"Particularly relevant to this evening was Lord Renton's keen interest in improving legislative drafting. He was thus a natural choice in the early 1970s to chair the Committee on the Preparation of Legislation. As he observed when addressing your Society in 1978, he was responsible for producing the first full study made officially for exactly 100 years into our methods of drafting. The terms of reference of the Committee were to make recommendations with

"˜. . . a view to achieving greater simplicity and clarity in statute law, to review the form in which public Bills are drafted, excluding consideration of matters relating to policy formulation and the legislative programme; to consider any consequential implications for Parliamentary procedure; and to make recommendations.' "