HC Deb 11 July 1963 vol 680 cc1427-552
Order for Second Reading read.
3.50 p.m.
The First Secretary of State (Mr. R. A. Butler) I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.
The House will be aware that the conference which was concluded last week at Victoria Falls, the report of which was issued yesterday as a White Paper, set in train the processes which will be necessary to secure the orderly and expeditious dissolution of the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland.
The Federation was established under an Act of the British Parliament. It therefore rests with the British Parliament to make the necessary legal provision for its dissolution and for the arrangements under which that dissolution is affected. The general purpose of the Bill is to enable Her Majesty, by Order in Council, to make the necessary provisions for this purpose.
I am sure that we would all wish to recognise at the outset of the debate that the Federation, which was established ten years ago, had great ideals and achieved considerable results, particularly in the economic sphere. As I stated during the conference, Her Majesty's Government have made their own assessment of the political realities at the present time and these are that two territories, at any rate, are unwilling to go on as members of the Federation and that, therefore, it cannot continue.
The Bill is an instrument which we put forward for approval because we have no alternative. However, we must not treat the Bill or the White Paper as being purely destructive. The Bill envisages collaboration between the territories and we can and must turn our attention to the future and not only the past. The passing of the Bill into law will not, by itself, bring the Federation to an end. It is, as I said, an enabling Measure. It is drawn in broad terms and while it specifies certain fields in which provision will or may need to be made by Order in Council, it in no way prejudges what the nature of those provisions may be.
These provisions will have to be worked out and a great deal of hard work will be necessary before they are concluded and put before the House. Their terms can be determined only when the arrangements to be made in connection with the dissolution of the Federation have been settled through the special inter-governmental machinery, which is referred to in the White Paper, established at the Victoria Falls conference.
The House will see that there is a close connection between the introduction of the Bill and the programme put in tram by the conference. It might be of assistance, therefore, if I said something about the work of the conference before I comment on the Clauses of the Bill. I think it justifiable to say that the conference was a success. I had hardly dared to hope that it would be possible to bring together these four delegations with sharply differing views. We managed to exist, or co-exist, peacefully under one roof for the time necessary to complete our labours. We proceeded in an atmosphere of amity and positive co-operation to reach agreed conclusions on all points in the space of four and a half days.
As it turned out, we indulged in some practical and, I think, modulated and reasonable talks against the background of the thunder of the Falls. Indeed, by the end of the conference one of the tourists assembled for the Rhodes and
