Commons Sitting of 5 April 1909

Preamble
Mr. SPEAKER took the chair at a Quarter before Three of the clock.

PRIVATE BUSINESS.
Torrens' Divorce Bill (Lords).
Read the third time and passed.
Anglo-Argentine Tramways Company Bill (Lords).
London, Chatham, and Dover Railway Bill (Lords).
Read a second time.

ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS.

  Territorial Force Regulations.
  Viscount VALENTIAasked the Secretary of State for War if he can see his way so to increase the grants in aid of expenses incurred in conveying officers, men, regimental stores, and baggage to and from the annual camp, paragraph 648 of the Territorial Force Regulations, so as to allow of officers travelling first class, and the expense of baggage conveyance not falling upon county associations?
  The SECRETARY Of STATE for WAR (Mr. Haldane): I have considered this question, but there is no evidence to show that these grants, which are the same as those given to the Volunteers for many years past, are not sufficient to cover the expenses in question.

  Dirigible Balloons.
  Mr. FELLasked the Secretary of State for War if the French Government is building nine garages or shelters for dirigible balloons; and how many shelters does the War Office propose to build?
  Mr. HALDANE: From the information at my disposal it appears that the French Government propose to have five Government shelters for dirigible balloons. The construction of a new shed for a dirigible balloon at Aldershot, in addition to the existing shed, is under consideration.
  Mr. FELL: May I ask if the construction of these balloons at Aldershot is
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  under consideration, and whether shelters are being provided on the East Coast?
  Mr. HALDANE: These questions are being very carefully considered.
  Sir ROBERT HOBART: Will the right hon. Gentleman give hon. Members of this House facilities to go down to Aldershot to see what is going on with reference to these balloons?
  Mr. HALDANE: I think that I had much better not.
  Captain CRAIG: Would the right hon. Gentleman arrange for some hon. Members to go up in these balloons—and keep them there?

  Woolwich Arsenal Workmen.
  Mr. FELLasked the Secretary of State for War if the skilled workmen who are discharged from Woolwich Arsenal are still given on leaving a circular or card advising them where to apply if they desired to emigrate to the Colonies or to foreign states?
  Mr. HALDANE: There has been no alteration in the arrangements made for the distribution of the circulars. The circulars are not given to men who were taken on temporarily for special jobs.
  Lord BALCARRES: May I ask if the circular is being given to any workmen who leave the Arsenal?
  Mr. HALDANE: The purpose of the circular was to save men from being got hold of by unsatisfactory persons. The establishment has been settled, and no men of the establishment are being discharged. The use of the circular has ceased to exist.
  Lord BALCARRES: Are these cards still being given to the men?
  Mr. HALDANE: As I have already explained, the establishment is settled, and no men under the establishment are being discharged. The use of the circular, as I have said, has therefore ceased to exist.

  Territorial Force.
  Mr. GEORGE ROBERTSasked the Secretary of State for War if he can state the present strength and establishment of the Territorial force in its different arms, the number of men who had enlisted for one year, two years, three years, and four years, respectively; the ages of the men in the different arms of the Territorial Force; and the number of guns and the type of gun with which the artillery are armed?
  Mr. HALDANE: There are no figures of strength available later than 25th February, and these were given fully in reply to a question put by the hon. Member for Rutland on 17th March, to which I would ask my hon. Friend kindly to refer. The figures of men serving on particular engagements can only be given approximately; those for 25th February are as follows:—

  1 year

  96,000

  2 years

  18,500

  3 years

  10,000

  4 years

  104,000

  The figures for one year include 19,500 men who have re-engaged since they joined the Territorial Force. The ages are only reported annually from the 1st October, and are, therefore, not available.
  The number of guns required for the units which have been recognised is as follows:—

  Guns.

  10-Prs

  12

  15-Prs. (R.H.A.)

  52

  15-Prs. (R.F.A.)

  492

  5-inch. Howitzers

  112

  4.7-inch Q.F

  56

  Legion of Frontiersmen.
  Mr. GEORGE ROBERTSasked the Secretary of State for War whether the Legion of Frontiersmen, having its headquarters in London, is an armed, drilled, and officered military body sanctioned by him, though it is a privately controlled force, and not subject to the laws and regulations governing auxiliary forces; whether its members are armed with revolvers and guns, but are exempt from taking out gun licences; and, if so, whether he will give his sanction to other individuals or organisations enrolling armed forces in similar fashion and enjoying similar privileges?
  Mr. HALDANE: No sanction has been given for the formation of the Legion of Frontiersmen as an armed force, and there is no intention of sanctioning the enrolment of armed forces as suggested in the last part of the question. As regards the gun licences I have no information.

  Native Chiefs and Liquor Traffic (West Africa).
  Sir JOHN KENNAWAYasked the Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies whether the Government will cause it to be clearly understood in West Africa that they have no wish to interfere with the free expression of opinion by native chiefs
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  in favour of or against the liquor traffic; and that it is contrary to their wish that any of these should suffer by withdrawal of allowance or otherwise for any lawful action he may take on the matter of the prohibition or restriction of the entry or consumption of spirits in his township, village, or district?
  The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for the COLONIES (Colonel Seely): I feel confident that the points very properly raised by the right hon. Gentleman's question are already thoroughly appreciated in West Africa. The Secretary of State would deprecate any special intervention on his part which could be construed into an expression of doubt on the subject.

  Transvaal and Mozambique.
  Mr. LONSDALEasked the Undersecretary of State for the Colonies whether he can give to the House the terms of the new agreement reported to have been concluded between the Transvaal and Mozambique?
  Colonel SEELY: The agreement deals with the Transvaal Railway traffic through Lourenco Marques, and the percentage to be allotted to that port and provides for the establishment of a joint board. It also deals with the labour supply from Portuguese East Africa, the essential conditions of which, I understand, remain unchanged, and contains some commercial provisions. The text of the Agreement which has been accepted by the other South African Governments and signed by Lord Selborne, has not yet been received.

  Trawler "Arcadia."
  Mr. LAMONTasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he will now lay upon the Table of the House Papers giving particulars of the capture in June last of the British trawler "Arcadia," of Grimsby, found fishing in German territorial waters off Nordeny, by the German fisheries patrol torpedo-boat S 42; of the arrest of the master of the "Arcadia"; and of the consequent legal proceedings before the court at Cuxhaven; and whether he can state how far within the territorial waters the "Arcadia" was at the time of her capture, and also how far from the shore?
  The UNDER-SECRETARY Of STATE for FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Mr. McKinnon Wood): The only Papers which I have are three despatches from His Majesty's Consul-General at Hamburg, which briefly

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  report the arrest of the trawler and the proceedings taken against the master, who did not appear for trial. I do not think there would be any advantage in laying these Papers, but the hon. Member may see them if he wishes. I understand that the "Arcadia" is charged with fishing at a spot which is only two and a third miles from the nearest sand-bank drying at low water, and the sand-bank being one mile from the high-water line of the coast. If the facts are as stated, the "Arcadia" was therefore within German exclusive fishery limits as defined in Article 2 of the North Sea Fisheries Convention.

  Local Rates in the Lews.
  Mr. YOUNGERasked the Lord Advocate what is the present position of the bank advance guaranteed by the Treasury to meet pressing financial necessities in the Lews in November last; whether there was still a large amount of local rates in arrear; and what steps are being taken to provide for the carrying on of the local administration?
  The LORD ADVOCATE (Mr. Ure): There still remains an unexhausted balance of the total amount guaranteed. The collection of rates is now going on, there being over £5,000 (including arrears as well as this year's rates) still uncollected. The local administration is being carried on as usual.

  Town Council Election.
  Mr. GULLANDasked the Lord Advocate whether the Government intended to introduce, this Session, a Bill dealing with the dates of town council elections and other town council affairs, as suggested by the Convention of Royal Burghs, and promised last Session by the Secretary for Scotland?
  Mr. URE: Yes, Sir.

  Irish Coast Lights (Strangford Lough Buoy).
  Captain CRAIGasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he can state the date on which the buoy was moored off Ballyquinton Point, county Down, and the number of times it has been taken away by the Irish Light? Commissioners to be repaired?
  The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the BOARD of TRADE (Mr. Tennant): I am informed by the Commissioners of Irish Lights that the buoy was placed there on 15th November last; that it was taken
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  away once for repair; and that on 23rd March the original buoy was replaced by one of another class.
  Captain CRAIG: May I ask whether the buoy has not been unsuccessful, inasmuch as the light always goes out at night?
  Mr. TENNANT: I am not aware of that fact.
  Captain CRAIG: Will the hon. Member inquire into it?
  Mr. TENNANT: Yes, certainly.
  Mr. T. L. CORBETT: Will the hon. Member have an inquiry held among the local fishermen and pilots and captains in the district itself as to the value of this buoy?
  Mr. TENNANT: I do not think the Board of Trade have any power to order such inquiry. If the hon. Member will await the answer to another question he will see the matter is under consideration.
  Mr. T. L. CORBETT: What are the powers of the Board of Trade?
  Mr. SPEAKER: Order, order. That does not arise on this question.
  Captain CRAIGasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he is aware that the buoy moored 6½ miles from Ballyquinton Point, county Down, is officially designated Strangford Lough buoy; can he state the reason for such a name being given to it, when it is placed in the fairway of coasting vessels 6½ miles from the bar mouth; and whether, when the buoy was so named, it was the intention of the Irish Lights Commissioners to moor it about 1½ miles from the bar mouth?
  Mr. TENNANT: I am informed by the Commissioners of Irish Lights that this buoy is officially designated the Fairway buoy off Strangford Lough, and that it was never their intention to moor it 1½ miles from the entrance to the Lough.
  Captain CRAIGasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he is aware that the Irish Lights Commissioners intended originally placing a lighthouse on Ballyquinton Point, co. Down, and, with that object in view, visited the Point, accompanied by some members of the Elder Brethren; and can he state why the scheme was abandoned?
  Mr. TENNANT: I am informed by the Commissioners of Irish Lights that they never contemplated placing a lighthouse

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  on Ballyquinton Point, and did not accompany the Elder Brethren on their visit to the Point.
  Captain CRAIG: Is it not a fact that an inquiry was held there by the Elder Brethren on the subject?
  Mr. TENNANT: I dare say that is quite true, but the point is, the Commissioners of Irish Lights did not.
  Captain CRAIG: Was there any report from the Elder Brethren to the Board of Trade?
  Mr. TENNANT: Not that I am aware.
  Captain CRAIG: Will the hon. Gentleman kindly enquire?
  Mr. TENNANT: Certainly.
  Captain CRAIGasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he could state the number of communications received recommending the Irish Lights Commissioners to moor the Strangford Bar buoy, co. Down, as far out as 6½ miles from the bar mouth, and give the names of those tendering the recommendation, and also their reasons?
  Mr. TENNANT: I am informed by the Commissioners of Irish Lights that they did not receive any communications of the nature suggested.
  Captain CRAIG: May I ask why they dropped the buoy where it is?
  Mr. TENNANT: Because they thought it was the best place.
  Captain CRAIG: May I ask how they arrived at that conclusion?
  Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Member must know the Under-Secretary cannot know that.
  Captain CRAIGasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he is aware that local feeling is running high with regard to the spot in which the temporary buoy has been moored off Strangford Bar; and whether he will recommend the Irish Lights Commissioners to remove it to a spot about 1½ mile from the bar mouth, in order to guide not only vessels navigating Strangford Bar, but at the same time to warn coasting vessels of the danger of the insetting tide at that spot?
  Mr. TENNANT: I am aware that a considerable number of local pilots and
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  masters of coasting-vessels desire that the buoy should be placed nearer the entrance to Strangford Lough. A number of communications received from them by the Board of Trade have been forwarded to the Commissioners of Irish Lights. I understand that the position of the buoy was decided on by a Joint Committee of the Commissioners and the Trinity House after investigation on the spot. The Board of Trade are, however, in communication with the Commissioners as to the desirability of a further conference with the Trinity House.
  Mr. T. L. CORBETT: Do the Irish Lights Commissioners take any notice of communications from the Board of Trade?
  Mr. TENNANT: They are under statutory obligations to send to the Board of Trade notice of new works. With regard to old works no sanction is required.
  Mr. T. L. CORBETT: Is this new buoy an old work?

  Irish Lights Commissioners.
  Captain CRAIGasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he is aware that a vacancy has been created on the Board of Irish Lights Commissioners by the resignation of Viscount Monck; and whether he will represent to the Commissioners the advisability of appointing some representative of the Board of Trade to fill the vacancy, who will be responsible to Parliament in regard to questions affecting the administration of the Board?
  Mr. TENNANT: I am informed by the Commissioners of Irish Lights that Viscount Monck has resigned, and that the vacancy thus created has been filled.
  Captain CRAIG: May I ask whether it has been approved by anyone who has any knowledge of that part of the coast from Belfast or the other shipping centres in the North?
  Mr. TENANT: I think if the hon. Member will wait he will see in due course whether the person appointed is a person who has his confidence.
  Mr. JEREMIAH MacVEAGH: Can the hon. Gentleman tell us who he is?
  Mr. TENNANT: No, I cannot.
  Colonel Sir IVOR HERBERT: Has the hon. Gentleman's attention been drawn to the recommendations of the recent Royal Commission on Lighthouse Administra-

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  tion and the evidence they took as regards the advisability of modifying the constitution of the Lights Board?
  Mr. TENNANT: I think that is under the consideration of the Department. No decision has been arrived at.
  Captain CRAIGasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he is aware that the loss of the French barque "Surcouf," off Ballyquinton Point, co. Down, made the twenty-fifth fatal disaster off that part of the coast during the past five years, and the sixth fatal disaster during the past winter; whether, under the circumstances, he will make the strongest possible representations to the Irish Lights Commissioners to have the temporary buoy removed from its present position and placed about 1| mile from the bar mouth, and whether, if the Irish Lights Commissioners refuse to do so, he will appoint a Commission to inquire into the whole matter on the spot, with a view to securing that the permanent buoy is moored in the right place?
  Mr. TENNANT: During the last five years ten vessels have been totally lost by stranding on the coast of County Down between Belfast Lough and St. John's Point, Strangford Lough. Of these wrecks five have occurred during the past winter. In only one instance was there loss of human life, namely, in the case of a wreck near Donaghadee in December, 1905, on which occasion four lives were lost. As I have informed the hon. Member the Board of Trade are in communication with the Commissioners of Irish Lights as to the desirability of a further conference with the Trinity House in regard to the position of the buoy.
  Captain CRAIG: Is the hon. Member aware that along the coast all the life saving is due to the coastguards, whose stations are now being taken away?
  Mr. TENNANTwas understood to say I have no doubt.

  The All-Red Route.
  Mr. FELLasked the President of the Board of Trade if any progress has been made towards the establishment of the All-Red Route?
  Mr. TENNANT: I must refer the hon. Member to the answer given on 8th March to the hon. Member for the Walton Division of Liverpool.
  Mr. FELL: May I take it that no progress is being made?
  Mr. TENNANT: I think that is substantially accurate.

  Law of Insurance.
  Sir JOHN BENN (for Sir Henry Dalziel)asked the President of the Board of Trade whether, in the preparation of any measure he may introduce in the course of the present Session amending the law in regard to the law of insurance, he will consider the advisability of providing such powers as will compel all companies and societies issuing policies of assurance on lives, or for endowment, or against sickness, who collect premiums by agents and collectors at a greater distance than ten miles from their registered office (commonly known as industrial assurance companies and collecting friendly societies), being brought under one uniform law, and of making all subject to the same legal obligations, so that security may be given to those assured against loss from unsound schemes; and will he consider the advisability of providing that uniform returns be made to Government by all such companies and societies?
  Mr. TENNANT: I am well aware of the importance of the questions referred to by my hon. Friend, but at present I can only assure him that they have been lately, and are still, receiving careful consideration.

  Royal Liver Friendly Society.
  Mr. GEORGE ROBERTSasked the Secretary to the Treasury whether he is aware that a meeting of members of the Royal Liver Friendly Society held in the Young Men's Christian Association Hall, Belfast, on the 18th of March last, under the Friendly Societies Act, for the purpose of electing a delegate to represent the members at the annual meeting of the society in Glasgow, a candidate named Thomas Thompson was legally elected, but, owing to the non-arrival of the election return at the society's chief office in Liverpool, the election was declared void; that the election return was properly filled up and handed to the society's official in charge of the meeting for transmission to the chief office; and whether he will inquire into the matter, with a view to the proper carrying out of the intention of the Friendly Societies Act?
  The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the TREASURY (Mr. Charles Hobhouse): I have no knowledge of the alleged facts other than that conveyed by the question. The Royal Liver Friendly Society is a

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  collecting society registered under the Friendly Societies Act, 1896, and subject to the Collecting Societies and Industrial and Assurance Companies Act, 1896. Neither the Assistant Registrar of Friendly Societies for Ireland nor the Chief Registrar has any jurisdiction in the matters to which the question relates. The election of officers is purely a question of internal administration in the society. If any dispute has arisen in relation thereto it can be determined only in the manner provided by the rules of the society for the settlement of disputes, or, failing that, by action at law.

  Law Library, Four Courts, Dublin.
  Mr. JEREMIAH MacVEAGHasked the Secretary to the Treasury whether he can state if tenders were invited for the contract entered into by the Board of Works for the heating and ventilation of the law library in the Four Courts, Dublin; if not, can he say why; with what film was the contract placed; and why contractors were precluded from tendering for the supply of a fan manufactured in Ireland, seeing that the Sirocco fan is used in battleships and in public buildings all over the world?
  Mr. LONSDALEasked whether the contract for the heating and ventilation of the law library, Four Courts, Dublin was publicly advertised by the Irish Board of Works; if not, whether he will explain why the usual course was not followed in this case; and whether he will state the amount of the contract and how much of the cost will be provided out of public funds, and explain why, in the specification for the ventilation portion of the contract, a particular fan of English manufacture was specified, thus excluding Irish manufacturers from competing?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: I am informed that the contract was not advertised for, as the work is difficult and of a special nature. The Board of Works for Ireland invited competitive tenders from three firms with whose work they are acquainted. Two of these firms are Irish and one Scottish. The Board did not specify any make of fan, but left each firm tendering to specify the fan which it thought most suitable, subject to consideration and approval of the Board, and so tender has yet been accepted.
  Mr. JEREMIAH MacVEAGH: Is it not a fact that in all these tenders by the
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  Board of Works public competition is invited? Why was that course departed from?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: I do not think that is the case, but I will make inquiry.
  Mr. LONSDALE: Will the right hon. Gentleman say whether the contract was advertised in the newspapers?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: I have said it was not.

  Post Office Holidays.
  Mr. NICHOLAS MURPHYasked the Postmaster-General whether he has made any arrangements for the uninterrupted discharge of telegraphic business at sub-post offices in Ireland within the usual hours, in the event of sub-postmasters being granted a weekly half-holiday?
  The POSTMASTER-GENERAL (Mr. Buxton): In Ireland, as in Great Britain, a half-holiday for a sub-postmaster would probably involve the closing of his office. I am considering the question of how far such half-holidays can be granted.

  National Telephone Company (Discharge of Workmen).
  Mr. M'ARTHURasked the Postmaster-General whether he has succeeded in making an arrangement with the National Telephone Company for the continuance of constructional work on the telephone system by the company till the end of its licence; and, if not, what action, if any, he proposes to take to prevent or provide for the threatened discharge of the constructional staff by the company?
  Mr. BUXTON: I am afraid I have nothing further to add as yet to my previous answer. The negotiations with the National Telephone Company for the continuance of construction works are still in progress.
  Mr. CROOKS: Would it not be as well to give the House a return showing exactly what was happening, as these alarmist rumours are going about?
  Mr. BUXTON: I will consider that. I have made a statement once or twice endeavouring to allay alarm as to the very great exaggerations on the part of the Press as to the number of men who are likely to be dismissed or who are under notice of dismissal. There is very great exaggeration.

  Holyhead Mail Train.
  Mr. MOONEYasked the Postmaster-General whether his attention has been called to the fact that the London and North-Western Railway Company have discontinued running a separate first-class dining car on the down day mail train from Holyhead; and, in view of the fact that this is a violation of the undertaking given by this railway company that there would be no reduction of the facilities heretofore obtainable on this train, what steps he proposes to take in the matter?
  Mr. TENNANT: My right hon. Friend has asked me to answer this question. I have no knowledge of the undertaking referred to, but I have communicated with the railway company on the subject, and will inform the hon. Member of the result.
  Mr. MOONEY: The undertaking I refer to was mentioned in this House by the Postmaster-General when the change was made, and the right hon. Gentleman's statement was that he would take steps to see that no facilities which were given heretofore would be taken away. May I ask the right hon. Gentleman if the matter comes within his Department to see that the promise is kept up?
  Mr. BUXTON: I was told that this question would be taken by the Board of Trade, and I have not looked into it. If the hon. Member will repeat it I will look into it and answer it. The facilities I spoke of were the times of arrival and departure, and so on. I will look into the point.
  Mr. MOONEY: I will put it down again to-morrow, but may I ask whether in view of the large sums to be paid to the company he will take care to see that this service shall not be starved by the railway company in any case?
  Mr. BUXTON: Certainly, if starvation comes in. The facilities I had in my mind were questions of the time of departure and arrival. I did not notice the question as I understood it was to be taken by the Board of Trade

  German Dirigible Balloons.
  Mr. FELLasked the First Lord of the Admiralty how many dirigible balloons have been acquired by, or are being built for, the German Government; and if he can give any particulars of the garages and stations being prepared to shelter them?
  Mr. HALDANE: My right hon. Friend has asked me to take this question. Six balloons are reported to have been built, and six more to be building. With regard to the latter part of the question, the information will be circulated with the Votes and Proceedings.
  Mr. FELL: Do I understand that the number of these garages and stations will be so numerous that they will require a special Paper?
  Mr. HALDANE: It is a long list; I have it here, and I propose to have it printed and circulated.

  Battleships (Gnu-Mountings).
  Mr. LANE-FOX (for Viscount Helmsley)asked the First Lord of the Admiralty how many manufacturers in this country now possess the necessary plant for the construction of gun-mountings for battleships and cruisers of the largest type?
  The Noble Lord also asked (1) with which firms arrangements were made by the Government for providing such an increase in plant as would secure an acceleration of the manufacture of gun-mountings for battleships and cruisers of the largest types; (2) on what dates in January last were orders given to manufacturers of gun-mountings for ships of the largest type to provide an increase in their plant, so that in the course of a few months Great Britain will have an advantage in this branch of construction?
  The FIRST LORD of the ADMIRALTY (Mr. McKenna): I propose to answer the Noble Lord's three questions together. The Admiralty have hitherto bought 12-inch gun mountings from two firms of contractors—the Elswick Ordnance Works and Messrs. Vickers, Sons and Maxim. The existing capacity of these firms for the supply of gun-mountings is equal to the demands of the shipbuilding programme of the current year. With a view to providing for an increase of output in case of need, communications have taken place between the Admiralty and both these firms. As regards one of them, inquiries were addressed to the firm in November last. Information was given that shop space admitted of an immediate extension of machinery; and in December or January the firm instructed their manager to make all inquiries as to any machinery which might be needed. As regards the other firm, the best method of extending the plant at their works has been under consideration for some months.

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  Both firms, after further communication with His Majesty's Government, gave instructions for the necessary work to be put in hand without delay in February last. Besides the two firms already named, the Coventry Ordnance Works have all the necessary plant for the construction of gun-mountings for battleships and cruisers of the largest type. It is proposed to give a trial order to this firm at an early date.
  Mr. CROOKS: Has a similar communication been addressed to the War Office?
  Mr. McKENNA: Yes. My right hon. Friend has been in communication with me on the subject.
  Mr. ARTHUR LEE: Were directions given or promises made in the month of January last of a kind which required an immediate increase of plant by the two firms to which he has alluded, the Elswick Works and Vickers, Sons, and Maxim, and placing them in a position to supply these heavy gun-mountings with greater rapidity?
  Mr. McKENNA: I should not have used the words myself "directions given or promises made," because in each case the firms had voluntarily agreed to make the necessary increase in the month of February last. Communications with the firms alluded to in the case of one of them began in November last. With regard to the other firm the Admiralty are aware that the firm had had the question of the enlargement of their works under consideration for some months past.
  Mr. ARTHUR LEE: Is the right hon. Member aware that the Prime Minister stated in this House—
  Mr. SPEAKER: Order, order. The hon. Member must not make quotations at question time.
  Mr. ARTHUR LEE: At what date in January last were orders given to the manufacturers of gun-mountings?
  Mr. McKENNA: I have stated to the House that the word "orders" is not the word I should have used in this case, but in February last both firms volunteered to increase their plant in consequence of communications they had received from the Government.
  Mr. ARTHUR LEE: Then it is not correct to say that "orders were given in January last"?
  Mr. McKENNA: It is correct to state that the information upon which one of the firms proceeded was obtained from the Government in November last, and that communications between that firm and the Government continued throughout November, December, and January, and until February, and in February the firm volunteered to increase its plant. With regard to the other firm, the Admiralty were aware that it had under consideration the increase of their plant, of which they gave a voluntary assurance in February. It would not be accurate to name the month of January, because the proceedings lasted from November right up to February.

  Naval Figures.
  Mr. BELLAIRSasked the First Lord of the Admiralty what is the total sum provided in the British Navy Estimates, 1909–10, for the material upkeep of the Navy so as to include shipbuilding repairs, and armaments, and prepared on the same basis as former figures for recent years which had been given to this House, and as the figure officially given for Germany, namely, £11,942,009?
  Mr. McKENNA: The total sum provided in the British Navy Estimates, 1909–10, for the services specified in the question, is £12,677,195.

  Reduction of Coastguards.
  Mr. FELLasked the First Lord of the Admiralty if the Admiralty had now considered the question de novo of the reduction of the coastguards as promised; and, if so, what was the decision come to with regard to further reductions?
  Mr. McKENNA: The matter is still under consideration, and the decision is expected at an early date.

  Peers and Elections.
  Mr. HENRYasked the Attorney-General if he will take into consideration the desirability of taking the necessary steps, by legislation or otherwise, to ensure that Members of the House of Lords, who are not permitted to take part in or vote at Parliamentary elections, shall not be allowed to send vehicles or motor-cars to assist during the time the elections are in progress?
  The ATTORNEY-GENERAL (Sir Wm. Robson): So far as this question relates to proposals for legislation I think it should be addressed to one of my right hon. Friends in the Cabinet. Perhaps, how-

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  ever, I may be permitted to say that the most appropriate time for suggesting legislation would be when the whole matter of the relation between the two Houses comes up for readjustment. As to taking steps otherwise than by legislation my answer is in the negative.
  Earl WINTERTON: Can the right hon. Gentleman say when will be an appropriate date for raising the question of the relations between the two Houses?
  Sir WILLIAM ROBSON: It does not rest with me to fix an early day, or I should certainly do so.
  Mr. CROOKS: May I ask you, Sir, whether the question put down by the hon. Member is not a direct interference with the Order of this House that Peers should take no part in elections? Would the lending of a motor-car mean that a Peer took part in an election?
  Mr. SPEAKER: It is a matter for the House to decide whether or not the Standing Order is carried out. If I remember aright, I think there was a discussion of the question of lending carriages, but that was before the days of motor-cars. I do not know whether they have made any difference.

  Romford Allotments.
  Mr. PIKE PEASE (for Mr. Carlile)asked the hon. Member for South Somerset, as representing the President of the Board of Agriculture, whether he is aware that the Romford Urban District Council has applied for Crown land for the purpose of allotments for the town of Romford; will he say whether the land applied for has been let to the council, and upon what terms; whether the Romford Urban District Council has been unable to relet such land to applicants for allotments for less than £6 10s. per acre per annum; and how this sum compares with the rent paid for the remaining portion of the field from which this land is taken?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE, who answered the question, said: Arrangements have been made to let on lease to the Romford Urban District Council three acres of Crown land at a rent of £7 10s. per annum, which is the abatement made to the farm tenant on giving up possession. There is no separate rent paid for the remaining portion of the field, which forms part of a larger holding, comprising about 361 acres, the average rent of which is about £l 10s. per acre.

  Horse Guards Parade (Improvements).
  Mr. HENRYasked the First Commissioner of Works whether it is his intention to consider schemes for the improvement of the Horse Guards Parade and its surroundings; and, if so, whether the work will be commenced during next autumn?
  The FIRST COMMISSIONER of WORKS (Mr. Harcourt): None of the schemes which have been submitted to me for the so-called improvement of the Horse Guards Parade have commended themselves to my mind. I am, therefore, not proposing to commence any work there during the autumn.

  Ambulance Service (Metropolis).
  Sir WILLIAM COLLINSasked the Home Secretary whether he has now considered the Report of the Departmental Committee on the ambulance service for the metropolis; and what action he proposes to take as the result of that Report?
  The SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. Gladstone):
  The valuable Report presented by the Committee has been received, but owing to the pressure of current work I have not yet been able to give it the detailed consideration which it requires. I will see whether I cannot deal at once with certain of the recommendations by administrative action, but I am afraid I cannot hold out much hope of dealing with the main recommendations, which involve legislation, in the present Session.

  Moutray Estate (New Holdings).
  Mr. C. C. CRAIG (for Mr. Moore)asked what are the names of the persons and the valuations of their respective allotments on the division by the Estates Commissioners of the untenanted land on the Moutray estate; what were the claims of the allottees to such new holdings; and if persons having claims as relatives of tenants previously evicted on this estate were passed over in favour of the allottees, and for what reasons?
  The CHIEF SECRETARY for IRELAND (Mr. Birrell): The Estates Commissioners inform me that the names of these persons, with particulars of their allotments, will appear in due course in the monthly returns of advances under the Irish Land Act, 1903, which are laid before Parliament. The applications made to the Commissioners by persons claiming as representatives of evicted tenants were refused, as they did not appear to come

  719
  within the provisions either of the Irish Land Act, 1903, or the Evicted Tenants Act.
  Mr. C. C. CRAIG: When is the Return expected? Can we have it before the Land Bill goes into Committee?
  Mr. BIRRELL: I think that will be so. I will see.

  Police Protection (Ireland).
  Mr. HALPINasked whether the police in a protection hut in the Kilmihil district, West Clare, are allowed to work for the farmer whom they are protecting; whether they are allowed to go into a public-house with the said farmer when on duty and take intoxicating drink from him; and whether a person having a licence to sell intoxicating drink is permitted to sell the same to the police when on duty?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The police in the hut do not work for the person whom they are protecting. On one occasion, when a labourer left without notice, they assisted him in tying some loads of hay for his cattle. There could be no objection to their doing so. They also work in their spare time in the garden attached to the hut. They are not only allowed, but directed to enter public-houses and other places with the person under their protection. When absent from their hut they have to obtain refreshments for themselves, but they do not accept them from him. They have often no alternative but to obtain their refreshments in public-houses.

  Rowe Estate, Garnaston, County Kilkenny.
  Mr. NICHOLAS MURPHYasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether the Estates Commissioners have acquired or propose to acquire 14 acres (I. P. M.) of untenanted land on the Rowe estate, at Garnaston, county Kilkenny; whether he is aware that the same is situate in the midst of uneconomic holdings varying from 14 to 22 acres (I. P. M.); whether the holders of such uneconomic holdings have applied to the Estates Commissioners for a portion of the lands referred to; and will he state what action he proposes to take?
  Mr. BIRRELL: Proceedings were instituted in July last for the sale of this estate direct to the tenants, including 27 acres of untenanted land for division. When the Estates Commissioners are dealing with this estate in its order of priority

  720
  the applications received in connection with the untenanted land will be duly considered.

  Applications for Sale (Irish Land Purchase).
  Captain CRAIGasked the number of estates comprised in the applications which have been lodged for sale, and the amount of money involved, under the alt red schedule of the Estates Commissioners allowing the 3 per cent, bonus instead of 12 per cent, since 24th November, 1908?
  Mr. BIRRELL: Advances amounting to £271,685 have been applied for in purchase agreements in direct sales entered into since 24th November last and lodged with the Estates Commissioners. That amount includes £68,774 applied for in respect of holdings on 19 estates, for the sale of which proceedings were instituted after that date.
  Captain CRAIG: Will this amount of money only get 3 per cent, bonus and not 12 per cent.?
  Mr. BIRRELL: That is so.

  Mr. Patrick Riordan (Invalid Vote).
  Mr. MOONEY (for Mr. John Roche)asked, in view of the fact that Mr. Patrick Riordan, J.P., was not appointed to the commission of the peace until last June, and his having twice attended Woodford Petty Sessions, what is the reason for declaring his vote invalid at the recent election of petty sessions clerk?
  Mr. BIRRELL: I am informed that Mr. Riordan had only attended the Woodford Petty Sessions once previous to the election, which took place, on 15th March. Having regard to the date at which he became a magistrate, he should have had at least three attendances to entitle him to vote.
  Mr. MOONEY: On what basis is it calculated that a magistrate appointed in June must have put in three attendances before his votes become operative? Is it not the fact that this gentleman twice attended Woodford Petty Sessions, and that he has put in the full number of attendances if you take that into consideration?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The vote was disallowed because, in the opinion of those with legal knowledge of the matter, he had not made a sufficient number of attendances. The whole question is one of great complication. The great thing is to observe the same rule for each party.
  Mr. MOONEY: Is it not the fact that another person, owing to this decision, has got the appointment?
  Mr. BIRRELL: I cannot help that. If both votes were illegal, I cannot help it.
  Mr. JEREMIAH MacVEAGH: Who decides the actual number of attendances?
  Mr. BIRRELL: I cannot say.

  Irish Land Purchase (Payment of Interest).
  Mr. PATRICK O'BRIEN (for Mr. Vincent Kennedy)asked whether, in the sale of any estates under the Irish Land Act, 1903, the tenants have been called on to pay interest on a sum greater than the purchase money agreed to be advanced to the vendor, in how many cases this has occurred, and what is the amount represented by the excess of the price over what the vendor received; and what has been done with this excess price?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The Land Commission are not aware of any cases of the kind. If the hon. Member will give a particular instance I will make inquiry.

  Inland Revenue Officers.
  Mr. YOUNGERasked what is the amount of the salaries for March which, by reason of the recent alteration in the date of payment, will not be included in the expenditure of the financial year ending 31st March last?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: If I may assume that the hon. Member refers to the Inland Revenue Department, the answer is nil.
  Mr. MOONEYasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he is aware that a number of Inland Revenue officers and supervisors were compulsorily retired on 1st April before they had completed their 40 years' service, which would entitle them to the maximum rate of superannuation, viz., two-thirds of their salaries; that some of these officers had, on 1st April, served 39 years and eight or nine months; and that a request by them that they should be allowed to remain in the service to complete the 40 years' service was refused; whether these compulsory retirements are in accord with the official statement that no official of either Department, Excise or Customs, would be detrimentally affected by the amalgamation of these two Departments; and whether, in view of the fact that the compulsory retirement of public servants against whose efficiency there is no complaint, within a few months of the period which would entitle them to the maximum rate of superannuation,
  722
  means a serious loss to them, and but little difference to the State, he will reconsider the claims for superannuation of these public servants?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: Forty Inland Revenue officers and supervisors were retired on the 1st instant before they had completed 40 years' service. Only four of these officers had on that date served as much as 39 years and eight months, and none had served 39 years and nine months. In fixing the actual retirement dates the Boards of Inland Revenue and Customs have allowed extensions not exceeding three months beyond 1st April in the case of officers 61 and over on that date, or beyond their 61st birthday, in the case of officers reaching 61 after the 1st April, in all cases where such extension would enable an officer to count either another year's service or another increment for pension. I know of no official statement to the effect quoted in the question. If the hon. Member refers to the statement made by me on 10th June, 1908, on the Inland Revenue Vote, he will see by reference to "Hansard," Vol. 190, Cols. 318–19, that the undertaking which I gave is not correctly represented by the words of his question. I can, however, assure him that the Retirement Order is being administered in the spirit of the undertaking then given.
  Mr. MOONEY: Then I understand that in cases where they have allowed three months to be added the time of the retired official is brought up from 39 years and eight months to 39 years and 11 months, and he is still kept out of the 40 years' limit.
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: The answer to that is that it is impossible to extend beyond the three months' period of grace which is allowed.
  Mr. MOONEY: May I ask whether this includes the saving of £4 10s. per head on these retired officials?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: I could not say.
  Mr. MOONEYasked, in view of the fact that the Order in Council of 15th August, 1890, giving power to the head of a department to call upon any officer to retire at 60 years of age only applies to Civil servants having a scale of salary in excess of that of the Second Division, and that officers of Inland Revenue and supervisors recently compulsorily retired were not in receipt of salaries on a higher or even as high a scale as the Second Division, under

  723
  what authority these officials have been compulsorily retired within a few months of the completion of the period entitling them to full pensions?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: The power to retire officers, either at the age of 60 or any other age, does not depend upon Order in Council, but has always been possessed by the head of a Department.
  Mr. MOONEY: The hon. Gentleman has not answered my question. I asked under what authority?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: I have answered that by saying it is within the power possessed by the head of a Department.
  Mr. MOONEY: By what authority? The head of a Department must have some power to act under, statute or otherwise. I am asking by what power the head of a Department exercises that function?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: The head of a Department can retire any official at any age he likes.

  Unstamped Receipts (County Kilkenny).
  Mr. NICHOLAS MURPHYasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether his attention has been drawn to the recent proceedings at Kilkenny Assizes against tenants on the estate of Mr. Boyse, of Bannow House, county Wexford, and others situate at Moonveen, county Kilkenny, in the course of which proceedings it transpired that the agents for this estate have been for a considerable time deliberately defrauding the Revenue authorities by issuing unstamped receipts to the tenants in question; whether he has seen the comments of the learned judge, in which he states that if the Revenue authorities hear of it they will have him or them up for ever so many penalties; and what action he proposes to take in the matter?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: The matter is under inquiry by the Board of Inland Revenue.

  Inland Revenue Officers (Old Age Pension Act).
  Mr. PATRICK O'BRIEN (for Mr. Vincent Kennedy)asked Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer, if he will say how many extra Inland Revenue officers have been engaged in investigating the working of the Old Age Pensions Act in Ireland; will the result of their inquiries be known; is he going to have a similar inquiry instituted in England; and, if not, will be explain why he does not propose to take that course?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: Six inspectors have been sent to Ireland to make these investigations. Some time must elapse before the result of their inquiries will be fully known, but my right hon. Friend expects to receive an interim report in the course of a few weeks. My right hon. Friend does not consider that a similar inquiry is necessary in England for the reasons which he gave when the supplementary Estimate for old age pensions was before the House on 1st March last. I should add that the general work of the old age pension officers will be inspected in the usual course.
  Mr. STEWART BOWLES: Will the report of the proceedings of these officers be laid before the House?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: I am not quite sure I should like notice.

  Old Age Pensions (Disqualification).
  Mr. PATRICK O'BRIEN (for Mr. Vincent Kennedy)asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will say whether there is any regulation under which the wife of a man disqualified for a pension merely on account of receipt of outdoor relief is debarred from getting the pension, if otherwise qualified; will he inquire if some eligible pensions have been struck off for this reason, especially in the counties of Cavan and Leitrim; and will he direct their cases to be reinvestigated, with a view to restoring to them their full rights under the Pension Act of 1908?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: The matter is governed by section 3 of the Old Age Pensions Act, and there is not, nor is there any power, to make, any regulation on the subject. My right hon. Friend is advised that poor relief given to a husband disqualifies the wife only if she benefits by the relief. The application of this principle to individual cases is a matter for the local pension committee, subject to appeal to the Local Government Board, with whose jurisdiction I have no power to interfere.

  Expenditure on Armaments (Special Taxation).
  Mr. CARR-GOMMasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether his attention has been drawn to the activities of certain societies formed with the object of bringing pressure to bear on the Government to increase the naval and military forces of the Crown; and whether he will introduce legislation whereby special taxation may be imposed on the revenues of these

  725
  agencies to meet part of the growing expenditure on armaments?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: My right hon. Friend cannot make any announcement at present as to what may or may not be included in the Finance Bill this year.

  Apothecaries Hall (Ireland) and Irish Universities Act.
  Mr. JEREMIAH MacVEAGHasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant whether his attention has been called to the appeal of the Parliamentary Committee of the Apothecaries Hall of Ireland for compensation for the losses likely to be sustained by that body in the operation of the Irish Universities Act; and whether, in view of the urgency of the representations, he will bring their appeal under the notice of the Treasury?
  Mr. BIRRELL: I received a year ago an appeal from the directors of the Apothecaries Hall of Ireland for compensation for the losses which they anticipate, as a licensing body, owing to the operation of the Irish Universities Act. The appeal is not one which I can recommend to the consideration of the Treasury.

  Estate Commissioners (Ireland).
  Mr. LONSDALEasked the Chief Secretary whether, in the case of the estate, record number 2,787, the agreements for which were lodged by 5th July, 1905, the purchase money has been paid to the vendor; and, if not, whether the Estates Commissioners can name an approximate date when payment will be made?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The purchase money has not been paid in this case, as the Estates Commissioners have found it necessary, before sanctioning the advances applied for, to direct a further inspection of certain village holdings. The reply to the concluding portion of the question is in the negative.

  Irish National Schools (Teaching of Languages).
  Mr. C. CRAIG (for Mr. Moore)asked the Chief Secretary if he is aware that the Commissioners of National Education in Ireland intimated in 1908 that monitors in their last year in 1911 must take a language in addition to English; that some schools elected to take French or German and others the Irish language; and that the former course was adopted in Porta-down, where the managers, teachers, parents, and children object to learning Irish in preference to French or German;
  726
  if he will say if the Commissioners make payments to the teachers in Roman Catholic schools for teaching Irish, but decline to do so in Protestant schools for teaching French or German; and, if so, if he will take steps to place the teaching of these languages on an equal footing?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The Commissioners of National Education inform me that in their code issued in 1908 they inserted in connection with the King's Scholarship programme a notice that in the year 1911, and subsequently, candidates for admission to training colleges would be required to undergo examination in one language in addition to English. Payments are made for instruction in Irish as an extra subject in ordinary National Schools without distinction, and as part of the general curriculum in bilingual schools. There are no funds available for making payments for French or German. Information was recently received that a French class is held in one of the Porta-down National Schools.

  De Montmorency Estate (County Kilkenny).
  Mr. NICHOLAS MURPHYasked the Chief Secretary whether the Estates Commissioners propose acquiring 300 acres (I.P.M.) of untenanted land on the estate of the Rev. W. De Montmorency, J.P., situate at Dongonbeg, county Kilkenny; whether he is aware that there are several evicted tenants, deserving labourers, and uneconomic land-holders in the district; and, in view of this fact, would he take steps to accelerate the division of the lands referred to?
  Mr. BIRRELL: Proceedings have been instituted before the Estates Commissioners for the sale of this estate, and it will be dealt with in its proper order of priority.

  Free Quotas of Police (Ireland).
  Mr. LONSDALEasked the Chief Secretary whether it is intended this year to redistribute the free quotas of police in Ireland; if so, whether he will state the number of the free force to be distributed, and on what principle the allocation is to be made; and whether the disturbed counties of Clare, Galway, King's County, Leitrim, Longford, Roscommon, Sligo, and Westmeath, in which additional police are now serving by virtue of proclamations under The Constabulary (Ireland) Act, 1836, will have those additional police allocated to them as a free force at the expense of the imperial taxpayer?
  Mr. BIRRELL: This whole matter is under consideration, but I am not prepared to make any statement on the subject at present.
  Mr. MOONEY: Is he prepared to admit the accuracy of the statement that extra police are serving in the disturbed county of Roscommon, or is it not the fact that they were withdrawn from Roscommon last week.
  Mr. BIRRELL: If that is so, the county is no longer disturbed.

  Disablement Allowances to Head Teachers.
  Mr. BRIDGEMANasked the President of the Board of Education if he can state the total number of break-down pensions that have so far been granted to teachers, the number granted to head teachers only. and the number granted to head teachers in single-area schools?
  The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of EDUCATION (Mr. Runciman): Disablement Allowances under the Elementary School Teachers (Superannuation) Act, 1898, have been awarded to 706 men and 1,534 women. I am unable to say how many of the recipients were head teachers.

  Children in London Schools,
  Mr. RAMSAY MACDONALDasked the President of the Board of Education whether he would ascertain and publish as a Parliamentary Return information showing, in respect to London schools, the number of children, with their ages, who have been refused admission, owing to the schools being full, since the summer holidays of last year?
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: I doubt whether this information is obtainable, and, in any case, I do not think the results would be worth the labour involved in compiling it. Where a child is refused admission owing to a school being full a place is usually found for him elsewhere. The Return which my hon. Friend asks for would not, therefore, afford any evidence as to the number of children, if any, for whom accommodation has not been found, nor would it be possible to avoid duplication in cases where parents have applied for admission to more than one school.
  Mr. RAMSAY MACDONALD: Does the Department take care that the "elsewhere" is within a reasonable distance of the child's school?
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: Yes; that is what we usually aim at.

  Secondary Schools (Higher Grant).
  Sir PHILIP MAGNUSasked the President of the Board of Education whether he can state how many secondary schools for boys and for girls, respectively, have qualified for the higher grant by conforming to the regulation as to 25 per cent, of free places; of such boys' schools, in how many Latin is an obligatory subject of instruction; and in how many handicraft teaching and laboratory work are essential parts of the curriculum?
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: I should be much obliged if the hon. Member would be good enough to postpone this question until tomorrow.

  Public Elementary Schools (New Staff Scale).
  Mr. CHARLES ROBERTSasked whether the new staff scale for public elementary schools, announced in paragraph 3 of circular 709, means that no individual teacher may actually teach a larger number of children than the number assigned to the grade to which he or she belongs?
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: The answer is in the negative. The staff scale set out in paragraph 3 merely affords a guide for calculating the total minimum staff required by the Board in a public elementary school, and has nothing to do with the number of children whom an individual teacher may teach. Paragraph 3 of the circular must be read in connection with paragraph 6, which announces the withdrawal of the old article 14 (which was the only provision in the code limiting the number of children whom one teacher could teach), and the substitution of a new article. This change leaves the authority at liberty to distribute the scholars among the individual teachers on the staff in any manner conducive to the efficiency of the school, subject only to the limitation of 60 children in a class.

  Unemployed Grant (Edinburgh).
  Mr. MUNRO FERGUSONasked whether the Scottish Office has applied to the Treasury for an additional grant to the Edinburgh Distress Committee over and above the £4,623 which was paid on Wednesday?
  Mr. URE: An application for an additional grant for Scotland was made to the Treasury. Had it been possible to agree to it, the claims of Edinburgh would, doubtless, have received further consideration.
  Mr. MUNRO FERGUSON: May I ask whether he adheres to the assurance that local subscriptions will be taken into account in determining contributions to the Central Fund?
  Mr. URE: Yes, Sir.

BOYCOTTING CASES (IRELAND).
Return ordered of the number of cases of persons boycotted throughout Ireland on the undermentioned dates and in the following form, with a footnote indicating the dates at which proclamations applying the provisions of section 2 of The Criminal Law and Procedure Act, 1887, to certain districts were issued and revoked, the dates at which proclamations applying the provisions of section 3 and 4 of the Act to certain counties and county boroughs were issued and revoked, and the date in 1901 on which proceedings were first instituted under the provisions of section 2, sub-section 3 (a), of the Act which are operative without proclamation:—

Date.

Complete Boycotting.

Partial Boycotting.

Minor Boycotting.

Total.

Cases.

Persons.

Cases.

Persons.

Cases.

Persons

Cases.

Persons.

30th June, 1893

…

…

30th June, 1894

…

…

30th June, 1895

…

…

30th June, 1896

…

…

30th June, 1897

…

…

30th June, 1898

…

…

30th June, 1899

…

…

30th June, 1900

…

…

30th June, 1901

…

…

31st December, 1901

…

…

30th June, 1902

…

…

31st December, 1902

…

…

30th June, 1903

…

…

31st December, 1903

…

…

30th June, 1904

…

…

31st December, 1904

…

…

30th June, 1905

…

…

31st December, 1905

…

…

30th June, 1906

…

…

31st December, 1906

…

…

30th June, 1907

…

…

31st December, 1907

…

…

30th June, 1908

…

…

31st December, 1908

…

…

28th February, 1909

…

…

—[Mr. Butcher.]

RESIDENT MAGISTRATES (IRELAND).
Return ordered of the Resident Magistrates in Ireland, showing their names,
ages when appointed, former vocation, districts where they now exercise jurisdiction, salaries on appointment and at present, and the dates of appointment (in continuation of Parliamentary Paper, No. 347, of Session 1907).—[Mr. Jeremiah MacVeagh.]

TRAMWAYS AND LIGHT RAILWAYS (STREET AND ROAD).
Return ordered of street and road tramways and light railways authorised by Act or Order, showing the amount of capital authorised, paid up, and expended; the length of line authorised, and the length open for public traffic down to the 31st day of December, 1908, in respect of companies, and the 31st day of March, 1909, in respect of local authorities; the gross receipts, working expenditure, net receipts, and appropriation of net receipts; the number of passengers conveyed, the number of miles run by cars, and the quantity of electrical energy used
during the year ended on the foregoing dates respectively; together with the number of horses, engines, and cars at those dates (in continuation of Parliamentary Paper, No. 268, of Session 1908) [Mr. Churchill.]

PRESENTATION OF BILL.
The following was presented and read the first time:—
Mr. DICKINSON—Women's Enfranchisement (No. 2).—Bill to enable Women to vote at Parliamentary Elections. (To be read a second time, 3rd May.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.

  SUSPENSION OF ELEVEN O'CLOCK RULE.
  The PRIME MINISTER The PRIME MINISTER moved: "That the Proceedings of the Housing, Town Planning, etc., Bill, if under discussion when the Business is postponed, be resumed and proceeded with, though opposed, after the interruption of Business."
  Question put.
  House divided:—Ayes, 167; Noes, 52.

  Division No. 48.]

  AYES.

  [3.40 p.m.

  Abraham, W. (Cork, N.E.)

  Harcourt, Robert V. (Montrose)

  Parker, James (Halifax)

  Acland, Francis Dyke

  Hart-Davies, T.

  Pearce, William (Limehouse)

  Ainsworth, John Stirling

  Harvey, W. E. (Derbyshire, N.E.)

  Pollard, Dr. G. H.

  Alden, Percy.

  Haslam, Lewis (Monmouth)

  Ponsonby, Arthur A. W. H.

  Asquith, Rt. Hon. Herbert Henry

  Hazleton, Richard

  Price, Sir Robert J. (Norfolk, E.)

  Baker, Sir John (Portsmouth)

  Hedges, A. Paget

  Priestley, W. E. B. (Bradford, E.)

  Baring, Godfrey (Isle of Wight)

  Henderson, Arthur (Durham)

  Pullar, Sir Robert

  Barker, Sir John

  Henry, Charles S.

  Raphael, Herbert H.

  Barlow, Percy (Bedford)

  Herbert, Col. Sir Ivor (Mon. S.)

  Rees, J. D.

  Beauchamp, E.

  Higham, John Sharp

  Richards, Thomas (W. Monmouth)

  Benn, W. (Tower Hamlets, St. Geo.)

  Hobart, Sir Robert

  Ridsdale, E. A.

  Bethell, T. R. (Essex, Maldon)

  Hobhouse, Charles E. H.

  Roberts, Charles H. (Lincoln)

  Birrell, Rt. Hon. Augustine

  Hodge, John

  Roberts, G. H. (Norwich)

  Boulton, A. C. F.

  Hogan, Michael

  Roberts, Sir J. H. (Denbighs.)

  Branch, James

  Hooper, A. G.

  Robertson, Sir G. Scott (Bradford)

  Brunner, J. F. L. (Lancs., Leigh)

  Hope, John Deans (Fife, West)

  Robinson, S.

  Buchanan, Rt. Hon. Thomas R.

  Howard, Hon. Geoffrey

  Robson, Sir William Snowdon

  Buckmaster, Stanley O.

  Hudson, Walter

  Roch, Walter F. (Pembroke)

  Burke, E. Havlland-

  Hyde, Clarendon G.

  Rogers, F. E. Newman

  Burns, Rt. Hon. John

  Illingworth, Percy H.

  Rowlands, J.

  Buxton, Rt. Hon. Sydney Charles

  Jenkins, J.

  Runciman, Rt. Hon. Walter

  Byles, William Pollard

  Jones, Sir D. Brynmor (Swansea)

  Rutherford, v. H. (Brentford)

  Carr-Gomm, H. W.

  Kavanagh, Walter M.

  Samuel, Rt. Hon. H. L. (Cleveland)

  Causton, Rt. Hon. Richard Knight

  King, Alfred John (Knutsford)

  Scott, A. H. (Ashton-under-Lyne)

  Charming, Sir Francis Allston

  Lamont, Norman

  Seely, Colonel

  Churchill, Rt. Hon. Winston S.

  Law, Hugh A. (Donegal, W.)

  Shipman, Dr. John G.

  Cleland, J. W.

  Layland-Barrett, Sir Francis

  Smeaton, Donald Mackenzie

  Clough, William

  Lever, W. H. (Cheshire, Wirral)

  Stanley, Albert (Staffs., N.W.)

  Collins, Stephen (Lambeth)

  Lloyd-George, Rt. Hon. David

  Strachey, Sir Edward

  Collins, Sir Wm. J. (S. Pancras, W.)

  Lupton, Arnold

  Strauss, E. A. (Abingdon)

  Cooper, G. J.

  Lyell, Charles Henry

  Summerbell, T.

  Corbett, C. H. (Sussex, E. Grinstead)

  Macdonald, J. R. (Leicester)

  Tennant, H. J. (Berwickshire)

  Cornwall, Sir Edwin A.

  Macdonald, J. M. (Falkirk Burghs)

  Thomas, Sir A. (Glamorgan, E.)

  Cotton, Sir H. J. S.

  Mackarness, Frederic C.

  Thorne, William (West Ham)

  Cowan, W. H.

  MacVeagh, Jeremiah (Down, S.)

  Toulmin, George

  Craig, Herbert J. (Tynemouth)

  M'Kenna, Rt. Hon. Reginald

  Ure, Rt. Hon. Alexander

  Crooks, William

  M'Laren, H. D. (Stafford, W.)

  Vivian, Henry

  Dewar, Arthur (Edinburgh, S.)

  M'Micking, Major G.

  Wardle, George J.

  Dickinson, W. H. (St. Pancras, N.)

  Maddison, Frederick

  Waring, Walter

  Dickson-Poynder, Sir John P.

  Mallet, Charles E.

  Warner, Thomas Courtenay T.

  Dilke, Rt. Hon. Sir Charles

  Marnham, F. J.

  Wason, Rt. Hon. E. (Clackmannan)

  Dobson, Thomas W.

  Massie, J.

  Wason, John Cathcart (Orkney)

  Edwards, Sir Francis (Radnor)

  Masterman, C. F. G.

  Wedgwood, Josiah C.

  Elibank, Master of

  Menzies, Walter

  Whitbread, S. Howard

  Essex, R. W.

  Molteno, Percy Alport

  White, J. Dundas (Dumbartonshire)

  Everett, R. Lacey

  Money, L. G. Chiozza

  White, Sir Luke (York, E.R.)

  Faber, G. H. (Boston)

  Montagu, Hon. E. S.

  Whitley, John Henry (Halifax)

  Ferens, T. R.

  Mooney, J. J.

  Williams, J. (Glamorgan)

  Ferguson, R. C. Munro

  Morgan, J. Lloyd (Carmarthen)

  Wilson, Hon. G. G. (Hull, W.)

  Foster, Rt. Hon. Sir Walter

  Murphy, N. J. (Kilkenny, S)

  Wilson, Henry J. (York, W.R.)

  Gibb, James (Harrow)

  Murray, Capt. Hon. A. C. (Kincard.)

  Wilson, John (Durham, Mid)

  Gladstone, Rt. Hon. Herbert John

  Myer, Horatio

  Wilson, P. W. (St. Pancras, S.)

  Greenwood, Hamar (York)

  Nicholson, Charles N. (Doncaster)

  Wood, T. M'Kinnon

  Gurdon, Rt. Hon. Sir W. Brampton

  Norton, Capt. Cecil William

  Gwynn, Stephen Lucius

  O'Brien, Patrick (Kilkenny)

  TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—Mr. Joseph Pease and Mr. J. H. Lewis.

  Halpin, J.

  O'Grady, J.

  Harcourt, Rt. Hon. L. (Rossendale)

  O'Kelly, James (Roscommon, N.)

  NOES.

  Acland-Hood, Rt. Hon. Sir Alex. F.

  Bowles, G. Stewart

  Clive, Percy Archer

  Balcarres, Lord

  Bridgeman, W. Clive

  Corbett, T. L. (Down, North)

  Baldwin, Stanley

  Butcher, Samuel Henry

  Craig, Charles Curtis (Antrim, S.)

  Beach, Hon. Michael Hugh Hicks

  Cave, George

  Craig, Captain James (Down, E.)

  Bignold, Sir Arthur

  Cecil, Evelyn (Aston Manor)

  Craik, Sir Henry

  Dalrymple, Viscount

  Kimber, Sir Henry

  Sheffield, Sir Berkeley George D.

  Dickson, Rt. Hon. C. Scott-

  Lambton, Hon. Frederick Wm.

  Stanier, Bevlile

  Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers-

  Lane-Fox, G. R.

  Talbot, Lord E. (Chichetter)

  Fell, Arthur

  Law, Andrew Bonar (Dulwich)

  Thomson, W. Mitchell (Lanark)

  Fletcher, J. S.

  Lee, Arthur H. (Hants, Fareham)

  Tuke, Sir John Batty

  Forster, Henry William

  Lonsdale, John Brownlee

  Valentia, Viscount

  Gardner, Ernest

  Lyttelton, Rt. Hon. Alfred

  Winterton, Earl

  Gibbs, G. A. (Bristol West)

  M'Arthur, Charles

  Wortley, Rt. Hon. C. B. Stuart-

  Guinness, W. E. (Bury St. Edmunds)

  Magnus, Sir Philip

  Younger, George

  Harris, Frederick Leverton

  Morpeth, Viscount

  Heaton, John Henniker

  Pease, Herbert Pike (Darlington)

  TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—Sir F. Banbury and Mr. Mildmay.

  Hills, J. W.

  Powell, Sir Francis Sharp

  Joynson-Hicks, William

  Pretyman, E. G.

  Kerry, Earl of

  Remnant, James Farquharson

HOUSING, TOWN PLANNING, ETC., BILL.
Order for second reading read.
Motion made and Question proposed: "That the Bill be now read a second time."
The PRESIDENT of the LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. John Burns): The Bill that we ask the second reading of to-day is the Government's Housing and Town Planning Bill, which was read a second time on May 12th of last year. After the Bill received its second reading, it was committed to the Grand Committee upstairs. This Bill was most favourably received both in this House on the second reading and in the country both before and since, and for 23 days it stood upstairs the ordeal of criticism and improvement. After the 23 days upstairs, the Bill was reported to the House of Commons on 3rd December last, but the Government considered, mainly in deference to the general view that was then expressed, and because of the demands made upon its time for other measures that had an equal claim, that it was impracticable to pass such an important Bill last Session; and the Prime Minister promised that, as the Bill was not passed last year, it should be re-introduced as early as possible in the Session of 1909. This has now been done, and, I submit, in extension of the Prime Minister's promise, that the new Bill which we submit to-day is almost an exact reproduction of last year's Bill, except those Amendments which were added in the Committee, with a few deletions, which were effected on the initiative of the Government and generally approved by the Committee upstairs. The promise that we gave in Grand Committee has been kept so far as it is possible for a Minister to keep a promise made under the peculiar conditions that some of the promises which I gave were accorded to the Committee. But since the Bill has been printed not a single exception has been taken to any of the Amend-
734
ments left by the Government, and, so far as I can gather up to this moment, there is no suggestion that the Government has not loyally kept the promise made to the Committee at its last meeting. What are the differences between the Bill this year and that which left the Committee? There are some minor verbal Amendments, some clauses have been rearranged, and the promises made to the Members of the Committee, as I have said, have been kept. The points which are raised to-day, so far as the Notice Paper is concerned, are points that in no sense touch or affect the principle of the Bill. The one that most affects the Bill—but not the principle—is the Motion down in the name of the hon. Member for Newcastle-under-Lyne, which, with all respect to him, I trust he will not press. I put it to him whether he would have this Bill plus his Amendment, or his Amendment without the Bill, or would he rather have his Amendment than the Bill? If he presses his Amendment I do not think the House of Commons is inclined to abandon a Bill of this importance, so long before the House, and to which the Government are pledged since 1906, and which, in its main features, has been received by all sections of the House with more or less approval, and with practically little serious criticism.
That brings me now to what this Bill, amended, improved, and enlarged, seeks to secure. The main and essential feature of the Bill is that Part III. of the Housing of the Working Classes Act, 1890, which enables local authorities to provide new houses for the working classes, and which is now only adoptive, shall be put in force throughout the country. That is an important, a serious and necessary, and, I believe, a practical step that housing reformers have been asking for for some years. Beyond that the Bill gives increased facilities for the acquisition of land for housing the working classes on small holdings terms. Such conditions under which land can be acquired for small

735
holdings have been so recently before both Houses of Parliament, and have secured, I believe, the cordial assent of both branches of Parliament; and it is, at any rate, equally necessary that the acquisition of land for what is equally necessary for the improvement of the country—namely, land for the housing of the working classes should be under similar conditions—that it is not necessary for me to labour those conditions at any length. The third improvement is that the provisions in this Bill enable loans to be obtained through the Public Works Loans Commissioners for periods up to 80 years, with the minimum rate of interest possible, and I think desirable. The fourth provision is that the new Bill, when it becomes an Act, will not only be better enforced by improved machinery than the existing Acts now are, but existing Acts embodied in this Bill; and at the end of the Session the whole of the Housing Acts, consolidated into one intelligible, and practical working measure, will, I trust, enable the housing of the working classes to be secured by machinery that will act more easily, more promptly, and more efficiently, and at less cost than now prevails.
The fifth point is that this Bill strengthens and simplifies the present law as regards closing orders, and the demolition of insanitary property unfit for human habitation. The sixth point of the Bill is that it extends, in Clauses 14 and 15, to houses of a higher rental value than at present, an implied condition in the contract for letting that the houses are fit for human habitation. It is not only that we should be content with the present law which says that when a landlord lets a house or tenement to an intending occupant that at the time of entry for occupation the house shall be fit for human habitation. What we want is to maintain that house in a condition fit for human habitation so long as human beings reside therein. Small though that point is, if vigorously enforced, which we believe under the machinery of this Bill it will be, that small but necessary point will, I trust, create a revolution in the minor conditions of the house, especially in our large towns and cities.
Clause 15 throws upon the landlord the responsibility of keeping the house reasonably fit. Now all these various objects are secured and achieved by the process of machinery set forth in this Bill. So far as the House is concerned this Bill is a dis-
736
tinct advance on the existing law. These proposals are moderate, reasonable, practical, and nothing has given the Government greater pleasure than the general way in which they have been accepted, so far as the House is concerned. I cordially commend that portion of the Bill to the House.
The next portion of the Bill is that portion which deals with town planning. This is a new departure in the legislation of this country. I regret that it has come so late. No one can go through the East End of London, or to places like Liverpool, Leeds, Manchester and Glasgow, and see the effect, both on the physique, morale, happiness, and comfort of men, women, and children, through lack of some such condition as this 100, or at least 50, years ago, but will come to one definite conclusion, that, late though it is, it is better late than never, and that the House of Commons should not lose this opportunity of giving to communities, especially growing and industrial communities, the opportunity of consciously shaping their own development in a better way than has occurred in the past. I have lately been spending week ends in visiting thirty or forty unemployed works in the East End of London, particularly in close proximity to open spaces, and if Members who do not know the East End of London had been with me, I could have pointed out in a practical way how, even close to places like West Ham Park, Hainault Forest, the western portion of Epping Forest and Hackney Marshes, and by the River Lea and other places, if we had had this Bill 40 or 50 years ago, the amenities of these parks and open spaces could have been enormously added to by maintaining a balance between them and the houses built in their neighbourhood. It is not fair or just to our poor that in many cases you build, as you do, close by a river or a canal, which might be made a pleasurable and healthy amenity by the adoption of a proper system of laying out roadways; it is not fair, I say, that streets should be put the wrong way on, that roads should be formed at the wrong angle, that they should be placed where the sun rarely reaches, but where the wind does always, or where ventilation is denied them, and where the line of greatest resistance is pursued in neglecting those natural and physical opportunities which, under the Town Planning Bill, could be profitably exploited for the whole community—to the benefit not only of the present genera-

737
tion, but particularly of children who are cursed, many of them, in their habitations and environment. This portion of the Bill has met with a favourable reception. It has had a little criticism, but I trust that before June the measure, the town planning portion of it particularly, will be on the Statute Book. I come to one or two portions of the measure which have been rather misunderstood or unintentionally misrepresented. If town planning is to be a success, as we all agree it should be, it is essential that the central body should have more control than it now has. I can understand some hon. Members saying that what has prevented town planning in the past has been where special, personal, or local interests have been so anxious to satisfy prejudices or selfish objects that it has been impossible for local owners, with a local authority of limited views, sometimes consisting not always of the most disinterested personnel, to come to the agreement that would be arrived at if the central authority intervened. And it is universally admitted on both sides of the House that for this purpose the Local Government Board ought to have more power to intervene, first by way of local inquiry, secondly by making surveys and investigations, separating the goats from the sheep, and seeing that the community do not suffer because litigious owners or prejudiced councillors happen to be at loggerheads, not about the interests of the locality as a whole, but about some pettifogging local or personal grievance which is very often allowed to stand in the way of a good owner developing his property, or of public-spirited companies doing the right thing—the local authorities being influenced, as alone they ought to be influenced, for the benefit of the community they serve. We think that the Local Government Board, as the central authority, ought to exercise a wider control, and for this control the Department has taken no more power than is essential for the proper purposes of this Bill.
Some of the powers of this Bill have been misunderstood, others have been exaggerated, and one or two are suspected on minor details'. May I say to all who do not agree with me as to the proposals of this Bill, whether as to parks or open spaces, roads or other points of detail, that they will find the Local Government Board as amenable and susceptible to reason and advice in the Committee of this House as they were in Grand Committee upstairs. It would be ridiculous if, on minor points in a Bill like this, we
738
should be suspected of dragging in proposals, as has been represented, to grab commons, to filch open spaces, to appropriate parks, and, generally speaking, not to rest content until the houses of West Ham and Poplar are in the middle of Kensington Gardens or in the centre of Wimbledon Common. Yet, that is the kind of representation we receive. As a matter of fact, the people who make that kind of suggestion in the newspapers forget that the Local Government Board is pre-eminently a body more concerned in regard to parks and open spaces than any other person or authority could be in this country. First, it has the care of the public health, and no town or city can possess health without open spaces and pleasant environment. Last year alone, the Local Government Board, which is suspected in some quarters of having designs to build on every common, on every open space or commonable piece of land, sanctioned £300,000 for the purchase of additional parks and open spaces. When it is suggested that we have fell designs on commons, my answer is: that out of £230,000 spent out of the unemployed fund last winter, £130,000 was expended in adding to parks and open spaces, and beautifying those which already existed. To suggest that we want to filch commons and run away with parks and open spaces is absurd. What differences there are between my Department and one or two hon. Members are open to consideration and adjustment. Of course, I do not hope to please every Member whose mind is filled with open spaces, but I do say that there is nothing in these proposals but what one can come to an agreement upon.
I now come to the third portion of the Bill. That is the portion which deals with the medical officers of health. It is a very important part of the measure. We have sixty-two county councils in the country, and, up to recently, only half of them have had medical officers. I do not think that this country, which, for the last hundred years, has led the world in public sanitation, should remain longer under the reproach of not having in every county of England and Wales a whole-time medical officer. And we have decided that every county council shall have a whole-time medical officer, devoting all his abilities and services to public health and sanitation. Bearing in mind the special provisions of this Bill, we also say that this in itself, especially when the terms and conditions under which the medical officer serves are to be approved by the Local

739
Government Board, should give some satisfaction to the members of a useful and honourable profession, which has a right to be protected against, at times, the capricious local interference which prevents them from doing their duty to the body politic as well as they otherwise ought to be allowed to do it. It is complained that this Bill has too much legislation by reference in it. We have disposed of that argument by circulating a lengthy Memorandum on Friday last. It consists of some 32 pages, and reproduces in relation to this Bill the substantive Amendments and quotations from other Acts, and I think that when we supplement our Memorandum by the consolidation of this Bill with other Bills the House will then have a workable and practical housing measure. We set out in the various schedules at the end of the Bill, as explained by the Memorandum, all the substantive enactments that have been substituted for the reference clauses in the original Bill; and as' to the various points that have been taken and the advice that has been offered to us by our legal critics on both sides of the House, we have combined in the Memorandum and in the schedules, and, I trust, in the consolidating Bill also, common-sense with legal precision. There are one or two other things to which I must refer before I sit down. The first is with regard to underground dwellings. We are taking steps to abolish underground and cellar dwellings altogether. Personal and public opinion in the last few years has moved rapidly, and the proposals of the Bill practically terminates underground and cellar dwellings for human habitation for the future. We are also seeking to obtain power to prohibit back-to-back dwellings. ["Oh."] I notice that one Member of the House says "Oh." That confirms the fact, perhaps, that representations as to back-to-back houses have only been received from one district, I do not believe that back-to-back houses ought to exist at all. So far as this Bill is concerned no back-to-back houses are to be allowed in future. And we are supported in that proposal, T see in a little handbill, entitled "Fresh Air and Ventilation," published by the National Association for the Prevention of Consumption and other forms of Tuberculosis. I find in that leaflet they say that "back-to-back houses and cellar tenements are unfit for human habitation." And that is our view, and no injustice is done to any community or to any owner
740
or to any interest when, if this Bill be passed, we say that no more back-to-back houses shall be allowed in future. If we wanted arguments against back-to-back houses I should like, if time permitted, to read one of the most remarkable little books I ever read dealing with the state of the poorer classes in great towns. This little book is the substance of a speech delivered in the House of Commons by Mr. Robert A. Slaney, a relative of the late Colonel Kenyon-Slaney. If one only had time to read this little book, which was Published in 1840, particularly with that part dealing with the consequences and the effects of back-to-back houses, I think we should carry the House with us. We are against back-to-back houses.
Mr. LUPTON: That book was written 70 years ago.
Mr. BURNS: Yes, but the same rule applies now. The particular town dealt with in this little book now labours under the disability of back-to-back houses.
Mr. LUPTON: And that town has the second lowest death-rate in the kingdom.
Mr. BURNS: Probably it would have been better if the town had not had back-to-back houses.
Mr. SPEAKER: I must ask the hon. Member for Sleaford not to carry on a conversation. This is a debate, not a conversazione.
Mr. BURNS: I can only say that in one town where back-to-back houses prevail we have this very remarkable result: Whereas the average age at death of the gentlemen and the professional classes was 44, amongst the tradesmen it was 27, and amongst operative labourers and their families it was 19; that is, 44 as against 19. My medical advisers advise me that the back-to-back houses were responsible in the day of this report for a death-rat o of 43 per 1,000 over the town as a whole, and an infant mortality of 570 per 1,000 of children under five years of age. It is represented to me on the responsibility of Dr. Tatham, Dr. Niven and Dr. Sykes, and other well-known medical men, that where all causes are responsible for 27 per 1,000 of deaths it is 38, and not 27, in back-to-back houses; infectious diseases were 4.5 in through ventilated houses and 8.7 in back-to-back houses; consumption stood at 2.8 in through ventilated houses and 5.2 in back-to-back houses. In the ordinary houses occupied by the labouring classes in regard to lung complaints the percentage was 6.6

741
in through ventilated houses and 9.2 in back-to-back houses. Where the children die from diarrhœa it is 1.4 in through ventilated houses and 3.4 in back-to-back houses. In a town that has recently expressed its desire to be allowed to continue these back-to-back houses, I find this very suggestive comment made by one of the best authorities on housing (Mr. Dewsnup) in one of the best books on the subject recently written. He says, speaking of Leeds back-to-back houses:—
"Newly built the houses may look attractive, but what will be their condition after years of wear and tear. More than a probability that the conclusion of Manchester will be re-justified."
England is not so destitute of land upon which to house its poor that they should be housed in working class tenements without a backyard in which to chop the wood and put the coal, and in which the children can play whilst the mother is able to keep a friendly eye on them through the washhouse window, and at the same time continue to carry on her domestic duties. All this is impossible in back-to-back houses, where the children have only got a stuffy room for a playground; and in the days of rapid traction you have no right to relegate children to play in a small front garden, or in the road or street, when the community is rich enough to provide the humblest garden in the majority of cases, and some measure of a backyard in which the youngsters can play whilst the domestic duties in the house are being carried out. This can be done better in through ventilated houses with a backyard and a garden than is possible in the case of back-to-back houses.
We shall probably be told that there are one or two details with regard to town planning that are more arbitrary than they should be, that they will want amending, and that there are other details we shall have to consider. On all these points I am quite convinced we shall be able to meet hon. Members when this Bill reaches the proper stage. We are extremely anxious that this Bill should go through the second reading before the Easter holidays, and I have contented myself on this occasion with giving a brief outline of the salient features of this Bill, which has been before the House so long, and which has been so favourably received by the country generally. I appeal to hon. Members who have put down instructions, nearly all of which, I think, are out of order, to recognise the reasonable and susceptible mood of the Local
742
Government Board with regard to this Bill. I ask them to do what I intend to do with regard to the passage of this Bill, to proceed along the line of least resistance, and before this session is out I hope hon. Members in all parts of the House will be gratified by the satisfaction which, I am sure, they will all feel of having contributed upstairs and in Committee, and through the various subsequent stages of this Bill in the production of a useful, if a humble, measure affecting the life of the people, the effect of which they will be able to gauge better 30 or 40 years hence than at the present moment. Whether that be so or not, this Bill and its future, and everything it contains, I commend to the consideration of the House, and I trust as soon as is consistent with reasonable discussion of its terms on the second reading, we shall be able to commit this Bill to a Committee of the whole House, and add to the Statute Book a measure in regard to which I thank every hon. Member of the House, from whatever part he may come, for the kindly assistance rendered to the Government in producing this Bill up to its present stage.
Mr. LYTTELTON: The Unionist party were the authors of the measure of 1890, and it is natural that during the years that have elapsed since that time some improvement of the legislation should have become necessary. I have never disguised the very great importance which I attach to this subject. I said at the time when we were considering temperance legislation that more good to temperance and morals can be done by measures of this kind than all the temperance legislation which it is in the power of a Government to bring forward. Even with regard to legislation I sometimes think it is almost a mockery to speak of education when the little children in the houses of the poor are living under the conditions which the right hon. Gentleman has represented, and which we all know to be true. I think I can say, speaking for my hon. Friends on this side, that our attitude towards the general outline of this Bill will naturally be sympathetic. There are details upon which we have extremely strong convictions, and there are some points upon which I confess I hold very grave doubts, but with regard to other matters I can promise that our attitude will be one of general sympathy so far as the second reading is concerned. My view has not been in any way dissipated by the genial speech we have just heard, or by the promise.

743
which is more valuable still, of the right hon. Gentleman's susceptibility to the persuasive discipline which will, no doubt, be applied to him in the future. I have had some practical experience of housing and town planning, but I am obliged to state, as the Under-Secretary said on a previous occasion, that this Bill strains the principle of legislation by reference almost to the breaking point. In its ingenious concealment of what it intends, and its mysterious references to archaic matters which are difficult and laborious to find, I must say that I can find no other fit parallel than the works of Mr. Meredith and Mr. Henry James, if I may with respect to these distinguished authors compare anything they have written to an Act of Parliament. I have given a good deal of time to the consideration of this measure, and I certainly think that the adoption of the principle of part III. of the Act of 1890 is sound. I think the principle of that bundle of clauses at the beginning which deals with legal matters of some complexity is also sound. I refer to the freeing of the channels of liberality for the benefit of housing schemes. I will only mention the Mortmain Acts, the Settled Land Acts, and the machinery of charities, and the stimulus which is given to public credit by way of loans on liberal terms at low rates repayable over a long period. All those seem to me to be quite sound. I also think that in the main due regard has been had to the authority and initiative of county councils. That was an improvement effected by the persuasive discipline of the Grand Committee. I can give a most unqualified and whole-hearted approval to the. institution of a statutory committee on each county council to deal with public health; and above all, I think more important still is the appointment by every county council of a medical officer, whose whole time shall be engaged in this most important matter, and who will not have, as at present occasionally, a most awkward conflict between duty and interest when he has to consider a question of condemning property which may be owned by lucrative patients of his own.
Then I come to the town planning part of the Bill, the principle of which also I think is sound. I could show conclusively, if time permitted, that millions of money might have been saved to this country had that foresight with regard to town-planning which it is proposed to initiate by this Bill been exercised in years past.
744
It is a lamentable fact that millions of pounds have been expended in this country in acquiring and pulling down expensive property which has been erected hap hazard, and which those responsible for the development of towns have had to remove to enable that development to take place. It is absolutely right also that the mistakes our forefathers made, and which are being made to-day in the suburbs, in placing a great number of houses to the acre, should be prevented in future, and that houses should be built, as the right hon. Gentleman has said, having regard to the site, air, and open space for gardening and for the children. Nothing could be better or more wholesome. Having considered this matter for a long time, if certain matters upon which I will touch presently are adjusted to our satisfaction, I do not think that owners of property near large towns need apprehend any loss at all in this regard. The principle of town planning will extend the market for building. Instead of landowners being almost forced, as they are at present, to sell small parcels of land upon which houses are packed at immense inconvenience and great unsightliness, the tendency of this legislation ought to be to extend the zones in the suburbs, to spread the building operations, and therefore to bring much more land into profitable occupation, and by that means to create a larger area upon which the profits of building may be made to recoup the landlords for the lesser number of houses which they will be permitted to place upon the acre. At present a landowner who wishes to do well by his property outside a town, is often deterred from letting builders come upon it because he is horrified at the deteriorating effect it will have upon the property that he sells, and also upon that which he does not sell. Nothing can be more disastrous to property than the erection of hideous insanitary houses, both to the land they occupy and to the land adjacent. The principle of this Bill is to substitute a smaller but a far safer property for the owner, and it will prevent disagreeable and speculative building.
I hope that the Government, and especially the right hon. Gentlemen opposite, will remember that in these matters of town-planning private enterprise has been the schoolmistress of the State. I do not think that that will be denied by anybody who has studied the admirable experiments which have been made throughout

745
the country, and whose reputation now is well known. These private experiments have proved to demonstration the absurdity of cast-iron bye-laws. I welcome nothing more in the whole of the Bill than the power given in reference to this point; perhaps I should like to give it to some other authority than the Local Government Board, but I welcome that power at any rate in competent hands. At present the way of securing light, air, sunlight, and healthiness to these urban communities is by prescribing a uniform width of macadamised channels and roads, whether those roads are wanted or not. Roughly speaking, you want one broad road from north to south, and another from east to west, through communities of this kind; and it would be lamentable, from the point of view of comfort and sightliness, if you insisted that each road should be 40 or 60 feet wide, should not be allowed to have trees or grass at the sides, and should, in fact, be without those features which have made garden cities so popular throughout the country. I claim also that existing private experiments have shown that commercial stability is perfectly consistent with regard being had to beauty, to historical conditions, and to local associations; and if they are further encouraged many other lessons will be taught to municipalities and to the Government by private undertakers, who are now well acquainted with their business, and ought to be encouraged to continue it. Their very mistakes are a great advantage to the Government in bringing forward this Bill, because they have had to be made good out of the pockets of private enterprise instead of at the expense of the ratepayers or taxpayers.
Such being an outline of the principles of the Bill which I view with sympathy, I trust hon. Members will bear with me while I point out certain matters in regard to which I have grave doubts, and others which I think are altogether wrong. First, I notice there is still a general power left to the Local Government Board on certain occasions to go against and to coerce the opinion of the county council. I think that that is a mistake. I remember hearing a very important speech in one of the local government debates in which an hon. Member of this House pointed out with convincing force the immense labours and heavy personal cost at which local government duties are undertaken by county councillors. I think that sometimes you may go past the opinion of district or urban councils; but if, for instance, a
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county council, representing the whole county, with its local knowledge and experience and knowing the danger and unpopularity of a charge upon the rates, thinks that a certain housing or town planning scheme is not desirable, my belief is that if the Local Government Board were to override that opinion, any plan that they might adopt under such circumstances would be pursued under such a weight of unpopularity that it would not only fail itself, but also bring into discredit the otherwise beneficent provisions of the Bill. I hope the Government will consider that point.
Then there is a provision which I think is sufficiently important to be regarded not as a detail, but as worthy of mention on second reading. I refer to the provision for a general register. That is a very expensive matter. A register of the circumstances of every householder in a district may take years, or at any rate many months, to compile. The population is migratory; if you ascertain in June the number of families, the number of rooms, their cubic space, and all the other particulars, the whole situation may have altered in November, and you may have to go over the whole business again. Considering the cost and the fact that under section 16 you have the duty of inspecting houses for the purpose of ascertaining whether they are insanitary, I very much doubt whether it would not be wiser to cut out the general register from the Bill. If you really deem it desirable on other grounds, it might be inserted in another Bill, but I doubt whether it would be worth while to encounter the unpopularity which would be caused by the heavy and often futile cost of such a measure by encumbering the present Bill with the provision. I would also invite the opinion of the House as to whether it would not be wise to substitute the Local Government Board for the justices as the appellate body in the matter of demolition orders and the like. A matter upon which I personally feel strongly is the provision for compensation for landowners whose land is compulsorily acquired. I am aware that the general view of hon. Members opposite is that we on this side regard the compulsory acquisition of land as an occasion for exaggerated and extravagant claims, and there are one or two stock instances which they always trot out. They may be right or they may be wrong, but they never mention the large number of cases which are settled with satisfaction and justice to all concerned. Let me point out what the

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provisions for compensation are in this Bill. I am dealing only with the principle of the matter. I think the arbitrator ought to be independent and unbiassed, and I think we ought to see—though I am not so sure of the assent of the right hon. Gentleman opposite—that if he is to err in the matter at all, he should err in the matter of liberality towards the dispossessed and invaded landowner. That is my own opinion, and it is generally acted upon. I think it is just. I will give an illustration in order to make quite clear the effect of the provisions of this Bill with regard to compensation to the landowner, whose land is compulsorily acquired for the purposes of this Bill. He may be a landlord who is fond of his property, and who has attractive designs for it. He may have laid it out in a way which the President of the Board of Trade would approve of. Were it laid out as a cricket ground, I am perfectly certain that the right hon. Gentleman would say that it had been laid out in the most admirable manner. He may have a wish to lay it out as a golf course, or as a place of recreation for children, or any other human object. It is not very agreeable to a man with this design, and who has arranged all the rest of his property in relation and in reference to the scheme he has prepared if the local authority should come and say, "We want this for a housing site." That could be done under the compulsory clause in this Bill. Every just man would say that the landowner—and I think it is right that he should give way to the public interest if it exists—has a right to be treated with liberality, and certainly to have his case adjudicated upon by a tribunal in every respect unbiassed. Now, what do the provisions of the Bill give him in such a case? It gives him an arbitrator appointed by the Local Government Board, whose credit is involved in this going through well, and he is paid on a scale fixed by the Local Government Board. There are many cases in which the Local Government Board are the authority who are responsible for the whole scheme, and who may be differing from the county council, say in regard to the expense that will be necessary to bring it effectually through.
The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. Masterman): Are you referring to housing?
Mr. LYTTELTON: I am referring to housing. The town planning tribunal of arbitration has a number of elaborate provisions differing from those in the first part of the Bill. You have one tribunal for the compulsory taking of land, and another contribunal constituted in the second part of the Bill to decide what the landlord is to obtain if his interest is injuriously affected. That seems to me to be an unnecessary complication. Let me go on to where I was when I was interrupted. I was saying that the landlord has the right to an impartial tribunal. The tribunal proposed is to be appointed by the Local Government Board, and paid on a scale fixed by the Local Government Board. He is not allowed to have counsel before the arbitrator, and he is not allowed, except by consent of the arbitrator, to have even a skilled valuer to represent what the value of the land is. The functions of the arbitrator are prescribed by the Bill. He is not allowed to give the customary 10 per cent, above the value, as I understand, on any site at all in respect of compulsory purchase. In other words, the landlord may have paid a considerable sum of money for the property, and it may be taken away. He is to receive compensation for it, and then he must find a means of re-investment. That being so, surely he is entitled to something above the bald value of the property. I think myself, with some experience of human nature, that if property is to be taken away under such circumstances as I have described, it would only be fair that the value should be ascertained by an impartial tribunal, and that the owner should have such assistance of skilled men and counsel as the necessities of the case demand. I can assure the right hon. Gentleman that when the Bill is in the Committee Stage the discipline he may receive on this point will pass peaceful persuasion at any rate if he will not give way upon it.
There is but one point more to which I wish to refer. There are other points to be raised by Amendments of which notice has been given, and I leave all these to the hon. Members in whose names they stand. But this point I consider more important than any I have ventured to bring before the House. I see no provision in the Bill for an addition to the staff of the Local Government Board, for the purpose of working this Bill. I can assure the Government that unless they

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make provision, and substantial provision, for that addition, this Bill, so excellent in its principles and intentions as it is in many respects, will be wholly unworkable. I feel certain of that. I will tell the House why. I have been engaged more than two years in dealing with one of those subjects, and I have had great assistance from Members of this House. We all know who have had practical cognisance of these matters that the subject is somewhat in its infancy. There are few in the country who know much about town planning. If you had twenty schemes to organise, I doubt whether you would be able to get the expert advice necessary before they could be put forward in even the most elementary stage. That is my opinion. But there are certain architects and surveyors who have very keen and adequate knowledge upon this important matter. I hope the Local Government Board will go slowly and steadily at first, and that the local authorities will do so also in this matter. I do trust that the Local Government Board, upon whom such enormous and, as I think, undue responsibilities are cast by the Bill will give the House an assurance that they will equip themselves sufficiently, and be really a guide to the country in this matter. If they do, I am quite certain that no objection will be raised by myself and those on this side of the House on the score of economy, because it is the worst and falsest economy—economy which would cost the country ultimately thousands and millions of pounds—if the immense powers which are contained in the Bill, and from which we hope so much, are administered by overworked and inefficient officials. I trust that the Government will fulfil the promise made by the right hon. Gentleman, that, while in the Committee stage, if the Bill is given a second reading, they will consider the suggestions which we make from this side of the House.
Sir WALTER FOSTER: I cordially agree with the remarks which fell from the right hon. Gentleman opposite on the second reading of this Bill. For many years I have pointed out that such powers as are proposed were an absolute necessity, and that there should be a larger staff at the Local Government Board. Under this new system of town planning, which, I think, was wrongly incorporated in this Bill, and especially so far as regards the powers the Local Government
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Board are to have in connection with housing, I think it will be absolutely essential, if we are to make any progress, to have a larger staff than the President of the Local Government Board at present commands. I think if we look back at the recent legislation in connection with small holdings we will see how unwise too economic administration is in connection with success. If the Small Holdings Act had been carried out by a larger staff in connection with its coming into operation we would not have had to face the difficulties which we have now to encounter. My right hon. friend the President of the Local Government Board will find in a year or two that he has not sufficient power in the Local Government Board as regards staff to grapple with the large amount of work that he undertakes by this Bill. I congratulate my right hon. friend on the manner in which he moved the second reading of the Bill. I think the discipline he has had upstairs during the 23 days of Committee has been of advantage. T never found the right hon. Gentleman appear to greater advantage than to-day, and I am conceited enough to say that there are those amongst us who may congratulate themselves in believing that the mill he went through with them upstairs has brought him into the exceedingly good frame of mind which he has exhibited to the House to-day. I hope the Bill will be brought to a successful conclusion in this House, and in another place.
I have in the first place to refer to one or two things in connection with the Bill which seem to me points that must be attended to in the Committee stage. I gathered from the President of the Local Government Board that the great question of the enclosure of commons will be attended to in a liberal spirit. We do not want—and I am sure there is no idea in the Local Government Board—to do away with open spaces, or to encroach upon commons. I hope that my right hon. Friends who are taking an interest in that question will be thoroughly satisfied with the action of the Government and the Committee. With reference to another point I totally disagree with the right hon. Gentleman opposite. I had some share of responsibility in putting in clause 30 about the census. I helped to put it in for several reasons. All the Housing Acts which have been passed have been failures—most colossal and

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lamentable failures in connection with modern legislation. Housing Act after Housing Act has been passed through the House of Commons since 1885, but because there has been no power in the case of reluctant authorities to compel them to do their duty they have failed. We hope to have stronger powers in this new Bill, and I think the census will be an important power in connection with the education of public opinion. We shall have in each locality a record of the condition of houses. That record will be open to public inspection, and it will be of inestimable value to the county council medical officer, and the county council committee when they inquire into those things. They cannot have this knowledge of localities unless it is put on record. I think the local authorities are recalcitrant on account of the expenditure, but they are always kicking against expense and additions to the rates. I believe that in this case it is an unwise economy.
Mr. LYTTELTON: Section 16 of the Bill not only gives power but makes it the duty of the local authority to inspect for the purpose of ascertaining whether buildings are in a habitable and sanitary condition.
Sir WALTER FOSTER: That is a power which has never been carried out. I believe this will have an educational influence far beyond anything that has been done. Although the local authorities may object both in towns and rural districts to carry out this power we ought to insist from these benches to have it retained. It may be unpopular, but it will have a great effect in improving the housing of the people. Why have all the other Acts been failures? They have been failures for two reasons. In localities you have public opinion against the expenditure of public money in the housing of the people. It would increase the rates. I should be very glad if there were some means of getting money from the Government for the housing of the people in these various localities. Unfortunately I do not see any prospect of that, but possibly when the Budget comes there may be some attempt to deal with the taxation of land values. It ought to be one of the first charges on the land that there should be proper accommodation for people who work on the land. In addition to the increase of the rates, one of the causes of reluctance to deal with this question is local influence. On nearly all the small
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local authorities are people who are the owners of houses. In small towns the representatives of the ratepayers are not only the owners of property, but very often they are the employers of workmen. I hope that this Bill will give the county councils power to intervene where a district council is unable or unwilling to do its duty. That would create a certain amount of force, and it would give the authorities power to interfere not only with the district council but with an unwilling county council. I do not think that the mandamus power of the Local Government Board is a very potent weapon. It has, as a rule, nearly always broken in the hands of those who have tried to use it. But we have in the Bill a certain amount of control in administrative power to force the authorities to do their duty. With reference to all these questions, at the very root of them the only power by which we can compel the local authorities to do their duty is the ground of public health. One of the wise things in this Bill is that the Local Government Board has decided that there must be a medical officer of health in every county. Bad housing increases the death rate, and the medical officer of health will be always anxious to bring about a better state of things in order that the record of his work may appear good in the eyes of the public. I think that his appointment is one of the best things which can be done. A hon. Gentleman opposite once sent me when I was at the Local Government Board a report—a medical report—of his county council. It was exceedingly well drawn up. It was drawn up by a lay committee, for the county council had no medical officer. He used, I am sorry to say, my commendation of that report as an argument against the appointment of a medical officer. I do not think that was a fair use to make of my commendation. Under this Bill county medical experts, assisted by sanitary inspectors, will be able to look not only after rural localities, but after neglected urban parts of the country, and they will be able from time to time to improve all the black spots in every county which ought to have the attention of a medical officer of health. These medical officers are to be given a position of security, which every officer of health ought to have. The Bill gives them the right of not being dismissed except with the consent of the Local Government Board. They are to have the position of being whole-time

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officers. One of the great difficulties in this country on this question has been the system of allowing medical officers of health for small areas to receive £10, £20, or £30, a year, and be appointed annually by small local authorities. They have very responsible work to do, and if these men could be given a security of tenure much good would result. Take a case in point. You have a small town, say, of 10,000 inhabitants. It has an urban district council. A medical officer of health is appointed at a salary of £25 or £30 a year. Ho does what he can to improve the sanitary condition of the district, but at the end of 12 months he is dropped. Why? Because he has been a little too zealous. I know, that the right hon. Gentleman knows, cases where these men after 12 months' active service in connection with the housing of the people are not reappointed by the district councils, and are dropped because they did their best to bring about a better state of things in the poorer districts. That is a scandal which ought to be removed. It can be removed if the Local Government Board would give the right of appeal on the part of these medical officers to itself. Even in watering places of 15,000 or 20,000 inhabitants men are dismissed for being too active in looking after the housing of the poorer classes. These men should be made independent in their very difficult and serious duties, so that they may look thoroughly after the habitations of the poor people. It should be our duty to improve the health of the people throughout the length and breadth of the land, not only in the counties, but in the urban districts, and it is because I believe this Bill will tend to improve the health of the people that T give it my hearty support, and I hope that the House will be able to make it still stronger than it is.
Mr. LANE-FOX Mr. LANE-FOX proposed to leave out from the word "That" to the end of the Question, and add the words "this House, while recognising the need for the improvement in the housing of the people, declines to make the cost of this national service a further charge upon the local rates," instead thereof. He said: The right hon. Gentleman the President of the Local Government Board, in one of his usually breezy and generous speeches, urged us to recognise the reasonable, tolerant, and susceptible method of the Local Government Board, and he also said he hoped in the course of the discussion to gratify Members in all quarters of the House on the
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various objections they had to make. One point with which the right hon. Baronet who has just spoken has dealt with, not very conclusively, as I hope to show, is what he described as the reluctance of local authorities to do their duty, and the right hon. Gentleman said the great object of this Bill was to be able to force reluctant authorities to do their duty. My experience of those reluctant authorities is. if you can provide a fair amount for the portion of the cost of the duties they have to perform their reluctance would vanish, and, further, my experience is—and I feel sure it will be largely shared—if the country wishes to have better conditions of housing, if the country is prepared to pay for it, it can get it. But as long as you have the present conditions by which 82. per cent, of the local burden is paid by rateable property and only 18 per cent, paid by other property, while other rateable property pays only 18½ of the Imperial taxation, so that the other 82 per cent. goes free, so long as conditions of that kind exist you cannot expect the local authority will show themselves vigorous in carrying out the duties Parliament has thrust upon them, and for which. Parliament provides no means for paying. The right hon. Gentleman knows well enough I do not wish to do anything to hurt his Bill. I have been sitting on the Committee upstairs in connection with this Bill for a long time, and I think the right hon. Gentleman will admit that I certainly did some small share in helping this Bill to pass through Committee. Therefore, he will not consider the Amendment I move as moved in any spirit hostile to the Bill. But if we do not take this opportunity of raising particular objections to matters which become more and more oppressive, especially for those who represent agricultural Constituencies, where the grievance is most felt, then our chance will have gone. I am not going to discuss the unfairness of the rating system. We had an excellent debate in this House, in which the whole of that grievance was brought forward and was admitted. The Chancellor of the Exchequer said:—
"I do not think anyone can defend our present system of rating."
and allusion was made to remarkable figures I have just quoted, which were produced before the Royal Commission on Local Taxation, by which it was shown that 82 per cent, of property is exempted from its share of contribution to local taxation. I am perfectly convinced that

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unless the right hon. Gentleman is prepared to meet in some way the situation which exists he will find this Bill is simply and solely a dead letter, that nothing more will be done under it than under previous Bills, and that a measure which all of us without exception, though we may differ as to detail, wish largely to be successful, he will find it has turned out an absolutely hopeless failure. Parliament has no right to go on piling on these burdens so manifestly unfair, and which have constantly been admitted as unfair. I am going to be perfectly frank. I consider all Governments have been to blame. I am not going to defend the passing of the Education Act of 1902 in this particular. I think it is the worst instance of piling on the burdens of unfair local taxation ever put upon the Statute Book, but since then we have the Provision of Meals Bill for school children and the Medical Inspection of School Children. The Board of Education is insisting on new regulations for our schools once more which are bound to be costly, and in regard to which they provide no means of carrying them out. All sorts of work has been heaped upon the local authorities, and numerous duties have been thrown upon them in connection with inspection. Amongst these I need only mention the Fertilisers and Feeding Stuffs Bill, the lights on vehicles, the milk supply, and various other demands which have have been made upon the local authorities, besides the demands of the Lunacy Commissioners and other Departments of the Government. The apparent plan of Parliament is to inflict its vicarious philanthropy upon other bodies and to leave them to undergo the unpopularity of providing the money. Local government is becoming absolutely hateful and odious to the feelings of some of the very best men men in the country. Extravagances are heaped up and are thrown from one party to another, and are becoming intolerable to people who realise that they cannot do their duty without engaging in expenditure which falls oppressively and heavily upon certain classes, and certain classes only, of the community. Many of those measures, in one instance certainly, are carried out by bodies the majority of whom are not ratepayers at all. The majority of the council in Durham (?) do not pay any rates at all. How can there be anything but a strong sense of injustice on the part of those who pay rates as long as that condition of things exists? With regard to the
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quinquennial valuation, personally I voted against it. This particular provision is unnecessary, costly, and hard and fast, and will not work well. I will not deal with the costliness of other parts of the measure. I now come to the real and important question of the rural districts. May I point out that there is no use in appealing to the fetish of the Liberal party, the taxation of land values, in this connection, because the districts that most want houses are the poorest districts in the rural parts, where the people are in some cases living in a state of poverty—of the direst poverty—and where the taxation of land values would be of very little use indeed. We do not know what the Government's view is in regard to these rural districts, but it certainly will not get any assistance from the fetish of the taxation of land values. Now with regard to the question of the actual cost of building cottages. It is admitted by the Select Committee that the building cannot be paid for under the present condition unless where houses can be erected by money, borrowed in a way which is very rare. If the House will allow me, I will quote one sentence from the Report of the Select Committee:—
"At the outset the Committee have reluctantly to make the observation, based on general experience throughout the country, that however cheaply cottages may be built they cannot be elected in the ordinary rural districts (where no industry exists creating a high rate of wages, but which is solely dependent on agriculture) so as to cover interest and sinking fund and the usual annual outgoings within the rent-paying capacity of the labourer."
Mr. Wilson Fox, whose loss every one will sincerely deplore, and whose practical work in this matter it will be impossible to replace, put the statement before us by which he estimated that cottages could be built for £150. If it was even possible to borrow the money at 2 per cent., still it would be necessary to charge rent of 2s. 6d. a week to make that cottage pay its way. Well, of course, everybody knows 2 per cent, is an absolutely impossible figure at which we could hope to borrow money from the Treasury to pay interest and for the sinking fund. Then we come to the question whether it is possible to build the cottage for £150. The hon. Baronet opposite seems to think so. I know, as far as the North of England is concerned, in my own part of the world in Yorkshire, it would be absolutely impossible to build a cottage for £150 by any local authority. I have had some very small private experience. Many Members of this House have had much more, but my experience is you will not build a

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single cottage for less than £300, and that one can build a pair or a row for £200 each. You cannot build a cottage, provide proper water supply and drainage and the necessary garden and give the necessary three bedrooms, you cannot really build a cottage that is suitable and of a kind in which we would desire to see working men live, and at the same time lay out the land in a satisfactory state for such a sum as £150. I think if hon. Members will consult those who actually had practical experience they will find that, to a large extent, that view is borne out. We know that the local authorities are not likely to be able to build cheaper than private individuals unless they build on a very large scale, and building on a large scale, under present conditions of rating, will be absolutely and entirely impossible. The Treasury will lend the money at the minimum rate laid down, but we have never been able to get the President of the Local Government Board to tell us what the scale will be and what the rate of interest will be. He frankly told us he did not know. He told us he went to the Treasury and did his best, wrestling with the beasts of Ephesus, and was checked. We do not wish him to repeat that experience. Of course, there might have been further wrestlings, and he may have succeeded, but the evidence given before the Select Committee was the Commissioners would only quote 4¼ per cent, as a minimum rate.
Mr. MORRELL: Not for all loans.
Mr. LANE-FOX: I refer the hon. Member to the Report. They will only quote 4¼ per cent, as their minimum, which rate of interest, with the sinking fund, would mean about £5 5s. per £100 on a fifty years' loan. At that rate if you are to have a cottage, which is going to cost £200, it is perfectly obvious that you will require a rent at the rate of £10 per cottage, and that will amount to 4s. a week. Everybody knows that the average agricultural labourer will not be able to pay 4s. a week; he can only pay 2s. Therefore, out of the rates you will have to give another 2s. a week, which by another simple arithmetical process would give about £5 a year. Take the average village in the average agricultural district, where cottages are most wanted, the valuation would be about £4,000. If cottages are a little cheaper you can build them for £150, but still there would be Is. a week, which would have to come out of the rates, but if the cottage is going to cost £200 you will have to find £5 a year,
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and it will practically come to this, that every penny rate on an ordinary valuation of £4,000 will bring in about £17. That means that for every penny of the rates you will only have to build three and a half cottages, and if you build 21 cottages you will have to have sixpence on the rates. Of course these figures may be varied in different villages, but the fact remains that a large amount would have to go on the rates.
Mr. BURNS: I am sorry to interrupt the hon. Gentleman, who is, of course, the architect of his own speech and the builder of his own hypotheses. He is building his speech on the hypothesis that the rate of interest is £5. The Treasury rate of interest is fixed by the Treasury Minute, and that says that the money will be issued at the lowest rate of interest at which they can get the money—not 5 per cent.
Mr. LANE-FOX: Yes, that is so; but I should be glad if he could give us the amount which it will be. I would point out that unless money can be lent at 2 per cent, and the cottages can be built for £150, there will be still a larger rent than 2s. a week, which, I say, is all the agricultural labourer will be able to pay, and there will still be a call upon the rates by reason of the measure. It is merely a matter of arithmetic. The right hon. Gentleman may, by wrestling with the beasts, be able to get money cheaper, but I do not think the right hon. Gentleman will be able to make any scheme pay under this Bill, and that will be the difficulty in those rural districts. I know that these expenses may be charged to special expenses but, if that is so, it is very unfair that certain districts which have done their best to provide houses should be rated in favour of those where the same amount of trouble and expense has not been incurred. Moreover, you will be enacting a premium on bad landlords who have not done their duty at the expense of good landlords who have. If this charge for special expenditure is put upon particular districts it will be impossible, I think, for the Bill to be administered as generously and thoroughly as we should like to see it. I know there are some hon. Members who think that this question of rates is only a question for landlords, but everybody knows that in large parts of the country there are a number of men farming their own land and upon whom the rates will fall heavily. The Government take power to force this question upon districts under a very unfair

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system. If they wish to force this question on the country or any particular district, they ought to do it upon a fair system of payment. If it is felt that certain classes are not paying their proportion, that will be the difficulty in regard to the non-fulfilment of this Bill, and it is only by removing the: difficulty which will arise under such circumstances that the right hon. Gentleman, or anybody else, can get this question of housing settled. If the right hon. Gentleman would only adopt the suggestion which was made by the Prime Minister in February last year of grants in aid under the full control of his Department, then in the more necessitous districts he might get some more satisfactory results. I hope very much that this Bill may succeed, and that a great part of its provisions will be passed in the form in which they are, but at the same time it seems to me that I have no option except to move this Amendment in order to take another opportunity of drawing attention to this great grievance, which is a serious burden upon my Constituents and upon those who live in a great part of the country. I beg to move the Amendment standing in my name.
Mr. HICKS BEACH: I rise to second the Amendment which the hon. Gentleman has moved, and I hope the House gives him the credit that he has moved this in no hostile spirit to the provision of further workmen's dwellings. I hope they will give me that credit, too, because I have not had an opportunity of taking so keen and active a part as my hon. Friend has done in reference to this question upstairs on the Select Committee and on the Bill in Committee last year, but I can assure the House, that I fully realise what a great problem remains to be solved in regard to this question of providing suitable and fitting accommodation for the working class people in our country districts and in the towns. I should not attempt to speak against a Bill for providing dwellings for the working classes if I thought the Bill which was introduced by the Government was likely to be successful in attaining that object, but it is because I feel that in the rural districts this Kill will be a dead letter that I rise to second the Amendment of my hon. Friend. Before I go into details I wish to emphasise most strongly what has been said by my hon. Friend below me, that no machinery is really provided in this Bill for carrying it out. In the first place, it is
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surely absolutely essential if this Bill is to be carried out, that a largely additional staff should be appointed. In the case of the Small Holdings Bill, Small Holdings Commissioners were appointed, and it is surely essential to see that there is some additional staff provided for carrying this Act out. The right hon. Gentleman, in introducing this Bill, and the hon. Gentleman opposite, who made a very good speech, avoided the really effective part of the scheme. How are they going to carry it out, and how is the money to be found for this additional accommodation?
I suppose the right hon. Gentleman has some solid ground for thinking that cottages can be built in country districts and rents raised from them sufficient to pay for the money expended, but I agree with my hon. Friend that it will cost £300 to build a single cottage and £400 to build a pair. I happen to have built a pair of simple labourers' cottages lately. They were perfectly simple, but I hope they are, as they were intended to be, good cottages, containing three bedrooms, two rooms downstairs, and an out-house outside. The actual carpentering and building work and plastering and putting on the roofs of these cottages cost £410 for the pair. But I think people make a mistake in their calculations when they think they can build cottages for £400 a pair. They cannot, and I think they forget very important features in regard to the building of cottages, which are essential to make them complete. For instance, on this pair of cottages I had to spend £18 for two privies at the back, £21 for building a wall at the back and levelling the soil and making two rain-water tanks, and then there was the ordinary fence around the garden, so that the total additional cost, quite apart from the actual building, amounted to £80, which brings up the cost of the two cottages to £490. I do not think that cottages can be built cheaper to make them really good, sound, and efficient houses, likely to last for a good many years. I have heard that cheaper cottages can be built, and I have seen cottages that have been built for less, but in the ordinary course, in a few years, a large sum has to be spent upon them to keep them in repair. On the whole, throughout this country I do not think you can build a pair of cottages for much less than £500.
It is quite true, as the President of the Local Government Board has said, that the rates of interest charged by the Treasury vary from 2¾ to 4¼ per cent. The

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Report says that the Treasury express themselves as unable to modify this rates of interest on the ground that the rates of interest on loans out of the Local Loans Fund are determined with regard to the solvency of the borrower, and this consideration in the present state of the money market only enables the Commissioners to quote 4¼ as their minimum, and with a sinking fund means about £5 5s. in £100 on a 50 years' loan. It has been the habit of the Treasury in those circumstances to increase the rate of interest, and it has been urged that if you increase the length of the loan you ought to decrease the rate of interest; but the lowest rate at which these loans were ever granted is 2¾, and it would be quite impossible for the Government in the present state of the money market to grant a loan at anything like that rate, as that was in 1898, when the price of Consols and all stocks was very high. It would be quite impossible for the Government in the present state of the money market to grant a loan at anything like that rate of interest. The conclusion that we are forced to is that any local authority which is going to borrow money in order to build cottages and hopes to pay off the loan within, say, 80 years, and to pay interest on the loan, and to provide a certain sum for keeping the cottages in repair, must charge at least 5 per cent. It is impossible for an agricultural labourer to pay more than 2s. a week for his cottage, and that, on £500, means that the actual rents received will amount to £10 4s., whereas the local authority to recoup its expenditure ought to be getting an income of £25. That means to say, therefore, that there is a loss on the rates of £15 a year on every pair of cottages built. That is the problem we have really to face. This Bill is going to be a dead letter in the rural districts, because I do not believe any rural district authority will incur the onus of building cottages when they know it will mean a large addition to the rates of the district.
I also think this Bill is a mistake because it will be really creating a premium on the bad landlord. Who are the people who will have to pay the rates? Take two parishes in a rural district. The owner of one of them has kept his property in good order and has provided good housing accommodation. The owner of the next parish derives his total income from the land, and he has been entirely unable, out of that, to improve the condition of the cottages in the way he would like. It may
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be a case like that, or it may be the case of a bad landlord who has not taken the trouble to do anything. The rate will fall on the ratepayers of the rural district, which will include the neighbouring landlords who will have kept up their cottages well, and who will have the rateable value of their property increased owing to the increased value of their cottages. They will have to pay the rates for building these cottages on the property of the landlord who has let his cottages go to ruin. That, I think, is obviously unfair. It is also bound to have a deterrent effect on private building. People in the past have been willing to spend money derived from other sources on the improvement of their estate, because they take a pride in their estate, and wish to see the people living on it housed in a respectable manner. When you ask them to pay out of the rates for putting up other people's cottages their reply is surely bound to be: "If I have to pay for So-and-So's cottages I shall take jolly good care he pays for mine." Therefore any additional cottages which are put up on that estate will, I am afraid, be put upon the ratepayers of the district. That, I think, is an effect which ought not to be encouraged in a Bill introduced by a responsible Government. On this ground alone the Bill is bound to be a dead letter in the country districts.
I should like to express my strong condemnation of the appearance again in a Government Bill of these powers of ginger coercion. It is all very well for hon. Members to say the power of the Local Government Board to coerce county councils or district councils is only put in as a matter of form; but what is the use of putting it into a Bill if it is not meant to be adopted some time or another? I can only, as a representative of ratepayers, again express my strong disapproval that any Government Department having the power of forcing a local authority elected by the people to carry out a scheme which is going to involve ratepayers in large additional expense. I feel most strongly that if the Government is going to take any steps to carry out the duty which the local authority declined to do the Government are the people who ought to pay for the scheme being carried out, and it ought to be paid off through the taxes, and not the rates. This question of local taxation has been referred to before this Session, and the method of the Government of showing sympathy with what they admit to be a real grievance is a very extraordinary one.

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Here we have a Government bringing in a Bill which is, to my mind, bound to increase this difficulty and the burden of the rates in the country. It is a burden, because, as the Chancellor of the Exchequer admitted, the rates are not borne in a proper proportion according to the capacity to bear them. Yet they have introduced this Bill, which is bound to increase that burden, and only the other day they issued a circular from the Board of Education which, when it is carried into effect, will also mean an enormous increase of the burden upon the rates. In my own county the expense under the new education code has been worked out by the county council, and they are of opinion that the additional cost involved by creating an additional number of teachers will amount to 2¼d. in the £ in the education rate alone. In Norfolk I am told there is an increase of 2d. This is a very funny method of showing their sympathy with the burdens of local taxation. I should like again to express the hope that if they wished the local authorities to carry out this duty of providing housing accommodation either in the country or the town, they can only do it either by giving a grant out of the Treasury to local authorities to make up their deficiency on these houses or else relieving the local authorities of some of the burdens and duties which they are now forced to carry out.
I know the Treasury do not favour the principle of giving a grant to a local authority to make up a deficiency in their expenditure. That is not a very sound thing to do from the Treasury point of view. Therefore I am again forced to this conclusion, that if you really want a local authority to carry out these housing duties you must relieve them of some of the burdens they now have to undergo. County councils are already overburdened with work, and from that point of view you ought to relieve them of some of their present duties, and you ought also, until you have carried out an absolutely radical reform in the whole incidence of the rates, to relieve the local authority of some of the heavy expenditure which they are now forced to carry out, in most cases very much against their will.
Sir JOHN DICKSON-POYNDER: The hon. Gentlemen who moved and seconded this Amendment have made allusion to the subject of the debate which took place in the earlier part of the Session, which dealt with the apportionment of local and Im-
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perial taxation. With almost all they said on that subject I entirely agree, and I think that opinion is shared by most Members of the House. We desire at the earliest possible date to see those services which are specifically national services recognised as such and paid for by the State, as distinguished from services which are local in character. I do not consider that the services which are embodied in this Bill can be characterised under the heading of State services. It can hardly be said that the building of a group of cottages in a remote country district should come from the security of the State and be considered as national services. The whole burden of the hon. Gentleman's speeches was that the whole expense of these operations, apart from housing, all of which are to be made compulsory under the Bill instead of optional, was to come upon the localities. That is not contemplated by the Bill. The Bill is merely giving greater facilities to part III. schemes. It extends the period of loan redemption to 80 years, and it lays down that the interest to be paid shall be at the lowest possible rate. It is contemplated that in many instances cottages will be able to be built upon an economic basis under these reformed proposals. We do not contemplate that cottage building operations are going to take place in country districts unless they can be undertaken upon an economic basis. Of course, it is perfectly futile to build these cottages if there is going to be a large charge upon the rates. It will only mean that you are going to put a bonus into the pockets of the employer at the cost of the ratepayer. It is only the security that is being asked, which should undoubtedly be upon the rates and not upon the State.
Anyone listening to these two speeches would think that this Bill was confined to part III. of the Housing Act. This Bill is a very large and comprehensive one, and it consists of something like 73 clauses, and, although this is an important improvement on the existing law, these improvements dealing with part III. by no means exhaust the Bill, and it is not in my judgment by any means the most important portion of the Bill.
The hon. Gentlemen went into an elaborate argument as to the impossibility of building these cottages upon an economic basis. I believe myself it will be found as time proceeds that they can be built upon an economic basis. They did not take into account or mention the fact that, in addition to the house, there is to be a

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very considerable parcel of land, and it is to be hoped that sufficient rent can thus be charged in most parts of England to enable adequate interest to be paid on the capital.
I pass to the general aspect of the Bill, and I congratulate my right hon. Friend on having fully carried out his undertaking and given us a Bill this year practically identical in substance with the Bill which emerged from the Committee Stage at the end of last Session. I can only hope the very shortest time will be taken in carrying this Bill through the necessary subsequent stages.
There are a few changes here and there which would be found to improve the Bill, but they are comparatively few and insignificant, and, speaking for myself, I shall be quite content to leave it where I find it. I shall do all I can to see it pass through the House at the earliest possible date. The Bill, of course, may not be in anybody's opinion an ideal Bill, a measure which does not realise all the ideals some of us would like to have seen, but that can never be attained in modern legislation. I will say that the Bill to-day presents a marked improvement upon the Bill which my right hon. Friend originally introduced at the commencement of last Session, and there are now many provisions in the Bill which will, when administered throughout, I believe, go a long way towards improving the health and the sanitary condition of the houses inhabited by the working classes. It is not necessary for me to travel over the ground that was travelled last year in the second reading debate, but I may be allowed to point out some of what appear to me to be the most conspicuous of those improvements which have been added to the Bill. In the first place, I was one of those, with the right hon. Gentleman opposite, who complained that the Bill was not very intelligible in form. I think it has undergone a very marked improvement in that respect. Many of the clauses that were in the very worst form last year have now been redrafted, and should be quite intelligible to the local authorities, who have to administer them hereafter. We have the memorandum which my right hon. Friend has now circulated in the House, and I think the Bill ought to present a much more intelligible form than when originally introduced.
One of the chief objections to the Bill last year was that the Local Government Board was brought in to interfere with the local authority at too early a stage.
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Many of us complained it took a form too bureaucratic. That to a very large extent has now been removed. The county councils have been introduced to take their proper place in the chain of local administration, so that where the district councils fail to do their duty the county councils will come in as a direct default authority, and then, standing in the background, comes the Local Government Board to undertake that in case either of those authorities, the county council or the district council, are too complacent or negligent of their duty, they can step in and insist on the work being done. I think it will be found in the majority of cases that the power devolved upon the county council of default authority over the district councils will be carried out within the county boundary without having resort to the Local Government Board. In those rare instances, I hope they will be rare, where the county council does not do its duty the Local Government Board stands with a whip to administer and see that the work is done.
Let me express my satisfaction that whilst this coherent change has now been established, whilst the county council has been given its proper position as the default authority, still, at the same time, all through the Bill the Local Government Board is given new and very direct and strong powers of direction and of authority. I believe that will go a long way towards improving public health conditions throughout the country. Let me add a word to what was said by my right hon. Friend opposite if the Local Government Board is to do the work we contemplate in this measure. I am quite convinced myself that there must be in the Local Government Board some definite department, consisting of a staff of officials whose duties will be exclusively confined to matters dealing with this legislation. The duties that now devolve on the Local Government Board in connection with this Bill will be largely increased to what has hitherto been the case. As well as that they will be highly technical in character. Not only will the housing and public health duties be constantly under their attention all over the country, but it may be anticipated that there will be cases where part III. will be put into operation, and where the Local Government Board must have technical skilled officials to see that those part III. schemes are carried out on the best and most economic basis. In addition to that, as was most clearly pointed out by my right hon.

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Friend opposite, there is to a certain extent the experimental duty of town planning to be administered and undertaken by the Local Government Board. It will require the constant attention of very skilled officials to undertake this work, and I cannot conceive any Department in the State where a skilled staff of officials, devoting their time exclusively to this particular work, will be more necessary than will be the case under this Bill in dealing with public health and town planning. I venture to impress upon my right hon. Friend that he should establish in the Local Government Board a special department, or, if he does not like the word "department," a special staff of officials, "whose work will be confined exclusively to the operations of this Bill.
As to this housing problem, many of us who have given a good many years' study to the subject, have always been impressed by the fact that the condition, both in the towns and country districts, is not due to the fact that there has been any lack of legislation, but has been due to the fact almost exclusively that those who had to administer this legislation have not done so properly. It is not merely the local authority that has neglected its work. I venture to say that the Local Government Board itself cannot escape blame in this matter. Had the Public Health and Housing Acts been properly administered in days gone by by local authorities, or where local authorities neglected to do so, had the Local Government Board insisted that they should, half the extravagant and wasteful legislation and schemes that have had to be carried out throughout the country might have been averted. This Bill, if properly administered by the local authorities and sternly watched over by the Local Government Board, will, I believe, prove to be a great economy by anticipating and checking many of those extravagances and a great deal of that expenditure that has hitherto had to be spent on housing operations.
I should like to say a word with regard to the medical officers of health. I think that is one of the most important provisions in the Bill, as has already been said, and I am glad to feel that the Bill in its revised form establishes those officers in much more favourable terms than in the original form. In the first place, the medical officer of health, instead of being dependent upon the mere guidance of the Local Government Board, has now under the Bill power to go all over the
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county area and to inspect wherever he desires, exactly on identical lines with the medical officer of health in the district. This will give a very great incentive to the exposure of bad conditions in many of our country districts. The Bill originally proposed that the local medical officer of health might complain to the county medical officer, whereupon action might be taken. I am afraid if that had been left to the local officer in many instances very little would have been done in the country districts. Now power has been given to the county officer, and I believe a great deal will be done which otherwise would not be done under the original proposal. If we connect with that proposal this second one that there is to be a committee of public health and housing attached to each county council we have then a regular established system supervising public health and housing in our counties which I am sure will go further than anything else to improve those conditions.
I wish to say a word upon the register, because I feel myself, to a certain extent, together with other Members, responsible for the inclusion of this proposal in the Bill. I am very glad to see that it remains as it was passed in Committee upstairs, and I hope it will remain untouched, as it is now. I gather there is a good deal of objection to this periodical survey taking place by the different authorities in the country. There is a good deal of apprehension that such a proposal will lead to unnecessary expense, and the right hon. Gentleman opposite said he believed it would be somewhat futile in its character. I believe that there is nothing in the whole measure which will ultimately produce more real housing reform and public health reform than this register when it has been established in the country. We may have attempts made to make this survey optional or to modify it in its scope on the part of the local authorities instead of compulsory. I hope that the Committee of the House will stand fast to the register being what it is now—compulsory upon all local authorities.
We have many instances in our legislation to-day of "may," and I should like to see a good many of those "mays" turned into "shalls." It would be most profitable to social reform if a considerable portion of the session was devoted to taking existing Acts of Parliament and converting the "mays" into "shalls." I think this is a conspicuous case where you should have "shall" and not "may," because undoubtedly, if it is allowed to a

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local authority to exercise this or not as it wishes, those areas where the worst conditions of housing to-day exist will be probably the very areas in which the local Authority will refrain from undertaking the register. As so many Members wish to address the House, I do not feel justified in attempting any lengthy defence of the register, but all I would say is, I am quite confident, on closer inspection, that the cost will be nothing like so great as many people apprehend. It looks at first sight to be a novel proposal, but, as a matter of fact, if only local authorities and the Local Government Board had carried out the existing laws in the past there would have been a survey in existence already. All I ask is that the law as it stands to-day should be properly administered, and should be put down in concrete form in a register, so that the local authorities -and the public should know exactly what is taking place in their own localities with regard to housing.
With regard to town planning, I think an alteration will probably have to be made in the clauses which deal with the limitation of houses per acre if the town planning part of the Bill is to be successful. There should be a very appreciable limitation of houses as compared with the number that can be erected under the existing bye-laws, and if the limitation is to be carried out successfully there must be no possible loophole by which the owner of property can come in upon a local authority and claim a large compensation for the difference between the houses as limited under the town planning scheme and the number he could put up under existing bye-laws. If such powers of compensation were allowed, or if a loophole were left in the Bill by which they could enforce compensation, it would make a great difference, because I believe that it is conceivable now to put something like 53 houses on an acre, and if the number were limited to 20 by the local authority, and you are to have owners asking for compensation owing to this reduction, it would make the schemes so extravagant to the ratepayers that it would be impossible to carry them out. I hope it will be made clear in the Bill or in the schedules of the Bill that no such compensation in any circumstances would be payable to the owner of the property.
Whatever its imperfections may be, I believe that if this Bill were properly administered by the local authorities, and
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strictly looked after by a department of the Local Government Board under the President over a period of years, it would be the means of carrying out great reforms. At present in this country we have a perfectly ridiculous paradox. We have our public institutions, our schools and our workhouses, and our prisons, all most strictly regulated under the most sanitary, and comfortable conditions. Yet the private homes of many of our people are in a most insanitary condition, and are practically uninhabitable. We want to establish once for all a system and machinery which can easily remove this ridiculous anomaly, and make it difficult, and I hope impossible, for the cruel misery and distress, which to-day are such familiar conditions among many of our fellow-countrymen, to continue to exist, and will make the conditions of their lives more in consonance with the higher civilisation in which we are living.
Mr. F. W. JOWETT: The Hon. Baronet who has just sat down is more optimistic regarding the effect of this Bill, if passed, than I am able to confess myself to be. As far as I can see in the 73 clauses which comprise this Bill and its six schedules, there are, naturally, many provisions which in certain points of detail are an improvement on previous legislation. But I cannot see how the difficulties that have been made manifest in all previous legislation on the housing question can be said to be in any way solved by the Bill now under consideration. These difficulties are practically twofold. There is first the difficulty which all local authorities have felt for many years past of raising the necessary means to carry out housing schemes successfully, and there is also the further difficulty that the terms upon which housing property for clearance schemes can be acquired are so onerous that localities and municipalities quail before them, and frequently refuse to act in consequence. I would like the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Local Government Board to point out in what part of this Bill there are to be found any powers whatever which are likely to make it easier for local authorities to carry out schemes of housing the people than it has been previously, so far as finding funds for the purpose is concerned. I would also like him to point out any clause which makes it to any material extent easier to acquire the land and property requisite for carrying out the provisions of this Bill

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than it has been previously. If he is unable to point out changes of this character then I say that the chief purpose of this Bill fails, because it does not alter to any material extent the position of affairs as it exists at present.
I am glad to admit, as I am sure many of my Friends will admit, that there are some clauses in this Bill on points of detail which are valuable, and the most important one, in my opinion, is precisely the one that was forced upon the Committee, I am sorry to say, so far as I remember, against the wish of the President of the Local Government Board himself, and that is clause 30. I hope that no Amendment will be carried to militate against the efficiency of that clause. I agree with what has been said as to the exaggeration—I believe it to be an exaggeration—as to the cost which the carrying out of this clause is likely to put on local authorities. It does not appear to me to be so formidable as some Members of this House seem to expect, but even though the cost may be higher than I for one would expect it to be I would still point out that a very substantial per contra is to be found in the increased health of the community and in decreased expenditure in other matters in which the authorities are concerned. But if this survey were carried out and maintained then more important than all, to my mind, there would be this result. The mere fact of the register being in existence showing all these facts with regard to the sanitary conditions of property in the localities would act as a spur. It would display things which could not be ignored, and the display of those points and the consequent action arising from the knowledge so obtained would produce considerable benefits to the community. In support of clause 30, and in answer to the objections that have been taken to it, I may mention that a Royal Commission presided over by the Duke of Devonshire recommended that such a register should be kept, and also that a Select Committee on Rural Housing has declared itself to be of the same opinion.
There are some points which, it appears to me, should be remedied in Committee if possible Clause 53 has a vague reference to land likely to be used for building purposes—that is to say, in making out any scheme for town planning the reference to the land to be scheduled is that it is likely to be used for building purposes. The result, if those words are in-
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corporated in the clause, would be this, that if an owner is dispossessed and asked to sell to the community any land which; has been described in a public document as land likely to be used for building purposes, he will want to sell it as building land, and not as land under a different form, under which it ought to be sold, so as to be perfectly fair to the community. In other words, he will seek to get the prospective value, whilst in reality he is only entitled to the value of the land as it then exists and for the purpose to which it is then applied. Also, it appears to me, that a change should be made in the Bill to allow land which has been compulsorily acquired to be kept. As I understand the position of the Bill at present, if land has been compulsorily acquired and is not used for the purpose for which it has been acquired, it must be sold. That, to my mind, should be remedied. The right hon. Gentleman the President of the Local Government Board should offer no objection, because I believe that on a previous occasion he supported this when he was in opposition. A further objection I have to the Bill as it now stands is to those clauses which deal with public utility societies. A provision which this Bill contains—which will enable public authorities to advance two-thirds of the cost to companies to carry out housing schemes with a philanthropic five per cent, object in view—is not to my mind one that is fair from the public standpoint. The proper thing seems to me to be that some means should be found of securing for the local authorities permanent power over those schemes to make it perfectly certain that the purpose for which public money is being advanced should be adhered to throughout, and not allowed to lapse after a few years. If, for instance a change were made in the Bill which would compel the local authority to retain the land itself, and then allow the public utility societies to build on that land publicly owned, it might then be permissible, and I myself would offer no objection to two-thirds of the cost of the building being advanced to the public utility society, because the public authority, holding permanently the land itself, could insist that the purposes for which the money was originally advanced should be strictly adhered to, and not allowed to lapse from any change in the direction of affairs, or any change in the views of those who happened to be managing the concern. So far as one's

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own information and experience goes in regard to the new ventures under the guidance and management of the public utility societies, the number of houses for the working classes are not very materially increased by them. For the most part the houses which have been built are houses which members of the working classes cannot possibly inhabit. I know that can be said to a certain extent in regard to schemes carried out by municipal authorities. It is often said with regard to municipal schemes of housing reforms, but it cannot be said with the same truth with regard to these schemes carried out municipally as it can be said in regard to the schemes carried out by public utility societies. For, after all, municipal authorities, in carrying out housing schemes, do attempt to build houses for the working classes. They may, and probably do, build a rather superior type of working-class house. But note the result of their action. It is this: That there is a general move up among the workers. Those who have been inhabiting the poorer type of house go into the municipal house. But they still belong to the working classes. I wish to say that so far as I can see public utility societies, and the class of houses they are erecting—at Letchworth, Hampstead, and elsewhere—are catering for a different class altogether, between whom and all workers there is a gap which is not, and will not, be actually and in effect bridged by this Bill, or by any proposals which are now under consideration. In conclusion, I want again to refer to what seems to me to be the crux of this question. We are wanting to increase the number of working-class houses available for the people. Do the proposals of this Bill promise to increase them to any material extent? If it be true, as I said at the outset, and as I apprehend the hon. Gentlemen who have spoken from above the Gangway themselves feel, that the localities will not, in the present state of the rating system, and with the present burdens which they have had put on them up till now, accept further financial responsibility. If this be true, then you might have 73 good clauses dealing with little detailed things which are all right in themselves, but the position is not, will not, and cannot be effectively altered, and no great change can attend it. I want to
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know—I am sorry that the benches near me above the Gangway are not occupied while I am asking for this information—but I want to know why it is that the working classes of England are not treated in the same way as the working classes in Ireland? I have no need to protest against the treatment of the Irish. I want them to get more good things if they can get them. I have no objection to them getting houses supported by public money, but I want to know why the English people are not treated in the same way?
Since this Parliament met we have decided to set apart, and the Treasury to advance, £4,500,000 at 2¾ per cent.—at 3¼ to include repayment—in order to build from 25,000 to 30,000 labourers' cottages in Ireland. Every year there is a certain sum of public money which goes to assist the work of building cottages for the labouring classes in Ireland. Last week we were engaged in a stupendous business which was to involve expenditure on the Treasury of £30,000,000 in order to transfer Irish land from one set of owners to another. Why, then, cannot the housing conditions of this country be remedied so far as they are defective—and everybody knows they are defective—by a little of the same kind of support that is being given to Ireland? I suppose there is something like £175,000,000 of money in the Post Office Savings Bank. I do not contend that this by any means belongs exclusively to the working classes, but a very large part has been deposited by them in small amounts—2½ per cent, is what they get for it. Cannot that money be allowed at a modest price to finance housing schemes in this country. I see no reason against it except this: That political economy only runs on this side of the Channel. In Ireland political economy does not count. [An HON. MEMBER: "And under this Government."] Yes, and under this Government. Yes, and I would further remind the House that the 1903 Act which committed the country to a policy of land transference was an Act passed by the late Government. We on these benches want equality of treatment. We want to see more houses built, not merely more clauses such as are spread over these 42 pages, and which deal with little points "that will not affect the general question. We want the houses built. They cannot be built, and will not be built unless the Government do something to assist the

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localities—to provide the money required on terms which will enable them to use it for providing houses at rents which the people can pay.
Mr. W. H. COWAN: When I gave notice of the Amendment standing in my name, I had intended to call the attention of the House to a feature in this Bill which has caused very considerable alarm in quarters which are certainly not unsympathetic to the proper object of the Bill. The policy of the preservation of our commons and open spaces for the use of the people for recreation and enjoyment is in no way a party question, and numbers as many friends and earnest supporters among hon. Members opposite as on this side of the House. I had intended to raise the whole question, and to show, as I think I should have shown, conclusively, that under this Bill, commons and open spaces of all sorts are placed absolutely at the mercy of a Government Department. This is contrary to the policy of Parliament for the last 40 years. The present position is this: Up to this time the commons and open spaces have been so protected that they cannot be taken away unless by a public process, which renders it exceedingly difficult to deprive the people of their great inheritance. Certain small concessions have been made by the Board of Agriculture. But in almost every case it has been absolutely essential that the provisional orders so granted should be confirmed by this House, and in the last resort it is this House, and only this House, which has a right to say whether or not a particular piece of common land or an open space dedicated to the use of the public should be diverted to any other use. Under this Bill the Local Government Board, a single Government Department, will have the right to issue orders which will require no confirmation by this House, and would not come before this House for consideration or discussion. Thus those concerned would be deprived of any opportunity of even expressing an opinion upon the expediency or otherwise of the proposal.
I had intended to go somewhat fully into this question, and to anticipate any possible objection that this was not so. Alarm has been caused to many of the open space societies, on whose behalf I speak—the Commons Preservation Society, the Metropolitan Parks and Gardens Society, the Society for the Protection of Places of Historic Interest and Natural Beauty, etc.
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I was prepared to deal with the suggestion that these societies were unduly alarmed, and I should have begun by replying that these societies have kept a watch over these matters, both in the metropolis and throughout England, for many years, and therefore that their opinions and their statements were entitled to be treated with very great respect. I should have gone a step further, and have been prepared to say that these societies have taken the highest legal advice, and been prepared to give the House particulars of that advice—advice from which the right hon. Gentleman himself would have seen that we were on sound ground in the assertions we make. But I am disarmed to a very large extent by the quite unexpected conciliatory attitude of the right hon. Gentleman, Because what is the history of this matter? When this Bill was introduced into the House of Commons last year it contained two clauses which obviously and admittedly struck at commons. It gave local authorities, with the consent of the Local Government Board not only a general but an express right to take for housing purposes portions of commons and open spaces. Acting on the suggestion of the Open Spaces Societies, I put down an Amendment which would have effectively nullified this nefarious purpose. What did the right hon. Gentleman do? He was approached before the Amendment was put upon the Paper, and before the clauses to which that Amendment expressly applied were reached. The right hon. Gentleman declined to negotiate. He refused to accept any proposal—and many were put before him. When he came to the clauses in the Bill he elected to postpone them until the end of the discussion. When the end of the Committee stage was reached, and when all the other clauses were disposed of what did he then do? He withdrew those clauses, and thereby deprived me and many other Members of an opportunity of raising the whole question of the effect of this Bill on the security of common lands in England. The Amendment in itself was not restricted to the clause which it purported to amend. It was an Amendment applicable to the whole of the Bill, for it commenced with the words "Nothing in this Act." It is not difficult to understand why the right hon. Gentleman pursued the course which he did, in the light of subsequent events. The right hon. Gentleman has printed at the head of this Bill a memorandum saying that it is the same Bill as was dealt with in Grand Com-

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mittee save for a few alterations which he has introduced to meet promises made in Committee. That is perfectly true, but those who have acted with me on this question imagined that the withdrawal of the clauses in these circumstances, without giving us any opportunity of raising the question which we desired to have debated, implied a promise that when the Bill was re-introduced it would contain nothing which would have the effect of placing these open spaces at the mercy of the Local Government Board. But now we find that the Bill as re-introduced contains everything to which we objected, with the single exception of these two clauses, and we object again, and, naturally, more strongly than ever. Again we entered into negotiations with the right hon. Gentleman. The Commons Preservation Society, through their secretary, sent the right hon. Gentleman a letter calling his attention to the position at considerable length and with considerable courtesy, and giving him notice of the Amendment which I proposed, in the name of the society, to put on the paper. The right hon. Gentleman did not deign to do more than send a mere acknowledgment of that letter, and from that day to this we have heard nothing from him. Therefore, I have a right to say that while I am disarmed by the right hon. Gentleman's conciliatory attitude I am also considerably surprised by it. The right hon. Gentleman says that he is going to be as amenable to the Committee as he was susceptible in Committee upstairs. I should like him to be more amenable in Committee than he was susceptible last year upstairs, because after our arguments he merely withdrew those two clauses and retained all the objectionable elements of the Bill. I want to be assured on this occasion that there will be a withdrawal of everything in the Bill which threatens our open spaces and common lands. I hope and trust that the right hon. Gentleman will give us such an assurance before the conclusion of this debate on the second reading of the Bill. The right hon. Gentleman has told us that the Local Government Board is the Ministry of Public Health. On the New Forest (Sale of Lands for Public Purposes) Bill, the President of the Local Government Board said:—
"There was one phase in the Bill which provided that land was only to be taken when immediately required 'in the interests of the public health of the locality.' He agreed that Lyndhurst was in an unfortunate position right in the heart of the New Forest,
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and was entitled to reasonable consideration in regard to everything appertaining to public health. He could, however, give the hon. Gentleman cases in which the local authorities had interpreted 'the interests of public health' very widely indeed, and he would suggest that the Bill should make it clear that the narrowest interpretation was to be given to this phrase."
The Ministry of Public Health should not be allowed any more than a local authority to stretch too far their powers and interfere with common rights in regard to the question of housing. If you put houses on a common under this Bill, and allowed one acre to each cottage as the measure proposes, you would withdraw hundreds of acres from the use of thousands and thousands of people, and I say this would be a most reactionary and undemocratic proceeding, because you would be preferring the interests of the few to the interests of the many. It is undemocratic to prefer the interests of the few to the interests of the many, even if the few be of the same class as the many. The alarm which has been felt because of certain objects of this Bill is entirely justified. I have here the answer of the Parliamentary Secretary to the Local Government Board which he gave to an hon. Member opposite last Session. The hon. Member asked
"Whether clause 7 of the Housing, Town Planning etc., Bill proposes to enable local authorities, or any other bodies corporate, with the consent of the Local Government Board, to appropriate for building purposes common lands, recreation grounds, disused burial grounds, village greens, fuel allotments, open spaces, or other land vested in them and acquired by gift or purchase on the definite condition, and trust that it should be permanently dedicated to the public use and enjoyment; and whether in framing the clause, consideration was given to its deterrent effect upon persons who may be contemplating making gifts of land to local authorities or subscribing towards the acquisition of open spaces."
The reply was:—
"The answer to the first portion of the question may be taken as generally in he affirmative."
The same hon. Member put a further question:—
"Are we to understand that if these clauses become law, the London County Council, with the sanction of the Local Government Board, would be able to build on Battersea Park."
and the answer was:—
"Yes, I believe that it would be so."
Here we have the Parliamentary Secretary threatening Battersea Park, the special preserve of the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Local Government Board. The right hon. Gentleman asks us to have confidence in him. We have regarded him in the past as a friend of the people. In 1902, in this House, the right hon. Gentleman said that the history of commons preservation

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during the last 40 or 50 years was nothing more nor less than the history of a long struggle against a surrender by local authorities of public common rights over scores of thousands of acres. We want the right hon. Gentleman and his Department to protect the common lands of England from these aggressions. While we have great confidence in him, yet we do not know what his successors might do. Nor do we know what he himself might do under the strong pressure of an impecunious local authority anxious to have a housing scheme financed on the most economical lines. It might be that the right hon. Gentleman would prefer economy to other considerations. We do know that in the past he strongly opposed the alienation of common lands by local authorities, or in the interests of local authorities, merely on the ground of economy. I quote from the same speech, which he made in 1902:—
"He agreed that Lyndhurst should be charged a reasonable sum for the land taken from the forest, but Lyndhurst should not be allowed to link up with other districts for the purpose of establishing a joint sewage farm by appropriating land from the forest simply because it was public land and could be secured very cheaply."
We want the President of the Local Government Board to protect our common lands from encroachments. We have confidence in the Local Government Board, and we have special confidence in the right hon. Gentleman, but we are not prepared to give him a blank cheque. I may trust a man up to a point. I trust the right hon. Gentleman to a much greater extent than I would trust many men, but I and those who are acting with me, the Open Spaces Societies and other bodies, will not trust either the right hon. Gentleman or any other individual on the question of giving powers to use the common lands of England for building and other improper uses. Therefore, we have a right to ask, and it is our duty to ask, what the right hon. Gentleman really means. The Open Spaces Societies recognise that there are cases of an exceptional character where it may be in the interests of a housing scheme that some small portion of an open space should be utilised, but I ask the right hon. Gentleman to say that this shall only be done where another piece of land, the equivalent of that which is taken, is restored for the public use. What I desire to know is whether the right hon. Gentleman is prepared to insert in the Bill a clause which will give absolute protection
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to commons and open spaces, subject only to the provision as to exchanges. I am prepared, on behalf of the Open Spaces Societies, to welcome such a proposal from the right hon. Gentleman, and I sincerely hope that he will make this alteration in a most valuable and useful Bill, of which I am a sincere and warm supporter so far as its legitimate objects are concerned. I urge the right hon. Gentleman, now he has gone so far, to dispose of this question once for all, and allay the alarm which, no doubt unwittingly, was caused by giving an assurance which will meet the views of not one or two Members of this House, as the right hon. Gentleman said, but of 30 or 40 Members who have put down Amendments identical with my own, and of the movers of other Amendments in regard to open spaces.
Mr. GEORGE CAVE: I think a very clear distinction is to be drawn between the housing and town planning parts of this Bill. With regard to the housing part, I am extremely glad that the Government have had the courage to take up the matter, and to devote to that particular question a substantial part of this session. I have always believed that a great deal of the misery, vice and intemperance we see in this country is due to bad housing, that is, to bad conditions at home, and I would never be a party to opposing any proposal which I thought would have the effect of remedying some of those conditions. As regards the housing part, I think many good provisions are contained in the present proposals. I am very glad we have been promised that this Bill will be considered in a Committee of the whole House. I know it was considered upstairs last year, but with all respect to the Members of that Committee, I do not think the Bill came to us in a satisfactory condition. There are in this Bill many clauses which require the consideration of the whole House. May I just say here how entirely I agree with the right hon. Gentleman the Member for St. George's, Hanover Square, in regard to what he said respecting the clauses relating to the medical officers and the housing committee. I think that proposal will be of the greatest possible use. Many of us in this quarter of the House have long contended that the appointment of a medical officer should be made compulsory, and I am very glad that we have before us a proposal which has a chance of becoming law in that direction. I also think the Financial Clauses of the Bill will be of great use in promoting the building of working class

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dwellings. With regard to the housing part I have one or two criticisms to make. I sympathise with the hon. Member for Guildford because the opportunity for his attack upon this Bill has been taken from him by the assurances given by the right hon. Gentleman. I hope we shall see those assurances take the form of a definite provision protecting public commons and open spaces. Generally speaking, local authorities are to be trusted in most matters, but I have seen so many contests between local authorities and the general public, in which the local authority has often been held to be wrong, that I do think public rights, such as common rights, highway rights, and rights of open spaces ought not to be left to the judgment of local authorities, but ought to be protected by express provision in an Act of Parliament.
The hon. Member below the Gangway said quite truly that Acts of Parliament are no use unless we have more houses built. Is it not a fact that the real difficulty inmost places is not any reluctance on the part of local authorities to use the provisions of the Statute, but want of funds and the risk of loss which most local authorities hesitate to face. I sympathise to some extent with what the hon. Member said that in this matter Ireland is treated very much better than England. I do not for a moment say that Irish Acts have not gone much too far, and I do not suggest that we should follow what I believe to be a bad example, but the House will remember in the Small Holdings Act, under pressure from the Committee upstairs, the Government consented to a provision under which if a small holdings scheme resulted in a loss a proportion of that loss is borne by the Treasury. I think if some proposal of that kind were made and accepted to the effect that a local authority going into a scheme for housing approved by the central authority, should, if they made a loss, receive consideration from the Exchequer. I think that would be a real encouragement to local authorities to put their powers into force. I hope in Committee a proposal of that kind will be made by the Government.

I want to make one minor criticism upon clause 15 of the Bill. I do not object to clause 14 under which the letting of a dwelling for occupation by members of the working class shall imply a condition that the house is at the commencement of the holding in all respects reasonably fit for human habitation, but Clause 15 provides
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that the house during the holding shall be kept by the landlord in all respects reasonably fit for human habitation. I think that proposal requires some further consideration. I do not know whether the undertaking is to be deemed to be given to the tenant or the local authority. I suppose from the wording of the Bill it is to devolve upon the tenant, and I am afraid that means a good deal of litigation. The effect of the clause is that if the tenant misuses the house, if he damages it so as, by his own conduct, to render it unfit for human habitation, the person liable to repair that damage is not the tenant who causes it, but the landlord who owns the house. If so, that is a matter which requires consideration because the Bill, as it stands, involves a certain amount of injustice. The effect of this clause is that a closing or demolition order may, as the Bill stands, be made not by a court as under the present law but by a Government Department, and no provision is made for hearing the owner of the house before such an order is made. I fear that the result will be to increase officialism, and the power of Government Departments to impose burdens on individuals without them having a proper opportunity of being heard on their defence. For myself I prefer the existing law, which gives to the owner the right to be heard before a court, generally a court of summary jurisdiction, and which empowers the court to make the order for the closing of the house, or the pulling down of any property.
I have one other observation to make upon the housing clauses, and it is in regard to clause 30, which provides for the keeping of a register of houses. In regard to this provision I want to reserve my opinion upon the general question, although, as at present advised, I am disposed to think that it would impose a heavy burden upon the authorities, and one which we are hardly justified in asking them to undertake. In any case, under the clause as it stands, the register is to be kept in rural districts by the county council, and I do not understand why. If this register is to be kept at all it should be compiled and kept by the district council which knows most about the locality, and I do not think the county council ought to bear the heavy burden and expense which this provision will throw upon them. I do not wish to criticise further the housing clauses, and I will leave any further criticisms I may desire to make until we reach the Committee stage.

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I want to say something of rather a different character about the town-planning portion of the Bill. Anybody who has studied those clauses must realise what a maze of provisions they contain. They are very difficult to follow and understand, and they must lead to a great deal of dispute and litigation. More than that: I think those clauses contain provisions which show a total want of regard not only for private but for public interests. I do not think the assurance given by the President of the Local Government Board on the subject of open spaces is quite adequate to meet the case. Will the House just look for a moment at these clauses. To begin with, the town-planning powers can be exercised under Clause 53: "With the general object of securing proper sanitary conditions, amenity, and convenience in connection with the laying out and the use of the land." Therefore, it may often be a mere question of taste—a question between the judgment and taste of the private owner to lay out the land in one way and the taste of the local authority, who might think the land ought to be laid out in a different way. Where that state of things arises, a scheme may be made under sub-clause 3 involving the pulling down of buildings already built. That may be a very great hardship to a man who may have had a house there for years.
Mr. BURNS: Or the owner himself.
Mr. CAVE: If the owner himself thinks so, I have no complaint; but, if the authority thinks so, and the owner does not, the will of the authority will prevail, and a house which the owner desires to occupy for the rest of his life may, against his will, be pulled down. That I think a very serious power to give the local authority. Sub-clause 7 also deals, amongst other things, with existing open spaces, roads, streets, parks, pleasure or recreation grounds, and those may be altered and varied at the discretion of the local authority. See how far that goes. Under clause 54, by schedule 4 the scheme for town planning may deal with a number of things which hitherto have not been within the discretion of any local authority. The very first sub-section of the fourth schedule includes: "Streets, roads, and other ways, and stopping up or diversion of existing highways." We have a very old law upon the subject
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of the stopping up of highways under which no highway can be diverted without a number of consents being obtained, including that of the parish council and the district council, and a reference to quarter sessions, at which reference any member of the public may object, and any member may claim to have it determined by a jury whether the highway should be stopped or not. The greatest precautions are taken before a highway can be stopped up, but under this Bill in its present form, at the mere will of the local authority, confirmed by a Government Department, any number of public highways may be closed. Schedule IV. also comprises "buildings, structures, and erections; open spaces, private and public; extinction or variation of private rights of way and other easements"; and they may go as far as the "suspension of statutory enactments, bye-laws, regulations, or other provisions in force in the area." These words are found in the schedule, and in clause 54 again it says that the scheme may provide for "suspending, so far as necessary, for the proper carrying out of the scheme, any statutory enactments, bye-laws, regulations, or other provisions, under whatever authority made, which are in operation in the area included in the scheme." That is a power which I do not think should be given to any local authority. Under sub-section 3 of the same clause the responsible authority need not even be the authority in whose area the property is situated. It may, if the scheme so provides, be a neighbouring authority. To put a possible case, you might under this Bill empower the London County Council to enforce a scheme in the county of Surrey, a scheme wholly objected to by the inhabitants of the parishes affected, and yet there would be no appeal whatever if once the scheme came into force. I think this clause goes absolutely too far. See how far owners or persons liable to be affected are protected by the Bill. I do not find in the provisions anything compelling the local authority or the Board to give notice to the owners, to hold public inquiries, or to hear anybody at all. In clause 55 it stated that the Local Government Board may make regulations regarding notices and inquiries, but in a matter so important as this I do not think we ought to rely upon a Government Department, without the directions of Parliament, to deal with this matter. In the Small Hold-

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ings Act the House took care that these provisions as to notices, inquiries, and so on should appear in the Bill itself or in a schedule to the Bill, and I trust that before this measure passes through Committee we shall have before the House the proposed regulations, so that if necessary we may propose Amendments to protect those who should be protected in regard to these matters. Under clause 56 a scheme may be put into force by the authority without the order of any court, and an owner if he does not comply with the scheme is liable to be dealt with forcibly by the local authority instead of the authority having to go, as I think it ought, to a Court of Summary Jurisdiction for an order. But that is a matter for Committee.
My last point is in reference to the very unfair provisions with regard to compensation. Under clause 57, if an owner thinks that his property may be diminished in value he must make a claim within a certain time after the approval of the scheme. He may not know how the scheme will affect his property, but he is to look forward and make his claims within a very short time. The amount is then determined in anticipation of the event, but he cannot get payment of the compensation until such time as the loss is actually incurred. That is an entirely new provision in legislation of this kind. No Act has hitherto provided that you must foresee your loss at the moment but be unable to obtain compensation until the loss actually occurs. Then see how the Bill deals with the opposite event, where the owner may gain by a scheme. In that case the Bill provides that the authority shall make a claim at once; the claim is determined, and, if it is decided that a gain will occur in future there is no provision that it shall not be paid until the gain actually occurs, but the owner has to pay the amount at once which it is decided he may gain by reason of the scheme. Anything more grossly unfair I cannot imagine. The tribunal to adjudicate under this clause is a new tribunal—the Local Government Board itself. What inquiries are to be held, or what hearing is to be given to the owners or to persons affected, the Bill does not say. I suppose the Board will make its own procedure and go as it pleases in the matter. It is perfectly absurd when you have to deal with questions of compensation to have totally different tribunals pursuing different courses of procedure.
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Then I have done my best, but I cannot understand clause 58. It is a tangle of provisions, every one intended to cut down compensation in some way or other. In the first part we have to assume that bye-laws operate in a district which, in fact do not operate. Under the second, part you have to do the same. Under Subsection 3, if I read it rightly, the right to compensation goes altogether in certain cases, because it states: "A person whose property is injuriously affected by the operation of a town-planning scheme shall not be entitled to obtain in respect of any matter or thing for which he would' under any other enactment be entitled to obtain compensation, any greater compensation than he would have obtained if the scheme had not been made." Where a man would be entitled to compensation under the Land Clauses Act, under this provision he would have no compensation at all. He cannot get it under that Act, because it does not apply, and he cannot get it under this Bill because he can have no more advantage than he would have if the scheme had not been made. I think that that will require to be seriously dealt with. Then we come to clause 60, which gives the Local Government Board power to force these schemes upon the local authority. I think if you are going to give this new power, at all events until you see whether it is used properly, you should leave it to the local authority elected by the people of the locality to use it or not, and not at the very beginning show your distrust of the local authority by inserting a provision to enable, the Local Government Board to put pressure upon them. The whole of these town planning clauses not only want recasting, but are in such a form that it is very difficult indeed to see how they can be put into a fair and practicable shape. I think time would be saved and injustice might be avoided if the Government would leave out altogether for the present year the town planning part of the Bill. I am not at all averse to some provision enabling local authorities to look forward and lay down lines of building for the future, but T think these clauses as framed will lead to many disputes, inflict a great deal of injustice, and if pressed do much more harm than they are likely, to do good. I shall not vote against the second reading of the Bill, because I think some of its clauses are good, but I shall not vote for the Bill in the end if it contains the town planning clauses in their present form.
The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD Mr. Masterman): I wish with the leave of the House to reply to various criticisms which have been made in the course of the debate. Before doing so, I should like in the name of my right hon. Friend and myself, to thank the House for the tone and temper which have marked the discussion, and for the very kindly and friendly fashion in which speakers in all quarters have received this particular attempt at social reform. I said in the name of ourselves, but it would perhaps be more correct if I said in the name of a Committee of the House. When we presented the Bill last year it was a Bill framed by the Government with such information and advice as they possessed, but it is now presented as the work of the House acting through a Committee, which gave careful and particular attention, not only to every clause, but to every line, during 22 days of most exhaustive criticism. There is a general impression outside on the part of those who are unfamiliar with the working of the Committee that the Bill was very much knocked about in Committee. I have even seen it stated that not one single clause remained the same at the end as it was at the beginning. That is a delusion. Forty out of the sixty-one clauses passed without any amendment at all, and most of the debate in Committee was concentrated upon one or two of the other clauses. We should have welcomed—I speak with all sincerity—the presence on that Committee of the hon. and learned Member for Kingston. We had the benefit of his presence in the Committee on the Small Holdings Bill, and I think by general admission he never makes a point without its being a real point which requires to be seriously considered. But if he thinks that the town planning part of this Bill passed without the most careful legal examination he is under a misapprehension. By far the greater amount of the debate in Committee concentrated itself upon the town planning part of the Bill, and especially upon the compensation clauses. The clause which he has just read to the House, and which I think he will find does not bear the interpretation he puts upon it, was promoted by no less a revolutionary person than the hon. member for Bury St. Edmunds. To a very large extent Amendments—I admit improving Amendments—were introduced by Members op-
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posite, and were freely adopted by the Committee, which never responded to the Party Whip from one day to another. Indeed, in the Committee we saw all the advantages as well as the deficiencies of government by free discussion. I am delighted that my right hon. Friend who speaks for the Opposition in this matter spoke so warmly about the Bill in its present form. He spoke even more profoundly than I think he did last year in regard to the Bill before it passed through Committee. I expected no less from the chairman of the garden suburb, and I did not think he would agree—I hoped he would not agree—with the hon. Gentleman who has just spoken that it is desirable that there should be any delay in the advancement of at least some broad and comprehensive ideas as to town planning. I believe it will probably be long before we see the lessons we have learned in the garden suburb being universally adopted by the local authorities, or even by private owners in this country. He has shown, and everyone knows that in this particular question we cannot hang up things by delaying them. Every day we see to our misery—I do not think that word is too strong to use in this connection—how different things might have been but for delay having been the motto of our action in the past. We are now slowly following the example of every one of the European countries. The measures we are taking in the matter of town planning are far less drastic than the measures which other countries have found it necessary to give to their towns in order that in the future posterity may not reproach the present for the way in which it has allowed town development. The right hon. Gentleman referred in more sympathetic accents than last year to the terminology of the Bill, and to the legislation by reference. He did us the high compliment of comparing our phraseology to that of two of the greatest living novelists. It would have been easier for us, if animated by advanced Radical enthusiasm, in framing this Bill to have swept away all the past legislation and commenced de novo. It is only the natural conservatism of my right hon. Friend which has led him definitely to build up on the past, and to refer all through to what has been done in the various housing and public health Bills. I think if my right hon. Friend will refer to the various other measures which were introduced by Conservative Governments in 1890, 1900, and 1903, he will see that this

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difficult jargon and terminology is more advanced in those Bills than in this Bill which we are now presenting to the House.
If I may I shall refer in a word to one of the objections made in the most kindly and friendly fashion by the right hon. Gentleman. He deplored the very stringent coercive power left to the Local Government Board in dealing with the -county councils. If he examines the Bill he will find it is reduced to almost a minimum. We have considerable power over the smaller authorities, and we give more power to the county councils to exercise default power over the smaller sanitary districts, but we take very few powers indeed to exercise default powers over the great county councils, and where we do so it is almost entirely in the case of a specific refusal to carry out work which has been put upon them. Everyone in the House recognises the great difficulty of proceeding by mandamus in these matters, and the great desirability of letting the local authorities do their work as far as possible in their own fashion.
One of the improvements the Bill makes is the offer of other avenues than those of compulsion. It transfers the power, if necessary, of one local authority to another, and it makes provision that deliberate hostility between the central and the local authority should be no longer possible. To a very considerable extent those who represent the county councils in this matter will be prepared to acknowledge that we are not acting unwisely in offering them the transfer of powers if the smaller sanitary authorities refuse to carry out their duties. I can inform the House that the steering of the right course between all the authorities and reformers has been a matter of extraordinary difficulty. Almost every day my right hon. Friend has been dealing with deputations on this subject for the last nine months. It is impossible to satisfy all. The House will agree that we have gone far in every possible method of conciliation to satisfy those who felt they required concessions consistent with the main object of our policy, which is to endeavour to provide a larger supply of habitable houses for the working classes, to endeavour to see that the houses supplied are in a fit state for habitation by the working classes, and to endeavour to see that the surroundings in which the houses are situated are something better than those of the houses which have been growing up in the outskirts of the big towns up to the present moment.
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We clearly recognise that there is much to be said as to the machinery of the Bill. In the fight against slums in the towns we flatter ourselves that some facts justify us in saying that we are fighting a winning battle at present, though it is not a battle which is proceeding as quickly as we desire; but in fighting against slums in the country at present we are fighting a losing battle. The country districts, with some exceptions, are getting worse and worse in connection with housing. Houses are falling to pieces, and in many cases no houses are being built at all. The situation is at a deadlock. Some have expressed a desire to know whether these powers are required. The right hon. Gentleman and others have criticised generally the question of registration and survey. I have no remarks at present to make about that except that it was carried in the Committee against the advice of the Government by Members voting from both sides of the House. Therefore, although there is much to be said one way or another, I do not feel that on the second reading debate it is my special function to offer any reply to the criticism on that subject. The right hon. Gentleman also referred to the transfer from the local justices to the Local Government Board of the powers in connection with the default. In regard to action of the local authority declaring a house unfit for habitation, it was a difficult thing for some districts to get the justices to act, and we think that the question whether a house is fit or unfit for habitation is one which an inspector of the Local Government Board ought to be able to deal with.
As to compensation, I heard from sundry interruptions during the debate that there is considerable scepticism whether we are not giving far too great compensation to landlords. In Committee we had some considerable criticism in connection with the incorporation of the Lands Clauses Act and other measures to safeguard the interests of private persons, and it was urged that we were going far too far in this matter. As to how far we are going, I would say that we have merely adopted the method which was approved by both Houses of Parliament in the Small Holdings and Allotments Act. If the method is suitable for purchasing large tracts of land for small holdings by local authorities, is it to be criticised if it is to be used for the purpose of small tracts of land which will be required for the building of house property? From the evidence given before the Committee in

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1906 it appears there is very great difficulty thrown upon rural housing, first by the difficulty of getting land at all, although land is abundant all round, and then by the difficulty, when the land is got if it is to be taken by compulsion, arising out of the fact that the expense in which the unfortunate village is involved is sometimes almost as much as the value of the land. I do not wish to emphasise that here. It has all been put in public documents. I think it has been shown that 60 out of 100 local authorities who were circularised gave as their reason for the fact that no building was going on that it was impossible to get land.
Then as to the provision for an addition to the staff of the Local Government Board, I should be a singularly remarkable Member of the Administration if I were to offer any opposition to such ideas. The idea of every Minister is the aggrandisement of his own Department. My right hon. Friend recognises that if this Bill passes the central authority will require expert advice which must be able to place at the disposal of the local bodies, and I have no doubt that the assurance he makes to the Committee will be carried out and that a very considerable increase—an increase adequate to the necessities of the situation—will be provided when this Bill becomes law.
I pass from the remarks of the right hon. Gentleman to the Amendment which was moved by the hon. Member for Barkston Ash, one of our most faithful Members of Committee upstairs. I rather gathered from the tone of his speech that this Amendment was less designed as a hostile Amendment to the Bill than as giving an opportunity for raising at every convenient season the relation between local and national expenditure. I may, therefore, perhaps hope that having raised the question he will not consider it necessary to go to a Division, which would make it appear that he is hostile to the second reading of the Bill. We have all expressed sympathy again and again with the demand of the rural ratepayer for relief, but there is, as has been pointed out, considerably more of a case to be made out for other branches of local expenditure, especially those mentioned by the Local Taxation Committee. We make no new demand on local expenditure which has not been made in the Housing Acts in the past. We certainly give default powers, but these default powers were given in the Act of 1903. We do earnestly hope that in
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the great bulk of these housing operations, which we trust will take place in the villages, they may be found to work on a self-supporting basis. The right hon. Gentleman told us some figures, which were rather alarming, as to the possibility of building under a scheme. I think the figures were unduly pessimistic. I offered some figures last year, and stated that it was not 4¼ but 3¼ which was the price charged by the Public Works Loans Commissioners. We offered every consideration to the extension of the time for repayment the sinking fund. The local authority will be able to obtain money as cheaply as it can be obtained in England for any public purpose. The figures which I have worked out show if you can get a cottage at anything like £150, which is their lowest estimate, you will be able to build at a remunerative rate if you charge rent of 3s. a week. That is high for the agricultural labourer, and in many cases it may be impossible, but it will meet in many cases, as it has met in the past, an unsatisfied demand for public property. What is, Mr. Speaker, the hon. Gentleman and his Friends asking us to do? Is it to readjust the incidence of local finance? That is outside the powers of this Bill. Is it to give a definite grant from the Treasury to all such housing schemes? If the hon. Gentleman will study the realities of national finance he will be forced to the conclusion that the time does not exist at present for such a demand. I think there is a distinction between giving ground from the taxes and letting a certain amount on loan fall upon the rates. If it falls upon the land it will fall no more than it does at the present time. The labourer under that system will receive the full remuneration and then pay an economic rent. It seems to me that anything which may prevent the change which will produce that result should be carefully looked at by the House before it is decided upon. The rural labourer is in a different position from the small holder. The rural labourer is deliberately receiving part of his wages in kind, but the small holder receives the wages of his labour. I am hoping that our most sanguine views with respect to this Bill will be realised. We are providing for these cottages something like an acre of land, and hope that in some five or ten years hence this House may agree that there is a marked improvement in this problem. We are told that we are indirectly and secretly endeavouring not to fulfil the pledges and agreements that we made in

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Committee. I can assure hon. Members that there is no suggestion of truth in that idea. The hon. Member for Guildford objects to clause 2.
Mr. COWAN: Not only to clause 2.
Mr. MASTERMAN: Clause 2 is taken solidly out of the Small Holdings Act, and it merely substitutes Orders after inquiries by the Local Government Board for the Provisional Orders of this House.
I am surprised that these vigorous attacks are made on the Small Holdings Act. It seems to me far more likely that if there is anything in them they apply more to the provisions of the Small Holdings Act than to the comparatively small plots of ground required in the villages for the building of 10 or 20 cottages. My right hon. Friend has declared that we have no wish to force our position on the House in this matter; and words will be set down by the Government which we hope will satisfy hon. Members who have made themselves guardians of this most important public trust.
Mr. W. P. BYLES: I understand that the words will protect the common land by the voice of Parliament.
Mr. MASTERMAN: The hon. Member will be able to raise a discussion on the question later on. Whatever words are inserted will be fully satisfactory to the various societies, but I cannot at present say what the words will be. This clause will enable the local authority actually for the first time to war for the clearing of some of the worst slum districts in their areas. I do not think the landlord who is really trying to perform the conditions of their contracts need fear any substantial injustice. The hon. Gentleman objects to what he regards the increased officialism of the Local Government Board. The Local Government Board have no wish to exercise vexatious powers. They can come in and co-operate, and under certain conditions they may come into coerce, but I think unless there is grave and flagrant dereliction of the public duty laid upon the local authority by statute, and that only after the most elaborate machinery of inquiry and representation, and every kind of safeguard, they will not, do so. He rather assumed, I think, that under the Town Planning Bill that the local landlords would be placed entirely at the mercy of the local authority. That is not so. Every scheme that is made by the local authority, or, as we hope will frequently be the case, adopted by the local autho-
794
rity, every portion of land in the hands of private owners must come before the central authority, the Local Government Board, for confirmation, and representations may be made. I think he was wrong in stating that. Under the fifth schedule there is a very definite statute of procedure, which includes the hearing of all objections and representations from persons affected. Representations may be made at any stage of the proceedings in this matter. I agree as fully as the right hon. Gentleman that though I would very greatly deplore the abandonment of what will be a second year, that we must proceed carefully, tentatively, and cautiously under the schedule.
Mr. CAVE: The schedule does not have any operation under the Bill, but only refers to matters dealt with by regulation.
Mr. MASTERMAN: The schedule becomes part of the Act of Parliament when passed.
Mr. CAVE: Only after the regulations were made.
Mr. MASTERMAN: I will not dispute the point of law with the hon. Member, but there will be such a procedure, and any other would be a breach of faith between the Government and the House of Commons. The hon. Member drew attention to what he called unfair compensation—that, through the imposition of the town planning scheme upon the land which is near the town, the town planning scheme means the diminution in value of any particular area the landlord may claim compensation, but is not to get it unless the loss actually occurs. If it means an increase, he is to pay compensation at once. The words referring to loss actually occurring were put in by the Committee against the wish of the Government. The Government desired to put those two parties to the treaty upon a footing of perfect equality. Whatever advantage the landlord is to have against the local authority, if there is decrease, must be upon the same terms as the local authority has against the landlord, and I regret that there should be appearance of a difference, and I am glad that the hon. Gentleman called attention to what at first sight seemed an unfairness. He asserted that the whole clauses dealing with town planning are vague and mystic, and, I think he said, difficult to understand. The right hon. Gentleman who spoke first will agree with me that vagueness and mistiness is a necessity. We searched the

795
statutes of other countries, and in every other country you will find some vagueness and mistiness as to amenity, as to the limit in which the Act should operate, as to the various evidence that should be surveyed by the town planning scheme, but there is no vagueness or mistiness in connection with the compensation, and I think we shall be able to show that vagueness and mistiness are very far removed from the compensation clauses. Each different scheme will have to be dealt with more in special than general regulations. And these are the only possible methods in which this town planning can be carried out. There is no one who is not conscious of the vagueness of the present system. I should be almost afraid to state to the House the figures given me as to the millions of pounds that have been thrown away during the past 20 or 30 years owing to the necessary operations in adjustments of conditions arising out of the boundaries of towns, which would never have occurred if such a Bill as this had been passed. I could show the House maps, especially of seaside towns, almost looking like the scrawlings of lunatics. Road after road would be found leading down a blind alley. At enormous expense the town had to come to Parliament later, with all its costly procedure, and to produce plans before the Parliamentary Committee in order that they might be permitted to carry out the work of driving these roads through those blind alleys. I submit to the House that if there is any charge that can be made against us or any other Government, it is not that of proceeding too speedily, but that we had not proceeded many years ago. I ask the House once again to realise the very broadest outlines which this measure proposes, and I do this because I think the natural modesty of the Local Government Board and those associated with it has very often allowed people to rather emphasise and criticise some points which this Bill presents, as any Bill with such classes must present that has to deal with the important social reform which it seeks to accomplish. First of all it gives cheaper and clearer power for the acquisition of land, for the building of cottages, especially in the country, and as I have submitted, the lack of such facilities has been very largely felt. Secondly, it offers money as cheap as possible without giving a subvention to building, which in practice would be a subvention to wages. It extends the terms of the repayment
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with the largest possible elaboration of the terms for sinking fund, and with permission for the local authority to use public utility societies, and for the central authority to advance money to public utility societies on more liberal terms than ever they had before. Thirdly, it lays an obligation upon owners of working-class property, after the Act is passed, to let the houses and maintain them in the future in all respects reasonably fit for human habitation, and if that is not done, after repeated refusal the local authorities may step in and see that those houses are put reasonably fit for habitation, and a charge is made on the rent of the house. Fourthly, it gives us quicker and more efficient methods of compelling sanitary inspection by many rural authorities. Anyone who is familiar with the realities of rural life will see that that is necessary, and there is a transference of powers to the authority which desires to exercise them which allows them to demolish houses which are so injurious to health as to be unfit for human habitation. Fifthly, we take special powers—and it is the only special powers we do take—to make inquiry from the central authority in congested areas, if we think for some special reason the housing authority there is in need of a stimulus. In the sixth suggestion, which has been welcomed by every speaker, we build up in county councils a public health, housing, and sanitary body, first by making it compulsory to have a medical officer of health, who will give the whole of his time to the duties of his office; and, secondly, by a public health and housing committee being given statutory recognition in every county council; and, thirdly, by giving the power to any county council which desires to do so, and which has the energy and self sacrifice to do so, to build under Part III, Then, coming from the country to the town, we have this great and most hopeful scheme for allowing each urban community in close association and agreement with the central authority, which may be able to give advice in future to say that its development shall be controlled in a manner which is desirable and satisfactory to the community as a whole, with the safeguarding of parks and open spaces, with the regulation of buildings, including the number of buildings per acre, and with a clause, which I know will be dear to the hearts of some of my hon. Friends below the Gangway, and I will not say less dear to myself, for ensuring that this development shall not be made in some rigorous,

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centralised, wheel-like fashion, but that each town shall bring into consultation those who are interested in the past history of the town and in the various places of historical interest or natural beauty, which should be given some central position or permanent preservation in the life of the growing town. It is impossible for anyone to declare that an Act such as this, setting out to accomplish such things, is an Act which this Parliament or any other Parliament should not welcome. We make no apology, even in the midst of the noise of other interests, for calling the attention of this House to the permanent realities of the life of the poor. We have heard a great deal lately in the last few months of the defence of an Englishman's home; here we are concerned with the preliminary requirement that the Englishman should have a home to defend. The majority of those for whose welfare this Act is designed have at present no home. We ask for provisions to remedy a condition which is not only a formidable barrier to all social progress, but which is a scandal to civilisation as at present constituted.
Mr. WALTER GUINNESS: The Parliamentary Secretary of the Local Government Board has taken credit to his Department for the moderation and generosity with which they have made the proposed Amendments which were put forward by the Committee. As I had the advantage of sitting on that very interesting Committee I should be the last to deny that the hon. Member and the President of the Local Government Board met us with every consideration, and gave our Amendments the best possible treatment that they could, but it seems to me that these Standing Committees always suffer from the defects of their qualities. They are largely composed of enthusiasts, who take a very extreme view of the matter which is before the Committee, and in this particular case the Standing Committee on several occasions went beyond the views of the Government itself. I think that the Bill as it now stands is in many respects worse than when it went to the Committee last Session. I need only mention one particular instance, the clause for the compulsory survey of working-class accommodation, which was inserted by the Committee against the advice of the Government. As the Bill now stands, although it certainly contains provisions which will be of value if they pass, to the cause of housing, it also embodies principles so new to our legislation and so dangerous in their methods that I believe they will de-
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feat the objects of the Bill. I recognise that in London there is certainly a very great necessity for certain amendments, and two very valuable provisions are contained in the Bill. The first is that for facilitating the granting of closing and demolition orders, and I agree that the Local Government Board will be better as the tribunal for deciding these matters, because they are the central Department, and acquire a large amount of technical knowledge, and experience in' the past has shown that magistrates in London have not given these demolition orders. The fact that no demolition orders have been granted in London during the: last few years I think shows the necessity for this change very clearly. Then I think it is also most necessary that increased responsibility, as this Bill proposes, should be thrown upon the landlord to keep his dwellings in repair. Undoubtedly there are other small Amendments in the Bill which I think would do a great deal to smooth out certain difficulties that have cropped up in the administration of the Housing Act of 1890 and the measures amending it; but much as I appreciate these valuable concessions I think if we pass this Bill as it stands the cost will certainly be excessive, and I think it will cause the country to drift towards a system under which the whole provision for the housing of the working classes would have to be taken over by the local authorities. The great difficulty under which private enterprise now suffers is the cost of providing this accommodation, and this Bill will enormously increase the burden, not only on the ratepayers, and therefore indirectly upon the builder of houses, but also on the builder himself directly. The Standing Committee treated the whole question of cost with absolute indifference.
And, it being a Quarter past Eight of the clock, and there being Private Business set down by direction of the Chairman of Ways and Means under Standing Order No. 8, further proceeding was postponed, without Question put.

PRIVATE BUSINESS.
  GREAT NORTHERN, GREAT CENTRAL, AND GREAT EASTERN RAILWAYS BILL (by order).

    PROPOSED AMALGAMATION.
    Order read, for resuming adjourned Debate on Amendment to question (31st

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    March) "That the Bill be now read a second time."
    Which Amendment was, to leave out the word "now," and at the end of the Question to add the words "upon this day six months."—[Mr. Mond.]
    Question again proposed, "That the word "now" stand part of the Question." Debate resumed.
    Mr. F. W. LAMBTON: The debate that we had on Wednesday last was short, and I am sorry it was not brought to a conclusion in one day, as the arguments advanced on that occasion have been forgotten by now. I wish to treat it, first of all, as a railway proposition and then as a question of Parliamentary procedure, and on both these grounds I must announce my intention of voting against the second reading of the Bill, because I do not think it is a good railway proposition and I do not think it is a good proposition with regard to Parliamentary procedure. The Secretary of the Board of Trade told us that questions of railway amalgamation should be judged on their merits and should not be condemned without close and careful consideration. Another proposition that he has laid clown was that he wished to make this amalgamation proposal a model of the other amalgamation proposals which are on foot in the country. He wished, so to speak, that the Committee should put its own stamp on these proposals. I submit that these are contradictory propositions. If the Bill ought to stand on its own merits we ought to vote for or against it on the merits of the Bill. We ought not to be told by the President of the Board of Trade that the Bill should be sent to a Committee so that the Committee may put its own stamp upon it. With regard to the merits of the proposal the three hon. Members who spoke in favour of the Bill were very loud in their praises of the railway companies for their frankness and boldness in coming out into the open, and we were solemnly warned by the President of the Board of Trade against doing anything which might drive them into underground vaults and subterranean channels where their noble aspirations would fade away into thin air. Personally I am no great admirer of secret societies or of underground tactics generally, and I do not impute any tactics of that sort to the railway companies, but there is no reason why you should give them great praise for coming before Parliament, because the reason is quite obvious. The right hon. Gentleman who moved the second reading of the Bill
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    also stated that they were frank and came boldly before Parliament and asked for something which they might have without coming to Parliament at all. Then he said:—
    "We have come into the open. We recognise who is our master in this case, and where lies the supreme power, and we come boldly conscious of a good case to ask from the supreme power that which we know will be ours with the greatest possible security if we get it from the supreme power."
    That is why these railway companies behave so nobly and so openly in coming to get the sanction of Parliament for something they said they can do without coming to Parliament. The reason why they ask for the sanction of Parliament is that it will give them supreme power and control over these matters. The right hon. Gentleman who spoke in favour of the Bill told us quite fairly and frankly what the companies expect to gain by the Bill. He said the Bill was framed for the private advantage of the companies, and it would be to the advantage of the three classes connected with railways, the passengers, the traders, and the workers.
    As regards the private advantage of the companies, I need say nothing. They are quite capable of speaking for themselves, and I have no doubt we shall hear to-night what those private advantages amount to. I myself have no grudge against any railway company, certainly not against any of these three. The Great Northern I have travelled on for half a century now with great comfort and convenience, and I hope to continue to do so. I do not think it is necessary for them, or for either of the other two companies to obtain these excessive powers from Parliament. The right hon. Gentleman who asked for these powers said he would safeguard the interests of the public, and at the same time provide for better equipment and better management of his own railways. I think there is one provision in the Bill which will not either add to economy or efficiency, and that is that there are to be 37 directors of these companies, and that any single one of them may hang up the whole of the proceedings, when there is any dispute, until it goes to a standing arbitrator. The right hon. Gentleman compared this amalgamation with other amalgamations, and said it is no new thing. After all, this company, if it becomes a working union, will not be a greater matter than that of the North Western or the Great Western. He pointed out that the mileage of the Great Western is higher than the proposed mileage

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    of this proposed amalgamation. The North-Western capital is about £100,000,000, and this amalgamation will be £117,000,000, but this is on an entirely different footing from any others. These three companies, if they are united, will cover a great portion of England, and will monopolise the whole of the Eastern counties north of London. They will monopolise and control traffic along the East Coast from London to Berwick. At the present moment the North-Eastern Railway has facilities in the journey to the North. I do not know what view the North-Eastern Company takes of these proposals. There is no petition from them I know, but I should be rather doubtful as to the advantage which this will bring about to the North-Eastern Railway. I have no doubt they oppose it, but even if they supported it it would make the case worse, because they have a monopoly now, and to add this would be a scandal which Parliament would not stand.
    The hon. Member for Grimsby spoke in favour of the Bill, and cast great scorn upon those who opposed it who did not come from what he called the zone occupied by these companies. The hon. Member for Newcastle spoke against the Bill, and the hon. Member for Grimsby said, "You are only people who live on the Tyne or the Tees. You have no right to be heard against the Bill." I have a petition here which came from the North on behalf of the Chambers of Commerce of Newcastle, Gateshead, Sunderland, Middlesbro', and the Hartlepools, and all the great district served by the North-Eastern in that district, and they strongly oppose this amalgamation. They point out how the trade of that district will be injuriously affected by the combination. They also allude to a subject which is not exactly a railway matter, the owning of ships by these railway companies. Under this Bill the whole of the East Coast, from the Thames to the Humber, will be under the control of one company, owning many docks and a large shipping fleet, and we fear that on the North-East Coast the facilities hitherto enjoyed by traders and by some coasting ships will be refused. There is a good deal of complaint now about preferential rates given by some of these companies to foreign produce. When these great combines of 117 millions are also allowed to own great fleets of ships trading to foreign ports they can bring foreign produce at rates which will compare most unfavourably with the rates which they grant in
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    their own district. There is no provision in this Bill for maintaining the rights of traders in the district to obtain the same rates as foreign produce will get.
    I would like to point out that this monopoly also results in a geographical monopoly, by which they will be able to keep out any possible competition in the future, either of a public or private nature. Take the North-Eastern Railway, for instance. I know of a case in Northumberland. There we are entirely in the hands of the North-Eastern Railway. Look at the geography of Northumberland and you will see the North-Eastern Railway entirely embraces that country. Five-and-twenty years ago there was an endeavour to make a line through the centre of Northumberland from Newcastle towards Glasgow, instead of going right along the coast from Berwick to Edinburgh. We got that Bill a second reading. We went to Committee upstairs, and the usual thing happened. The North-Eastern came down with counsel, who were naturally more important than ours. The Committee listened to the strong battalions, and our railway Bill was thrown out. The North-Eastern was told they must make a line in place of the projected line. They made a small loop line, very well designed by the engineer, and strategically as effective as the lines of Torres Vedras. That line prevents any possibility of any further line from either Scotland or England unless they tumbled through the Cheviot Hills. If you grant monopolies in the geographical districts of the Eastern Counties you establish a monopoly which no one will be able to break through.
    The hon. Member for Grimsby and the hon. Member who moved the second reading of the Bill alluded to the great value of the fish traffic, and how important it was that the people should have cheap fish and an abundant supply of fish. He pointed out that this proposal would lead to abundant fish. I do not think that is the view of persons who trade in fish. I have a petition here from the National Sea Fisheries Protection Association. They say that in the fish trade, which affords a food supply for the poorest of the people, over 12,000 tons were landed of over eleven millions in value. They object strongly to this Bill being passed. They object to it not only because it is an amalgamation, but because they think they will lose some of those facilities they already enjoy. One of the strongest reasons against this amalgamation is that it increases the danger of the hardship they

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    suffer from owners' risk rates. I introduced a Bill—the Railway Contracts Bill—to deal with owners' risk rates. I thought that was a good Bill. The hon. Baronet the Member for the City said that it was a good Bill, It passed the second reading without a Division, but owing to circumstances over which I had no control it went no further. These owners' risk rates, as they are worked by most of the companies, are a great hardship on traders, and I think they are particularly a hardship on traders in the fishing districts.
    Not only does this association petition against the Bill, but there is also the petition which hon. Members must have seen of the dealer in Billingsgate who passes £500,000 in rates to the railway companies. He also is under a great apprehension that the passing of this Bill would do away with the facilities hitherto existing, and that the supply of fish at owners' risk would be taken away from them, and that the risk would have to be carried at companies' risk rate. Owners' risk rate, if carried out under competition, is not so bad, and is all very well for fish and other perishable produce if the trains arrive to time With competition there is some hope that will take place; but under amalgamation, where there is no competition, trains with fish have only to arrive late two or three mornings in the week to compel traders to send it at companies' risk rate, which is nearly double. Traders consider they are not safeguarded by the clauses or Instructions added to this Bill. Talking about Grimsby, let me mention that the owners' risk rate from Grimsby to London is 30s., and the company's risk rate 52s. 4d. for fish. The company carry foreign meat at company's risk rate for 25s., and foreign meat is carried from Birkenhead also at 25.s., while fish is charged 52s. 4d.
    Those sort of grievances, I maintain, are not remedied by any of the clauses put in by the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Trade in this Bill. The Bill does not safeguard the interests of the traders in that respect. I submit nothing has been shown by the President of the Board of Trade in the Instruction he is about to move or in any of the clauses that any facilities will be given under this new combination. The only safeguard he has put down is one hardly worth the paper it is written upon, namely, that no charges are to be increased because of or on account of this amalgamation. I do not think hon. Members below the Gang-
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    way are satisfied with the promises as to workmen's clauses. As to that point, I do not know so much. With regard to the clauses and Instructions which have been put down, I do not think they adequately safeguard the passengers, the traders, or the workmen, and on that account I shall vote against the second reading.
    With regard to Parliamentary procedure, I think we are asked to do a very curious thing in being asked to pass the second reading. The right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Trade has told us he wishes the Bill to go to a Committee, so that the Committee may place its own stamp upon it; that is to say, he think this Bill is not a good Bill as it stands. He puts down clauses in order to make it a presentable proposition; but does he think this is a presentable proposition to inquire into the whole railway policy and to produce a scheme to be brought before Parliament? Why should they do so on this particular Bill? The right hon. Gentleman is trying to force this Bill through Parliament, and we ordinary private Members are simply pawns between the railway directors and the President of the Board of Trade. We are told we are free to vote on this Bill, and we are told the Bill has not many merits, but that it is necessary to send it before a Committee to receive the stamp of approval of that Committee. We knew what the result will be when it comes back to the House. In those private Bills we are told we must send them to a Committee, and when they come back we are told, "You ought not to discuss them or not to cast reflections upon your private Committee which has sat upstairs."
    Therefore the control of Parliament over these matters is almost absolutely taken away. I would like to read some remarks made by the Lord Chancellor a day or two ago in the appeal case in reference to the telegraph monopoly. He said:—
    "This appeal is in admirable illustration of the danger to which the great interests of this country are exposed by the slovenly manner in which public Acts of Parliament are expressed, and the still worse way in which private Acts are expressed."
    I think this is a warning which we ought to take to heart. This Bill before us is a slovenly Bill, and the clauses added to it are so slovenly that we should not do our duty if we send the Bill upstairs to be considered by a Committee and do not consider it ourselves down here. Surely we are capable of forming an opinion down here as to whether the Bill is good and ought to pass the second reading or not. This sort of passing from the House of Commons to the Committee, and from the

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    Committee back again, is the way to produce the slovenly Acts to which the Lord Chancellor referred. I ask hon. Members who have any respect for private Members' right in this House to object to-night to this form of procedure.
    We have been told by the President of the Board of Trade that this question of the amalgamation of railways ought to be inquired into by a Committee. Why does not he appoint a Committee for that purpose? There is no use in using that argument to induce us against our will and conscience to vote for the second reading of a Bill we do not wish to have. We may lose our independence, judgment and action altogether in this House if Bills are carried in this way. Private Members have lost almost all, arid now it is hardly worth while being a Member of this House at all. The whole business of the House is carried on now in a bureaucratic manner. When we do get a chance on a private Members' Bill or a private Members' night of dealing with a matter we are told to refer it to a Committee, or are put off in some other way which does not give us an opportunity of expressing the opinion of the House. If the opinion of this House had been expressed on Wednesday night the Bill would not have passed its second reading. It would have been defeated. I hope the House will not change its mind. It is a Bill which will establish an enormous monopoly, and which must be injurious to the great interests concerned, and which I hope the House will refuse to sanction.
    Mr. SAMUEL ROBERTS: My hon. Friend behind me spoke against this Bill for his own district in the North of England. I am glad to have the opportunity of representing the views of a large city of the Midlands—Sheffield, with a population of 450,000, which is served by all three of these companies. The view of the Chamber of Commerce in Sheffield is that it would be to the public advantage, and to the advantage of the trade of the city, that this Bill should become law—with one small proviso: There is a small railway called the Sheffield District Railway, which is only about four miles long, and they would like some assurance that the facilities granted over this short line of railway are not diminished by the amalgamation. I think that that proviso will probably be met by the railway companies concerned. The view of these gentlemen whom I represent is this: They are much more likely to be served well by a fairly strong combination, as this combination would be,
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    than they are when served, as at present, by three companies, which are all more or less starved for money and have no money to spend for the development of their business and to meet the requirements of traders. They see this—that the revenues of the railway companies of this country have gradually diminished all round and the working expenses have gone up, and that in consequence of that they are starved for money, and that they would be much more likely to obtain money from the public if this strong combination goes through. The alternative they see is this: Secret arrangements and agreements between these companies. You cannot stop people making these agreements, as the right hon. Gentleman very properly pointed out in his impartial speech which he made the other night. Far better let us have the agreement above board with the safeguards and clauses which the right hon. Gentleman proposes for this Bill.
    My hon. Friend behind me says that these safeguards are of no avail. Let us examine what they are. First of all there is the important Instruction which the President of the Board of Trade proposes to move, providing that the public interest should be represented before the Committee by counsel, through representatives of the Board of Trade and any other public Government Department, and that there is to be made a special Report to this House stating distinctly the advantages and disadvantages which would result to the interest of the public and to passengers or traders using the railway concerned, also the safeguards which are considered necessary to be placed in the Bill for the protection of special and general interests. Then we have the first clause providing for the maximum rates. This, in my opinion, is a very great concession to get from these railway companies, because it provides that the railways are to be treated as one railway, that the maximum rate is to apply only at the commencement of the journey, and that then the rates are to go on as if the railways were one railway. At present, when traffic is transferred from one of these railways to another the maximum rate is put on again when the transference commences, and traders have to suffer in that way. This is a very valuable concession. I do not know exactly the value in money, but it is a large amount.
    As to passenger fares and rates charged I think the clauses proposed to be put in

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    this Bill will provide that there will be no increase in the passenger fares or rates charged by reason of the passing of this Bill. An appeal to the Board of Trade and to the Railway Commission will provide ample security. Then comes the very important clause as to facilities which provide that any of the authorities specified in section 7 of the Railway Traffic Act of 1888 may represent to the Board of Trade that the facilities in any district as regards either passengers, goods, or minerals have been unreasonably diminished as compared with the year 1908. Then the Board of Trade may call on the joint committee of the railway for an explanation and endeavour to' settle the matter amicably, and if it is not settled amicably they are then to make a complaint to the Railway Commissioners, who may order the joint committee to restore the facilities. Now, if hon. Members refer to section 7 of that Act, they will find that the public authorities who may make this complaint are "any borough or county council, or any chamber of commerce, or any urban or rural district council." "Any" of them. I think my hon. Friend is a little wrong in saying the public are not sufficiently provided for in enabling them to make proper complaint to the Board of Trade in regard to this matter. Then there is the clause with regard to servants. That is, "if during three years after the passing of this Bill any servant of these Railway Companies is discharged on account of the passing of this Bill, or by reason of its passing, then he is to have compensation." At present he is discharged, and he gets no compensation at all. You cannot, as I said, compel these companies not to make private agreements, but if they make private agreements the "discharges will take place without any compensation at all. I want my hon. Friends below the Gangway to realise that.
    Perhaps I may be allowed to say—though it is no concern of mine—a few words on behalf of the shareholders of the railway companies. The right hon. Gentleman very truly stated in his impartial speech—if he will allow me to say so—that a large part of the capital in these railway companies is paying dividend at the present time. Three-fifths of the capital in the Great Central Railway is paying; no dividend at all, and taking the capital of the three railway companies at £117,000,000 there is not 3 per cent.
    Mr. G. J. WARDLE: What about watered stock?
    Mr. S. ROBERTS: The percentage is 2.97 interest paid.
    Mr. WARDLE: Where does the hon. Gentleman get his figures?
    Mr. S. ROBERTS: I got them from the right hon. Gentleman opposite.
    Mr. WARDLE: That is where you got them wrong.
    Mr. S. ROBERTS: The hon. Member will have his chance to reply afterwards. It may be said that these people advance their money on their own risk, and have no claim for compensation or consideration from this House. I do not agree with that. The money has been advanced for the public benefit. The public have received benefit, and are receiving benefit, and a large part of these people are receiving no interest on that money. I think myself they have a claim. If you calculate the loss on capital, say, in the last 15 or 20 years in the railways of this country, you will find, as most of us know very well, that shares have diminished enormously, especially ordinary railway shares. The shareholders are very much poorer to-day than they were 15 or 20 years ago. Yet this money has been devoted to the public service, and the public benefit. The railway companies were created, and have their standing by this House, and I think they have some claim on our consideration. There is one point I should like to put forward. I do not know what you would say, Sir, as Chairman of Committees, but since I have been in the House I have always taken it that it is a general rule that a Bill of this character has primâ facie a right to be read a second time. [Cries of "No!"] Yes, this House is not a tribunal to go into the minutiœ of this Bill. [A Voice: "The policy."] The policy, perhaps the general policy, but we are not the proper tribunal. The proper tribunal is a first-class Committee upstairs. The right hon. Gentleman proposes that this Bill should be referred to a Hybrid Committee with full power to go into every detail. Especially I should like to notice again that the Instruction which he proposes to move is: "That the Board of Trade, and any other Government Department, shall be represented by counsel and witnesses so as to be sure that the public interest is properly provided for."
    And then they are to make a special report to this House, so that hon. Mem-

    809
    bers who have any doubt can, if they are not satisfied when that report comes, vote against the third reading of the Bill. For these reasons I sincerely trust this House will not refuse a second reading to this Bill, but that they will trust to this Committee which the right hon. Gentleman proposes.
    Sir FRANCIS CHANNING: I am glad to have one or two minutes to lay before the House some of the reasons which have induced the Parliamentary Committee on Railway Traffic, of which I am chairman, to support and warmly advocate the motion of my hon. Friend. I do not at all agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield with regard to this particular Bill. The objection which we take to this Bill, and which I think can be shown to be an unanswerable objection, is that the Bill is not one of an ordinary type. It is not a Bill of the usual character affecting railways or waterworks, or other public bodies which raises no special question of principle, which only raises indirectly questions of limited controversy. This is a national question of supreme importance. What we have to say, and the ground of our objections, is not to be found in mere questions of detail. It goes to the very root of principles which should govern the State control of the railways of the country. We hold that this House will wholly fail in its duty if it does not reject this Bill summarily on the second reading. That sounds a strong proposition, but while admitting the force of what has fallen from my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield with regard to ordinary Bills, and recognising that in many cases factious and ill-considered opposition may have been offered to useful private Bills, what we do say is that this is a matter of totally different scope and magnitude. We ask this House not to read this Bill a second time, and not to accept any principle such as the second reading of this Bill would involve, until the whole question, the group of questions, which underlie this Bill, shall have been inquired into freely, openly, and fully by an authoritative body which can really lay an authoritative report before the House of Commons, upon which freely and openly the country can form a decided, clear, and definite opinion as to the future relations of the State to the railways. I listened with great interest to the extremely able speech
    810
    of the right hon. Gentleman. That speech would have been an admirably conceived speech if the Bill was of the character alluded to by the hon. Member for Sheffield, but it seemed to me it did not touch the real issues of this vast and revolutionary proposal. It did not adequately appreciate what the rights of the nation, the rights of the traders, and even what the rights of the Board of Trade are in respect to a gigantic proposal such as this is. I do not know positively—no one knows positively, that is part of our case—but I infer that this group of proposals, gigantic in their scope and sweeping in their character, are the direct offspring of the secret and unrepresentative conference which has been sitting so long at the Board of Trade. I can attribute no other origin to these proposals than that. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, whose ingenuity was evidenced in piloting the Merchant Shipping Bill, and the Patents Acts (Amendment) Bill through Parliament, and obtaining the assent of many bodies, initiated this conference. It seems to me he initiated it on wholly different lines from those he took with regard to these two other important and vital issues, in which he secured so definite and so great a success.
    This Railway Conference, we know, has been absolutely overweighted by powerful railway directors and by skilled railway managers, who practically—it is an open secret—have had the management of the whole of this work from the beginning to the end. As to the representation on that body of the trading classes, of chambers of commerce and of chambers of agriculture, it has been simply ludicrous in its character, and absolutely lacking in cohesion and organisation—such cohesion and such organisation as would produce any effect on the results of the action of that Conference. I say that Conference has no' authority whatsoever, because it was absolutely unrepresentative in its character. I say that it has less than no authority, because its proceedings, in the position with which we are now faced, are absolutely blank. We know nothing about them; we have not yet received their report; we have not seen the evidence; we know nothing of the arguments which may have operated on their minds.
    Mr. T. L. CORBETT: Does the hon. Baronet mean to imply that the Government appointed a Committee which was absolutely prejudiced in favour of this Bill?
    Sir F. CHANNING: I do not wish to speak discourteously, but I think the hon. Member would be well advised if he were not to interrupt my arguments. I do not say that the Government appointed a prejudiced Committee, but I say that the body was unrepresentative. We know how boards appointed from time to time to deal with rivers, harbours, and many other matters are constituted, but this Conference was not constituted in that way. As regards the traders and the agriculturists of this country it has had practically no representative character. I wish to urge this special point. If I am right in attributing to this Conference and to this inquiry this extraordinary group of proposals now before us, we have this to complain of: we are recommended to accept the principle of this Bill before we have received any Report from this body. Then my right hon. Friend, in his speech, which I do not think the hon. Member for Chester was wrong in saying would carry a certain amount of dissatisfaction and dismay into the minds of traders of the country, went on actually to say that this Bill, with these additional clauses, on which I put the same interpretation as the hon. Member for South-East Durham, and hold that they give with one hand and take away rather more with the other, should be accepted as a model. I protest with all respect against the contention of my right hon. Friend that such a Bill as this should be, or could be made into a model solution of our railway difficulties, or laid before Parliament and the country as a plan for the future management of railways. I hold that this procedure is vitiated at the beginnng. If the second reading be passed, if we accept this Bill, we will have sanctioned the principle of the complete monopoly of the railway lines of this country, concentrated and controlled by a group of able men who will hold the nation and the traders absolutely in their hands, and form an irresistible vested interest, a practical despotism over the traffic and trade of this country, which the powers of the Board of Trade and of the Railway Commission will be wholly unable to restrict within reasonable limits. The President of the Board of Trade, in reply to a deputation introduced to him the other day, admitted that this Bill practically handed over half the area of England to these three railway companies.
    If we take clause 17 we find that it gives unlimited power to form working agree-
    812
    ments and working arrangements and to set up joint boards with all other railways in the country, and if this is to be the model of our railway system, then I say we have a monstrous proposal laid before us—a proposal which will bring about almost inevitably and automatically a combination of the railways of this country, under one syndicate, for one purpose, and for one policy.
    Mr. CHURCHILL: I assure my hon. Friend, who has urged grave objections, that he is absolutely mistaken as to the effect of the clause. It would not be legal.
    Sir F. CHANNING: I differ very strongly from my right hon. Friend on that point. He may take that view, but I take the absolutely opposite view. I take the view that the very allowance made by that clause of all these agreements, the creation of joint boards all over the country, must inevitably legalise those agreements. When those boards are created they will practically dominate the whole of the country from one end to the other, and I see no escape whatever from that position. The right hon. Gentleman has contended that if we do not swallow this Bill at one gulp we shall be confronted with underground and secret combinations which will do far more harm to the country than this Bill. There again I absolutely traverse the whole of that contention. We know perfectly well that the Great Northern and Great Central Railways tried to force upon the country a working arrangement which was based upon the interpretation of a clause of the Act of 1858, and we know that that was made short work of by the Railway Commissioners when it was brought before them, and their decision was upheld on appeal. What does this Bill mean? It means the absolute recognition of these secret agreements and joint arrangements, the working of which, as my right hon. Friend supposes, are not perfectly free and easy to organise outside the purview of Parliament. The real gist of the matter is that the control which the railway companies are trying to obtain in this country over the whole traffic of the country must be obtained with the sanction of Parliament, and cannot effectually be obtained by any other means whatsoever. What is more, clause 17 ousts from the jurisdiction of Parliament or from its consideration each of these proposals which may be brought year by year before it for the combination of this railway and that railway for various purposes.

    813
    Those Bills would, of course, come to Parliament, and those interested would naturally have an opportunity of stating their objections and grievances caused by such proposal. As far as I can see, if this Bill passes with clause 17 in it those joint agreements and arrangements will be legalised, and Parliament will be ousted from any control in regard to the whole of that sphere. My right hon. friend says these people will have an opportunity of challenging and stating their case. I hope his view may have some foundation.
    As I read the Bill, and as I have considered the whole of the grounds for believing that Parliamentary sanction is necessary for anything that can be really effectual for the purposes of the railways, I do not think there is anything in that contention. For the President of the Board of Trade to come here in the twentieth century and say he is powerless to restrain ill-advised, ill-considered, and unjust combinations is a declaration of doctrine which I little expected to have heard in my time from any President of the Board of Trade. If there are injurious combinations and agreements, then it is the first duty of the President of the Board of Trade to come to this House and obtain power to put his heel down upon all combinations which are prejudicial to the interests of trade. How is this Bill justified? We have heard a good deal from the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Sheffield, who put his case with that moderation and justice which one would naturally expect from him. What does it all mean? It means that the railways are poorer than they were. Why are they poorer? I believe that the railway companies have been hardly hit by the landlords and the lawyers upstairs in the past. Those two groups of expenditure might well have been dispensed with in the national interest. The traders have had to pay for these losses year by year, month by month, and hour by hour, in heavier charges and conditions as compared with the traders in other countries. The traders have had to pay for all the delinquencies of the landlords in the past. [An HON. MEMBER: "It is the fault of Parliament."] It is true that Parliament may have sanctioned many private Bills which did place certain railways under disabilities which caused loss to them. Railways have also suffered from Parliament judging unwisely as to the merits of certain Bills which exposed the companies to undue competition. But if the railways are poor it is largely owing to their bad finan-
    814
    cial management of those railways. As to the question of over capitalisation it was challenged the other day. But, in a debate last year, the hon. Member for Dulwich distinctly stated and admitted that about £200,000,000 of railway stock might be regarded as "watered."
    Mr. BONAR LAW: The hon. Baronet is entirely mistaken. The sum of £200,000,000 was given by another hon. Gentleman, and my point was, if the statement was accurate, the return on the balance was a poor return.
    Sir F. CHANNING: The hon. Gentleman is extremely skilful and adroit in all his statements, and I at once accept his disclaimer, but the speech certainly conveyed to me the impression that he assented to that view. I affirm that view, and I do not think there is the slightest doubt that it is the true view. The railways have been enormously capitalised, and in certain cases the shares have been practically doubled, and what I say is that it is a gross and intolerable injustice for the traders and agriculturists of this country that they should be called upon to make up the dividends on watered stock. What is happening? The Great Central Railway is in a bad financial position. We know that another company, the Great Eastern, is distinguished for the great facilities and the wise arrangements it has made to serve the agriculturists of the eastern counties. The farmers of Lincolnshire have asked me what will be the result of this amalgamation? They ask if they will have the advantages of the Great Eastern Company, or will the whole of this combination be whipped up to the higher standard? In one of the Irish Amalgamation Railway Bills a clause was introduced to keep the rates all over the amalgamated companies at the lowest rate given over any portion of those railways, and that clause was absolutely ineffective. We know perfectly well what this Bill means. It does not guarantee, it cannot guarantee, and will not guarantee any gain whatsoever to the traders and agriculturists in the vast area over which it is concerned. This Bill is simply one to bolster up one weak company with two others to create a basis of credit on which to issue further liabilities in the shape of capital. I protest against that. It seems to me that while all wise men must wish to see the railways of this country placed on the soundest economic basis, and worked in a way profitable, to the shareholders and fair and reasonable to the traders, the policy

    815
    of the railway companies in their capital issues year after year is a mistaken policy. I do not know what is in the mind of my right hon. Friend. Some people may be dreaming of railway nationalisation if you can only get the railways into a ringed fence. I do not envy anyone the satisfaction he may get out of that dream. I think the result of such a plan would be to create a most gigantic vested interest in this country which we should never be able to deal with by acquiring national control over the railways in the national interest. The only suggestion I will make if we are to have amalgamation is that the first condition of amalgamation should be that the railways should adopt the principle of a sinking fund, just as our great municipalities adopt that principle, and just as all great borrowing corporations adopt it. Why should the first condition not be to diminish and not increase the liabilities of railway companies? I protest against this Bill. Having watched and studied the gigantic trusts and combinations in the United States, I say, do not let us by passing hastily Bills of this nature bring upon this country the tremendous evils with which President Roosevelt has been vainly struggling for the last two or three years. I want to see the railways of this country prosperous and well conducted, serving the country fairly. I want to see some approach made—whether it be by railway nationalisation, or heaven knows what means, I do not much care—to better and more economic organisation, giving better and cheaper conditions of traffic, so that we may be placed more on an equality with nations like Germany and other countries; but do not let us begin by taking a step in the direction of Americanising the railway system of this country. I hope the House will reject the Bill.
    Sir F. BANBURY: The hon. Baronet opposite has conjured up a vision of something terrible that is going to accrue to the country if this Bill passes second reading. He has informed us that the railways concerned cover half England. I have not measured the map, but I think his statement is at least slightly inaccurate. The three companies concerned do not cover a quarter of England.
    The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of TRADE (Mr. Churchill): Nearly half—not in mileage, but in geographical area.
    Sir F. BANBURY: I was talking of mileage. The hon. Baronet went on to say
    816
    that the railway companies were managed by extremely able men. With that I agree; in fact, it is the only part of the hon. Baronet's speech with which I do agree. But he also said that there had been extremely bad financial control and management, and I should like to know how he reconciles the two statements. He also cited the Board of Trade Committee, and was apparently under the delusion that this Bill is the outcome of that Committee, whereas the hon. Member for Chester, who spoke on Wednesday last, and who is a Member of that Committee, cited that body as being against this particular amalgamation. So that the hon. Baronet has apparently hardly studied the question, and when be expresses a hope that heaven may send some remedy, he does not much care what, it would be better if he took a little trouble and found out what the actual remedy proposed by the companies is. He also made a great point about "water." The actual amount of water is 10 per cent.
    I have been asked by the three companies to reply to the arguments which have been advanced against the Bill, and to make on their behalf a statement of the position which they intend to take up in consequence of the course of events since last Wednesday. I did not seek that position. I was asked to take it up, and therefore I consented. I quite recognise the gravity of the effect of the few words I have to say to the House this evening, and I wish they had been entrusted to abler hands. I want to ask the House to accord me that indulgence which it always accords to people who have a difficult task to perform, and to recognise that—I hope I shall not make any slip—what I say is the considered judgment of the three companies concerned. They desire to put the facts of the case as they regard it before the House and the country. The three railway companies believe that this Bill will be an advantage to the public, an advantage to the men they employ, and an advantage to the shareholders, and it was in that belief that they introduced it. It must be admitted by everyone who has studied the question that rich and powerful companies give better service to the public and to the traders, and are better employers of labour, than the poorer companies. If that statement is questioned I would ask hon. Members to look at the London and North-Western Railway—I am in rather a difficult position, as I do not want to cast discredit on any particular railway—and then to look at the London,

    817
    Chatham, and Dover Railway. There can be no question whatever that the rich and powerful company has given a better service, not only to the travelling public but to the trader, and has been a better employer of labour than the smaller and more struggling company. I do not say that as in any way casting a slur upon the smaller companies. It is not their fault; they have not the money to do that which they would like to do; and it is only by allowing the companies to obtain the command of capital that you can get from them what I say, without hesitation, as a railway director of some years' standing, they are desirous of giving—that is, an efficient service to the travelling public and to the trader—notwithstanding what the hon. Member for Durham has said—and also to be good employers of the men who work for them. The effect of this Bill would be to enable these companies to bring about that result. Combined they can do what disunited they cannot do. I would ask those who travel whether they would prefer to have three trains starting at 12 o'clock from King's Cross, Liverpool Street and Marylebone, all of them nearly empty, or one train starting at 12 o'clock and another at half-past 12? Who would benefit? The public would benefit, because they would get an extra train, while the companies would benefit because they would save three useless trains and run two full ones. I have been told that this is going to stop all competition, that competition in the railway service will be bad. The hon. Member for Chester—I am sorry he is not in his place—advanced in support of this argument the opinion of Sir Edward Watkin. He said:
    "I would like to give to the House on this question of competition the opinion of two very great railway men—the late Sir Edward Watkin, who was chairman of the Manchester, Sheffield, and Lincolnshire Railway, said: 'There had been great progress in competition. and accommodation had been immensely increased, whilst rates and fares had largely decreased.' He also expressed the opinion that unconditional amalgamation which destroyed competition would be an unmitigated evil to the public."
    That is the opinion of Sir Edward Watkin, whom the hon. Member for Chester described as one of the greatest railway men. Sir Edward Watkin was connected with the Southeastern Railway. May I ask anyone who has travelled on the South-Eastern Railway, of which Sir Edward Watkin was chairman, and who has travelled on the Great Northern Railway, which was the better railway from the point of view of the public. There can be mo doubt at all that during the time Sir
    818
    Edward Watkin was chairman of the South-Eastern Railway it was one of the worst in the country, whether you regard it from the point of view of the shareholders or the public.
    Mr. BEALE: Sir Edward Watkin was also chairman of the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway part of the time.
    Sir F. BANBURY: I am perfectly aware that Sir Edward Watkin was chairman of that company, but the South-Eastern Railway was the one with which he was chiefly concerned, and I venture to say that I will not be contradicted in what I have stated with respect to that railway. He was also chairman of the Metropolitan Railway, and the result is that the Metropolitan shares at the moment are practically worth nothing. That railway has now been electrified, but that work ought to have been done many years ago. Sir Edward Watkin was chairman of the Manchester, Sheffield, and Lincolnshire, and was responsible for its coming to London, with the result that its shares have been reduced to almost nothing. It has been getting worse and worse from the point of view of the shareholders and the public.
    Mr. BEALE: I am not saying anything in his favour.
    Sir F. BANBURY: Then we are agreed that the authority quoted by the hon. Member for Chester is admitted by the hon. Gentleman opposite to be a person of whom nothing ought to be said in his favour.
    Mr. BEALE: The hon. Baronet mentioned a fact about a man of great experience in the railway world. I thought that fact was qualified by another. I am on the side of the hon. Baronet in this particular matter, but I want him to get his fact right.
    Sir F. BANBURY: The hon. Member for Newcastle-on-Tyne also spoke against the Bill. He said, talking of over capitalisation:—
    "Take the year 1850. British railways per mile were then capitalised at £34,000 per mile. What do they stand at at the end of 1907? Close upon £56,000 per mile. Who is to blame for it, and who should suffer as a consequence? The people who have rashly spent their capital over the companies. Might I give you au illustration of what has taken place? I refer to the Taff Vale as an illustration of the question of what is meant by spreading over. In 1889 they gave every holder of £100 of their No. 1 Preference Stock £125 of new Four per Cent. Preference Stock, and £ 150 Ordinary Stock. Every holder of £100 Ordinary Stock received £250 of new Ordinary Stock. Yes, but let us see the result. It is that we want. As a result the four per

    819
    cent dividend on the company's ordinary stock does not sound out of the way, until one realises that it is actually 10 per cent. dividend on the money really sunk in it."
    In 1850 the best of the railways consisted of two sets of lines with iron rails, and running over badly ballasted roads, the utmost speed of the trains not exceeding 40 miles an hour. At the present moment the main lines of the big companies consist of four lines of steel rails, perfectly ballasted. The permanent way costs a great deal of money. Over these lines trains run nearly 60 miles an hour. The carriages have dining and sleeping arrangements, they are lighted with electricity and heated by steam, whereas formerly the carriages consisted of what would merely now be considered as little better than cattle trucks. Does the hon. Member think that all this has been done without capital? The railway companies have done their duty to the public, and they have endeavoured to have a pride in owning well-managed concerns. I venture to say to the lines running to the north, there is no line that can compare with the Great Northern as regards facilities and comfort. It is just as well that these few fallacies should be exposed. The hon. Member below the Gangway talked about capitalisation, and brought forward the Taff Vale Railway, which, he said, had altered the amount of its ordinary stock by increasing it. The capital invested in the railways of this country amounts to thirteen hundred millions in round figures. The whole of the capital of the Taff Vale Railway is only £8,000,000, of which the ordinary stock amounts to £5,192,000. Now, what is the use of bringing forward to the House, as an illustration, a "two-penny ha'penny" little railway like the Taff Vale? In the great railways concerned in this Bill the capital has never been touched. The North Eastern, the North Western, and the Great Northern have preferred and deferred, but they declare their dividend on the original stock. The South Eastern also does so, and, although I am not sure, I think the South Western does the same, so that the argument is applicable only to the Taff Vale Company. The two railway companies have come to this conclusion with a great sense of the responsibility on which they are acting. They recognise that a great deal of what hon. Members call over-capitalisation has accrued through lengthy proceedings upstairs and through heavy legal expenses. They do not want to incur these heavy expenses or to waste the
    820
    time of hon. Members sitting upstairs in Committee, or the time of learned Gentlemen, if that can be avoided. They adopted rather the unusual course by going to the President of the Board of Trade and making to him—before the Bill came to the House of Commons—those concessions which they thought they might make in order to secure the passing of the Bill. They made these concessions instead of leaving them to be made in Committee upstairs, in order that the House of Commons, before it passed the second reading of the Bill, might thoroughly know all the conditions of the Bill, and all that the companies were going to receive. They recognised that the debate on Wednesday last was not very favourable to the passing of the Bill. They would not like the House of Commons to be under any delusion as to the action they proposed to take, and they have asked me to state that they have gone to the furthest limit of concession that they can go. In justice to the shareholders they can go no further, and though they recognise that by making this statement they may possibly run the risk of losing the second reading of the Bill—an event which they would greatly deplore—they must leave the responsibility of rejecting the Bill to the House of Commons.
    Mr. T. LOUGH: I do not think that my hon. Friend who has just spoken has improved the prospects of the Bill. I think he would have been wise if he had left it to the able hands of my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade. I would like to ask you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, if you remember the strange coincidence which took place last Wednesday when the Bill was before the House? This is a proposal for the amalgamation of three great railway companies, but in five years, instead of an amalgamation of three companies, it was proposed that we should have a National Railway Company—an amalgamation of all the companies—such as the National Telephone Company. This fact makes our debate a very momentous one, and throws a different aspect on the question which I ask the House to consider. The proposal is one which is of so great a change that it should not be hurried through the House, for we are asked to take a step which the House will never be able to retrieve. I ask the House to be deliberate in the matter, and to realise the greatness of the issue upon which it is called upon to decide. The right hon. Gentleman will agree with me if I say that he is using

    821
    every effort to persuade the House to accept this Bill. He should leave the issue to the House. I must say that I agree with my hon. Friend who has been disappointed at the action of the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Trade. He says that the Government Whips will not be put on for the purposes of the Division. It is not the Government Whips that we fear, but we want to carry the President of the Board of Trade with us, and if he will leave this matter to the House he ought to do so in an open and generous spirit, and he ought to have some respect for the decision which the House may pronounce. The right hon. Gentleman should not have tried that persuasion so much, and I hope, if he takes the opportunity of speaking again, he will leave the matter frankly to the House, and use no persuasion of any kind, secret or open, to influence the decision upon this most important matter. The right hon. Gentleman recommended the Bill because he said he had secured some very valuable concessions. He directed our attention to two or three clauses he had put down upon the Paper in very good time. I will not examine these clauses at very great length, because they have already been somewhat severely handled, but I will say this about them, that if any one looks at them they will see that the clauses pre-suppose only that the present facilities shall be continued. That does not satisfy me. If the railway company should get great advantages they should be willing to divide them with the public, and there is no advantage in this clause for improving any facilities, and if any one studies the clause with regard to passenger fares and the clause with regard to goods and the clause with regard to service, he will be driven to this conclusion, that the real intention of the combination is secretly to withdraw facilities and to raise rates. What do the clauses mean? They say no rates shall be raised because of the passing of the Bill. Why should rates be raised for such a purpose? How can it be proved that the companies come forward to raise them because of the passing of this Bill? They would be wanting in all human ingenuity if they came forward with a case such as that. They will present primâ facie evidence of various kinds in favour of such a change, and they will succeed in getting it. Mark the kind of difficulties placed in the way of the traders by the right hon. Gentleman. My right hon. Friend says his clause shifts the onus of proof. There is
    822
    a sublime faith about my right hon. Friend in connection with this matter. Many of us are older hands, and have been before the Railway Commissioners, in whom he has such confidence. Many of us are traders, and have gone before the Board of Trade, and know what we got by the process, and if any one will examine these clauses he will know that no trader will get free access to the tribunals, and that even when he does get there he will find he gets very little for his pains and for his expense. I say the clauses are bad. If any hon. Member doubts that let him not accept what I say, but let him examine them for himself. Look at the papers issued by the Chamber of Commerce, which analyses the clauses and tears them to pieces, and shows they are no good to the traders of London. Look at the formidable opposition to this Bill! London is against it, Newcastle is against it and other great towns are antagonistic to it. [An HON. MEMBER: "Sheffield and Bradford are for it."] I will give the hon. Member the places he says are for it, but I venture to say the great bulk of the opinion of these localities will be found against the Bill. I want to remind the House of one observation made by my hon. Friend who spoke a few moments ago. He quoted a clause from the amalgamation Bill of 1900—the clause put into the Irish Amalgamated Railways Bill. It was that if any amalgamated line had low rates for any class of produce that rate should apply to all lines brought together. Why is not that clause brought into this Bill? It is not quite successful even that clause, but if it were inserted it would show evidence of the good spirit of my right hon. Friend. This was a real clause put in by the Board of Trade in an Amalgamation Bill. Why have we not got it here? Look what it would have done. On the Great Eastern Railway you have a low rate for agriculture, as low as any in the country, and if that had been extended to the Great Northern Railway and the Great Central Railway it would have been of great value to the farming interest. The Great Northern Railway and the Great Central Railway tap the coal district, and they have very cheap rates for heavy classes of goods. If that had been extended to the Great Eastern Railway system that would have been a great benefit. But this clause, which was a Board of Trade clause, has been carefully avoided by my hon. Friend, and I say that the clause that he has given us in substitution

    823
    for it is not worth the paper it is written upon. I am sorry to have to take another point with regard to this Bill. I would like to correct a few of the inaccuracies which were put before the House both by my right hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, who moved the Bill, and the President of the Board of Trade. These inaccuracies, I must urge, with great submission to the House, have been made in the course of an attempt to make little of the great step which the House was asked to take. Take the length of the line that is to be amalgamated. My right hon. Friend told us that it was 2,412 miles, and the President of the Board of Trade confirmed that figure. The real length is 3,556 miles. The explanation is that the right hon. Gentleman did not take into account the lines worked by the companies, leased by the companies, or over which they have running powers. When they come in the magnitude of the undertaking is increased by 50 per cent. The President of the Board of Trade told us that the capital of the companies was 117 millions; that is totally inaccurate. The real capital is 170 millions. The reason is that he confined his view to the Preference and Ordinary shares, but what about the Debentures. They are the most important part of the capital, and if you take this gigantic figure of 170 millions the House will see that the problem assumes quite different proportions. When my hon. Friend said 117 millions, one of my hon. Friends said "part of it is watered," but the right hon. Gentleman said, "No, no water; this is money honestly provided by the people." Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the Great Northern shares were watered in the year 1890, and £125 was given for every £100? Then my right hon. Friend said, taking the return on the capital, the return on the ordinary shares was only 3 per cent.
    Sir F. BANBURY: What does he mean when he says in 1890 that the ordinary stock of the Great Northern Railway was watered?
    Mr. LOUGH: I am not as good an authority on this point as the hon. Baronet, but I ask whether the rearrangement of the stock was not made in 1890?
    Sir F. BANBURY: Not the ordinary stock.
    Mr. LOUGH: I beg pardon, some stock. What I say is that £125 was given for every £100 subscribed.
    824
    Then my right hon. Friend became quite pathetic about dividends, and said the dividend was only 3 per cent.; but in these bad times 3 per cent, is not so bad at all. The worst line of these three for dividends is the Great Central. In 1889 the Great Central paid 3¼ per cent, on its ordinary stock. In 1890 it paid 2⅞ per cent., and then the dividends suddenly disappeared because the railway plunged into this scheme of building the line to London. The argument presented to the House now for the amalgamation shows that that line is not wanted. It is 47 miles too long, and the goods are now to come by the Great Northern and the Great Eastern—supposing they do come that way. What? benefit will it be to the poor public? The interest on the capital which has been sunk in the line which was not wanted will remain to be paid by those who have to bear the burden of the amalgamation just as it does at present. It would be better for the people who made the mistake to bear the punishment for their mistake. It is hardly just to ask the House or the country to take it over from their hands.
    There is one other astonishing misstatement, I think rather a careless one, of the right hon. Gentleman with regard to the servants of the company. He said he had taken security that no employé of the companies should be dismissed because of the passing of the Bill. There is no such provision in this clause. The clause for the protection of the servants is very imperfect. It only lasts for three years. It does not secure that no one shall be dismissed, but only says compensation shall be provided if they are dismissed. That is a very different clause from that which is represented to us by the right hon. Gentleman.
    Mr. CHURCHILL: What I did was, in answer to a question, to state that there were five clauses which would be published as soon as the printer could get them ready. I published the clauses verbatim, and I am not to be charged with having represented anything differently.
    Mr. LOUGH: I did not intend in the least to misrepresent the right hon. Gentleman. In fact, I am not in a position to do it, because I am quoting from his clause. I was quoting from the words of his speech, and I press upon him and on the House that his position is a little inconsistent. He is pressing us too much, and we do not like to be pressed like this. The decision at which he arrives is that

    825
    the matter should be left to the House of Commons, and I ask him to leave it in a generous, open spirit, and to repose some confidence in the decision which the House will ultimately pronounce. The great argument in the mind of my right hon. Friend is that if we do not pass this amalgamation we shall have underground burrowing and arrangements made in the dark instead of these other excellent arrangements. The only underground burrowing I fear is that which goes on at the Board of Trade. These companies, if they do not come to the Board of Trade or Parliament, may make any arrangement they like for aught I care. If the public became aware that they have made any improper arrangement, this House has got the means of putting it right in its own hands. If my right hon. Friend is really frightened because of those underground arrangements, I would ask him to take a more cheerful view of it. Let him not despair of the House of Commons. I will tell him how he will be able to get at those underground borrowings; in fact, I gave him a hint the other day when I asked a question. The first time one of those railways who have made what I would call an illicit, or underhand, agreement ever came to this House with a General Purposes Bill, let this House say: "We will not look at your Bill until you have laid on the table the agreement." This House has abundant powers in its hands to bring all those arrangements to book.
    There is one other matter I should like to bring to the notice of the right hon. Gentleman. He referred to the recommendations of the Committee of 1872. He told us that Committee found a great deal of merit in combinations. I agree. I am not against properly constructed combinations, but I rather find fault with my right hon. Friend because he did not tell us all that Committee said. What did it say? It said that whenever there is a combination of this kind there are two provisions that ought to be taken for the protection of the public. There are more than two, but I refer to two. It said that none of those railways which were allowed to amalgamate should be allowed to retain the ownership of canals. One of these railways has two hundred miles of canals, and why might not that be an alternative course for traffic. The second recommendation was that none of those railways should be allowed to hold sea harbours or keep control of any port. That recommendation of the Committee of 1872 is
    826
    flagrantly broken in this proposal before the House. I say if we go back to the authority of the Committee we ought to look at it fairly and we ought to take advantage of any of the hints which they have given to the House for the protection of the public in the days that are to come.
    I venture to say this: I am not against properly-considered amalgamation, or any other business arrangement, but what I argue is that it must be properly considered, fair terms must be given before any amalgamation of this kind is brought forward. The House will ask what I would suggest as fair conditions instead of the wretched conditions as now embodied in these clauses. In the first place, I would say I would rather see even a larger amalgamation than as proposed in this Bill than have anything to say to this partial amalgamation which still deals with half of England.
    Let us look at the whole facts, and make up our minds. There is the first condition to be insisted on, and this would be that the public must be represented on the body that controls the amalgamated railway. This House cannot give up all their rights to gentlemen, to a board of directors, especially great power of this kind, who have announced openly that their only object is to make as much as they could. If there is to be any amalgamation the public must be represented on the authority that controls the railway. Then there is another principle that goes with that, the public must share the profit of the amalgamation and the loss, if you like. The public would certainly have to share the loss. I would like to ask the right hon. Gentleman, he hinted to us he is going to keep up the dividend and increase the value of the shares. The right hon. Gentleman made a very pathetic case about shares being down to £18, and the dividend being so low. In the case of the London Docks he had shares down to £19 and has put them up to £70. How did he do it—by simply putting dues on goods. If I wanted to put the matter offensively, I would say by taxing the bread of the poor. How will he raise the dividends now? Ah! there is alchemy by which this thing is will only have a little thinner on the poor. If be sanctioned by this House, the principle should be embodied in the Bill that the country should share in the benefits of the amalgamation. Perhaps I may put it a little more plainly. I would say when the dividend

    827
    came to 4 per cent, on the ordinary stock, part of any additional profit over that should go, perhaps, to the servants, to improve their position, and the remainder should be divided between the company and the public. At any rate, there should be a provision for dividing the advantages of the arrangement. The only other condition I venture to suggest as relevant to this is the condition suggested in 1871, namely, that the companies should be asked to give up their outside services. These companies are great dockowners, great shippers, possessed of one exclusive harbour if not more, possessing canals and hotels, and they are carters and owners of shops in great cities, and all these things. All these special services should be looked into, and probably this House would find it wise to restrict the efforts of the railways to their own proper business rather than allow them to become great monopolists in these spheres. These are the only suggestions that I venture to make. If the House sees any merit in them, it will absolutely condemn this Bill. The conditions here are that nothing is offered to the public, nothing is offered to the servants, and nothing to the traders, and I fervently hope that when this House considers the matter this authority, which is the only authority fit to judge of it, will come to the decision to reject the Bill.
    Mr. BONAR LAW: I would like to defend the President of the Board of Trade from one of the statements of the right hon. Gentleman who has just spoken. He blamed him for coming down to the House and expressing his own opinion of this important question. I venture to say that no course could possibly be more disrespectful to this House than that the head of the one Department which has the best means of looking into questions of this kind should come down and not tell the House what is the opinion of the Board of Trade in regard to the matter. There has been a great deal of discussion as to whether this subject should be decided here or by a Committee upstairs. The principle is a subject to be decided by this House: the details, or anything approaching details, are obviously questions to be decided by a Committee upstairs. For that reason I shall not go into the details that have just been referred to by the right hon. Gentleman, although, as it happens I have some figures which would enable me to deal with some of his remarks. But as I do not think that the figures used by the right
    828
    hon. Gentleman, after the illustration afforded by his method of calculating the difference above and below 3 per cent., have left a very deep impression on the House, I shall not deal with them, and I shall confine myself to what seems to me to be the general principles which should guide this House in dealing with the matter. As far back as I can remember no subject excited more general complaint, and one that was more generally admitted by the public, than what was regarded as the silly competition which was indulged in by the different railways. This was the kind of thing of which I hail myself to speak. Two railways have communication between two great cities. As regards the passengers, it was never until quite lately even suggested that return tickets should be interchangeable on the lines, and the trains at each station in each city arrived at precisely the same hour, owing to the fear by each company that the other line should get any advantage over it, and for a great period of the day there were no trains arriving at or leaving either station. Then, if you turn to the traders—I am again giving my own experience—business people were pestered every week by canvassers coming and asking for their business by a particular railway, although they could not reduce the rates one iota in order to induce one to send the traffic by one line rather than another. Well, that great army of canvassers was carried on at a great expense, though it did not add one farthing to the total traffic of the railways. Take another instance. Whenever a railway company came to Parliament to ask for powers to improve a particular line the application was opposed by the other companies. Great expense was incurred, the money spent on these occasions added immense amounts to the capital of the railways, and that capital represents a loss not only to shareholders, but a loss of facilities to the general public. Well, now, surely there is not a man in this House who, on the general principle, will not say that that kind of competition is absurd, and ought to be put an end to.
    But I agree, when you leave principles and come down to particular instances, such as is now before the House, that there is apparently great differences of opinion. I have listened to the speeches which have been against the Bill. It seemed to me, rightly or wrongly, that the line taken by everyone who opposed the Bill is this: That even though you do not show that trade, the public, or the com-

    829
    munity is going to gain, yet the railway companies are going to be benefited, and the shareholders going to get something, and that in itself is a reason why the House should look with suspicion on the Bill, and should reject it. I say that the exact opposite principle ought to guide us; that the line on which we ought to go is this: Unless you can show that there is going probably to be some disadvantage to the public, then it is an advantage, and nothing but an advantage, to the community, that railway companies should become profitable enterprises. Let the Mouse consider this proposition. Is it not certain that in any business, whatever it may be, there must be a great expenditure constantly going on if this business is to be kept up to date. Where can the money that they expend come from? It must come in one or two ways. It must come either out of profit or it must come by increase of capital. It is no exaggeration to say that from that point of view the railway system of this country has now come to a standstill. The companies cannot get capital. I took the trouble to ask a stockbroker, a friend of mine, to look up the prices for the last 20 years of two or three leading English railways, and compare them with American railways.
    Let me tell the result—which is precisely the result that everyone would have expected. In regard to American railways, there has been a steady appreciation. In regard to the British railways there was a rise in the first 10 years. Since there has been a steady, persistent, and constant fall, which has reached enormous figures. I may add that during the last Recess I was staying with the chairman of a railway company, a friend of mine—not, I may say, one of the companies concerned in this discussion. Anything I am now saying is said purely impersonally, because I have never been a member of a railway board, nor have I held, or hold, any shares in the railways. I mentioned to my friend in conversation that it seemed to me that part of the line with which I was familiar ought to be electrified. This is what he said:—
    "We know that perfectly well, but we have laid it down as an absolute rule that there must be no capital expenditure of any kind. Why? Because in our opinion the only chance of the recovery of the railway is that by means of the utmost economy, the utmost parsimony, we should be able to produce a dividend, and in that way to encourage the public again to give us capital which will enable us to carry on developments which are absolutely necessary if the railway is to be kept going."

    That is the general position which we have got to face. I ask the House to consider
    830
    that it must be to the disadvantage of every section of the community connected with railways that railways should not be able to provide the capital necessary to keep them up. It must be to the disadvantage of the traders. If the company cannot find the money to increase facilities and obtain further rolling stock then trade suffers. The hon. Member for Chester, who made a careful and well-reasoned speech against the Bill, mentioned one fact which has struck myself. He pointed to the enormous sums of money spent by these railway companies on new docks and facilities at the docks, and he drew from that the inference that a Bill of this kind is bad. I recognise that it is an expenditure which has not always been wise, but I draw exactly the opposite inference, namely, that the kind of competition which made them spend that money was wasteful and ought to be put an end to. Another point to which I attach the utmost importance in this: When I was at the Board of Trade we used to constantly have complaints that the cost of carrying produce from abroad was lower than the rate at which home produce is carried on the railways of this country. We looked into every case brought to our notice, but we never found a case where preference was given within the meaning of the Railway Acts. But I am bound to say this, that I always found, and I find now, that the difference between these rates for home produce and the dock rates is that the home rates are higher. All these railway companies have been spending their money in getting facilities for bringing in foreign produce, and they competed at rates which they found did not pay. Take away the motive for that competition and it immediately becomes the interest of those companies to develop the traffic on their own lines, and they would have, in addition, money available to spend on the development of their lines. I am bound to say that I agree with the hon. Member for Chester that the public should share in the advantages which the railways are going to get by this kind of arrangement. But it seems to me that what the hon. Member proposed to do was to prevent any advantages from being obtained. If there are no advantages, how are you going to share them? It seems to me that the obvious course for this House, is to throw no obstacles in the way of railway companies becoming profitable undertakings. Once they are profitable undertakings, as the President of the Board of Trade and the Chancellor of the

    831
    Exchequer know, there are a great many ways by which pressure can be put on railway companies, but how on earth can you put pressure upon them when the managers come to you and say that they are only paying expenses now. Let them once have a margin of profit, then the Board of Trade would have the power and the right to insist that in those cases reasonable rates should be given for home produce in this country. It is in the interests of the traders in the first place that railways should be reasonably profitable undertakings. If that is true as regards the traders, it is far more true as regards the workmen on railways. I am bound to say that I was surprised to hear the speech of the hon. Member for Newcastle, who spoke as if he represented the railway workmen with regard to this question. I am sure he took the line which he believed to be best in the interests of the workmen, but I am perfectly certain that it is a shortsighted line. I remember that in the last Parliament my hon. Friend the Member for Derby used to give us at the Board of Trade some very bad quarters of an hour. He was constantly pointing out cases where railway men were badly treated. I remember on one occasion saying if you expect to get good terms for your men from the company is it not your business to prevent the railway companies being put to unnecessary expense and annoyance where no public advantage is to be gained. I pointed out that if there is a margin of profit on the working of the railways the servants of the railways have a chance of getting benefits, but if the railways are being starved certainly the position of the railway men cannot be improved. That is common sense, and apart from that it has been proved by experience. The cases the hon. Member used to bring before our notice of bad treatment of the railway servants were almost invariably from the poorer railways, and it was the better equipped companies which treated the men best. It is clearly in the interests of the railway servants that the railways should be a profitable institution, because if they are profitable the men will have a better chance of getting a share of those profits when they are made. I do not know whether I have time to go into some of the specific objections raised against this Bill, but I will take one which was raised in the speech of the hon. Member for Durham. I ask the House to re-
    832
    member that that statement comes from the North of England, which is served entirely by the North-Eastern Railway. A first point is that it is said that we are going to lose all the facilities which now exist of going to the Railway Commissioners and getting through rates on these systems But that does not apply to this district because they are all outside, and therefore they have the right to get these through rates from the Railway Commissioners.
    The hon. member for Chester made a great point that that facility will disappear as between the Great Eastern and the Great Northern Railway, but I do not attach much value to it, and I say without hesitation if it is worth anything that is a point which the Committee upstairs is bound to consider, and see that the public does not come worse off than at the present time. The next curious statement in regard to the north-east of England is that competition is going to be done away with. That is a very curious statement coming from a district where there is no competition now. If you will look at this a little more closely you will see the meaning of it. These three railways have got ports and harbours of their own, and there will be a tendency to send traffic to benefit those ports and harbours. But the North-Eastern Railway has ports and harbours, too. Does it not send traffic to its ports and harbours? If you will look at this statement you will find the real object is not that competition is to be done away with, but by the amalgamation of these railways there will be a stronger kind of competition which will be more effective.
    There is only one other point I should like to put to the House. The President of the Board of Trade said, and said quite truly, in my opinion, that this is not the only way in which railway companies can get working agreements of this kind. The hon. Member for Chester made the kind of business speech which I like to hear on this question. He said it is perfectly obvious that if the railway companies can get all they want without a Bill they would not be asking for this Bill. That is perfectly true. I confess that when I read the Bill first of all, and afterwards when I saw the clauses of the President of the Board of Trade, I did not see what was the object of the railway companies in having this Bill at all. I deliberately refrained from asking them what their motive is in bringing forward

    833
    this Bill. I will give to the House what seems to me to be the explanation of it. There are some things which the railway companies can obtain by agreement with each other without the assistance of the House of Commons, but there are some other things which they cannot get without coming to Parliament. After giving the matter the most careful consideration I can, the conclusion I have come to is that there is nothing which it has been suggested will injure the public that the railway companies cannot do now without coming to Parliament. On the other hand, there are some things which are of immense advantage in the way of economy which they cannot do without an Act of Parliament. In other words, it is impossible to get that concentration of management in one hand which is the very essence of economical management without coming to Parliament for power. I think there is another explanation which anyone as acute as the hon. Member for Chester will have no difficulty in seeing. Railway companies by getting an Act of Parliament instead of an agreement among themselves have a far better chance of being able to go to the public and get the capital necessary to develop the lines. The right hon. Gentleman who spoke last tried to make the House imagine that that was a bad thing.
    Mr. LOUGH: No.
    Mr. BONAR LAW: The right hon. Gentleman said that what they would do would be as soon as they got this Bill to go to the public and get the money. I am in the recollection of the House. At all events, that I think is one of the objects. There are none of the things which have been complained of that the railway companies cannot do without this Bill. The best proof I can give of that is to take the arguments which have been used against the measure. Take the argument of the hon. Member for Newcastle. He told us that far fewer men were being employed on particular railways now than ought to be employed, that the rate of wages had fallen since 1900, and that the hours of labour are longer. I do not know whether that is so or not, but in either case is it not obvious that whatever has happened has been done without this agreement, and nobody has given us any reason to believe that the changes will be greater under the new conditions than under the old. The hon. Member for Chester himself gave us a list of
    834
    facilities which he said had been lost. One of them seemed a little peculiar, namely, that the rates for the carriage of coal had been raised. When it is remembered how tremendous was the rise in price, and what an enormous sum the railway companies had to pay for coal, it does not seem a very unreasonable thing that under such circumstances they should get a little more for carrying it. Personally I should not think it an unfair arrangement in such a case that there should be a sliding scale. But, apart from that, the whole trend of the hon. Member's argument was that we should not have this Bill because of the evils which have already happened.
    Mr. MOND: My point was that whenever an agreement was made facilities were diminished, and that if you had a huge amalgamation like this they would diminish still more.
    Mr. BONAR LAW: That is just exactly what I said. The hon. Member's facts were things which had happened; his prophecy was about something that might happen in the future. The hon. Member probably had something else in his mind. He probably thought that the Government or the Board of Trade would step in and stop all these agreements. They certainly cannot. Nobody can compel railway companies to indulge in cutthroat competition against themselves when they have realised that it is foolish competition. In any case, whatever power the Board of Trade may have in a matter of this kind will not be interfered with by the carrying of this Bill. Whatever they do they must do all round—to those who come to Parliament for agreements and those who make agreements without coming to Parliament. It seems to me that nothing could be worse, from the House of Commons' point of view, that to put companies who come and lay their cards on the table in a worse position than companies who do the same thing without coming to the House of Commons at all.
    Well, I am bound to say that I cannot imagine any proceeding more foolish than that the House of Commons, after everybody has been complaining for years that the railway companies are indulging in silly competition, should step in and try to prevent them from putting an end to that silly competition. There is only one section of the House which has any reasonable or logical right to prevent the second reading of the Bill. I admit that that

    835
    section has the right. That is the section which desires the nationalisation of the railways at all costs, and, from their point of view, it is quite right to try to refuse facilities of the kind now asked. It is right in two ways from their point of view. If you make railway ownership impossible you will make out a case for nationalisation, and if it should be necessary to pay something for the railways, by driving them as a preliminary into the bankruptcy court, you will get them a great deal cheaper. I am bound to say that section of the House is a very small one, and I feel that other Members of the House really desire that the railway companies should conduct their enterprises in the best way in the interests of the public, and in their desire to put down unnecessary expense they should get a fair trial.
    Mr. CHURCHILL: The House is now asked to make an important decision. The Government wish to make it clear to the House that this is a private Bill. The Government is not responsible for the Bill. The Board of Trade is not responsible for it. I did not initiate it, I do not conduct it, and if it were rejected I should not repine. It is a private Bill, but although it is a private Bill it is one which raises wide issues. It touches public interests, and not merely private and sectional interests. So far as private and sectional interests are concerned, I have nothing to say. Whether Hull or Grimsby will be benefited, and how this matter will affect the North-Eastern Railway, who will be benefited and who will suffer by the changes, what benefits will be derived by the coal trade or other trades, or what small and what large traders will be benefited—all these are matters about which no doubt there are grave disputes, which, in my humble judgment, do not come within the scope of the decision which the House is asked to take to-night. Parliament has appointed a regular procedure for dealing with private and sectional interests. We have heard a great deal about private and sectional interests in the course of the debate for and against the Bill. Parliament has devised the method by which those interests may be examined and cross-examined, and heard by witnesses and counsel, by which they may be tested and adjusted, and that method of procedure is infinitely preferable to any attempt which we can make here on the floor of the House in the
    836
    time available even on the most generous construction of our rules for the discussion of private business. I do not complain in the least that Members who represent private and sectional interests have spoken in this debate; but I think the House has already instituted a proper tribunal where all such claims may be dealt with in a way we cannot pretend to deal with them here, and I think the House ought not to be allowed to be influenced by private and sectional interests. Now, Sir, I venture to say further that neither ought we to argue about the form or the detail of a particular clause. I could criticise some of the clauses. I could also criticise some of the criticisms of some of the clauses. My right hon. Friend has referred to clause 17, and I admit that the words are somewhat wide; and I have received an undertaking that the companies will accept any amendment which the Board of Trade will propose. I only refer to this matter in order to say to the House that the form and details of the Bill ought not to be dealt with and disputed in the House, because no scrutiny which we can give to these matters can be other than partial, and not to be compared with the scrutiny which some of the ablest Members of the House have exercised after hearing all the evidence, having all the facts thrashed out day after day, and all the matters of an extremely complicated and controversial question dealt with.
    We ought not to decide to-night on private and sectional interests; and I venture to say that neither should we be led from the main points of issue by matters of detail and form; but we should decide upon broad grounds of policy. What are the broad grounds of policy? There are three main grounds. First there is the general treatment which the House should accord to private Bill legislation. On that the Government have a clear opinion. We think, and we base our opinion on the long practice of the House—an opinion which has been inculcated by Chairmen of Committees—that unless a private Bill has been shown primâ facie to be unquestionably against the public interest it should, as a matter of fact, be dealt with. There is considerable difference between the vote for the second reading of a private Bill and the second reading of a public Bill. A public Bill deals with matters that are controverted and disputed in the House of Commons—matters upon which all the Members are called upon to express an opinion; but a private Bill is a matter

    837
    which, when brought before Parliament, differs from a public Bill, inasmuch as a vote on the second reading does not carry with it the same affirmation as in the case of a public Bill. The House of Commons has a wholly different procedure in dealing with private and with public Bills. A private Bill goes to a second reading at a comparatively unimportant stage, and it is not until after that that evidence can be brought forward on its behalf. Therefore the refusal to read a private Bill a second time is a refusal to hear evidence upon the question which is brought forward. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Islington has said, it is telling the persons who bring the Bill forward, "We will not even look at your Bill" and this attitude he recommends the House to take. And here let me say, and I am backed by all the authorities in this House that as a refusal to read a Bill a second time amounts to a refusal to hear evidence on the case, so acceptance of the second reading of a private Bill does not bind the House to the general principle of the Bill. The House is perfectly free without any inconsistency to reject that measure upon third reading. The vote for the second reading means no more than provisional assent to evidence being brought forward and to having the case stated, without interfering with the opportunity of rejection after the matter is examined by the tribunal and procedure which the House appoints; and therefore I venture to say that if no very flagrant and apparent vice appears upon the face of a private Bill the House would not be justified in a refusal to examine the Bill by the ordinary procedure which the House has devised for the purpose. The second question which the House has to ask itself is whether the proposals in this Bill are so vicious and contrary to the public interest that the House has no choice but to forbid it without further examination; that the House is bound to sweep it away, to dismiss it with one single gesture of disapprobation, and to terminate the subject out of hand with one single stroke. I, at any rate, look at this matter with absolute impartiality, caring nothing for the special interests of the railway companies or any particular interest represented in this matter, and having done my very best to look impartially into the whole matter, although the hon. Member opposite said I laboured deliberately to deceive the House, which is a departure from the courtesy with which Members of his party have always treated me. His language was in that re-
    838
    spect a divergence from the usual courtesy they display—
    Mr. WALTER HUDSON: Whom does the right hon. Gentleman mean? Does he mean me?
    Mr. CHURCHILL: No; the hon. Member for Stockport.
    Mr. WARDLE: May I be permitted to say that there was one sentence in my speech which was not reported, and which qualified what I did say. I said the right hon. Gentleman had either deliberately misled the House, or did not know what he was talking about, or else had been misled by those who advised him, and I am prepared to justify what I said.
    Mr. CHURCHILL: The hon. Member has always treated me with great courtesy, and although I do not pretend to be an expert on railway matters, I do speak as one who has long and carefully considered the matter with my experts, and I put forward no opinion without the sanction of my experts. As to the question of my having deceived the House I am sure the hon. Member does not want to press that. The question the House has to decide whether this Bill is primâ facie so constituted against the public interest that it cannot be further examined. On that I have no difficulty in forming a clear opinion. The second question is, What do the House think about the great principle of amalgamation? In regard to this great movement and tendency to amalgamation which has travelled by so many roads and pre-occupied the minds of all who are interested in railway matters, is the House going to say that as long as railways are under private management we are opposed to all further amalgamation? Is that going to be the position which the House is going to take up? I earnestly hope it will not be the position which the House will take up. The immediate future of British railways, as my right hon. Friend has sought to show, depends upon amalgamation. Every amalgamation improves the case and prepares the way for the larger amalgamation which will come in the future, and it is unthinkable that the universal amalgamation such as that contemplated by the right hon. Gentleman can possibly be carried out by any Government in this country without at the same time a wider and larger measure of public control being established than now exists at the present moment. Amalgamation cannot bar the future, it is

    839
    the future. I agree in that respect with the hon. Gentleman opposite, who has shown in his speech the high qualifications that he possesses for discussing this matter or any matter of this kind. It cannot be in the interests of the employés of a railway to be servants in an unprosperous concern which is struggling with difficulty to maintain itself in a state of stagnation, and which has no means of raising further fresh capital. It cannot be of interest to the traders or the general public to be served by railways which do not offer investments which anybody having an alternative would choose, or is even likely to make an investment in; and it cannot, I say without hesitation, be anybody's interest that shareholders who have invested honest money in railway enterprise should not receive a reasonable, moderate, and fair return for the wealth which they have devoted to that purpose. I wonder what my hon. Friend the Member for Chester would think if anybody came to him and suggested that he should invest the not inconsiderable share of this world's goods which he has at 2½ and 2¾ per cent.
    Mr. MOND: I have lately been investing trust funds in such shares, and would be glad to invest again on such terms.
    Mr. CHURCHILL: I was speaking of my hon. Friend's own funds. I say, without in any way impugning the discretion of the trustees, I would ask whether he would be satisfied over the whole range of his financial operations with a return from his money of 2.97 per cent. I do not think he would, and I think probably a similar opinion is shared by a great number of people, who agree with the shrewd view which my hon. Friend takes upon the subject. If that is so and in so far as it is so in regard to lines of railway what the hon. Gentleman said absolutely applies, and it cannot be argued that it does not. There must be stagnation, there cannot be new development, there cannot be increased facilities for the traders, and there cannot be increased benefits to the operatives on the lines which they are constantly seeking.
    My hon. Friend the Member for Northampton said this operation of supreme importance ought not to be carried through until the whole question had been inquired into and fully investigated. That brings me to the third question. If the first question is one of procedure the
    840
    second is the general principle of amalgamation and the third is an entirely practical one. What will be the consequences of the vote which the House is now asked to give? If the Bill is rejected there is an end of the matter and many other matters as far as railways are concerned, and I fear so far as this Parliament goes, I think it is unlikely that other schemes of combination—and there are a good many other schemes of combination—will secure the sanction of this House. What can be done without Parliamentary sanction will be done, and a great deal can be done which it will not be easy to stop by legislation. But there is one thing which cannot be done by railway companies without Parliamentary sanction. They can make their combinations, they can dismiss their workmen, they may take all sorts of steps of that character, they may alter their rates, but without Parliamentary sanction they cannot get facilities for raising fresh capital, because it is only by statutory authority which Parliament will afford them that those facilities and advantages will be gained, and I believe there is no exaggeration in what the hon. Gentleman opposite has stated that many things which will be detrimental to the public interest may be done without the sanction of the House. This part of the operation which would be beneficial, and which is vital if the healthy progress of British railways is to be maintained, requires Parliamentary sanction, and will be destroyed if Parliamentary sanction is refused.
    I am urged to adopt an alternative method to that which I now venture respectfully to counsel upon the House. I am urged to appoint a Select Committee or a Royal Commission to inquire into the whole question of combinations and amalgamations. If the House declines to read this Bill a second time I do not exclude that method, but I warn the House solemnly that such an inquiry will be protracted, and that the delay will be such that it is very likely that no report will be presented in time for legislation within the scope of this Parliament, and as that inquiry throughout its whole course will be an academic inquiry, not of a practical character, without any real issue or real measure before it. I am told to consider the precedent of 1872. The precedent of 1872 is that an important inquiry was held when such a Bill as this was introduced, but the Bill was never heard of again. When the inquiry had reported and made some very valuable recommendations and others of a negative character, especially

    841
    in regard to combinations and amalgamations, the measure which had led to its being initiated was never brought forward again, and the process being already prepared, no suitors came forward, and the reason, I am informed, why the measure did not come forward was, that the railways in question found they were able to secure what they wanted without recourse to the procedure proposed.
    To compare such an inquiry as I am now asked to initiate, such an abstract and vapoury discussion, with the kind of inquiry which will follow if the Instruction of the Board of Trade be adopted, is really to compare a sort of debating society discussion upon, we will say, murder and suicide, with a coroner's inquest upon the body of a man. There is as great a distinction between theory and reality as there would be in these cases. I suggest to the House that instead of an unreal and visionary inquiry a full examination of real and concrete proposals, with the actual interests represented and with the real facts brought by those concerned before the Committee, is infinitely of greater value to those who wish to see public interests protected and public opinion guided into larger combinations of railway enterprise and more perfect and more satisfactory methods of public and State control. Under the Instruction of the Board of Trade we should have an opportunity of making before the Committee the whole case of amalgamations in the public interest, and we should make that case with all the information which we have acquired during these conferences which have been held for the last year, which have been somewhat disrespectfully referred to to-night, which were instituted by my right hon. Friend, and which were abandoned for this very reason—that you could not get any further by mere words. You require definite and concrete proposals before you can achieve any further results. All we have learnt by these conferences we shall be able to put forward before the Committee in the public interest. I propose to secure that these thoroughly able and competent persons should help us and call witnesses who would unfold before the whole nation the essence and the main features of the great question of railway amalgamation.
    The House has to choose. I am not going to make myself unhappy at the decision whatever it may be. We carefully refrained from assuming a direct responsibility in regard to the merits of the Bill. All we admit responsibility for is to say
    842
    that in our judgment this is not a Bill which the House should refuse to examine by the regular procedure provided. The House has to choose between a discussion of this great proposal on its merits and taking up a position of non possumus upon the question of railway amalgamation. It has to choose between refusing to hear evidence on this subject, probing it thoroughly, or holding an inquiry into the era of railway amalgamation of an extremely discursive character, and a real inquiry into a definite live proposal. Reviewing those various alternatives which are presented, I have no doubt or hesitation that in the general interests of the trade and industry of the country the position of this House should be in conformity with its regular practice to have this Bill thoroughly sifted and examined to-day, and to hold its own opinion absolutely unprejudiced in reserve until the subject is explored in the only manner by which it can be properly examined.
    Mr. RICHARD BELL: The speeches made to-night on both sides have a great deal in their favour, but I wish to say at once that I am going to support the second reading of this Bill, and I must crave the indulgence of the House to be allowed to give my reasons. The President of the Board of Trade has already made some promises which I accept as a small measure of protection both to the traders and the employés. I am convinced that my action in supporting this Bill is conducive to the best interests of the employés so far as the small measure of protection is concerned. I have come to the conclusion from some particular knowledge and experience of the treatment meted out to the employés of railway companies who' have indulged in recent agreements by which they have hit both traders and employés. I refer to the Scottish railway companies. I believe that most people have read with keen anxiety, and some disappointment I dare say, of the action of the Scottish railway companies by their pooling arrangement by which they hit very hard the traders and manufacturers in Scotland—so much so that a large number of the manufacturers threaten to close their works as a protest against the action of the railway companies. That was done without any Bill in the House of Commons; and if they can do this to the danger of the manufacturer, and therefore to the danger of the workers of the country, without coming to Parliament, let

    843
    us have the thing openly discussed in Parliament with a small amount of protection given to the workers, whether railway employés or not.
    The Scottish railway companies have dismissed scores of their men, and hundreds are now working short time. Coming nearer home we find that by private arrangement, by pooling or otherwise, they have also hit the public to some extent, and their employés. They have discontinued trains where they formerly kept them on. That is not giving facilities designed to the interests of the employés. We read in our papers a short while ago a great deal of discontent of the general public at the London and North-Western Railway people in discharging a large number of the men of the North London Railway, whom they had taken hold of without coming into Parliament for power. Therefore, if the railway companies by secret agreement, by some undercurrent arrangement, today can do a majority of the things they can do by the power conferred on them by this Bill, then I say let us have it discussed in this House, and by the Committee, and apply the protection which has already been promised, and which I have no doubt will be put in, and if I can have some little influence I will endeavour to
    get others. From a few letters I have received men have already been interfered with by one of those companies. I want to safeguard the interests of those men. That is why I support this Bill. I know the clause which the right hon. Gentleman has promised to insert is not all I desire to protect the employés, but at any rate it is a small measure of protection. I shall endeavour to get those clauses improved. The traders are well able to look after themselves, but I am not in any way speaking disparagingly or unkindly of them, but I have at any rate to look after the interests of the employés as well as I can possibly do in a measure of this kind.
    This is a small measure of protection which is going to be inserted in this Bill—that no men shall be dismissed unless they are compensated. It does not say how much compensation. It will not be my fault if it is not stated what amount of compensation shall be paid. What I want to do is to enlarge on that principle and to get some small measure of protection for the employés and for the traders also.
    Question put: "That the word 'now' stand part of the question."
    The House divided: Ayes, 140; Noes, 126.

    Division No. 49.]

    AYES.

    [11.2 p.m.

    Acland, Francis Dyke

    Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers-

    Howard, Hon. Geoffrey

    Acland-Hood, Rt. Hon. Sir Alex. F.

    Duckworth, Sir James

    Hyde, Clarendon G.

    Agnew, George William

    Duncan, Robert (Lanark, Govan)

    Illingworth, Percy H.

    Ainsworth, John Stirling

    Edwards, Sir Francis (Radnor)

    Kearley, Sir Hudson E.

    Allen, A. Acland (Christchurch)

    Elibank, Master of

    Kennaway, Rt. Hon. Sir John H.

    Astbury, John Meir

    Etnmott, Rt. Hon. Alfred

    Kimber, Sir Henry

    Balcarres, Lord

    Evans, Sir Samuel T

    Lamont, Norman

    Baldwin, Stanley

    Everett, R. Lacey

    Lane-Fox, G. R.

    Balfour, Robert (Lanark)

    Falconer, J.

    Law, Andrew Bonar (Dulwich)

    Banner, John S. Harmood-

    Fell, Arthur

    Layland-Barrett, Sir Francis

    Beach, Hon. Michael Hugh Hicks

    Ferguson, R. C. Munro

    Lewis, John Herbert

    Beale, W. P.

    Fletcher, J. S.

    Lloyd-George, Rt. Hon. David

    Beauchamp, E.

    Forster, Henry William

    Lupton, Arnold

    Bell, Richard

    Freeman-Thomas, Freeman

    M'Micking, Major G.

    Bellairs, Carlyon

    Fuller, John Michael F.

    Maddison, Frederick

    Bridgeman, W. dive

    Gardner, Ernest

    Markham, Arthur Basil

    Bright, J. A.

    Gibb, James (Harrow)

    Marks, G. Croydon (Launceston)

    Bull, Sir William James

    Gibbs, G. A. (Bristol West)

    Marnham, F. J.

    Burns, Rt. Hon. John

    Gladstone, Rt. Hon. Herbert John

    Menzies, Walter

    Causton, Rt. Hon. Richard Knight

    Gooch, Henry Cubitt (Peckham)

    Mildmay, Francis Bingham

    Cave, George

    Gretton, John

    Montagu, Hon. E. S.

    Cecil, Evelyn (Aston Manor)

    Guinness, Hon. R. (Haggerston)

    Morgan, J. Lloyd (Carmarthen)

    Churchill, Rt. Hon. Winston S.

    Guinness, W. E. (Bury St. Edmunds)

    Morpeth, Viscount

    Clough, William

    Gurdon, Rt. Hon. Sir W. Brampton

    Morrell, Philip

    Cochrane, Hon. Thomas H. A. E.

    Haldane, Rt. Hon. Richard B.

    Murray, Capt. Hon. A. C. (Kincard.)

    Corbett, C. H. (Sussex, E. Grinstead)

    Harcourt, Rt. Hon. L. (Rossendale)

    Newdegate, F. N.

    Cornwall, Sir Edwin A.

    Haworth, Arthur A.

    Nicholson, Wm. G. (Petersfield)

    Craig, Herbert J. (Tynemouth)

    Hay, Hon. Claude George

    Pearce, Robert (Staffs, Leek)

    Dalrymple, Viscount

    Hedges, A. Paget

    Pease, Herbert Pike (Darlington)

    Dewar, Arthur (Edinburgh, S.)

    Hobhouse, Charles E. H.

    Pease, Rt. Hon. J. A. (Saff. Wald.)

    Dickson-Poynder, Sir John P.

    Hodge, Sir Robert Hermon-

    Peel, Hon. W. R. W.

    Dickson, Rt. Hon. C. Scott-

    Holland, Sir William Henry

    Powell, Sir Francis Sharp

    Dobson, Thomas W.

    Hope, James Fitzalan (Sheffield)

    Pretyman, E. G.

    Doughty, Sir George

    Houston, Robert Paterson

    Price, Sir Robert J. (Norfolk, E.)

    Priestley, W. E. B. (Bradford, E.)

    Smith, Abel H. (Hertford, East)

    Vivian, Henry

    Raphael, Herbert H.

    Smith, F. E. (Liverpool, Walton)

    Ward, W. Dudley (Southampton)

    Rea, Waiter Russell (Scarborough)

    Spicer, Sir Albert

    Waring, Walter

    Rees, J. D.

    Starkey, John R.

    Wason, John Cathcart (Orkney)

    Renton, Leslie

    Stewart-Smith, D. (Kendal)

    Whitbread, S. Howard

    Ridsdale. E. A.

    Talbot, Lord E. (Chichester)

    White, J. Dundas (Dumbartonshire)

    Rogers, F. E. Newman

    Talbot, Rt. Hon. J. G. (Oxford Univ.)

    Whittaker, Rt. Hon. Sir Thomas P.

    Rose, Charles Day

    Tennant, Sir Edward (Salisbury)

    Williams, W. Llewelyn (Carmarthen)

    Rutherford, W. W. (Liverpool)

    Tennant, H. J. (Berwickshire)

    Williamson, A.

    Samuel, Rt. Hon. H. L. (Cleveland)

    Thomson, W. Mitchell- (Lanark)

    Younger, George

    Schwann, C. Duncan (Hyde)

    Toulmin, George

    Scott, Sir S. (Marylebone, W.)

    Ure, Rt. Hon. Alexander

    TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—Mr. Eugene Wason and Mr. Samuel Roberts.

    Seely, Colonel

    Valentia, Viscount

    Shipman, Dr. John G.

    Verney, F. W.

    NOES.

    Abraham, William (Rhondda)

    Harvey, W. E. (Derbyshire, N.E.)

    Renwick, George

    Alden, Percy

    Haslam, James (Derbyshire)

    Richards, Thomas (W. Monmouth)

    Baring, Godfrey (Isle of Wight)

    Haslam, Lewis (Monmouth)

    Richards, T. F. (Wolverhampton, W.)

    Barker, Sir John

    Hazleton, Richard

    Richardson, A.

    Barlow, Percy (Bedford)

    Henry, Charles S.

    Roberts, Sir J. H. (Denbighs.)

    Barnes, G. N.

    Higham, John Sharp

    Robertson, J. M. (Tyneside)

    Belloc, Hilaire Joseph Peter R.

    Hills, J. W.

    Robinson, S.

    Benn, W. (Tower Hamlets, St. Geo.)

    Hobart, Sir Robert

    Roch, Walter F. (Pembroke)

    Bethell, Sir J. H. (Essex, Romford)

    Hodge, John

    Rowlands, J.

    Bignold, Sir Arthur

    Hooper, A. G.

    Schwann, Sir C. E. (Manchester)

    Boulton, A. C. F.

    Hope, John Deans (Fife, West)

    Scott, A. H. (Ashton-under-Lyne)

    Bowerman, C. W.

    Horniman, Emslie John

    Sears, J. E.

    Bowles, G. Stewart

    Jenkins, J.

    Seaverns, J. H.

    Bramsdon, T. A.

    Johnson, John (Gateshead)

    Seddon, J.

    Branch, James

    Johnson, W. (Nuneaton)

    Shackleton, David James

    Brigg, John

    Jowett, F. W.

    Shaw, Sir Charles E. (Stafford)

    Brodie, H. C.

    Kekewich, Sir George

    Silcock, Thomas Ball

    Brooke, Stopford

    Kilbride, Denis

    Snowden, P.

    Brunner, J. F. L. (Lancs., Leigh)

    Lamb, Ernest H. (Rochester)

    Stanier, Seville

    Burke, E. Havlland-

    Lambton, Hon. Frederick Win.

    Stanley, Albert (Staffs, N.W.)

    Burt, Rt. Hon. Thomas

    Lea, Hugh Cecil (St. Pancras, E.)

    Stewart, Halley (Greenock)

    Carr-Gomm, H. W.

    Lever, A. Levy (Essex, Harwich]

    Straus, B. S. (Mile End)

    Channing, Sir Francis Allston

    Levy, Sir Maurice

    Strauss, E. A. (Abingdon)

    Cleland, J. W.

    Lough, Rt. Hon. Thomas

    Summerbell, T.

    Cobbold, Felix Thornley

    Lyell, Charles Henry

    Thompson, J. W. H. (Somerset, E.)

    Collins, Sir Win. J. (S. Pancras, W.)

    Macdonald, J. R. (Leicester)

    Thorne, William (West Ham)

    Cooper, G. J.

    MacVeagh, Jeremiah (Down, S.)

    Walters, John Tudor

    Cotton, Sir H. J. S.

    Micklem, Nathaniel

    Walton, Joseph

    Cowan, W. H.

    Montgomery, H. G.

    Wardle, George J.

    Crooks, William

    Morton, Alpheus Cleophas

    Warner, Thomas Courtenay T.

    Curran, Peter Francis

    Newnes, F. (Notts, Bassetlaw)

    Watt, Henry A.

    Dalziel, Sir James Henry

    Nicholls, George

    Weir, James Galloway

    Davies, Timothy (Fulham)

    Nolan, Joseph

    White, Sir George (Norfolk)

    Duncan, C. (Barrow-in-Furness)

    O'Brien, Patrick (Kilkenny)

    Wiles, Thomas

    Edwards, A. Clement (Denbigh)

    O'Connor, T. P. (Liverpool)

    Wilkie, Alexander

    Edwards, Enoch (Hanley)

    Oddy, John James

    Williams, J. (Glamorgan)

    Essex, R. W.

    O'Grady, J.

    Wilson, Hon. G. G. (Hull, W.)

    Fenwick, Charles

    Parker, James (Halifax)

    Wilson, Henry J. (York, W.R.)

    Ferens, T. R.

    Parkes, Ebenezer

    Wilson, John (Durham, Mid)

    Foster, Rt. Hon. Sir Walter

    Pickersgill, Edward Hare

    Winfrey, K.

    Griffith, Ellis J.

    Priestley, Arthur (Grantham)

    Harcourt, Robert V. (Montrose)

    Radford, G. H.

    TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—Mr. Mond and Mr. W. Hudson.

    Hardy, George A. (Suffolk)

    Ratcliff, Major R. F.

    Question put: "That the Bill be now read a second time."
    The House divided: Ayes, 136; Noes, 111.

    Division No. 50.]

    AYES.

    [11.10 p.m.

    Acland, Francis Dyke

    Causton, Rt. Hon. Richard Knight

    Duckworth, Sir James

    Acland-Hood, Rt. Hon. Sir Alex. F.

    Cave, George

    Edwards, Sir Francis (Radnor)

    Agnew, George William

    Cecil, Evelyn (Aston Manor)

    Elibank, Master of

    Ainsworth, John Stirling

    Churchill, Rt. Hon. Winston S.

    Emmott, Rt. Hon. Alfred

    Allen, A. Acland (Christchurch)

    Clough, William

    Evans, Sir Samuel T.

    Balcarres, Lord

    Cochrane, Hon. Thomas H. A. E.

    Everett, R. Lacey

    Baldwin, Stanley

    Corbett. C. H. (Sussex, E. Grinstead)

    Falconer, J.

    Balfour, Robert (Lanark)

    Cornwall, Sir Edwin A.

    Fell, Arthur

    Banner, John S. Harmood-

    Craig, Herbert J. (Tynemouth)

    Ferguson, R. C. Munro

    Beach, Hon. Michael Hugh Hicks

    Craik, Sir Henry

    Fletcher, J. S.

    Beale, W. P.

    Dalrymple, Viscount

    Forster, Henry William

    Beauchamp, E.

    Dewar, Arthur (Edinburgh, S.)

    Freeman-Thomas, Freeman

    Bell, Richard

    Dickson-Poynder, Sir John P.

    Fuller, John Michael T.

    Bellairs, Carlyon

    Dickson, Rt. Hon. C. Scott-

    Gardner, Ernest

    Bridgeman, W. Clive

    Dobson, Thomas W.

    Gibb, James (Harrow)

    Bright, J. A.

    Doughty, Sir George

    Gibbs, G. A. (Bristol West)

    Burnt, Rt. Hon. John

    Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers-

    Gladstone, Rt. Hon. Herbert John-

    Gooch, Henry Cubitt (Peckham)

    Markham, Arthur Basil

    Seely, Colonel

    Gretton, John

    Marks, G. Croydon (Launceston)

    Smith, Abel H. (Hertford, East)

    Guinness, Hon. R. (Haggerston)

    Marnham, F. J.

    Smith, F. E. (Liverpool, Walton)

    Guinness, W. E. (Bury St. Edmunds)

    Menzies, Walter

    Spicer, Sir Albert

    Gurdon, Rt. Hon. Sir W. Brampton

    Mildmay, Francis Bingham

    Starkey, John R.

    Haldane, Rt. Hon. Richard B.

    Montagu, Hon. E. S.

    Stewart-Smith, D. (Kendal)

    Harcourt, Rt. Hon. L. (Rossendale)

    Morgan, J. Lloyd (Carmarthen)

    Talbot, Lord E. (Chichester)

    Haworth, Arthur A.

    Morpeth, Viscount

    Talbot, Rt. Hon. J. G. (Oxford Univ.)

    Hay, Hon. Claude George

    Murray, Capt. Hon. A. C. (Kincard.)

    Tennant, Sit Edward (Salisbury)

    Hedges, A. Paget

    Newdegate, F. N.

    Tennant, H. J. (Berwickshire)

    Hobhouse, Charles E. H.

    Nicholson, Wm. G. (Petersfield)

    Thomson, W. Mitchell(Lanark)

    Hodge, Sir Robert Hermon-

    Pearce, Robert (Staffs, Leek)

    Toulmin, George

    Holland, Sir William Henry

    Pease, Herbert Pike (Darlington)

    Ure, Rt. Hon. Alexander

    Hope, James Fitzalan (Sheffield)

    Pease, Rt. Hon. J. A. (Saff. Wald.)

    Valentia, Viscount

    Houston, Robert Paterson

    Peel, Hon. W. R. W.

    Verney, F. W.

    Howard, Hon. Geoffrey

    Powell, Sir Francis Sharp

    Vivian, Henry

    Hyde, Clarendon G.

    Pretyman, E. G.

    Ward, W. Dudley (Southampton)

    Illingworth, Percy H.

    Price, Sir Robert J. (Norfolk, E.)

    Waring, Walter

    Kearley, Sir Hudson E.

    Priestley, W. E. B. (Bradford, E.)

    Wason, John Cathcart (Orkney)

    Kimber, Sir Henry

    Raphael, Herbert H.

    Whitbread, S. Howard

    King, Alfred John (Knutsford)

    Rea, Waller Russell (Scarborough)

    White, J. Dundas (Dumbartonshire)

    Lamont, Norman

    Rees, J. D.

    Whittaker. Rt. Hon. Sir Thomas P.

    Lane-Fox, G. R.

    Renton, Leslie

    Williams, W. Llewelyn (Carmarthen)

    Law, Andrew Bonar (Dulwich)

    Ridsdale, E. A.

    Williamson, A.

    Layland-Barrett, Sir Francis

    Rogers, F. E. Newman

    Younger, George

    Lewis, John Herbert

    Rose, Charles Day

    Lloyd-George, Rt. Hon. David

    Rutherford, W. W. (Liverpool)

    TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—Mr. Eugene Wason and Mr. Samuel Roberts.

    Lupton, Arnold

    Samuel, Rt. Hon. H. L. (Cleveland)

    M'Micking, Major G.

    Schwann, C. Duncan (Hyde)

    Maddison, Frederick

    Scott, Sir S. (Marylebone, W.)

    NOES.

    Abraham, William (Rhondda)

    Haslam, James (Derbyshire)

    Richards, T. F. (Wolverhampton, W.)

    Baring, Godfrey (Isle of Wight)

    Haslam, Lewis (Monmouth)

    Richardson, A.

    Barker, Sir John

    Hazleton, Richard

    Roberts, Sir J. H. (Denbighs.)

    Barlow, Percy (Bedford)

    Henry, Charles S.

    Robertson, J. M. (Tyneside)

    Barnes, G. N.

    Higham, John Sharp

    Robinson, S.

    Belloc, Hilaire Joseph Peter R.

    Hills, J. W.

    Roch, Walter F. (Pembroke)

    Bethell, Sir J. H. (Essex, Romford)

    Hobart, Sir Robert

    Rowlands, J.

    Bignold. Sir Arthur

    Hodge, John

    Scott, A. H. (Ashton-under-Lyne)

    Bowerman, C. W.

    Horniman, Emslie John

    Seaverns, J. H.

    Bowles, G. Stewart

    Jenkins, J.

    Seddon, J.

    Bramsdon, T. A.

    Johnson, John (Gateshead)

    Shaw, Sir Charles E. (Stafford)

    Branch, James

    Johnson, W. (Nuneaton)

    Silcock, Thomas Ball

    Brigg, John

    Jowett, F. W.

    Snowden, P.

    Brodie, H. C.

    Kekewich, Sir George

    Stanier, Beville

    Brooke, Stopford

    Kilbride, Denis

    Stanley, Albert (Staffs, N.W.)

    Brunner, J. F. L. (Lancs., Leigh)

    Lamb, Ernest H. (Rochester)

    Stewart, Halley (Greenock)

    Burke, E. Haviland-

    Lambton, Hon. Frederick Wm.

    Straus, B. S. (Mile End)

    Burt, Rt. Hon. Thomas

    Lea, Hugh Cecil (St. Pancras, E.)

    Strauss, E. A. (Abingdon)

    Carr-Gomm, H. W.

    Lever, A. Levy (Essex, Harwich)

    Summerbell, T.

    Channing, Sir Francis Allsten

    Levy, Sir Maurice

    Thompson, J. W. H. (Somerset, E.)

    Cleland, J. W.

    Lough, Rt. Hon. Thomas

    Thorne, William (West Ham)

    Cobbold, Felix Thornley

    Lowe, Sir Francis William

    Walters, John Tudor

    Collins, Sir Wm. J. (S. Pancras, W.)

    Lyell, Charles Henry

    Walton, Joseph

    Cooper, G. J.

    Macdonald, J. R. (Leicester)

    Wardle, George J.

    Cowan, W. H.

    MacVeagh, Jeremiah (Down, S.)

    Warner, Thomas Courtenay T.

    Crooks, William

    Micklem, Nathaniel

    Watt, Henry A.

    Curan, Peter Francis

    Montgomery, H. G.

    Weir, James Galloway

    Dalziel, Sir James Henry

    Morton, Alpheus Cleophas

    White, Sir George (Norfolk)

    Davies, Timothy (Fulham)

    Newnes, F. (Notts, Bassetlaw)

    Wiles, Thomas

    Duncan, C, (Barrow-in-Furness)

    Nicholls, George

    Wilkie, Alexander

    Edwards, A. Clement (Denbigh)

    O'Brien, Patrick (Kilkenny)

    Williams, J. (Glamorgan)

    Edwards, Enoch (Hanley)

    O'Connor, T. P. (Liverpool)

    Wilson, Hon. G. G. (Hull, W.)

    Essex, R. W.

    Oddy, John James

    Wilson, John (Durham, Mid)

    Fenwick, Charles

    O'Grady, J.

    Winfrey, R.

    Ferens, T. R.

    Parker, James (Halifax)

    Griffith, Ellis J.

    Parkes, Ebenezer

    TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—Mr. Mond and Mr. W. Hudson.

    Harcourt, Robert V. (Montrose)

    Radford, G. H.

    Hardy, George A. (Suffolk)

    Renwick, George

    Harvey, W. E. (Derbyshire, N.E.)

    Richards, Thomas (W. Monmouth)

    Bill read a second time.

    Motion made and Question proposed: "That the Bill be committed to a Select Committee of nine members, five to be nominated by the House and four by the Committee of Selection."—[Mr. Churchill.]
    Debate arising, and it being after of the clock, and objection being taken to further proceeding, the debate stood adjourned till to-morrow (6th April), at a quarter past eight of the clock.

HOUSING, TOWN PLANNING, ETC., BILL.
Postponed Proceeding on Amendment to Question, "That the Bill be now read a second time," resumed.
Which Amendment was, to leave out all the words after the word, "That," in order to insert the words, "this House, while recognising the need for the improvement in the housing of the people, declines to make the cost of this national service a further charge upon the local rates."—[Mr. Lane-Fox.]
Question again proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
Mr. WALTER GUINNESS: At the interruption of business, at a quarter past eight of the clock, I was urging the opinion that the quinquennial survey was both cumbersome and useless. This survey is to be compiled on the information of the owners themselves, and it is obvious that the owners will not be in a position to provide very accurate information on the various subjects in regard to which it will be demanded under clause 30. Besides this information from the owners, the local authorities will have to get verification by their own inspectors. The right hon. Gentleman, the President of the Board of Trade, estimated this cost at no less than £500,000 every five years. I think it is quite obvious that this money could be spent to far better purpose in providing houses instead of merely getting this information about houses. This quinquennial survey will be useless, because it will always be out of date. It will be very strongly resented, and I think that will do away with any advantage that might be anticipated. I think women will strongly object to a register being kept at the Town Hall in which their ages will be entered, and which may be inspected by anyone. I do not see that any considerable advantage is to be expected from this provision. The right hon. Member for the Ilkeston Division stated that the chief object of this was to encourage local authorities to carry out their duties. Well, already they have the duty laid upon them of inspecting working class accommodation in their districts, and what expectation is there that they will carry out this duty better in future than in the past? In London it is cast upon the borough council—the very body
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who in the past have been criticised for their slackness in administering their powers. I think this provision will throw a great cost on the ratepayers, and give no. benefit.
There is another part of the Bill which is even more dangerous from this point of view—I mean the clause which empowers the Local Government Board to compel local authorities to initiate a scheme of housing under part III.—that is to say, to provide accommodation apart altogether from any rehousing obligation to which they may be subject, owing to demolition of working-class property. The principle of re-housing has for many years been recognised, and the Housing Act of 1890 only incorporates the provisions of previous enactments, and, in the case of parts I. and II., laid on local authorities the duty of providing accommodation equivalent to that destroyed for the clearance of slums and other public improvements. Private Bill legislation has long recognised this principle, which was only put in the form of a general Statute in the Act of 1903. But it is now proposed to substitute for this definite and easily-measured obligation of providing rehousing accommodation a power to enable the Local Government Board to insist on accommodation being provided for any number of the working class, quite apart from the cost that may be thrown on the ratepayers. What can the Local Government Board know of the necessities of any 'district in regard to working class accommodation? I am quite sure that in the case of London the local authorities know now very much more of the needs of a district than can possibly be in the knowledge of the Local Government Board, and therefore I do not think there is a case for the transference of those responsibilities from the local authorities to the Local Government Board. It is important to remember that there is a great distinction between housing and rehousing. Rehousing cannot possibly discourage the solution of the housing difficulty by private enterprise. In London during the last sixty years as many as 23,000 rooms have been provided for the working classes by municipal activity. No doubt that has done much to relieve congestion amongst certain classes; but, large as that number is, it is only 7 per cent, of the total accommodation provided of nil sorts. It shows that private enterprise has done far more for meeting the housing difficulty than any action of local authorities. If a larger number of rooms are-

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provided by public authorities, it is quite certain that in future they will check private enterprise. A standing order of the London Council—and it is to the credit of the Progressives that they laid it down—is that the building of a house is not to be undertaken if it can be shown that there is any risk of it being thrown as a burden on the rates. If the Local Government Board is to have the power of initiating housing schemes regardless of financial consequences, private enterprise will be ruled out altogether. Although private enterprise has to pay a higher rate of interest, it has an advantage over municipal interest because it is not hampered by the same restrictions which check the housing operations of public bodies; but when public bodies no longer even aim at their schemes being self-supporting, private enterprise will find itself in a totally different position. There will be no check on municipal housing schemes; and the representative of the municipality will preserve himself from the indignant protests of the ratepayers by saying that he has only initiated these schemes owing to the compulsion of the Local Government Board.
I cannot think how a private builder will think it worth his while to invest in bricks and mortar. Private enterprise will be driven out of the field altogether when it is found that the municipalities pay the rents of the few out of the rates of the many, and it will be quite impossible for private builders to put up working-class dwellings at all. In country districts the position will be equally bad. In many country districts housing is provided at a loss. The nominal rents which are paid by agricultural labourers are often barely sufficient to pay for the repairs of the cottages; and a large amount of housing is provided in lieu of wages. I am quite certain that if the rural ratepayer finds that he pays for housing out of the rates he will not be willing to build cottages as at present and the local authorities will have to bear the whole cost of the housing. I should like also to say a word as to the effect of the town-planning provisions of the Bill in discouraging the provision of houses by private enterprise. I think that Members on every side of this House are agreed as to the urgency of providing some means of regulating the growth of towns and preventing the shapeless development which too often they take at the present time. But the town-planning provisions of this scheme are so widely
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drawn that I think it very probable they may do more harm than good. Under these provisions Parliament would abrogate the whole of its control over the regulation of building, and would transfer this control to the Local Government Board. The Parliamentary Secretary to the Local Government Board told us to-night that the justification of this was that in foreign countries the provisions in legislation of this kind were equally misty and nebulous. As far as I know, the only country that has gone so far on this part is Germany. The hon. Member shakes his head. Then I do not know what country he is alluding to, but in Germany they will put up with far more bureaucratic measures than this country is ripe for. I think it is not at all desirable that the Local Government Board should be given powers to dispose of such matters of vital moment by general provision. These matters have hitherto been kept within the control of Parliament, and if the House will recognise the unparalleled scope and importance of the measures to be handed over to the Local Government Board it will think twice before it gives this power to a Department. Under the Bill the Local Government Board are to have unlimited power over regulating building and the allocation of buildings. They will be able to say in one street—You can only have houses with stone facings, while in back streets you must only have houses with bricks; in one street you can have shops, in another you must have houses without shops.
Mr. BURNS Mr. BURNS dissented.
Mr. WALTER GUINNESS: The right hon. Gentleman shakes his head. Perhaps he has not that intention, but there is nothing in the Bill to prevent a future President of the Local Government Board using his powers in that direction and very much hampering the erection of most useful buildings. He has also to provide in the regulations as to open spaces, both private and public, and there is not a word as to the compensation that is to be paid for these open spaces. There is nothing to prevent the Local Government Board laying down by these regulations that private owners must lay out an enormous proportion of their land in open spaces, and that they are to have no compensation for these lands which would be devoted to the public interest. They are also to be able to lay down regulations as to the time during which large schemes are to take effect. It is laid down in the schedule, and also under clause 56 the

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local authorities are able to step in and do the work of private individuals if they think that delay in the work has prejudiced the operations of the scheme. Under that provision private owners may have to make roads and to put up dwellings or buildings not according to their own convenience, not according to business considerations, but to suit the convenience of the local authorities. I think these matters ought not to be settled by the local authorities, but ought to be kept for the control of Parliament.
I think far less objection could be taken to them if it was provided Parliament should see these provisions before they became law. The right hon. Gentleman would not hear of this in Committee. There was a proposal that these provisions should lie 40 days before both Houses of Parliament, and should only take effect if neither House presented an address against them, but the right hon. Gentleman only conceded that they should be brought under the provisions of the Rules Publication Act. That Act is perfectly useless. All it provides is that 40 days' notice should be given so that the local authorities interested should be able to present a petition against the provision, and should be ensured consideration of the matters they put forward. As soon as the 40 days are up the Local Government Board, without any modification of these rules whatever, can bring them into force, and there is no provision made whatever for Parliamentary control over these provisions. The Local Government Board may, I think, very much hamper building by these general regulations which they are to be empowered to make, and which I have shown will not be effectually controlled by this House, or in any way whatever.
But I think the more dangerous provision of this Bill is the provision about betterment, because that provision, if it has the sense in which I read it, will make it impossible for the private owner to develop his land. Hitherto the development charges have been imposed where it has been found that the value of "the owner's property has been enhanced by public expenditure. The precedents which immediately come to one's mind are the provisions of the Housing Act of 1890 for betterment charges in the case of the demolition of obstructive buildings, and also the provisions in the Private Bill legislation in force in London, and I think also in Manchester. Where a street is widened and where one side is knocked down and it
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confers a very large advantage upon the owners on the other side of the street, it is only fair that they should contribute something towards the cost which has been borne by the local authority. But under a town planning scheme the increase of value which takes place—not owing to the expenditure of public money at all, but owing to the expenditure of the private owner for the development of his own land—is to be tapped for betterment charges. There may be cases where, owing to the nearness of open spaces provided by public money, private owners under a town planning scheme ought to contribute something to local expenditure; but such cases are not the only ones which Clause 57 apparently contemplates, as under it betterment charges would be levied everywhere, because it lays down that where, by the operation of a town planning scheme, property is, or will be, increased in value, then betterment charges will be made. Ordinary development can only take place in future under the operation of a town planning scheme, and therefore ordinary development will apparently be brought under the action of this betterment clause; that is to say, a builder will have to pay betterment charges upon the result of his enterprise and the expenditure of his own capital. This question of betterment was carefully considered by a Committee of the House of Lords presided over by Lord Halsbury in 1894, and they reported that the effect of public work in raising the value of private property was very difficult to assess, and in view of these difficulties they recommended "that in default of acquiescence by the person on whom the notice is served, in the amount of the charge, this amount shall be decided by arbitration, unless the said person claims to go before a jury, and the decision shall be taken with as little delay as possible." In these local Acts which this Committee were considering, the most elaborate provisions were laid down for the assessment of this betterment. The usual system is for property to be valued before the improvement, and again seven years afterwards, and for the owner to be charged half the increased value, and if he does not like to pay the principal at the time he may elect to pay a betterment rate of 3 per cent, on the outstanding principal which he has not paid. If it is necessary to have this power of appeal and these elaborate provisions under these private Acts, surely this same power of appeal ought to be conceded under this Town Planning Bill, which will be far wider in

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its operation, and will probably produce far more difficult questions. I think the betterment ought to be limited to those cases, as in the past, where the improvement in value has resulted from the expenditure of public money, and I am quite certain that if this Bill is not to cause endless friction an appeal ought to be given to some independent tribunal. There will bf, a great deal of public indignation caused among certain classes by the provisions of the Local Government Board, and if that public opinion is to be allayed, and if this Bill is to work smoothly, we ought to prevent any sense of injustice by giving an appeal.
I cannot help feeling there is little hope of this improvement in the Bill being put in by the Committee of this House, because, although the right hon. Gentleman met us in a very conciliatory spirit in some respects on the Committee, he showed a most extraordinary reluctance to submit to any curtailment of the legislative or judicial powers of the Local Government Board. I believe the Bill in its present form will only work injustice and confusion, and will do a good deal to hamper the action of local authorities in developing their districts. I hope if these necessary amendments, which will only serve to prevent friction in the action of this Bill, cannot be inserted in this House, they will be inserted in another place.
Mr. EUGENE WASON: From beginning to end, and I have sat here since the debate opened, there has not been a single syllable said with reference to Scotland. I really was surprised that neither from the President of the Local Government Board, a man bearing the honoured name that he does, which is well known all through Scotland, nor from the Parliamentary Secretary have we had one syllable with reference to Scotland. I was a member of the Committee to whom this Bill was referred, as were also the hon. Members for Leith Burghs and Kilmarnock.
I do think we ought to have fair treatment in this House and elsewhere with reference to measures brought before this Parliament. The right hon. Gentleman, the President of the Local Government Board, when he introduced the Bill, referred us to a memorandum which had been carefully prepared so that those who run might read the Bill. I took the trouble to read it when I came down to the House. I find the only reference so far as
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Scotland is concerned is Clause 52, which is a pretty way to treat Scotland. I think we ought to have something in the nature of the declarations that have been made so far as extending the Bill is concerned in the same way towards Scotland. I would like to ask the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Ayrshire whether he would justify the separate treatment given to Scotland under Clause 52 as against that given to England. I hope he does not. This is a point which I think is well worthy of the attention of the House. The appeal so far as Scotland is concerned is the High Court. I say that is not fair, and that we ought to have equality with England, and that the Local Government Board of Scotland ought to have the same rights as the Local Government Board of England.
The right hon. Gentleman the Member for St. George's (Hanover Square), in a speech made the other evening, stated that if this Bill was to work properly it would be necessary that the English Local Government Board should be strengthened. I think that is right, and I am quite certain if there is a Board in Scotland that requires to be strengthened and requires to be invigorated, and I hope it will be reinvigorated under the new President who recently left this House, it is the Local Government Board. I complain as a Scottish Member that during the whole course of this debate, from no person on the Treasury Bench or no person in the House, has a single reference been made that this Bill applies to Scotland. I should be failing in my duty if I did not rise to make my protest and to see that in this' measure Scotland should not be left in the lurch and that it should enjoy at least equal rights and privileges with our English brethren. I believe it is a good Bill, and that if it is worked well and properly it will do untold good both to Scotland and to England.
Viscount MORPETH: The President of the Local Government Board made a serious statement, but one which did not surprise me. Those who criticised this Bill are, I believe, supporters of the main principle. We recognise it is an important reform, and we at no time deny that there is not a serious dearth of houses, both as to their quantity and even more as to their quality.
We welcome the promise he has made that he would consider in a conciliatory spirit any suggestions we are able to make, but I feel bound to point out that this is not the first Housing Bill. There

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have been many Housing Bills in the past, equally well intentioned, and as we have heard, they have been lamentable failures—not as was suggested, because the Local Government Board neglected its duties, but because local authorities were not able to face the vast expenditure that is bound up in this question of re-housing. The Parliamentary Secretary has just told us, as an orthodox economist, he does not desire to aid the rates by charity rents. He holds the singularly optimistic view that this housing scheme will pay for itself. He has pointed out quite truly, so far as this Bill affects the question, that economies can be effected on it, and local authorities will be able to build more cheaply than in the past owing to the conditions of rates of interest, time of repayment, and the like, but he must be singularly optimistic if he thinks the schemes will be self-supporting. We heard the same claim made by some right hon. Gentlemen when the Small Holdings Act was brought into this House. Already we see that that measure is to a large extent hung-up, not because of the ineptitude or ill-will of the local authorities, but owing to the difficulty of financing the measure. Already it has been pointed out this afternoon we are near the breaking point. This is a reforming Parliament, but its reforms largely take the shape of imposing fresh duties and largely increased expenditure on the county councils and the local authorities of the country. It is comparatively easy to be a reformer when the burden and the expense are put on the shoulders of other people. I need not enumerate the large number of measures passed throwing extra expense on the local authorities. What will be the effect of this? In my opinion you have already almost reached the point beyond which you cannot go further. There are signs not so much in the rural districts as in poor urban districts, that we are on the verge of a strike on the part of the local authorities. The very district which the hon. Gentleman, the Parliamentary Secretary, represents, was a pioneer in this movement. It very nearly reached that point at which it threw up its duties in disgust. I do not say for a moment that the strike will take the form of a formal strike, and that the local authorities will defy the Government. It will be more in sorrow than in anger, and they will say they are simply unable to continue to carry out the work which Parliament has thrown upon them. There is also another aspect of this question. Suppose
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that the local authority is in default in not carrying out this measure as the Government desire to see it carried out, the Local Government Board has power to compel it. But the Local Government Board does not itself carry out the duty, and imposes the obligation of carrying out its will on the body elected by the people. The local authority is a body elected like this House, and has to proceed very carefully for fear of the anger of the electorate. Many instances will be found of the local authority being reluctant to carry out some special work because of the vast expenditure which forces it, and if they are compelled to carry it out by the Local Government Board they will find themselves between the devil and the deep sea. After the conciliatory speech of the President, I will not stop to say which of these alternatives the Local Government Board represents, but I am very certain that all those engaged in local administration act continually in the fear that if they go too fast for the public opinion of the district they will be driven out at the next election. The officials of the Local Government Board do not suffer from that fear, and for that reason it is undesirable that the large and extensive powers given under this Bill should be given to the Local Government Board to force the pace in the local districts. The Local Government Board has taken steps in this Bill to free itself; not only to take complete power to control the action of local authorities in a matter which entails such vast expenditure and delicate consideration in the localities, but it has actually taken power in this Bill to free itself from all control by Parliament—that is, to set itself above the Statutes passed by the Houses of Parliament. This is the most incredible claim that has ever been made, so far as I know, in this country. I do not suppose that Magna Charta, or the Bill of Rights will be closely bound up with housing. None the less, the President of the Local Government Board, if he were so disposed, takes power to override these ancient laws and important statutes. There is no power that I know of—unless it is the power that the Shah has lately assumed for himself in Persia—equal to that which the right hon. Gentleman claims. Of course, I know that all capable persons are friends of autocracy—if they are the autocrats. But I am thankful to say that in this country, and especially among local authorities, there is still a healthy distaste for this form of Government.

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My hon. Friend, the Member for Barkston Ash, pointed out what I think is a dilemma. It is quite true, as the hon. Gentleman said, that this cannot be claimed as a national service. That I admit, but he pointed out, I think perfectly truly—I think it ought to be pointed out in every debate—a measure of this kind, with the burden and expense that is to be thrown upon local authorities, is one which they cannot bear and which the electorate which returns them will not stand. And it is for the Government of the day who bring in measures of this kind, which they sincerely desire to be effective and which all parties in this House, I believe, are quite desirous of seeing effective, to devise some method by which these measures can be financed and can be made operative without this intolerable strain. Either the measure falls still-born, or it is carried through with an amount of friction, and an amount of ginger, and an amount of goading, which will work very badly for local government in this country.
So much for the general principle. I should like to say a good deal on one or two points of which, although they may be called details as compared to the general principles, are yet, I think, of very great importance. I quite admit that in this matter the President of the Local Government Board has had an extraordinarily difficult task. He had to pick his way between a conflicting and varying body of claims of every sort of local authority, large and small, and he had to hold the balance between the Local Government Board and local authorities. I think he let it dip rather too much in his own favour. Still, I admit that it was an extraordinarily difficult task. I will also frankly admit that I think in the course of last year that in the course of discussions that took place in the Grand Committee the Bill was very greatly improved. And although, in my opinion, there are still some points of local administration and adjustments of local administration which leave a good deal to be desired, yet, looking at the Bill as a Bill, I think the right hon. Gentleman may fairly claim that he did attempt to meet a good many of our points, and that he has, in fact, succeeded in his object. Yet I should like to point out one or two particulars in which I think he has failed to meet that difficulty, and consequently we still have much friction, and difficulty in the future. One instance, as the Parliamentary Secretary told us, was that the default powers had been reduced to a mini-
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mum, and I should like to call his attention to a particular instance in Clause 10, I think. But in any case it is an instance in which the Local Government Board take power to act, in default, to order the county council to act, as the county council itself is in default—to some other authority. At the same time it is very undesirable that a local body should be made responsible for the default of another, and it is very undesirable that it should be carried out in that manner. After a great deal of discussion as to who the authority was to be which was to carry out these duties, they came to a compromise which, I believe, on the whole was fairly satisfactory—the primary duty was put on the district council, with power of supervision and control in the county council. The Government then put in a clause, under pressure, I admit, by which the county council if they considered that the smaller authorities were not doing their duty, as sometimes happens, might take over the administration of the whole matter and carry out these housing problems themselves. But they put at the end of the clause a condition which makes the clause absolutely a dead letter. They put in the condition that the charge was to be made a county charge, and not a charge on the special district benefited. I would point out how different that is from the provision made where the charge is in respect of a new school for the parish, and is divided between the district that benefits and the whole county. With regard to education you are bound to have a school for every parish, whereas in respect to housings nine-tenths of the county may be sufficiently supplied with cottages, and only a small part of the county may not have done its duty. If the charge is not on the one small area, it will be found that no county council will burden the whole county area for the sake of a small district. As regards Clause 17, I think everyone has welcomed that clause, which makes it incumbent on every county to appoint a medical officer of health. But here, again, it seems to me that the Government has introduced a very dangerous proviso. Having laid it down that the county council is to be the supreme sanitary authority of the county, and that it is to have a medical officer, it then proceeds to make the medical officer independent of the county. It declares that a medical officer cannot be dismissed except with the consent of the Local Government Board. Why is the medical officer to be the only officer who is to be

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given this independent position? Why are not the other officers of the county, however important their duties may be, dismissible, while the medical officer alone is to be exempted from the proviso. I would remind the House that in the discussion which has taken place on the revision of the poor law, it has been pointed out that the system under which Poor Law officers were independent of the local authority was that they were only removable with the consent of the Local Government Board. That has acted in an unsatisfactory manner, and it has in fact been impossible very often to get rid of officers who had not committed any special fault, but were simply incompetent. It is proposed by the Report of the Poor Law Commission that that should be altered, but here the President of the Local Government Board, a much more important official, is to be given this power which will make it impossible for the county councils to deal with their own servant. One hon. Member has asserted that local authorities are so corrupt that they cannot be trusted to deal either honestly or honourably with their servant, and that if he were to report adversely with regard to certain property he would promptly lose his place. If they are so corrupt and incapable in regard to the primary rules of honesty they are not fit to be trusted with the administration of this Bill, and this proviso to make the medical officer irremovable except with the consent of the Local Government Board ought not to be accepted. The clause dealing with the keeping of the register has given rise to a good deal of apprehension as to the cost it is likely to inflict, but I think that apprehension has been much exaggerated. The hon. Member for one of the Divisions of Wiltshire showed how the system had been in force in his county and had not caused very great expense. Not only are the main points set forth in clause 30 made obligatory, but since 1890 they have teen part of the law of the land because it has been part of the duty of the medical officer to draw attention to any insanitary property. Obviously, if the medical officer is to make a report worth having, and know which property is sanitary and which is unsanitary, he must go round to all the houses in his district, and, surely, it is not putting a very great extra burden upon him to say he shall keep a register of that property. Even if it does cause some expense and trouble the record is well worth making and keeping. It may
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be rather too full, as set out in clause 30, and it may be modified in Committee in some particulars. "With regard to other requirements it is desirable we should have full knowledge, especially with regard to the water supply. The President of the Local Government Board must know that the water supply in a vast number of villages is a disgrace to the country. If we have this register and this record we shall know what the real state of affairs is, and we shall not have all this exaggeration which appears in the newspapers, and the names of those who are making money out of insanitary property will be disclosed. Drastic measures should be taken against the owners of insanitary property which should be ruthlessly closed, and it is along that line rather than along the lines of ambitious schemes of rehousing which are always carried out at a maximum of expense by local authorities. It is along these lines we ought to proceed in conjunction with those useful societies now springing up for improving housing. We should cooperate with the voluntary system represented by the garden cities now being built rather than incur any very great expense. If the right hon. Gentleman hopes to see any large scheme of building under this Act, I am afraid he will be disappointed, because if it is attempted there will be so much reaction on the part of the already overburdened ratepayer that the Act will be of no benefit at all. If we proceed carefully along the lines I have indicated, and if the right hon. gentleman will make some such concessions as those which I have set forth, which will make this Act work more smoothly in practice in country districts, I think he will put a useful measure on the Statute Book.
Mr. A. H. SCOTT: I agree with the Noble Lord opposite and those responsible for the Amendment in some of the observations they have made in reference to the ever-increasing cost placed upon local authorities by measures passed in this House in connection with different matters. The House has recently put heavy charges on local authorities: but strange to say this Bill has the unanimous support of alt the municipalities in the country. I think the President of the Local Government Board will bear me out that they have shown great anxiety to have this measure. It will give them increased power to deal with insanitary property and to make provision for the extension of their towns—power which they have required for many

863
years. But there are three clauses in the Bill to which the municipalities are strongly opposed. The Noble Lord follows the usual idea of Members of this House that one. clause in the Bill is excellent; it will cost money, but it is worth it; while at the same time he is pleading for no increase in the rates. If clause 30 is necessary, let this House be responsible for the cost. The town clerk of Liverpool has made a careful estimate of what it would cost to furnish such a report in regard to that city, and he puts the amount at £9,000. The usual advocates of economy and efficiency would tell you that that tax is only a halfpenny on the rates. But it is the continued halfpenny. Municipalities have not realised and do not believe that that clause will be of the slightest benefit to them when they have acquired the information. Every municipality of any size has carefully made investigations into its insanitary property. They do not require to visit it every five years; they want to visit some of their property every month or every few months. The result is that in every large municipality all this information is already collected. There are other two clauses in which the Local Government Board take increased powers to influence local authorities. Local authorities object very strongly to the continual overlooking of the Local Government Board, and they are entitled so to object. One-third of the members of local authorities come before the constituents every year—or that would be the case if Parliament would only pass a measure doing away with aldermen. In municipal administration the argument cannot be used that the government of the city is out of accord with popular feeling or that the ruling body has not the people behind it. The financial arrangements in large towns are just as honestly conducted as financial matters in this House; in fact they are more closely watched and discussed by the representatives of the people than are financial matters in Parliament. We pass millions with just a vote being put to the House. Every detail of municipal administration comes before the people, and the people themselves are responsible for it. If you could get the city treasurer of one of the large corporations to look into your Imperial finance—your expenditure on armaments—he would condemn the finance of the country. Mistakes are made by municipalities, but they are made as they are made by us in this House. There is no reason why a check
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should be put upon them by a gentleman who is not elected. The municipalities have every confidence in the present President of the Local Government Board, but they know that he is not going to hold that office for ever, and the result may be that his place will be filled by a man who is altogether out of sympathy with municipal life. We, in representing municipalities, therefore, in considering this Bill have to look ahead. We are anxious that Parliament should impose no further restrictions upon them, that it should not keep giving powers to the Local Government Board to interfere with their administration, and that full power should be given to the local authorities to carry out the object of the Bill in the beat possible way. If the local authorities are trusted, they will do their best to administer this most useful measure.
Mr. W. R. ADKINS: I agree with the hon. Member for Leeds that the efficacy of this Bill, which I hope Members in all parts of the House desire to see a success, must be greatly hampered by the entire absence of help from the Exchequer in any form. The arguments of the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade were able and weighty as to the difficulty of giving help from the taxes, but for all that those who work on local authorities know quite well that this Bill will not do half the good we want it to do if there is to be no help at all from a central fund towards carrying out the work in many places where the needs are greatest. It is impossible to arrange for housing on a system that will pay for itself, and no amount of pressure from headquarters without financial aid will have the completely successful result which we all desire to see. You will have the greatest difficulty in its present form, particularly in urban districts, in having the Survey Clause carried out. Between the local authorities who are to carry out the Bill, and the Local Government Board which is to exercise various kinds of control, great difficulties will arise The Local Government Beard no doubt with the best of reasons and intentions, takes up an entirely novel position.
Under clause 10 the Local Government Board may order the county council to do work which under the Bill it is intended that the district council should do. The local authorities know what their statutory powers are, but they are to have these varied not by Parliament, but by an

865
Administrative Department. That is entirely out of harmony with the whole system of local government in this country.
Then there is in the Bill a provision by which the Local Government Board is to define the duties of the medical officers of health. Surely to allow a department to alter the duties of an official whom it does not appoint is to put a Government Department in the place of Parliament itself and to hand over to a Government Department those powers of legislation which Parliament ought to keep to itself. Again, as I have always been taught, no less by speakers from this side of the House than anywhere else, one method of our scheme of local government is that when there is a difference between a popularly elected authority and a Government Department, not upon a matter of administration, but on a matter of interpretation of an Act of Parliament, you ought to go to the recognised judicial authority to say what is the true interpretation, otherwise you are going to give to the Government Department dispensing powers as to what is the meaning of the Act of Parliament. Although it might affect but a small matter, such as in this proposal, still it is the same dispensing powers which in previous years had such an effect on Constitutional proceedings. We do not ask that the Local Government Board should have to go to a court of law on questions of fact, or of administration, but in proper time some of us will move in Committee an Amendment providing that the Local Government Board's decision should only be final on questions involving what is the meaning of the statute when so determined in the High Courts of Justice; and that on the application of one of the parties direct a case may be stated on a question of law. I hope the House follows the distinction between a question of fact and a question of the meaning of an Act of Parliament. I submit it is not fair and would not conduce to good administration that when a Government Department takes one view, and a local authority takes another, that particular Government Department should be the judge, and should enforce its own point of view as if it was an independent party to the dispute. These are some of the points in which I submit to the House this Bill in its present form unnecessarily disturbs the ordinary procedure of local government. Reference has already been made to the fact that in regard to town planning the Local Government Board take power to
866
suspend statutory enactments. That is a point open to precisely the same objection. I hope the House will hesitate long, when it comes to these matters in Committee, before allowing any Government Department to suspend statutory enactments, even with the best of intentions. I do not propose to vote, at this stage, against the second reading of the Bill, or in favour of any Amendment. I am perfectly convinced that every one of those matters I have mentioned, if remedied, will not lessen the efficiency, but will rather increase its efficiency exceedingly. We were told by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Local Government Board that this Bill is not now so much a Government Bill as a Bill of the House, and as it is to go to a Committee of the whole House, the House will have an opportunity of dealing with these matters, and I am quite certain that those who represent local authorities in this country will not appeal in vain to the House of Commons to preserve to those local authorities the powers of self-government which they possess. We were told by the Parliamentary Secretary that the Local Government Board were only going to coerce Local Authorities in cases of gross dereliction of the duty laid upon them by statute. If he spoke for the Government, and that statement is adhered to, there will be no more friction from the point of view of the local authorities. If that statement is not adhered to it will place upon many of us the very unpleasant duty of deciding on the third reading—admirable is this Bill and excellent as are its provisions—whether we can conscientiously vote for it if it still retains the blots upon it which would mar that principle of self-government which is necessary to local government in all its aspects.
Mr. MITCHELL-THOMSON: I agree cordially with the observations of the hon. Member who has just spoken. I have no intention of prolonging the debate at this stage, particularly as it is somewhat of an academic character, and I will not descend into particulars that should more properly be reserved for Committee. That brings me to the remarks of the hon. Member for Clackmannan. He pointed out that so far as the consideration of this Bill Scotland has received a very small share either of appreciation or consideration. I do not know that I altogether agree with the hon. Gentleman as to that, and I warmly welcome the fact that now we have an extension of the earlier Acts

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to Scotland. If it comes to be a question for the consideration of the people of Scotland, I do not know that some blame does not deserve to be attached to the parties who originally instituted the Scottish Committee system, which, I think, is partly responsible for the fact that the Bill did not attract so large an attendance of Scotch Members as it deserved. It is impossible for hon. Members to give their attention to other measures on the Scottish Committee, and also to a complicated measure of this sort. Therefore, so far as the application clause, 52, went, I think there were a number of members of the Committee to whom the Clause was more than a little unintelligible. I am not going to add to the hours of this day by academic observations, but I only make this one point, because I think it is important; I take this case out of many which are typical. Under Clause 53, subsection 2, the Local Government Board may authorise a local authority to prepare such a town planning scheme "with reference to any land within or in the neighbourhood of their area." I will ask the right hon. Gentleman to consider that proposal, not only from the point of view of the relations between local authorities and the Local Government Board, but with regard to the relations likely to arise between the authorities inter se what is to happen when you have one local authority preparing a scheme in regard to land in the area of another local authority, more especially when one authority is a county council and the other is a borough council. I think that is a ease when friction will arise. I notice that the hon. Member for Bury St. Edmunds, who is very astute in detecting anything affecting the London County Council, has inserted a provision exempting that body. If that is done with regard to the London County Council what about the other county councils of the country? lean assure the hon. Gentleman that there are many county councils certainly in Scotland and also in England who feel very great disquietude in regard to this clause. It is not only from the point of view of the county councils that there is reason for a little anxiety. If you have a little strip of land lying outside the area, say, of a borough which is likely to be scheduled, I doubt very much whether it will receive from the county all the energy in effective administration which it might deserve to
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receive in the ordinary course of events. There is a great danger that if it is scheduled it will not receive that attention, and even if it is likely to be scheduled the county are likely to wait and see how events go before they go in for any particularly energetic development. The Board, at the present moment, are entitled in a case of divided responsibility like that either to entrust the work to one authority or to divide it between two and summon a joint body. I have no objection, and I think the county council authorities would have little objection, to a division of the work or to the summoning of a joint body, but the first plan, the delegation of this power to one authority, especially if the authority is a borough council, is open to the very gravest objection unless the county council is found to be acting in default, because if you do permit the Local Government Board to entrust to the council of a borough the power to regulate the area under the control of a county council, you are in fact giving to the borough council that extension of areas which it ha always been and is now the sole prerogative of Parliament to give. When a borough council wants an extension now, it has to come to Parliament. Under this Bill it is proposed that the Local Government Board shall give it the extension so far as this portion of the area is concerned. This points the way to a whole series of objections of detail which will certainly deserve and receive sympathetic and careful treatment from the right hon. Gentleman.
Mr. H. C. BRODIE: I made my first speech in this House in connection with the Rural Housing Bill some three years ago, and it is a source of great pleasure and. satisfaction to me to feel that the efforts of the President of the Local Government Board and of many members with whom I have worked, are at last reaching fruition. I congratulate the right hon. Gentleman and the Government and the Committee which sat last Session on the Bill which they have produced. While I sympathise to a great degree with the remarks of the hon. Member for Barkston Ash, I agree with the Parliamentary Secretary and the hon. Baronet the Member for Chippenham that in view of the favourable terms which have been allowed in regard to loans and the acquisition of land, there is every ground for hoping that cottages will be

869
built under this Bill upon an economic or paying basis. But I cannot subscribe to the doctrine of the hon. Baronet that the building of cottages or the housing question is really a local matter. In my opinion housing is a national question; the object of proper housing is to secure a healthy race, and just as for years past we have combined for our defence on a national basis, and much more recently have united to extend national succour to the most needy aged poor, we should feel that we may well combine to secure a minimum standard of national housing.
In view of the national character of this work, and of what has recently been done for housing in Ireland, I would venture to suggest to the right hon. Gentleman that at least a small sum of money might be secured from the Exchequer. It would not need the tenth part of the cost of a "Dreadnought" to pay the expense of the admirable proposal of a national survey of housing conditions. If that were done it would greatly lighten the burden laid upon local authorities. I have no objection to the powers conferred on the
county councils for building, but I submit that similar concurrent powers should be conferred on parish councils, which in many cases would and could build houses economically. There is an opportunity in this Bill of inserting some provision for security of tenure in the case of small holdings, and giving to the magistrates who hear cases of eviction power to receive evidence and to decide upon a period of grace before the eviction order takes effect. A provision of that sort would enormously enhance the value of this Bill, which, I believe, is one of the most valuable measures of social reform.
Mr. BURNS Mr. BURNS rose in his place and claimed to move "That the question be now put."
Question put: "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the question."
The House divided. Ayes, 128; Noes, 20.

Division No. 51.]

AYES.

[12.45 a.m.

Abraham, William (Rhondda)

Haworth, Arthur A.

Roberts, S. (Sheffield, Ecclesall)

Acland, Francis Dyke

Hedges, A. Paget

Robinson, S.

Adkins, W. Ryland D.

Henry, Charles S.

Roch, Walter F. (Pembroke)

Agnew, George William

Higham, John Sharp

Rogers, F. E. Newman

Allen, A. Acland (Christchurch).

Hobart, Sir Robert

Rose, Charles Day

Balfour, Robert (Lanark)

Hobhouse, Charles E. H.

Rowlands, J.

Baring, Godfrey (Isle of Wight)

Holland, Sir William Henry

Scott, A. H. (Ashton-under-Lyne)

Barlow, Percy (Bedford)

Horniman, Emslie John

Seddon, J.

Beale, W. P.

Howard, Hon. Geoffrey

Seely, Colonel

Beauchamp, E.

Hudson, Walter

Shackleton, David James

Bennett, E. N.

Illingworth, Percy H.

Silcock, Thomas Ball

Bowerman, C. W.

Jenkins, J.

Strachey, Sir Edward

Bramsdon, T. A.

Kilbride, Denis

Straus, B. S. (Mile End)

Bright, J. A.

Lamont, Norman

Strauss, E. A. (Abingdon)

Brodie, H. C.

Levy, Sir Maurice

Summerbell, T.

Brooke, Stopford

Lupton, Arnold

Tennant, Sir Edward (Salisbury)

Brunner, J. F. L. (Lancs., Leigh)

Lyell, Charles Henry

Tennant, H. J. (Berwickshire)

Burns, Rt. Hon. John

Macdonald, J. R. (Leicester)

Thompson, J. W. H. (Somerset, E.)

Carr-Gomm, H. W.

MacVeagh, Jeremiah (Down, S.)

Toulmin, George

Causton, Rt. Hon. Richard Knight

M'Micking, Major G.

Ure, Rt. Hon. Alexander

Cleland, J. W.

Maddison, Frederick

Verney, F. W.

Clough, William

Markham, Arthur Basil

Vivian, Henry

Corbett, C. H. (Sussex, E. Grinstead)

Masterman, C. F. G.

Walters, John Tudor

Cowan, W. H.

Micklem, Nathaniel

Ward, W. Dudley (Southampton)

Craig, Herbert J. (Tynemouth)

Mond, A.

Waring, Walter

Davies, Timothy (Fulham)

Montagu, Hon. E. S.

Warner, Thomas Courtenay T.

Dewar, Arthur (Edinburgh, S.)

Montgomery, H. G.

Wason, Rt. Hon. E. (Clackmannan)

Dickson-Poynder, Sir John P.

Morgan, J. Lloyd (Carmarthen)

Wason, John Cathcart (Orkney)

Duncan, C. (Barrow-in-Furness)

Morrell, Philip

Watt, Henry A.

Edwards, A. Clement (Denbigh)

Murray, Capt. Hon. A. C. (Kincard.)

Whitbread, S. Howard

Edwards, Sir Francis (Radnor)

Newnes, F. (Notts, Bassetlaw)

White, Sir George (Norfolk)

Elibank, Master of

Nicholls, George

White, J. Dundas (Dumbartonshire)

Essex, R. W.

Nicholson, Charles N. (Doncaster)

White, Sir Luke (York, E.R.)

Everett, R. Lacey

Norton, Capt. Cecil William

Whittaker, Rt. Hon. Sir Thomas P.

Falconer, J.

Parker, James (Halifax)

Wilkie, Alexander

Ferens, T. R.

Pearce, Robert (Staffs, Leek)

Williams, J. (Glamorgan)

Fuller, John Michael F.

Price, Sir Robert J. (Norfolk, E.)

Williams, W. Llewellyn (Carmarthen)

Gladstone. Rt. Hon. Herbert John

Priestley, Arthur (Grantham)

Wilson, Hon. G. G. (Hull, W.)

Griffith, Ellis J.

Priestley, W. E. B. (Bradford, E.)

Wilson, Henry J. (York, W.R.)

Haldane, Rt. Hon. Richard B.

Radford, G. H.

Wilson, P. W. (St. Pancras, S.)

Harcourt, Robert V. (Montrose)

Rea, Walter Russell (Scarboro')

Hardy, George A. (Suffolk)

Richards, Thomas (W. Montmouth)

TELLERS FOR THE AYES.— Mr. Joseph Pease and Mr. Herbert Lewis.

Harmsworth, Cecil B. (Worcester)

Ridsdale, E. A.

Haslam, Lewis (Monmouth)

Roberts, Charles H. (Lincoln)

NOES.

Acland-Hood, Rt. Hon. Sir Alex. F.

Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers-

Starkey, John R.

Baldwin, Stanley

Forster, Henry William

Talbot, Lord E. (Chichester)

Banbury, Sir Frederick George

Gibbs, G. A. (Bristol, West)

Thomson, W. Mitchell- (Lanark)

Bignold, Sir Arthur

Gretton, John

Valentia, Viscount

Bridgeman, W. Clive

Guinness, W. E. (Bury St. Edmunds)

Craik, Sir Henry

Lyttelton, Rt. Hon. Alfred

TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—Mr. Lane-Fox and Mr. Hicks Beach.

Dalrymple, Viscount

Morpeth, Viscount

Dickson, Rt. Hon. C. Scott-

Stanier, Beville

Resolution agreed to.

Main question put and agreed to. Bill read a second time.
Bill committed to a Committee of the whole House for this day.—[Mr. Burns.]

ARMY (ANNUAL) [COMPENSATION].
Resolution reported:—
"That it is expedient to authorise the payment, out of money voted by Parliament for Army services, of compensation for damage and other expenses caused by billeting under any Act of the present Session to provide during twelve months for the discipline and regulation of the Army."
And, it being after half-past Eleven of the clock on Monday evening, Mr. Speaker adjourned the House without question put, in pursuance of the Standing Order.
Adjourned at Three minutes before One o'clock.