§ MR. S. SMITH (Flintshire)I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the. Home Deportment whether his attention has been drawn to the restriction on Sunday labour in foreign countries with respect to the publication of Sunday newspapers; whether he is aware that in Germany the law is very strict in providing that a newspaper may be printed during the night from Saturday to Sunday, but that the distributors must have finished their work by eight or nine o'clock in the morning; and that no newspaper can be bought in Berlin after 10 o'clock on Sunday morning; while no newspaper is allowed to work its staff on Sundays with the exception of two, which have a special arrangement with. 1301 the police, who see that none of the staff work seven days a week; whether he is aware that in Vienna no daily newspaper appears on Monday morning, which, combined with the fact that the Sunday edition is almost entirely produced on Saturday, secures for every newspaper worker a holiday on Sunday; and whether the Government see their way to provide, by some analogous arrangement, for the suppression of Sunday labour in this country in connection with newspaper work?
§ THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT (Sir M. W. RIDLEY, Lancashire, Blackpool)I have seen certain information recently published in one of the newspapers on the subject referred to in the Question. With respect to my own sympathies and the action of the Government I have nothing to add to what I recently stated in the House. I cannot, however, undertake to propose legislation in the direction indicated.