§ Mr. CHIOZZA MONEYasked the Prime Minister if his attention has been directed to a statement by Herr Eickoff, the German delegate to the Inter-Parliamentary Union at Brussels, that any earnest proposition for the limitation of armaments would be gladly considered in German official quarters, and that this statement was made with authority; and if he has any reason to believe that the German Government now takes a different view on the subject from that explained by him in the Naval Debate of 16th March. 1909, when he said that the German Government, replying in the most formal manner to British official representations as to a mutual reduction of naval expenditure, had more than once stated that German naval expenditure was governed solely by reference to German needs?
§ The PRIME MINISTER (Mr. Asquith)I have not seen the statement in question, but, of course, nothing said at the Inter-Parliamentary Union can supersede in authority statements made recently by the German Chancellor himself.