Commons Bill [HL]

These amendments have created much interest. Amendment No. 174 would add the words,"““as long as it does not remove, infringe or impede the owner’s rights””." That is fair enough and we agree with it. Similarly, we agree with Amendment No. 175. However, Amendment No. 176, proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Williams, would leave out paragraph (c) of Clause 31(2), which concerns the ability of a commons association to raise money. There may well be occasions when a commons association may wish to raise money. There may be issues on the common which need to be put right, with the agreement of members by a majority vote, and that might involve the use of resources. Also, under grant aid schemes one often has to find collateral moneys in order to achieve the grant—particularly with social funding, Objective 1 or Objective 2 funding, or something of that nature. So the ability to raise money is useful in developing facilities on a common to assist the well-being of the commoners and, indeed, perhaps to enable them to benefit from an income that they would not otherwise receive. Of course, there is the whole question of environmental schemes and whether they would be funded 100 per cent, and so on. All those issues need to be examined closely. Amendment No. 177 would enable a commons association to borrow money, and that would certainly be an extremely useful facility. The whole issue of acquiring and disposing of land in Amendment No. 178 needs further explanation. Like others who have spoken, I am not sure exactly where it would leave us. Amendment No. 179 seeks to leave out subsection (3), which enables a commons association to charge fees. I agree that the issue of fees for rights of common and surplus grazing is contestable, but surely raising membership fees should be allowable because, again, the commons association may wish to achieve certain objectives. If it has a membership mainly made up of active graziers, not having such a facility might well hamstring the association, and I am not sure that that is desirable.