| Previous Section | Back to Table of Contents | Lords Hansard Home Page |
Scottish Legal Services Ombudsman and Commissioner for Local Administration in Scotland Bill
Brought from the Commons; read a first time, and to be printed.
Flood Prevention and Land Drainage (Scotland) Bill
Brought from the Commons; read a first time, and to be printed.
Policyholders Protection Bill
Viscount Chelmsford: My Lords, I understand that no amendments have been set down to this Bill and that no noble Lord has indicated a wish to move a manuscript amendment or to speak in Committee. Therefore, unless any noble Lord objects, I beg to move that the order of commitment be discharged.
Moved, That the order of commitment be discharged.--(Viscount Chelmsford.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
United Nations Personnel Bill
Read a third time, and passed.
National Heritage Bill [H.L.]
4.21 p.m.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of National Heritage (Lord Inglewood): My Lords, I beg to move that the Commons amendment be now considered.
Moved, That the Commons amendment be now considered.--(Lord Inglewood.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
[The page and line refer to Bill (59) as first printed for the Commons.]
Page 3, line 20, after 'fund)--' insert--
1
'( ) after paragraph 4 there is inserted--
4A. There may be paid out of the Fund to a trustee such remuneration, on such terms and conditions, as the Secretary of State may approve.",'.
Lord Inglewood: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do agree with the Commons in their amendment. The extension of the role of the National Heritage Memorial Fund to include the distribution of lottery proceeds has inevitably resulted in a very substantial increase in the time commitment required from the chairman of the National Heritage Memorial Fund and his fellow trustees. The powers conferred by the Bill are likely to increase the demand still further. The upshot is that we might be approaching the point at which it is no longer reasonable to expect trustees to serve on an unpaid basis as has hitherto always been the case.
The issue is partly one of fairness to those who are willing to serve as trustees, but we also need to bear in mind the possibility that it may become increasingly difficult to persuade high calibre candidates to accept appointment, especially as regards the time-intensive post of chairman, if remuneration is not available. The Government do not propose to take any immediate decisions on the matter; indeed, the current chairman of the NHMF Trustees, the noble Lord, Lord Rothschild, has made it clear that he has no wish to serve other than on the existing unpaid basis. Nonetheless, the NHMF is virtually alone among lottery distributors in that its trustees are currently precluded by statute from being paid.
Under the terms of the present legislation, which of course predates the advent of the lottery, the trustees can be offered only expenses and allowances. Legal advice is that allowances must be interpreted very restrictively and that amendment to the law is needed to enable the trustees to be paid in the usual sense of the word. We have therefore concluded that we should take the opportunity of the Bill to remove the current statutory bar on remuneration. That is the purpose of the amendment made in another place. It inserts an additional provision into Clause 2 to enable remuneration to be paid to trustees out of the NHMF's
Moved, That the House do agree with the Commons in their amendment.--(Lord Inglewood.)
Lord Donoughue: My Lords, perhaps I may say that, in general, we are pleased that this very useful Bill is completing its course. The amendment has our support and we are delighted to hear that it will not be implemented before the general election. There is a wider problem that I should just like to mention; namely, that of compensating people in the cultural quangos, many of whom work very hard without proper compensation. The amendment would usefully correct that position in a small area.
However, there is one particular point of concern about the Bill and that is the question of clawback--the provision to recover grants which have been made should the beneficiary subsequently sell at a capital profit with the help of the amendment. Can the Minister confirm that the arrangements for clawback are indeed satisfactorily in place and that they will normally be applied?
Lord Inglewood: My Lords, I am gratefully reassured by the remarks made by the noble Lord, Lord Donoughue, in support of the proposed amendment. The noble Lord raised the matter of clawback which is important. I hope that it might be helpful to your Lordships to put the matter on the record. The legislation gives the NHMF Trustees a power to attach such conditions as they think fit in making a grant. Such conditions may relate, among other things, to disposal of the heritage asset concerned and repayment of that grant.
So far as concerns actual practice, the NHMF will continue to monitor all projects after payments have been made and, where appropriate, it will clawback the grant paid under the terms of the grant agreement. Clawback can include a proportionate share of any capital appreciation in value resulting from the grant, should the heritage asset concerned be sold. That applies where the NHMF permits the sale of a heritage asset or where the conditions of grant are breached. I hope that that response will reassure the noble Lord.
Lord Strabolgi: My Lords, before the Minister sits down, perhaps I may ask him a question. I know that the Government will not implement the grants immediately, but can the noble Lord give me some idea as to how much the remuneration will be for the trustees? On this side of the House, we accept that the work of the trustees has increased enormously and that there was a great omission in the Bill, until now, in that they were supposed to work for nothing. I understand that the noble Lord, Lord Rothschild, has generously said that he will continue; but, if the Government are to attract trustees of the right calibre, it will be necessary to make it worth their while so that they are not out of pocket. Can the Minister give me some idea of the position in that respect?
There is a further point. A certain disparity has arisen between the quangos of other parts of our national life and those relating to the cultural heritage. I believe that those which relate to the cultural heritage are at a great disadvantage compared with some of the other quangos where the trustees are very handsomely rewarded. Can the Minister give me some idea as to the Government's thinking in that area?
Lord Inglewood: My Lords, as I explained in my opening remarks, we have no immediate plans to implement the changes proposed. It was a matter of putting the provisions on the statute book and then deciding, in the circumstances of some future case, what the appropriate level of remuneration might be. As no decision has been taken to implement the proposals, it would be premature to assess what might be the appropriate going rate for the job at the time. I hope that that answers the question put by the noble Lord, Lord Strabolgi.
On Question, Motion agreed to.
4.28 p.m.
Baroness Blatch: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now again resolve itself into Committee on this Bill.
Moved, That the House do now again resolve itself into Committee.--(Baroness Blatch.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly.
[The DEPUTY CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES (Baroness Turner of Camden) in the Chair.]
Viscount Tenby moved Amendment No. 100:
The noble Viscount said: In moving the amendment, I shall speak also to Amendment No. 101. We have already spoken at considerable length on the subject of driving disqualification as a disposal for non-motoring offences. In view of what is listed today on the Marshalled List after my amendment, I suspect that we are not yet out of this particular wood.
Clause 36 makes available to the court such disqualification where there has been wilful refusal to pay a fine or fines. I confess to having some reservations about the implications of using disqualification for anything other than a motoring or an associated offence. Let me say now that I understand fully the points made in particular by the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford, and the noble Earl, Lord Russell, on the third day of Committee.
There is justifiable worry that loss of mobility will obstruct those seeking jobs. After all, it is often loss of employment which makes some fine offenders get behind in their payments in the first place. Of course, the unpalatable fact, which many refuse to accept, is that a low income is not a solid basis for car ownership in the first place--a home truth which becomes only too
Having voiced these reservations, however, I have to weigh them against the fact that I, like so many others, have been seeking alternatives to custody for such fine evaders. Almost any initiative which seeks to do that ought to be given a try. In this I believe I share the views of the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh. I make two points only on this. First, there is to be a pilot scheme. Presumably if this shows that the proposal is unworkable or there is solid--I stress the word "solid"--evidence that it is proving inequitable, the provision will presumably be withdrawn. No doubt the Minister will confirm this.
I emphasise my second point in relation to the fears expressed on this subject earlier by some Members of the Committee. Magistrates will have complete discretion to use this sanction, or another more appropriate one. If a person's job is in jeopardy, the magistrates will not wish to use it as that will make the ultimate objective of paying the fine in question even more unattainable. I should have thought that was fairly obvious. I must assure the Committee that most magistrates are sensitive to these concerns and think long and hard before passing sentence. They endeavour to make that sentence as practical and constructive as possible.
I apologise to the Committee for the somewhat extended preamble. I now turn to the first of my amendments. The point about limiting the period of disqualification to 56 days is that after that time a driving licence has to be sent to the DVLA at Swansea and consequently existing penalty points will be automatically erased. These points will have been imposed as the result of driving offences of varying degrees of seriousness. It seems inappropriate that they can be wiped out by a sentence for a totally unrelated matter. Accordingly, it would surely make sense to keep the confiscated licence at the local court to which the offender could be listed to return on an appropriate date in the future.
I now turn to Amendment No. 101. Driving while disqualified is rightly seen as a serious offence which can attract a custodial sentence. Nevertheless, there are many who regrettably take that risk, as I am sure my magistrate colleagues in this place will confirm. On the whole, however, the police are able to keep tabs locally on such reckless and irresponsible drivers because most of them are known to them. In future they will have to deal with an added complication; namely, someone driving while disqualified whom they will have no reason to believe may be disqualified. This problem will be exacerbated if proportional reduction in the disqualification period is permitted as the full or part payment of the outstanding fine. A pilot scheme should surely above all be simple. The more complicated it is,
These provisions will make it much more difficult for the police to catch disqualified drivers and that, in turn, will increase the risk to ordinary members of the public from disqualified drivers. I invite the Minister to grapple with the following at two in the morning in driving rain:
Quite frankly, I pass on that, and if a traffic cop has any sense, he will too.
I appreciate that it may well be thought by some to be inequitable that an offender may be able to cancel a community service order early through settlement of a fine when that right may be denied to a disqualified driver. I suppose I could argue that one disposal is negative while the other--putting something back into the community through work--is positive, but I do not have high hopes that such sophistry would gain agreement on all sides of this Chamber.
To summarise, these amendments seek to make the provisions as simple as possible. They seek to remove the administrative and operational complications inherent in permitting offenders to buy their licence back through early repayment. I ask the Minister even at this stage to look at these provisions again and, if need be, consult other interested parties before Report. I beg to move.
Page 26, line 45, after ("period") insert ("not exceeding 56 days").
"And the total number is reduced if it is reduced by such number of complete weeks or months as bears to the total number the proportion most nearly approximating to, without exceeding, the proportion which the part paid bears to the whole sum".
Next Section
Back to Table of Contents
Lords Hansard Home Page