Mr Norman St John-Stevas: Surely the great objection to raising the Premium Bond prizes at this moment is that what the Government are doing increases the gambling fever at a time when many moralists and sociologists are extremely alarmed at the growth of gambling. The objection is that the Government have provided another form of gambling.
Mr Norman St John-Stevas: I have, I think, about one minute or so in which to address the House, and I should like to take this opportunity to make my position plain. I am not condemning gambling, and I disagree on this point with my hon. Friend the Member for Wimbledon (Sir C. Black). I do not regard all forms of gambling as immoral. What is wrong is for the Government to encourage gambling in this form by...
Mr Norman St John-Stevas: Would not the right hon. Gentleman agree that it is just as important to attract the right type of recruit to the police force as to get recruits in sufficient numbers? Has his Department any plans in mind for attracting graduates into the police force? Unless this is done we shall be faced with a serious problem in the force.
Mr Norman St John-Stevas: asked the First Secretary of State and Secretary of State for Economic Affairs whether he will refer the wages structure and conditions of work of London Transport busmen to the National Board for Prices and Incomes.
Mr Norman St John-Stevas: Is not this failure to report the matter to the Prices and Incomes Board the final evidence of the failure of the Government to take their own prices and incomes policy seriously? Is it not clear to everyone—it must be clear even to the First Secretary—that the London Transport Board is about to make a hand-out to the busmen, together with a reduction in the services offered to the...
Mr Norman St John-Stevas: I have; 1957 was the date.
Mr Norman St John-Stevas: Yes.
Mr Norman St John-Stevas: I am sure we all congratulate the hon. Member for Hammersmith, North (Mr. Tomney) on his notable contribution to the debate. I only hope that he will not look down on those of us who have not had his advantages in life and who are, therefore, perhaps at a disadvantage in speaking on this Bill. I should also like to congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Lancaster (Mr. Berkeley) on the...
Mr Norman St John-Stevas: I would not agree with that. I think there is no reason why offences against the young should not be detected. There are the parents, who see that the rights of children are protected. The existing law imposes an impossibly high standard, as the mover of the Bill has pointed out. Celibacy is a high ideal; I certainly subscribe to that. But the fact is that few are capable of it. It requires...
Mr Norman St John-Stevas: I would accept that as being so. I am not saying that every Church has agreed on this, but the majority of official Christian opinion is in favour of a change in the law. Let us remember also two further points on this moral issue. While we are right to condemn homosexuality as being morally wrong in the objective sense, we must realise, first of all, that subjectively the moral guilt in the...
Mr Norman St John-Stevas: Surely also the very fact that we are in a crime wave is an additional reason for changing the law, because the police should not be concerned with these peripheral moral matters but concerned exclusively with catching the professional criminal. A powerful reason for reforming the law is precisely that it would clear away an irrelevancy which causes many people to withhold support from the...
Mr Norman St John-Stevas: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he will now make arrangements to raise the status of Her Majesty's mission to the Holy See from that of a legation to an embassy.
Mr Norman St John-Stevas: What possible justification can there be for this continual discrimination against the Holy See, particularly in view of its obvious diplomatic importance, as evidenced in particular by the recent papal initiative in Vietnam?
Mr Norman St John-Stevas: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what steps he proposes to take to reduce the present inflated dollar premium.
Mr Norman St John-Stevas: Since the dollar premium is now at a fantastic level of nearly 18 per cent., thanks to the actions taken by the Chancellor last April, would he now be gracious enough to do something to help the investor who has to pay the equivalent of a 5 per cent. capital levy when he realises dollar investments?
Mr Norman St John-Stevas: I beg to move, That leave be given to bring in a Bill to establish a means by which illegitimate children can be recognised at law by their fathers. The problem of illegitimacy is extremely grave. From the latest statistics which are available, we know that there are between 50,000 and 60,000 illegitimate births a year. That is 6.6 per cent. of the birth rate, and in England today we are...
Mr Norman St John-Stevas: asked the Secretary of State for Education and Science whether he will now take action to implement the proposals in the Goodman Re port on London orchestras.
Mr Norman St John-Stevas: I thank the hon. Lady for that most encouraging reply. Is she aware that music lovers throughout Britain, including my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition and my right hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Handsworth (Sir E. Boyle), will be most grateful to her for this? Will she allow me to say that it is clear now that her beauty is matched only by her generosity?
Mr Norman St John-Stevas: That may be so, but would not the hon. Gentleman agree that this Clause, while covering the cases he mentions, goes much further than those cases, and that this is the objection to it?
Mr Norman St John-Stevas: It is not my intention to talk this Bill out. I merely want to say that the point raised by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Southport (Mr. Percival) is not a Committee point; it is a major point of principle. I certainly would have found myself able to vote for this Bill if it had been merely a matter of Clause 1(a) and Clause 1(b), but I think that paragraph (c) makes a fundamental...