§ SIR HOWARD VINCENT (Sheffield, Central)To ask the Secretary of State for War if his attention has been called to the rule of the War Department, as laid down by the late Secretary of State for War, Mr. Edward Stanhope, that two-thirds of Government requirements should be obtained from the trade, and upon the faith of which capital was expended by the Sheffield trades concerned; and will he take care that the rule referred to and adopted by himself and his immediate predecessors is observed as much in respect of bayonets as of other material of war.
(Answered by Mr. Secretary Arnold-Forster.) There is no rule that any definite proportion of orders shall be placed with the trade, except as regards guns, which, in the past, have been allocated as far as possible to the trade and ordnance factories in the proportion of two-thirds and one-third. The practice bas never been extended to stores, such as bayonets, and, in view of the small number of bayonets required, it is not possible, in the present instance, to place with the trade a larger number of bayonets than the 2,500 reserved for them.