The noble Lord has made in one respect a less responsible speech than I think the House would expect of him. I would say that whatever may be the rights and wrongs of any procedure which has been followed, he will, I am certain, take the decision himself, and advise his constituents to take any decision in what he conceives to be the national interest, and not with any intention of depriving the War Office of anything he welcomes, or the reverse, their having.

All three hon. Members who have spoken on the Motion have made references to the White Paper which has been promised and on the general situation appertaining to the acquisition of land. I regret very much—and I hope it will be accepted in good part—that I am not prepared to be drawn on the subject as to what may or may not be covered by the White Paper. I will say, however, that I should expect it to be available to the House in the very near future. When it is available, then the procedure regarding public inquiries which I was asked about by the hon. Member for Devizes (Mr. Hollis) and the matters referred to by the hon. Member for Woodbridge (Mr. H. Hare) will be seen in their true light and can be properly examined by the House. I would say with sincerity and some feeling, because I have followed the problem closely, that it is really to the advantage of hon. Members on all sides of the House to wait until the White Paper does appear. With regard to the delay which has been alleged to have taken place, it may be irritating to hon. Members, but it is sometimes irritating to Government Departments to be pressed by Members on this point. We do feel some frustration about the time these things take. But I ask the House to realise that the sole reason for the delay in production of the White Paper has been the almost unparalleled effort made by the Government to consider the objections which were raised, and to try to devise adequate machinery for dealing with them. I do not propose to say more on the subject of the White Paper, except to repeat that it will be produced, I think, in the very near future, now.

I would like to turn to the problems raised by the hon. Member for Devizes, which concerned his own constituency and on which I would like to give him as much reassurance as I can. First, he has raised again the matter of the 4,000-lb. bombs dropped in the neighbourhood of Market Lavington by the Royal Air Force. He appears to have been under a misapprehension regarding what my right hon. Friend the Secretary for Air told him. The hon. Member says that as a result of complaints, 4,000-lb. bombs would not be dropped again in the area of Market Lavington. My information is that what the Secretary for Air said was that they would not be dropped on the particular date, and they were not. I am anxious to make it clear, so that there shall be no misunderstanding, that I can give no undertaking, having said that, that these bombs will not be dropped in that area. My right hon. Friend has been distressed by the complaints made on the occasion referred to, and he is examining very closely exactly what happened on that occasion, and into what reasonable steps can be taken to avoid its happening again. Whether he will come to the conclusion that these heavy bombs ought not to be dropped there is a matter into which I cannot enter or give a commitment tonight. I would add, in passing, that the occasion in question was by no means the first time that these heavy bombs had been dropped. I understand that it was the first time that any damage had been done.

In regard to the possibility of moving this bombing range, I entirely agree with the hon. Member that, of course, if it were possible reasonably to take these operations right away from an inhabited area, it would be a very good thing to do. With deference to the hon. Member sitting just above the Gangway, I will not suggest that the operations should be moved to Scotland, but I would agree that if a suitable area could be found which is remote from habitation, that is the answer to this matter. But, in fact, the problem cannot be solved quite as smoothly as that. It is not merely a question of transporting a number of elderly gentlemen to watch a spectacular demonstration of bombing, which I admit might be done anywhere; but of having large numbers of people watching these operations, and other training which takes place on the ground and in the air, all of which forms part of the same exercise. For these reasons, the Air Ministry at the moment regard the use of this part of the country, and their base at Old Sarum, as being essential.

With regard to ammunition in the Savernake Forest, I have little time at my disposal, and I want to speak as fully as I can in the time which is left. There is at the moment a substantial amount of ammunition left there, though it is considerably less than during the war. We realise that as soon as we can remove it. the better for everyone. I would like to assure the hon. Member, and the citizens of Marlborough, that I believe, in all sincerity, that the danger is so slight as to be almost negligible. I have very carefully examined the safety precautions during the last 24 hours and, while I cannot say that they are 100 per cent. foolproof, I can assure the hon. Member that they are as foolproof as we can get them. We are engaged in moving this ammunition as soon as possible into permanent underground storage. But, it must be remembered that it has mostly been exposed to the weather for long periods; most of it has been to Europe and back again, and it must be most carefully examined and sorted before we can store it in dumps under the ground.

I think that the hon. Gentleman was very reasonable in not grumbling about this, and I would like him to know the progress we have made in this work. The total surplus ammunition we have declared as a result of the end of the war is no less than 1,200,000 tons, and we have cleared it at this rate; between April, 1944, and March, 1945, we cleared only 16,000 tons, but that was at a period when we were very hard pressed. In the year 1945 to 1946, we cleared 270,000 tons, and in the year 1946 to 1947, we cleared 320,000 tons, and I hope that we can keep up that rate. It is most important to remember that this work has to be done by technicians with the highest qualifications, and it is an operation of some danger. But we feel some satisfaction that we have moved it at that rate, and if we can keep it up for the coming year, we shall not have done too badly.