§ * SIR CHARLES DILKE (Gloucestershire, Forest of Dean)I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, seeing that at the recent Arbitration on Special Rules for the 961 China and Earthenware Trade, Lord James of Hereford recommended the Home Office to draft an additional rule giving special privileges in the way of relaxation of rules to firms making use of lead glaze conforming to a low standard of solubility to be specified; whether any such additional rule was in fact proposed by the Home Office at the adjourned arbitration; and, if not, will he state what he proposes to take in order to carry out the recommendation of Lord James of Hereford to the Home Office.
§ * MR. RITCHIEAt the stage which the arbitration had then reached no such exemption could be put into the Code of Rules except by agreement. Communications passed between the Home Office and the manufacturers, but an agreement on the basis suggested by Lord James could not be arrived at. I am still in communication with the manufacturers, and I am not without hope that it may be possible, with the assistance of Lord James, to settle a rule offering inducements to manufacturers to use glazes of a low solubility.