are not confiscating freeholders' rights. Commonhold is an alternative. If they wanted to, freeholders could sell their rights by agreement to existing leaseholders and form commonhold associations. We are not expropriating anything from anyone. We are trying to set a fair system for land tenure that encourages owner-occupation in our society and stakeholding—whatever we want to call it, it is a good thing, and we should all support it today.

I am grateful to catch your eye, Madam Deputy Speaker. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Hastings and Rye (Mrs. Lait) for bringing this important measure to the House. I was impressed by the detail, care and attention that she has put into the arrangement of the clauses of the Leasehold (Reform) Bill. She must have spent much time on the minutiae of the Bill, for which we should all commend her.

I also congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Kensington (Mr. Fishburn), who was my Member of Parliament at one time, on having brought such a measure before the House on eight separate occasions. I only regret that he will not carry on, like Fox, to the 21st occasion, until he gets his Bill through. I commend him for his efforts and for his care and attention in trying to look after his constituents and other people who have been affected.

The hon. Member for Ealing, Southall (Mr. Khabra) made a thoughtful speech, but tried—without great success—to turn this into a party political issue, which fortunately it is not. If he is so concerned about protecting tenants from large landowners, why did the Labour party oppose our home ownership policies when we tried to sell council houses to tenants? After all, we are the party of home ownership—the party that believes in people owning their own properties—and our record in the past 16 years or so has proved that. We have put about 3 million people in possession of their properties at the expense of some large owners—council landlords who have not looked after their tenants as well as they should.

I want my hon. Friend the Minister to take great note of the Bill. I hope that he will either support it today or bring forward similar legislation in the next Queen's Speech—certainly before the next general election, as my hon. Friend the Member for Edmonton (Dr. Twinn) said. It is an important issue, both for the Conservative party and the people of Brentford and Isleworth, and it is, therefore, important for the Minister to assure us that it will be a matter of major legislation and concern for the Government before that election.

I have worked on behalf of leaseholders in my constituency, particularly those in Brentford dock, where tenants have had enormous problems because their freehold has been sold underneath them, so to speak, several times; they have reached the point where they do not know who owns it. They have also had problems with, among other things, service charges, management costs, repairs and lifts. That leads me to believe that commonhold is the way forward.

Commonhold is a freehold development in which two or more people can come together and form an association to achieve home ownership, which is an important consideration. I shall take this opportunity to explain in some detail how the system will work. A commonhold is a freehold development of two or more units which share services and facilities and so require a system for communal management and for the ownership of the common parts.

The promoter of a commonhold—the person who establishes it—might be the developer of a new development. Many new developments are being built, new properties are being taken up, construction is taking place and the economy is reviving. Today, interest rates came down, which means that more properties will be purchased. People will want to go into the market and buy—the market is reviving. Not only the Conservative party but the Labour party should encourage that trend, and we should talk up the economy. I am rather disappointed by Labour Members, because they are always talking down the country. We want to revive confidence in the economy and the property market, and it is absolutely futile for the Labour party to talk it down, creating a sense of gloom where there is no gloom.

A block of flats is the most obvious example of a commonhold, in which the flats would be owned on a long leasehold basis. There would be nothing in commonhold legislation to prevent commonhold from being established for non-residential purposes. Equally, the system might be adopted for commercial or mixed-use developments, and the units would not have to be horizontally divided like flats. Therefore, the system could also be used for housing, industrial estates and even shopping precincts, with flats or offices above. It could also be applied to agricultural buildings and surrounding farmlands.

The owner of a commonhold flat or other unit—the unit owner—would, unless and until the commonhold was brought to an end, own the freehold in his unit. That ownership would automatically carry with it the right to essential passage—such as for access to gas, water and electricity—and the right to perform any communal service, such as for cleaning, maintenance, use of the common parts and insurance of the structure. If a building had other communal facilities—such as parking, gardens or recreational facilities—the right to use them would go with the unit.

The commonhold association, for which the Bill provides, would be a corporate body established under the commonhold legislation and run exclusively by the unit's owners, who would then own and manage any common parts as well as the services and facilities. The commonhold association would have the benefit of a charge against each unit in respect of any arrears of service charge, to give it comparable protection to that which applies to service charges under current leases.

On the winding up of commonhold, the freehold in the individual units would automatically be transferred to the commonhold association, and the owner's right to his unit would be converted into a share of the association's net assets. The commonhold share would be calculated according to the proportions laid down for each unit when the commonhold was established. That arrangement would ensure that the value of the commonhold property, as a whole, could be realised by a single person, such as the liquidator of the association, thereby avoiding the problem that would arise if all unit owners continued to own their units.

I should like briefly to speak about the commonhold association. The commonhold system would include a self-contained scheme for the establishment, conduct and—in conjunction with the winding up of the commonhold itself—dissolution of the commonhold to run the commonhold. The corporate body would not be established under the Companies Acts, although similar procedures would apply where appropriate.

The creation of a corporate body would be considered appropriate for a number of reasons. The most important are: the aims of achieving a high level of standardisation; the fact that some of the more stringent requirements of the companies legislation are considered inappropriate to mutual organisations of that kind; and the restriction of the special rules about the liability of each individual, as we have seen in certain schemes set up under the Companies Acts and Friendly Society Acts.

This measure is long overdue. As many hon. Members have said in this debate, in some ways it puts right some of our more antiquated leasehold laws and brings a new form of common ownership into its own that is in keeping with the times and the conditions in which we live. More and more young people leave home and find jobs. They want to live by themselves until they get married and to have an equity stake in property. If they are allowed only leasehold tenure, as commonly happens, it will lead eventually to conflict, as has been explained. Commonhold, however, will enable young people in particular—those who are in the job market, especially in urban areas, and flat dwellers—to have a stake in common ownership. That is highly commendable and very much in line with the Conservative party's home ownership policy. I support the Bill.

I congratulate the hon. Member for Hastings and Rye (Mrs. Lait) on her success in the ballot and her decision to introduce a Bill on commonhold. We believe that commonhold is a key concept for future housing policy in Britain, and the hon. Lady has done the House a service by giving us an opportunity to debate it. She moved the Second Reading of the Bill with conviction, clarity and good humour, despite the frustration that she must have felt, sitting here earlier this morning watching the clock ticking away and thus watching its prospects of progressing beyond this place today fade, too.

We heard several valuable contributions from hon. Members on both sides of the House, all of whom have direct constituency experience of the problems of leasehold tenure. My hon. Friend the Member for Ealing, Southall (Mr. Khabra), who stayed with us until literally a moment ago and then apologised to me and, I think, the Minister for the fact that he had to return to his constituency, made the case for a more far-reaching reform. Like many other hon. Members, he highlighted constituency examples of the injustices currently faced by leaseholders.

The hon. Member for Kensington (Mr. Fishburn) started elegantly by admitting to eight previous attempts to introduce legislation on this subject. I acknowledge and pay tribute to his commitment over many years—like his distinguished predecessor in the Kensington seat, he has campaigned for leasehold reform and the introduction of commonhold. It is a sad comment on the reluctance of some people in his party to make progress that we are still debating the issue rather than seeing commonhold in effect. I hope that it is not that which explains his decision to leave Parliament at the coming election.

The hon. Member for Kensington asked about my party's approach to next year's legislative programme. I have great pleasure in assuring him that the Labour party will be only too pleased to introduce a comprehensive leasehold reform Bill in the next Queen's Speech.

The hon. Member for Croydon, North-East (Mr. Congdon) expressed disappointment with the failings of the Leasehold Reform, Housing and Urban Development Act 1993 and articulated concern about the problems associated with leasehold tenure. He highlighted the case for more safeguards for leaseholders of councils and other social landlords, and I think that he was speaking for many hon. Members in doing so.

The hon. Member for Chipping Barnet (Sir S. Chapman) made the case for sanctions against landlords' failure to offer first refusal to tenants under the Landlord and Tenant Act 1987 and sought safeguards against forfeiture of the lease being used as a weapon to coerce leaseholders into paying extortionate service charges and repair costs. I think that he spoke for many people who have similar views.

The hon. Member for Beckenham (Mr. Merchant) said that leasehold was simply an inadequate form of tenure and that he was looking to commonhold as a new form of tenure that he saw as a replacement for leasehold. I shall have more to say about that in due course.

The hon. Member for Edmonton (Dr. Twinn) also highlighted the extent to which leasehold was not working. He gave several examples of the problems confronting leaseholders and the potential abuse of the system. Rather intriguingly, he referred to the dangerous political consequences of not acting to remedy wrongs against leaseholders. Given the size of his majority, I am sure that he has every reason to raise that concern.

The hon. Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Mr. Deva), after making some rather over-optimistic comments about the state of the housing market—views which will not, I suspect, be shared by the millions trapped in negative equity or the 1,000 households a week which are losing their homes through repossession—gave us the benefit of his views on the complex arrangements for the establishment of commonhold associations and on other aspects of the Bill. He ended intriguingly by arguing the case for common ownership and associating it with Conservative party policy. I shall not explore that concept any further, as those with a long memory on the subject will know that it could possibly bring us into interesting territory.

As is widely known, England and Wales are almost unique in the world in retaining a system of leasehold tenure for residential lettings. The system has many drawbacks: it gives unique advantages to landowners, who are able to accumulate and retain substantial property holdings while securing repeated capital gains through the sales of new leases as the old ones come to the end of their term. The leaseholder bears most of the costs of maintaining and improving the fabric of the property while the freeholder benefits from that investment. Not surprisingly, leaseholders have increasingly protested when the odds appear to be weighted so unfairly against them and in favour of landowners.

In recent years, there has also been growing evidence of disgraceful abuses of the leasehold system by some unscrupulous freeholders and their managing agents. They have sought to pressurise and intimidate leaseholders, with threats of large service charges or repair costs, into meeting unreasonable demands or forfeiting their lease. The Evening Standard and its assiduous property correspondent, Mira Bar Hillel, deserve praise for exposing those shameful malpractices and for pressing the case for further leasehold reform.

A series of leasehold reform Acts has been passed by the House. The most effective by far, as my hon. Friend the Member for Ealing, Southall stressed, was the Leasehold (Reform) Act 1967, which gave leaseholders in houses the right to buy out the freehold of their homes. It saved many thousands of leaseholders from the prospect of homelessness as their leases came to an end. It ensured an orderly transfer of large numbers of leasehold houses into the freehold tenure—the natural tenure for owner-occupation.

Subsequent leasehold reform measures have focused primarily on the position of leaseholders in flats, but they have, sadly, proved less successful than the 1967 Act. The Landlord and Tenant Acts of 1985 and 1987 were supposed to give redress to leaseholders against unreasonable demands by the freeholder and against the inefficient or incompetent management of their blocks. The Leasehold Reform, Housing and Urban Development Act 1993 was supposed to give leaseholders in flats a similar right to enfranchise their homes as the 1967 Act had given to leaseholders in houses.

All three Acts have failed to make a substantial impact. Landlord abuse remains rife, as the antics of Messrs. Bebbington and their colleagues Malthouse Chevalier and Co. have revealed. Those abuses have rightly been exposed by the Evening Standard. The sanctions supposedly available in the 1967 Act proved hopelessly cumbersome and ineffective—as the hon. Member for Chipping Barnet highlighted in his speech. We have also seen how, in the past year, a large landowner, Smith's Charities, was able to sell a substantial estate over the heads of its leaseholders, with impunity and without offering the leaseholders first refusal. Ministers have been unable to point to a single case of leaseholders securing effective remedies through the 1987 Act.

At the same time, the number of leaseholders in flats who have succeeded in buying the freehold of their homes has been small. The restrictive rules of the 1993 Act—which reflected, more than anything else, the influence of large landowners in ensuring that the Act was not effective—together with the costs of the process, which can be high, and the unbelievably byzantine rules that have to be circumnavigated by any leaseholder aspiring to acquire the freehold of their block, have provided all too many opportunities for reluctant landlords to frustrate the aspirations of leaseholders. As my hon. Friend the Member for Burnley (Mr. Pike) highlighted in his short intervention, as we warned as the 1993 Act was passing through Parliament, those loopholes and problems have prevented leaseholders from obtaining, on any significant scale, the benefits of enfranchisement that they were promised.

Why have all the measures failed? The answer is not hard to find, and I have already hinted at it. It lies in the uncomfortably ambivalent attitude of the Government and the Conservative party towards leasehold reform. Ministers know that a radical reform package to give leaseholders effective redress against landlord abuse and the right to buy their homes is necessary. However, as Ministers remain beholden to the big landed interests, they have not been willing to give leaseholders simple, effective and cheap remedies or to introduce simple machinery to enable leaseholders to buy their freehold at a fair price.

I am afraid that the surrender to the big landowners' interests in the Leasehold (Reform) Act 1993 was a sad example of those influences stopping a process that everyone in the leasehold field believed was right. The concessions that were made to the big landowners during that Bill's progress through Parliament produced a bureaucratic nightmare of red tape and hidden loopholes, with endless scope for escalating costs to frighten off all but the most determined leaseholder.

What ought to be done to assist leaseholders? The Labour party published its proposals for leasehold reform last October in a policy paper entitled "An End to Feudalism". The proposals set out in that paper included, first, the introduction of commonhold as a new form of tenure for home owners living in flats. I do not claim any originality in this regard—this is a tenure that is widely welcomed by people across the political spectrum; indeed, it was contained in the manifestos of the Labour party and the Conservative party at the last general election.

Secondly, we advocated the simplification of the enfranchisement rules to make it easier for leaseholders to buy out the freehold of their homes. Thirdly, we argued for a fairer and simpler valuation procedure to cut unnecessary costs and to safeguard leaseholders from unreasonable demands from the freeholder. Fourthly, we argued for a ruthless pruning of the complex red tape and the bureaucratic procedures implicit in existing legislation to make it easier for leaseholders to get through the process.

Finally, we argued for effective remedies for leaseholders against landlord abuse, the charging of unreasonable service charges or costs for repairs, and inefficient management. We advocated the right to manage for leaseholders so that they could take over the management of their homes if they wished to do so. These proposals have been warmly welcomed by a large number of leaseholders who have responded to our consultation and we have no doubt that they form the basis for a fully effective leasehold reform package.

The introduction of commonhold as a new tenure for people living in flats is an important part of this package. Therefore, we obviously welcome the initiative of the hon. Member for Hastings and Rye in introducing her Bill. As she pointed out, although it is called the Leasehold (Reform) Bill, it establishes the concept of commonhold and does not set out proposals for the reform of leasehold. We support the concept of commonhold.

There is very little disagreement about the merits of a commonhold framework as against the existing leasehold system. As the hon. Lady explained in introducing her Bill, it enables people to own the freehold of their home while, at the same time, through the commonhold association owning a share in the freehold of the whole block. It gets rid of the need for a separate freeholder, and it gives the occupiers of the block proper control over the management of their homes.

Few people, other than those who hanker nostalgically for a feudal system of landholding or who have a vested interest in retaining the status quo, will object to the concept. Indeed, my only surprise today—which has been shared by a number of hon. Members who have spoken—is that it has taken so long for legislation to introduce commonhold to pass through the House. As I have already mentioned, there were unequivocal pledges to introduce commonhold in the 1992 Conservative party and Labour party manifestos. However, as with so many of the promises made in the Conservative party's 1992 manifesto, the pledge to introduce commonhold has not been honoured.

The hon. Lady has done her bit to try to rescue her party from the embarrassment that it must feel about this. She has arrived like a knight in shining armour at the eleventh hour, and she should be congratulated for that. Given the lack of parliamentary time available for consideration of a measure of this complexity and importance, one has to ask: why have the Government not introduced the Bill as a Government measure? One also has to ask: why are the Government not prepared now to give Government time for the Bill to enable it to progress further?

Ministers can hardly claim that they have not had time—the manifesto pledge to which I referred was made four years ago, and a draft Bill has been floating around in the Lord Chancellor's Department since at least 1990. Ministers cannot claim that other legislative measures have kept this measure out, as we have one of the lightest legislative programmes for many years. In addition, in this very light programme, we are currently considering two Bills on housing, either of which would have been a suitable vehicle for the Government to include commonhold measures if they had wished. The only conclusion that can be drawn is that, as with so many of the other leasehold reform proposals in 1985, 1987 and 1993, the Tory Government really do not have the political will to grasp the nettle.

If the concept of commonhold has such wide support, why have the Government been so slow? Apart from the usual forces of inertia, and reluctance to admit that anything can be better than the British tenure system—a reluctance that I fear is rather strong in the legal profession, and presumably is quite well entrenched in the Lord Chancellor's Department—I suspect that the main force for delay is the reluctance to grapple with the central issue of commonhold as a replacement for leasehold.

If commonhold is, as we believe it should be, a tenure that will take over within a relatively short period as the main form of tenure for people buying flats, there must be an effective mechanism to enable existing leaseholders to convert their leaseholds to commonhold. Such a mechanism would, however, once again threaten the vested interests of the big landowners. Is it therefore any surprise to see the outcome in the form of the Bill that we are debating today—I do not blame the hon. Member for Hastings and Rye, because she clearly inherited the Bill—ducking the issue of conversion from leasehold to commonhold?

The Bill essentially provides for the establishment of a commonhold framework in new developments where the occupiers agree a commonhold framework from the outset. The provisions of clause 6, which set out the initial conditions for establishing a commonhold, are clearly most easily met in the case of a new development. They appear to have been drafted with that prospect in mind. Conversely, when we look for the arrangements for conversion from leasehold to commonhold, it appears from subsections (3) and (4) of clause 8 that that will be possible only where 100 per cent. of the occupants of the block, and indeed 100 per cent. of those holding any interest in the block, are in favour.

I would welcome confirmation from the Minister on whether my interpretation of those provisions are correct. If it is, it will be difficult for leaseholders in existing leasehold properties to meet that condition. It only requires one occupier in the block, perhaps an elderly person who simply does not want the hassle of a change of tenure, to put an insurmountable obstacle in the way of establishing a commonhold.

More to the point, it provides an easy loophole for any freeholder who wants to prevent his leaseholders from being able to convert to the commonhold tenure. All that that freeholder has to do is to retain just one room in the block, even if that constitutes one hundredth or one thousandth of the total accommodation, or to let it on an assured shorthold tenancy. That is all that is required to frustrate the hopes of all the other leaseholders in the block to convert to commonhold. That cannot be right.

Once the commonhold has been established, the provisions of clause 8(7), as I understand them, allow major decisions affecting the commonhold to be taken provided they command the support of 80 per cent. of the units in the commonhold. That sensible measure is designed to prevent a single or unrepresentative voice from preventing the commonhold association from managing its affairs expeditiously. There may be questions about the choice of the 80 per cent. figure as the threshold. That could create problems, for example, in a block of four flats where just one occupant would retain a veto over the actions of the other three. The principle of a threshold below 100 per cent. must, however, be right.

As I understand the Bill, however, the option for overriding a simple or unrepresentative objection does not apply before the commonhold is established. That will come as a severe disappointment to many leaseholders who would like to convert to commonhold.

Chas Johnson of CARLA—the Campaign against Residential Landlord Abuse—which has done so much in recent months to support and mobilise leaseholders who have been the victims of unscrupulous landlords, has written to me to say that the Bill does nothing to deal with the existing leasehold system and merely provides an alternative in the form of commonhold. He writes:

"Commonhold as an optional alternative is of no real use. As a mandatory form of tenure for new and converted multi let residential property in the future (with the abolition of leasehold) it would provide an elegant form of property ownership and would be welcomed. If it is to be an option then clearly the rogues who work the leasehold scams will be more than happy to opt for leasehold."

This dilemma is at the heart of the Bill. If it is an option only for new developments, it will play only a marginal role for many years, and may never replace leasehold as the main form of tenure for flat owners.

A more effective measure allowing scope for easy conversion from leasehold, and with the clear objective of replacing it within the reasonably near future, will clearly be necessary, but, of course, that threatens the vested interests of the big landowners, and the Government are clearly not prepared to take on those interests.

David Marcus, a partner in Franks, Charlesly and Co., and widely recognised as one of the country's leading experts on leasehold and related matters, makes the same point. He writes:

"I think all those in favour of commonhold have been working on the basis that it will be a substitute for the leasehold system; this Bill is drafted on the basis that it will be an alternative system; frankly I cannot see that unless it is made compulsory that it will have any effect. It is a completely new system and I cannot see that any of the large landlords will be prepared to accept it unless they are compelled to do so. My scenario would be that it would be compulsory after a particular period of time. Once the major house builders start adopting it then a lot of others will follow in their footsteps."

The hon. Gentleman says that the Conservative party is against the measure because it does not want to upset large landlords. But as the scheme is voluntary, how can the hon. Gentleman make that assumption?

Plainly, the hon. Gentleman has not been listening closely to what I have said: the Conservative party is not prepared to introduce a scheme involving an element of compulsion which will enable leaseholders to transfer from existing leasehold properties to commonhold properties, because that would threaten large landowners to whom the hon. Gentleman's party is still financially beholden.

David Marcus makes another valid point about the lack of reference to experience elsewhere. In Australia, the strata title system has been operating for many years with considerable success. One had hoped that those responsible in the Lord Chancellor's Department for drafting proposals for the commonhold system, which operates on similar principles to strata title, would look closely at the Australian experience.

One of the conclusions to be drawn from that experience is that an appropriate body to provide advice and help with the resolution of disputes about the establishment and operation of strata titles is essential. I can see no provision in the Bill for such a service, and the only body that provides expert specialist advisory services in this field, the Leasehold Enfranchisement Advisory Service, has no guarantee of funding beyond the end of this year. I hope that the Minister will tell the House how he expects the need for advice and assistance on the resolution of disputes will be handled. I assume that his Department would neither welcome nor be equipped to handle the scale of inquiries that are likely if commonhold takes off as a viable tenure. The Australian evidence suggests a figure of about 20,000 inquiries a year on issues relating to strata title.

Clauses 3 and 5 give the Lord Chancellor's Department extensive powers to make rules and regulations. Although it may be sensible to have some of the detailed provisions—in particular, those regulations that may need to be varied in the light of experience—made by order rather than included in primary legislation, that in itself has probably helped to keep the Bill down to a manageable size compared to some of its draft predecessors. Nevertheless, it would be helpful to have an indication of how these powers will be used. Will the Minister outline the scope and main features of the commonhold constitution rules that will be made under the provisions of clause 3 and of the regulations that may be made under clause 5?

Will the Minister clarify one of the provisions in clause 16 on the recovery of service charges? That clause specifies that service charges are recoverable from the owner of a commonhold unit, or from the person who is registered as the owner where ownership has not yet been changed on the register, or from the person who is a tenant under a long lease of the unit.

Although I understand the first two provisions, which cover the owner or the previous owner, I am puzzled by the reference to a leaseholder. As I have stressed, the Bill appears to require 100 per cent. unanimity before a commonhold can be set up and specifies that only owners of units within the commonhold can be members of the commonhold association.

How, then, do leaseholders come into picture? If it were possible to convert from leasehold to commonhold with less than 100 per cent. participation, we could envisage circumstances in which some residual leaseholders might remain, but that is not provided for in the Bill. If the Bill envisages the prospect of leaseholds being created by owners of commonhold units, surely, over time, that should undermine the integrity of the commonhold. I would welcome clarification on that point.

We would want to consider further other points of detail if the Bill were to progress to Committee, but I fear that that will not happen. Although the Bill is welcome in so far as it raises the issue of commonhold—a form of tenure that we view as an appropriate framework for home ownership in flats—unfortunately, as presently drafted, it is not the right way forward if we want to open the door to a significant number of commonholds.

The hon. Member for Hastings and Rye should be congratulated on having raised the issue. In doing so, she has helped to reinforce the case for a thoroughgoing range of leasehold reform measures. Unless substantially amended, however, the Bill would not be the right vehicle in the long term for a thriving and successful commonhold sector, replacing leasehold as the main tenure for owner-occupied flats.

We must wait for the return of another Government, with a real appetite and commitment to leasehold reform, to ensure not just appropriate commonhold measures that will allow the tenure to become the norm and to replace leasehold, but more thoroughgoing and effective remedies for leaseholders who have suffered too many abuses under the current system.

In the short time that the hon. Member for Greenwich (Mr. Raynsford) has left me to respond to the debate, I begin by congratulating my hon. Friend the Member for Hastings and Rye (Mrs. Lait) not just on her success in introducing this important matter today, but on the manner and content of her speech. She demonstrated that, in dealing with complex property law issues, she had a command of detail and could convey the essence of the Bill's proposals. I commend her for that.

I was pleased to note that speeches were made by a number of my hon. Friends. They included my hon. Friends the Members for Chipping Barnet (Sir S. Chapman), for Kensington (Mr. Fishburn), for Edmonton (Dr. Twinn), for Beckenham (Mr. Merchant), for Twickenham (Mr. Jessel), for Croydon, North-East (Mr. Congdon), and for Brentford and Isleworth (Mr. Deva).

I wish especially to single out my hon. Friend the Member for Kensington. He referred to his illustrious predecessor, Sir Brandon Rhys Williams. I am pleased that the bouquet was given to Sir Brandon. My hon. Friend will be unaware that my first experience in politics was as a schoolboy campaigning for Sir Brandon when he fought against Michael Foot in the by-election following the death of Aneurin Bevan. Sir Brandon played an immense part in the House. My hon. Friend has lived up to that in his time here.

Let me make the Government's position clear. They are firmly committed to the implementation of commonhold. As my noble and learned Friend the Lord Chancellor reaffirmed in the other place less than two weeks ago, it remains our firm intention that appropriate legislation should be introduced as soon as possible. Before I outline the steps that are being taken to advance the implementation of commonhold, it would be helpful to remind hon. Members of some of the background to the issue, most especially because of some of the comments on the period that has elapsed since the concept was first introduced.

In a nutshell, the purpose of commonhold is to provide owners in multi-occupier developments with the means of owning the freehold interest in their homes and, at the same time, to furnish them with a system for the efficient management of the development. That will have the dual advantages of affording owners a measure of control and security that is often believed to be lacking in long leasehold developments, although avoiding the difficulties of so-called "flying freehold" schemes. The emphasis of the commonhold system will be on co-operation between owners in the development that forms the commonhold. So long as the commonhold continues, the owner of each unit is the freeholder, and the commonhold will be managed by an association comprising the unit owners.

The commonhold association will own any common parts and will be responsible for their repair and maintenance. That will be financed by a service charge payable by the unit owners. In certain circumstances, it will be possible to bring the commonhold to an end, in which case the ownership of the unit will automatically be converted into a share, fixed in advance, of the ownership of the entire property within the commonhold. Statutory rules will govern the conduct of the commonhold association and the rights and obligations of the unit owners in relation to each other.

Clearly, the success of any multi-occupied building or development will depend on the existence of a satisfactory and enforceable regime of mutual rights and obligations between the people who live in it. However, that is not provided by the present law governing the ownership of freehold land. It is, of course, possible for the subdivision of a building to be organised by means of a leasehold structure, and there are doubtless many developments that operate on a perfectly satisfactory basis, especially where the tenants also have effective control of the freehold estate by means, for instance, of a jointly owned management company.

Neither commonhold nor any other form of land tenure will ever eradicate the possibility of disputes between neighbours, as we have been reminded during the debate. However, commonhold can have considerable advantages over the leasehold system.

The first and most obvious advantage of the commonhold system is that it will enable people to own the freehold in their homes in developments that would otherwise necessitate a leasehold structure. People naturally resent what they regard as the temporary nature of ownership that a lease confers in a property for which they regard themselves to have paid full value—an observation made by my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon, North-East. People also resent having to pay a ground rent, which may be high, seemingly for nothing. In addition, there is no such thing as a standard lease. The wide variation in lease terms presents pitfalls and uncertainties for an intended purchaser, and does nothing to simplify or reduce the cost of conveyancing.

Furthermore, a lease is a declining asset and leases that are coming towards their expiry cease to be mortgageable. The security of a building society or of any other lender ultimately rests on its ability to sell the mortgaged property and to recoup the amount owing to it. Lenders rightly act with caution in advancing mortgage funds. Typically, a lease that has less than 40 to 45 years to run will frequently not be regarded as satisfactory security for a loan. It also follows that, where a lease is nearing expiry, the value of the interest that it confers will diminish. Those problems will not apply to the ownership of a unit that is a commonhold.

A further advantage is that the commonhold system will automatically provide a statutory framework of rights and obligations which is directly enforceable by and against each unit owner in the commonhold and which will be standard from one commonhold to the next. The unit owner's position will no longer depend on the vagaries of the terms of the lease under which the property is held or on the willingness of the landlord to co-operate in enforcing the unit owner's rights.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Hastings and Rye has pointed out, one major problem with leases is that important decisions on repairs and on the provision of services are often left in the hands of landlords whose interests may be opposed to the interests of the tenants. That tension can be exacerbated, especially when the financial value of the landlord's interest in the building is negligible when compared with that of the tenants. As we have heard, there have been a number of well publicised cases. I will not go over them now, because they have been touched on by so many of my hon. Friends and by the hon. Member for Greenwich.

The Government are acutely aware of the problems that can be caused by bad landlords. For the future, the problem would be addressed by a commonhold system which would put the management of property in the hands of a democratically run commonhold association. In those circumstances, the interests of the unit owners and the commonhold association would clearly be identical. In addition, the requirement for fundamental decisions affecting a commonhold to be made unanimously will protect the interests of minorities. That has, of course, to be subject to certain measured provisions to prevent the operation of the commonhold from being thwarted by a few recalcitrant unit owners.

The Government also recognise that the problems caused by the abuse of the leasehold system by bad landlords have to be tackled immediately for the protection of existing tenants. It is not merely enough to rectify the problem for future generations by enacting legislation on commonhold. To that end, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment has brought forward a package of additional rights for tenants in the Housing Bill. My hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet asked when my right hon. Friend would be dealing with the detail of the five proposals that he intends to bring forward. It is my understanding that my right hon. Friend intends to table those amendments in Committee. We therefore do not have very much longer to wait.

The genesis of commonhold can be traced back at least as far as 1965, when the Wilberforce committee on positive covenants affecting land recommended the introduction of an optional basis for new, large, multiple developments of a modified strata title system, similar to what had been introduced a few years earlier in New South Wales.

Matters developed further in 1984, when the issue was referred to the Law Commission. In its report "The Law of Positive and Restrictive Covenants", it recognised that the law is defective in imposing mutually enforceable property rights and obligations. The law allows only restrictive covenants to be enforced between successors in title of the original landowners, and there is no direct way in which to enforce positive covenants, such as rights of support or an obligation to keep a fence or a wall in repair.

Those problems are of course accentuated in blocks of flats, where each flat often depends on its neighbour for support and shelter. The very stability of the building depends on proper maintenance and repair of the individual flats and the common parts.

The commission recommended the creation of a new interest in land—the land obligation—that is capable of subsisting as a legal interest like an easement, and which would impose a burden on the owner of one piece of land, either for the benefit of the owner of another piece, or as part of a development scheme. Those recommendations were accepted by the Government, then superseded to an extent by the commonhold proposals that were put forward, and therefore required some substantial revision to take account of the fact.

The commission recommended the adoption of some form of condominium legislation similar to that in America, Australia and various other jurisdictions. In response to the report, the Government established an interdepartmental working group, under the chairmanship of a law commissioner, to produce proposals for similar legislation in England and Wales. It reported in July 1987 and recommended commonhold as a new way in which to own property.

In fact, the Lord Chancellor published for consultation a draft commonhold Bill, as my hon. Friend the Member for Kensington said, which the Law Commission had prepared. Following the favourable responses that he received to the general principles, he announced the Government's intention to bring forward the necessary legislation.

The original draft of the Bill was, however, incomplete in various respects, and that is no secret. It has become clear in this debate that specific problems need to be addressed in many areas. The implementation of commonhold will mark a major milestone in the development of property law. The Government are determined that their proposals are implemented on the basis of technically sound legislation that will provide a firm bedrock for the establishment of what will amount to an entirely new system of land tenure. For that reason, the Government have not seen fit to proceed with their proposals until the draft legislation has been fully thought through and reworked to make it as effective as possible.

It is especially necessary in property law reform to ensure that the details of legislation are correct, since it may be very many years before land tenure problems become apparent. By the time that the need for reform manifests itself, the job of rectifying the problems without unravelling the complex arrangement of rights and obligations based on the original legislation will have become a major undertaking. That is even more important when the reforms concern people's ownership of their own homes.

The great property law reforms of 1925 illustrate how long major pieces of property legislation may be expected to last. Indeed, it is a tribute to the thoroughness with which the 1925 legislation was prepared that so much of it is still in force today, although a Government Bill is going through the House at the moment to adjust arrangements for trusts for sales of land.

rose—

I will not give way to the hon. Gentleman, because I know that my hon. Friend wants the Government's full response. In fairness, the hon. Gentleman cut into my time to some extent.

The benefits of our approach can be seen in the steady and continuing progress on property law reform over past years. All measures have proceeded, or are proceeding, with general support. That is in large part due to the lengthy consideration that they received before they were introduced into Parliament. Proposals that eventually found fruition in the Landlord and Tenant (Covenants) Act 1995 were transformed through that process from matters of deep controversy to a measure supported by all political parties and a wide range of interests of all sizes and types in the property industry.

I was hoping that during the debate we would see consensus across the Floor of the House on the need to proceed with commonhold. As anyone who has considered the original draft Bill will be aware, the aims and purposes of commonhold can be stated easily enough but the legislation required to implement the scheme will necessarily be complex.

I shall explain the reasons for the necessary complexity. Before I move on from the original consultation on commonhold, however, I should say something about one of the issues at the forefront of the consultation exercise. I refer to the circumstances in which conversion to commonhold will be compulsory.

The Government's consultation paper was issued prior to the enactment of the Leasehold Reform, Housing and Urban Development Act 1993. That measure fully implemented the Government's proposals for a leasehold enfranchisement scheme. It enabled tenants to acquire collectively the freehold of the building in which their flats were situated. When the proposals for commonhold were first mooted, they were closely associated with leasehold enfranchisement. Indeed, I expect that, following the implementation of commonhold, the two schemes will be complementary. However, commonhold is to be a stand-alone scheme.

In implementing commonhold, the Government have no plans to extend the right of tenants compulsorily to acquire the freehold of their buildings. To attempt to do that and to re-open the issue of leasehold enfranchisement in that way would, in our view, muddy the waters and introduce unnecessary controversy into the implementation of a reform that I believe is supported on both sides of the House. That point has been made with some force by my hon. Friend the Member for Kensington. In that regard, he was absolutely right.

The implementation of commonhold will necessarily involve the passing of detailed technical legislation.

When?

It is not that the basic principles of commonhold are particularly difficult to define. I have indeed endeavoured to touch upon most of them.

The Bill makes a creditable attempt to cover the main planks of the scheme. The difficulty with legislation will be in ensuring that commonhold schemes—they will represent one of the most fundamental changes in property law—will work efficiently and fairly, and without anomaly, in the context of the greater mass of the law generally, and of property and company law in particular.

The newness of the concept of commonhold has great advantages but great care must be taken to ensure that it does not bring with it outweighing disadvantages. It is necessary to provide comprehensively for a system that is superior to leaseholds while things are going well and to ensure that the same system does not result in a worse situation if things go wrong.

In my view, most landlords are decent, honest and competent. The problems lie with those who have not become such, so as to require legislative intervention. Great care must be taken, therefore, to ensure that the commonhold scheme is able effectively to deal with bad cases. Commonhold should not be capable of being used a vehicle for fraud. Nor should it be possible for continuing incompetent or dishonest operations to be hidden from view in a commonhold association.

Propositions such as these are simple to state but great care will be necessary to put them into practice. We must ensure that legislation meshes with existing law, and that the necessary protections and safeguards are reproduced as required.

I am pleased to report to the House that my officials, with the assistance of officials from other interested Departments, have been engaged in detailed work on these matters for some time and are in the course of preparing a commonhold Bill that will set out the complete regime for implementing commonhold. I hope that it will be possible for the Bill to be published for consultation during the summer so that hon. Members and others will have the maximum opportunity to consider the Government's proposals in detail.

The Government are determined to proceed with their task of preparing commonhold for implementation and will introduce the new Bill as soon possible to ensure that this important reform reaches the statute book. The issues that are being addressed to prepare the new commonhold Bill include corporate status. One has only to consider the implications arising from the fact that commonhold associations will be corporate bodies with legal personalities quite distinct from that of their individual members. Commonhold associations will therefore be different from, for instance, residents associations in existing leasehold developments, while their corporate status would afford them significant advantages in managing—

Object.

Object.

Second Reading what day? No day named.

Not moved.

Object.

Object.

Debate to be resumed what day? No day named.

Object.

I am glad to have the opportunity to debate local government spending in Lancashire, and especially the lack of Government support. I am grateful for this chance to discuss the matter, especially after the Minister's answer to me on 27 February when, at the end, he said:

"If Labour councillors cannot manage, perhaps they should resign."—[Official Report, 27 February 1996; Vol. 272, c. 707.]

It is not the Labour councillors in Lancashire who should resign, but him and the Government. They should give the people the opportunity to elect a new Government—and the quicker the better.

When the Tory party was elected to office in 1979, it had said during the election campaign that it wanted to free town halls. Ever since they took office in 1979, the Government have shackled local government by their legislation, and even more by the financial restraints that they have imposed. I refer particularly to Lancashire and its funding, but what I shall say applies to almost every council in the country.

Before I came to the House, I was a member of Burnley borough council, first as chairman of finance and then as leader of the council. I used to think that the position could not get worse, yet, year after year, it gets worse. The best example of saying one thing when not in office and doing another when in office is what the Tory party has done to local government.

Although today I shall concentrate on revenue spending, similar arguments apply to capital spending. The local education authority has no capital available to build or repair schools. Councils do not have the money to build urgently needed housing to rent or to improve housing stock. We are seeing housing standards decline. What a dismal, appalling record of 17 years in office.

According to the Association of County Councils, in Lancashire the band D council tax—I will use band D as an example—in 1996–97 will increase from £528.35 to £557.49, an increase of 5.5 per cent. Yet at the same time, the council has had to cut the services it provides because of the Government's appalling national underfunding of local government. I argue that, in total, they underfunded local government by about £3.66 billion in 1996–97. If we examine that figure, we see that it is even below the current spending level. That is appalling.

For continuation of service at the present level, allowing for inflation and so on, Lancashire county council would have to spend £978.1 million. The standard spending assessment—the figure that the Government say the council should need to spend—is £889.5 million. The capping limit—the limit up to which it is allowed to spend—is £934.6 million. The difference between the continuation of service estimate and the capping limit imposed by the Government is £43.5 million.

Lancashire county council has no intention of breaking the law, so it has been forced to reduce its expenditure budget by that figure. It has done so by several means. It has reduced the services committee estimates by about £18.5 million. Library hours have been cut. It fought hard not to close any library, because it felt that that would be an appalling thing to do. Cuts have been made in museums and the arts, and some £6 million has been cut from social services, which are absolutely crucial. We have had to cut £9 million from our budget for repair and maintenance of roads and road building in the year ahead.

In order not to have to impose further cuts, the council has used balances and reserves and sold some assets. That has brought in £16 million. That sort of thing can only be done once. The council cannot keep selling assets. Once it has sold them, it does not have them to sell. What will it do in future years? If it has no balances left, it cannot use them again.

In the Budget this year, the Government announced that priority was to be given to schools. They said that it had been a tight expenditure round. I would have said that it was not just a tight, but an appalling, expenditure round.

Lancashire has given the £26 million provided for its schools to the delegated schools budget, and the primary and secondary schools' budgets have been increased by 5.1 per cent. So Lancashire has again conformed with the Government's view, but if it gives that money in the way that the Government wish, it has to make bigger cuts in other areas. That means that, within education, leaving aside the schools budget, items such as discretionary grants, youth services and so on have had to bear an even greater burden of cuts than would otherwise have been the case.

I have received today, purely by chance, a letter from Lancashire county council in response to a complaint from a Mrs. Gregory, who is one of my constituents. She is not the only person who has raised this issue. She is connected with the running of the girl guides and brownies in her part of Burnley. They now have to pay for the use of premises, because the county council can no longer provide funding. In this day and age, it is totally unacceptable if we have to make cuts that affect our young people in that way.

The district auditor said:

"the level of balances is as low as is prudently acceptable"

in Lancashire. The estimated balance of the county fund at 1 April 1996 will be £14.2 million, falling to £8.5 million at the end of the current financial year on 31 March 1997, which is less than 1 per cent. of 1996–97 net expenditure. The district auditor believes that that is the prudent minimum that the county needs to keep in its reserves and balances.

In a report to Parliament on 30 November 1995, Lancashire education authority was shown to spend 1.5 per cent. on administration, which is well above the average in efficiency and, again, shows how well the county council is run. Lancashire continues to have the support of the district auditor. In his latest management letter, published recently, he said:

"Prudence and accountability have been features of the financial arrangements in the County Council for many years. This tradition of excellence continues despite the challenges of the present financial constraints."

He also said:

"We remain content that the overall management arrangements of the Lancashire County Council are sound and that a healthy culture exists within the County Council for the achievement of economy, efficiency and effectiveness in service delivery."

We also note that, in 1995–96, central administration in Lancashire is 1.87 per cent. of the potential schools budget, against an average for county councils as a whole of 2.09 per cent. and an average of 2.22 per cent. in all local education authorities. Again, that shows that Lancashire county council is not top heavy in administration, but keen to provide the services to the people of the county that are so essential—services that it was elected to provide.

With spending at 5.1 per cent. above standard spending assessment, Lancashire has one of the highest spends above SSA of all the shire counties. That largely results from the inadequacies of the SSA system, and the Government need to deal with it. It also results from the high needs of the county. I stress to the Minister that he must consider county councils that have particular needs. In Lancashire, our needs are due to deprivation, poverty, low wages. unemployment, and, in many parts of the county, the industrial heritage that has left us with dereliction that must be cleared as we go forward to the 21st century.

The area cost adjustment overstates the cost differential between the south-east and the rest of the country. By rectifying that discrepancy, the county council would, in our view, gain about £9 million in standard spending assessment. I am sure that the Minister will say that the Government are reviewing that. I know that it is being reviewed, but we had the problem in 1995, and we will have it in 1996–97. He knows that, whatever the review yields—he does not know what the outcome will be, any more than I do—and even if it is favourable in the way that I would wish, it will not solve this year's problems, nor those of the new financial year. which starts in a few weeks.

I shall give one example of what the area cost adjustments will mean for education. Schools in Essex have been provided with an SSA of £2,055 per primary school pupil and £2,791 per secondary school pupil. The comparative figures for Lancashire are £1.964 and £2,615 respectively. If one multiplies the number of children involved, one can see the vast difference in millions of pounds that it makes for Lancashire county council. We accept that some adjustment may need to be made for the London area, but we believe that the present adjustment is too high and needs to be reviewed—Lancashire should get more money as a result.

The Government's assumption that authorities generate interest payment receipts in relation to their size is flawed. Consequently, the Government over-estimate Lancashire's ability to generate revenue receipts by approximately £4 million, resulting in a reduction in the standard spending assessment.

Lancashire has an acute need for more money. It believes in the provision of services. I am sure that the Minister will recognise that, for county councils, the most expensive services to provide are education and social services. That would be so whichever party was in office. I know that, before he was elected to the House, the Minister—like me—had experience in local government, which is extremely useful for any politician.

Education and social services are expensive because they are both labour-intensive and crucial. Social services deal with people in need, whether they be elderly or disabled, and education services cater for young children whose start in life is the biggest investment we can make in the nation's most important asset for the future.

Lancashire needs more money from the Government, and we need it now. We need a fairer settlement, and a Government who believe in local government. There needs to be an end to capping. I have always accepted, and have said many times, that the Government, of whichever party, have the right to determine in Parliament what resources they will make available to local government. People may argue that the funds made available are insufficient, but I accept that, at the end of the day, the Government have the final say.

In my view, the Tories have failed local government and Lancashire. More than anything, we need a Labour Government as soon as possible, because the Tories cannot respond positively and make more funds available.

I am grateful to the hon. Member for Burnley (Mr. Pike) for giving me the opportunity to discuss Lancashire's needs as he sees them. It is interesting that his attitude represents the cobwebs of old Labour being drawn back over the new Labour breath of fresh air. His is the classic old labour approach—judging quality by the amount of other people's money being spent.

In a way, I am sorry for the hon. Gentleman's constituency. As I said in answer to his parliamentary question of about 10 days ago, to which he referred, the difficulty is that his constituents have a Labour county council; the hon. Gentleman's other difficulty is that the district county council—Burnley—is also run by Labour. The only thing that is saving many of the people in the area, perhaps through capping alone, is that they have a Conservative Government.

The Government have pushed councils such as Lancashire into recognising value for money, although the councils have been pulled down this road kicking and screaming. Compulsory competitive tendering was anathema to them, but it ensures better services and better value for money. The Audit Commission was introduced by the Government to improve value for money and standards. Those concepts were resisted, but are now slowly being taken on board, by so-called new Labour.

In terms of our general funding for 1996–97, Lancashire compares favourably with the other shire counties. On a comparative basis, Lancashire's standard spending assessment has increased by 3.1 per cent.

Many local authorities draw up a wish list, and we heard a bit of that today. Authorities add new demands, but someone ends up having to pay, be it the general taxpayer or the local council tax payer. Someone has to put up the money to fund the demands if they are accepted. The Government have sought to put an end to that approach once and for all.

We must recognise the importance to the economy of the way in which local authorities spend their finances. Approximately 25 per cent. of Government expenditure is local government expenditure. It is just as important for local government to squeeze effectiveness out of every drop of other people's money spent as it is for central Government. Local authorities must consider that point and take account of it.

They must realise that they can squeeze full value out of every pound they spend; they must be more effective, and they must provide better services. It is an old, but true, local government motto that the authorities exist to provide more and better services for less cost. That can be done—I know that it can be done, and so does the hon. Gentleman: it is a case of "More, better, for less". But that attitude is not being shown by the hon. Gentleman's local council of Burnley.

I understand that Burnley borough council is getting a reputation for being top heavy. I was given the example of an anti-poverty officer who earns £30,000 a year, which is a burden on the poorer people of the area. An equal opportunities officer was appointed; the post turned into a department with its own sub-committee. As a result, the band D tax level has risen from £87.13 three years ago to £143.99 now—an increase of 65 per cent. in three years. That is inefficient.

Other forms of inefficiency have been shown to me. I understand that Lancashire county council is on course to underspend by £3 million on home helps and related services. It has been calculated that the county's residential and non-residential care service—because it is in-house—costs £15 million a year more than if it was in the private sector.

Every district auditor's management letter is a curate's egg. We have heard about the good parts from the hon. Gentleman, but the district auditor has also reported that sickness among employees is costing the council £12 million a year. That matter should be looked into and sorted out.

The county council has formed an anti-poverty unit as part of its welfare rights committee. It has a starting budget of £100,000 a year, which would pay for 16,000 more home help hours. But the unit is nothing more than a talking shop.

Does not the Minister understand that Lancashire county council pays so much attention to poverty because such a high percentage of our people work in Burnley and Lancashire for less than £80 a week? That is a poverty wage; it is appallingly low pay; it is scandalous slave labour.

I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman is right with his figures, but it ill behoves local authorities to load people with extra taxes when they could do more, better, for less. It would be better to look into ways of providing better services for less cost.

The hon. Gentleman highlighted particular issues; each local authority has its own problems. He and I know that, because we have both been keen members of local authorities. It is possible to do something about providing individual services in a better way, but it is not right for the hon. Gentleman or me to participate in individual discussions about them.

Burnley ranks 33rd out of 274 shires in terms of SSA distribution. Lancashire is right at the top: it ranks fifth out of 35. Its SSA went up by 3.1 per cent. this year, and its SSA per head went up by 2.8 per cent. this year. Its education SSA went up by 5.1 per cent. this year. If other local authorities can manage, Lancashire can and should. If the controlling Labour party in Lancashire cannot deal with the issues, it should resign and let someone else take over.

Every year, we have to set the demands of local authorities in the context of what the country can afford. Local government spending accounts for a quarter of all public spending, and no Government, of whatever political complexion, can afford to ignore it. Public spending decisions are made in the context of the financial strategy to promote sustained economic development and to ensure higher living standards overall. The best way to protect local government services is to ensure that the national economy is strong, and inflation is under control.

To this end, we must continue to seek better use of existing public spending and keep control of public wage bills, and both local government and central Government have an essential role to play in that. There is no doubt that there is still scope for increased efficiency in Lancashire. It can be done by efficiency, yet the hon. Gentleman referred to cuts. If a successful private business—the people who pay the council tax—can do it, it behoves the public authorities to do it as well.

We have ensured that local authorities have an opportunity to move within their budgets—they have been given the greatest of opportunity to move, except for one or two ring-fenced areas. The SSA is only a sign of what the Government feel is a means of breaking up the total expenditure available for local government as a whole. Within that, every local authority has the opportunity to move, to flex, to use different ways of approaching problems and to use private sector methods—including the private finance initiative, compulsory competitive tendering and other methods—to produce more and better services for less. Local authorities must be answerable to their electorates in the way in which they exercise their responsibilities.

It seems to me that Lancashire county council needs an education. Its budget for 1996–97 has been set at £935 million, an increase of 3.2 per cent. above the level of inflation. It is one of the highest spenders in the country, with a budget that is more than 5 per cent. above its SSA. Its council tax is £557 for a band D property, the second highest figure for a county council. Last year, the council reported that it would have to draw heavily on reserves to maintain services, and now it expects to add £7 million to its reserves during 1995–96. Despite that, the authority plans to increase its spending in 1996–97 by 4.2 per cent.

There is no doubt that this county could do better with its money. It is loading costs on its local community, and it is crying out for more central Government funding. To repeat what I said in answer to questions last week, the Labour councillors who are in control of the county are obviously not in control; they should stand down and let the Conservative councillors take over.