Commons Sitting of 19 June 1911

Preamble
The House met at a Quarter before Three of the clock. Mr. SPEAKER took the Chair, and was cheered on his return after recent indisposition.

PRIVATE BUSINESS.
Rhymney Railway Bill [Lords],
Read the third time, and passed, with Amendments.
Brighton, Hove, and District Railless Traction Bill [Lords],
Chapel Whaley and District Gas Bill [Lords],
Read a second time, and committed.
Dundee Harbour and Tay Ferries Bill [Lords],
To be read a second time To-morrow.
Penllwyn Railway Bill [Lords],
Read a second time, and committed.
Midland Railway Bill [Lords] (by Order),
Second Reading deferred till Friday, 30th June.
Private Bills, etc.—Ordered, That Standing Orders 39, 128, 204, and 230 be suspended, and that the time for depositing Petitions and Memorials against Private Bills, or against any Bill to confirm any Provisional Order or Provisional Certificate, and for depositing duplicates of any documents relating to any Bill to confirm any Provisional Order or Provisional Certificate, also for depositing at the Private Bill Office all Documents relating to any Order under The Private Legislation Procedure (Scotland) Act, 1899, be extended to the first day on which the House shall sit after the Recess.—[The Deputy-Chairman,]
Dumbarton Churchyard Order Confirmation Bill,
Read the third time, and passed.
Local Government Provisional Orders (No. 14) Bill,
Local Government Provisional Order (No. 15) Bill,
Pier and Harbour Provisional Order (No. 3) Bill,
Read a second time, and committed.
Private Bills (Group G).—Ordered, That the Committee on Group G of Private Bills be revived, and that they have leave to sit and proceed with the remaining Bill in the Group To-morrow, at half-past Eleven o'clock.— [The Chairman of Ways and Means.]
Pedlars Act (1871) Amendment Bill,
Second Reading deferred from Tomorrow till Monday next.
One other Member took and subscribed the Oath.

TREATY SERIES (No. 14, 1911).
Copy presented of Convention between the United Kingdom and Mexico respecting Telegraphic Communication between Mexico and British Honduras. Signed at Mexico, 27th May, 1910 (Ratifications exchanged at Mexico, 8th May, 1911) [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.
TREATY SERIES (No. 15, 1911).
Copy presented of Treaty of Commerce and Navigation between the United Kingdom and Japan. Signed at London, 3rd April, 1911 (Ratifications exchanged at Tokio, 5th May, 1911), together with Exchange of Notes, terminating the Agreement of 4th to 5th December, 1878, respecting Expenses incurred for Shipwrecked Subjects, London, 3rd April. 1911 [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.
PAYMENT OF MEMBERS (FOREIGN PARLIAMENTS) (MISCELLANEOUS, No. 7, 1911).
Copy presented of Reports from His Majesty's Representatives Abroad respecting Payment of Members of Foreign Parliaments [Address 6th March; Mr. Lees Smith] [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.
JAPAN (No. 2, 1911).
Copy presented of Correspondence respecting the Ownership of Land and Mines by British Subjects in Corea [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.

COMMONS ACT, 1876 (BURRINGTON COMMONS, SOMERSET).
Copy presented of Special Report by the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries upon Modifications of a Provisional Order for the Regulation of Burrington, Ham, Blackdown, Langford Green, and Haryat Green, in the parishes of Burrington and
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Wrington, in the county of Somerset [by Act]; to lie upon the Table, and to be printed.

LUNACY (SCOTLAND).
Copy presented of Fifty-third Annual Report of the General Board of Commissioners in Lunacy for Scotland [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.
CROFTERS HOLDINGS (SCOTLAND) ACTS.
Return presented relative thereto [ordered 14th June; the Lord Advocate]; to lie upon the Table, and to be printed.
SHOP HOURS ACT, 1904.
Copy presented of Order made by the Secretary for Scotland, dated 26th May, 1911, providing for the early closing of certain classes of Shops in the burgh of Perth [by Act]; to lie upon the Table.
ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS.

  Welsh in Law Courts (Interpreter's Fee).
  Mr. LLEWELYN WILLIAMSasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether his attention has been drawn to the fact that Welshmen who give evidence in Welsh in the Law Courts have to pay the interpreter's fee; whether he is aware that on 12th May last a number of colliers were fined at Pontardawe Police Court 4s. 6d. each for leaving their work in order to attend a funeral; that the said fines were deducted in accordance with the magistrate's order by the colliery company from the men's wages; and that three of the colliers who had given their evidence in Welsh had the interpreter's fee of 2s. 6d. each deducted in addition to the fine; and will he say under which statute such a deduction is authorised; and whether he will take steps so to amend the law as to enable Welshmen to give evidence in their own language in Wales without being called upon to pay for doing so?
  The SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. Churchill): My attention had not been previously drawn to the matter. I have communicated with the magistrates, and am in-

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  formed that the magistrates, having awarded damages and costs to the employers, proceeded, in accordance with the decision in the case Keates v. Lewis Merthyr Consolidated Colliery Company, to ascertain the amount of wages due to the workman, and to make an order under the Employers and Workmen Act, 1875, authorising the deduction of the damages and costs from such wages. As regards the interpreter's fee, I am informed that it is the regular practice at the Pontardawe Court for such interpreting as is found necessary to be done by a police officer without charge to the parties, but that on the occasion in question the officer ordinarily employed as interpreter was absent through illness, and no other officer competent to discharge the duty was present. In these circumstances it was agreed between the parties that an interpreter should be employed, and that his fee should be paid by the losing party, along with the other costs in the case. The interpreter's fee was accordingly included in the costs payable by the defendants.
  Mr. LLEWELYN WILLIAMS: Can the right lion. Gentleman not promise some legislation or order to put this thing right in future, as a case has happened in North Wales recently?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: No, Sir. I am not aware that a case has been made out for legislation.

  Metropolitan Police (Superannuation Allowance).
  Mr. PETOasked whether, in the case of a man who joined the Metropolitan Police in the year 1862, after the 17th March, and who served for 26½ years and left prior to the passing of the Superannuation Act of 1890, he will have contributed 7d. a week during the whole period of his services and would receive 18s. 7½d. per week superannuation allowance, whereas if he had joined the force either before the 17th March, 1862, or after 1865, or if he had retired after 1890, in either case he would have received 20s. a week superannuation allowance, and if he had joined before the passing of the 1862 Act he would have paid only 5d. a week, and for that smaller contribution he would receive a larger superannuation allowance; and whether, in these circumstances, he will arrange that men who joined the force between 1862 and 1865 shall draw the same superannuation allowance as those who joined before and after those dates?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: There has been no time to verify the details quoted by the hon. Member, but I can say at once that all police officers have been pensioned in accordance with the statutory provisions in force at the date of their retirement, and they have in no case received less pension, and in many cases more than that they agreed to accept in their conditions of service. It would obviously be impossible to review pensions which have been enjoyed for more than twenty years.
  Mr. PETO: Will the right lion. Gentleman inquire how many, or, rather, how few, ex-police officers there are whose services date from between 1862 and 1865 and who are receiving less pension for larger contributions than those whose services commenced earlier or later than those dates?

  Motor Traffic.
  Captain WARINGasked the Home Secretary if he will direct the police authorities to pay more heed to the regulation of the motor traffic in crowded thoroughfares, especially at cross streets and turnings, instead of constantly detecting in the uncrowded parks small differences of speed, the highest of which as a rule is well below the 20-mile limit?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: I do not think any directions are necessary. The police give constant attention to the regulation of motor traffic in crowded thoroughfares. They have prosecuted in only twenty cases since the beginning of this year for exceeding the speed limit in Royal Parks.
  Mr. FELLasked the Home Secretary if he will consider the question of the necessity of making further provision for the protection of the general public, both on the pavements and in vehicles, from the dangers they run from the excessive speed of the meter omnibuses; and whether he will consider the desirability of requiring speedometers with large dials to be fixed to the sides of them, so that the police may be able to prosecute whenever the maximum speed of twelve miles an hour is exceeded?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: The question of the speed of motor vehicles in the streets of London is receiving my attention, but I am advised that the suggestion made in the question is impracticable.
  Mr. FELL: What is the difficulty in having a speedometer visible to the public on motor buses?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: The general question of speedometers of a proper character has often been considered. Everybody is agreed in principle that it is desirable to have them, but I cannot now go into this matter which is a very complex one.
  Captain MURRAY: Would it not be possible to do something to prevent taxi-cabs in particular, from exceeding the speed limit?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: Much is done by the control of the police, but I am not aware that the law is broken to any great extent since the Act has come into operation.
  Mr. CATHCART WASONasked the President of the Local Government Board if he will state how many applications have been received by his Department for limitation of speed of motor vehicles and how they have been dealt with?
  The PRESIDENT of the LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. Burns): The Local Government Board have received since the Motor Car Act, 1903, came into force forty-four applications under Section 8 for restriction of speed or prohibition and 230 applications under Section 9 for imposition of a ten-mile limit. Regulations have been issued in respect of fifteen applications under Section 8 and 102 applications under Section 9, and regulations have been promised in respect of eleven under Section 9. In seven cases under Section 8 and thirty-under Section 9 regulations have been refused. Three applications under Section 8 and twenty-seven under Section 9 are still under consideration. The remaining applications have either been definitely withdrawn or have been allowed to fall in abeyance.

  Employment of Children Act, 1903 (By-Laws).
  Mr. DENMANasked the Home Secretary how many local authorities have made by-laws in pursuance of the powers conferred upon them by Section 1 of The Employment of Children Act, 1903, and how many of these have been confirmed by the Home Office with and without amendment, respectively; and whether that section has in fact had any appreciable effect in reducing below the statutory limits the hours of labour worked by school children?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: By-laws under Section 1 of the Act have been made and confirmed in the case of seventy-seven local
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  authorities in England and Wales. The Home Office has no power to amend bylaws when confirming them, but the usual practice is for by-laws to be submitted in draft in the first instance so that the details can be discussed between the Home Office and the local authority before the latter finally adopt them. The by-laws are enforced by the local authorities, and not by the Home Office, and it would be very difficult to obtain definite information as to the actual reduction in the amount of child labour which has been effected; but it is certain that in many towns there has been a considerable improvement as a result of the by-laws on the conditions existing before the Act was passed.
  Mr. DENMAN: Having regard to the importance of the subject, and the recommendations of the Street Betting Committee, and also having regard to the intimate connection of this question with the Bill introduced by the President of the Board of Education, will the right hon. Gentleman have further inquiry made into this question?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: I fully agree with my hon. Friend as to the importance of this subject, but I do not think I can deal with a question, which has so many considerations attached to it as have just been enumerated, and leads up to the decision to hold a special enquiry, without much more notice than my hon. Friend has afforded me.

  Official War Histories.
  Sir JOHN JARDINEasked the Secretary to the Treasury what is the estimated cost of the official history of the Russian-Japanese War; and what amount thereof has already been expended?
  The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the TREASURY (Mr. Hobhouse): It is impossible to give absolutely accurate figures, but the total cost is not expected to exceed £13,000. Up to 31st March, 1910, £5,703 12s. l0d. had been spent.
  Sir JOHN JARDINEasked the Secretary to the Treasury what has been the cost of producing the official history of the Boer War; and whether any estimate was made beforehand, and if the cost is within the estimate?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: The total cost of the Combined History up to 31st March, 1910, was £34,706 18s. l0d. (see for details page 110 of the Civil Services Appropriation Accounts for 1909ߝ10) (H.C. 7 of 1911).

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  The only future expenditure anticipated will be for copies for the public service, taut against this must be set the receipts for royalties and for sales to the public, which have amounted to £600 between 31st March, 1910, and the present date. The total cost is considerably greater than was anticipated when the history was taken in hand in 1900, though no exact estimate of the cost was then framed.
  Sir JOHN JARDINE: May I ask what was the supposed estimate of the cost of this book, and what is the difference between that supposed estimate and the £31,000 that the thing has cost?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: As I have already explained no estimate was taken in 1900— which was when neither I nor anyone on this Bench was responsible.
  Sir JOHN JARDINE: Guess-work!

  Small Holdings (Scotland).
  Sir JOHN JARDINEasked what areas of land in the county of Roxburgh have been provided by the county council as small holdings and allotments during the present century?
  The LORD ADVOCATE(Mr. Ure): I understand that no such areas have been provided, the view taken being that the response to invitations for applications was not such as to warrant the council in applying the Acts.

  Scottish Bankruptcy Laws.
  Sir JOHN JARDINEasked whether it is intended at an early date to give effect to the Report of a Departmental Committee issued in 1910 anent the working of the bankruptcy laws in Scotland?
  Mr. URE: It is intended to introduce legislation on the lines of the Report referred to by my hon. Friend, but I cannot at present say when the Bill will be introduced.

  Coronation.
  Mr. BOWERMANasked the hon. Member for Southampton, as representing the First Commissioner of Works, if he can state whether the workmen employed upon Government work are to be paid their wages for the two days' holiday during Coronation week?
  The TREASURER of the HOUSEHOLD (Mr. Dudley Ward): Two days' leave without deduction of pay will be allowed, in the county of London, to park-keepers,
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  workmen in the direct employment of the Board, and workmen employed on day work. Outside the county of London one day's leave only will be allowed.
  Mr. CHARLES DUNCANasked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether arrangements will be made for the clerical staffs of the Expense Accounts Department at the dockyards to be granted a full day's holiday on Coronation Day without being called upon to work up the time either before or after 22nd June?
  The FIRST LORD of the ADMIRALTY (Mr. McKenna): The Expense Accounts Department staff will be granted a full day's holiday on Coronation Day. It will, however, be necessary in order to have pay sheets ready one day earlier than usual, for a certain amount of extra time to be worked, but this will be reduced to the lowest possible limit and will be paid for.
  Mr. PICKERSGILL: I beg to ask the Home Secretary a question of which I have not been able to give him private notice, although, as it is urgent, I hope he may be able to give an answer. It is: By what common law or statutory authority the Metropolitan Police have erected a number of barriers on the public highways, in the county of London?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: It is quite clear I cannot answer a question of law such as that on a few minutes' notice.
  Mr. PICKERSGILL: I will raise the question to-morrow on the Motion for the Third Reading of the Consolidated Fund (No. 2) Bill.
  Mr. DOUGLAS HALLasked the Home Secretary whether, before authorising the construction of the huge wooden barricades which shut out access to the route of the Coronation Procession, he considered the grave probability of persons anxious to see the Procession, and especially young children, being crushed and seriously injured against them or in passing through the narrow doorways in the same; whether he is aware that the fear of this possibility is deterring many loyal subjects of the King from being present on this auspicious occasion and whether he or the Chief Commissioner of Police have received any complaints in regard to these barriers from the general public or from elsewhere?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: The police have received no complaints regarding these

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  barriers, as the public, for the most part, realise that they have been erected for their protection. There is no reason whatever to apprehend any risk of persons being injured in being forced through them, as a crowd would have no object in remaining formed up behind a structure which cuts off their vision. The force of police and military told off for each barrier gate will be adequate effectively to control access to it and it will not be closed until the necessity for doing so arises.
  Mr. DOUGLAS HALL: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that these barriers will be in existence on the following day. Last night there were crushes against the barriers, and I heard women screaming while being pushed against them. If they are left in existence on the following day they may cause a serious catastrophe.
  Mr. CHURCHILL: They were put up on the occasion of the last Coronation and then the crowds were not nearly so large as it is anticipated they will be on the present occasion. The Commissioner of Police informs me that the force of police at his disposal will not enable him to prevent pressure of an extrordinary character being created by the crowds without some such means as the erection of barriers. These barriers are put up for the protection of the public, and I believe the reasons for them are extremely well founded.
  Mr. LOUGH: May I ask whether, as the Coronation ceremony in Westminster Abbey does not start till eleven o'clock, and in view of the fact that a clear passage can be kept between the Abbey and the House of Commons it can be arranged for the door leading into the Abbey to be kept open till ten o'clock?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: I have no authority, of course, to give any direct answer to this question, but I will indicate what appears to be the general wish of the House to the proper authorities.
  Mr. E. G. PRETYMAN: I wish to ask a question of the Home Secretary of which I have given him private notice, namely, whether the police have issued an order forbidding the placing of chairs inside the railings of St. James's Park alongside the Mall, and will he consider whether this order cannot be withdrawn, as it will deprive many of the opportunity of seeing the procession and lead to overcrowding on the roadside?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: I received the note of the hon. Gentleman a few minutes ago, and I will consult with the Chief Commissioner and see what are the reasons for the order which I understand has been issued. I am quite sure that there is no wish to inconvenience persons in any way. I will communicate privately with the hon. Gentleman.

  General Post Office.
  Mr. TYSON WILSONasked the Postmaster-General when the revision at the General Post Office parcel office, stated to be under consideration on 6th July, 1909, will be brought into effect; and will he give the number of hours' overtime performed at this office, by all classes, during the week ending 27th May, and the cost of same?
  The POSTMASTER-GENERAL (Mr. Herbert Samuel): The revision of the force of the General Post Office parcel office has now been sanctioned and is being carried out. The full effect will, of course, not be felt for some time, as the additional officers have to be obtained and trained. During the week ended the 27th ultimo 5,138½ hours' overtime were performed at a cost of £290 2s. These figures do not include Sunday duty and provision for the work of officers taking holidays in lieu of Bank holidays, which accounted for 1,241½ more hours at a cost of £88 0s. 8½d.
  Mr. TYSON WILSONasked the Postmaster-General if he is aware that, in addition to the 1,911 days that the twenty-four sorters attached to the East Central section of the General Post Office performed the duties of acting overseers for the year ending 31st March, they were frequently employed as extra overseers, during which time no record was kept or substitution allowance paid for such service; whether, notwithstanding that a large increase of force has been made and a considerable amount of extra duty incurred since the removal to King Edward building, no increase has been made in the supervising force; and whether, in view of the discontent among the supervising officers, owing to their additional responsibility, he will consider the advisability of increasing the supervising staff in this section?
  Mr. HERBERT SAMUEL: I am assured that it is not the case that the twenty-four sorters referred to by the hon. Member were frequently employed as extra over-

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  seers as suggested in the question. A few of the sorters have been employed on part-time supervision during brief periods of emergency or pressure and other sorters have been under tuition; but the figures given in my previous reply are not affected thereby. Since the occupation of King Edward's building the question of a revision of the staff has been taken up. An interim addition to the rank and file has already been sanctioned, and I hope that the complete scheme will soon be ready The question of adjusting the supervising force to meet the requirements will not be overlooked.

  Unemployed Workmen Act.
  Mr. WILLIAM THORNEasked the President of the Local Government Board, if he will state whether it is the intention of the Government to grant the sum of £200,000 to enable the various distress committees in different parts of the country to assist unemployed workpeople under the Unemployed Workmen Act of 1905?
  Mr. BURNS: No decision has yet been arrived at in this matter.

  Housing Accommodation (West Mailing, Kent).
  Mr. ROWLANDSasked the President of the Local Government Board whether his attention has been called to the fact that a number of families have been evicted at West Mailing, Kent, on account of their houses being unfit for habitation; whether the local authority, before evicting the people, had taken any steps to re house them under the Housing and Town-Planning Act; and whether proper housing accommodation will be provided for the labourers of West Mailing and their families?
  Mr. BURNS: My attention has been drawn to the matter referred to, and I am in communication with the Rural District Council of Mailing on the subject.

  Metropolitan District Railway (Overcrowding).
  Mr. WILLIAM THORNEasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he is aware that, on Tuesday, 13th June, the trains leaving Aldgate East station on the Metropolitan District Railway, at 6.21 and 6.29 p.m., were excessively overcrowded on arrival at the station, and at least 300 people were left upon the platform after the trains had left the station; and if he intends taking action to prevent this state of things?
  The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the BOARD of TRADE (Mr. Tennant): The railway company informs me that on the evening in question delays of trains on another part of their system led to some irregularity in the working of the traffic at Aldgate East station, and that under normal conditions there is no delay to passengers at that station. I am sending my hon. Friend a copy of the company's letter.

  Irish Lights Board (Supply of Brushes).
  Mr. WILLIAM ABRAHAMasked the President of the Board of Trade whether his attention has been called to the fact that Messrs. Varian and Company, Dublin, whose tender for the supply of brushes to the Irish Lights Board has received the sanction of the Board of Trade, do not pay to the workmen in their employment the standard rate of wages recognised by the trade society in the district where such men are employed; if the contractors have made it a condition of employment that their workmen shall not be members of the trade union known as the United Society of Brushmakers, and will not allow any of the present employés to join the Brush-makers' Trade Union; and whether he will cause a full inquiry to be made into these allegations in order to secure compliance with the Resolution of the House of Commons of 10th March, 1909, as to rates of wages and proper conditions of labour prevailing in respect of the particular trade in question?
  Mr. TENNANT: Messrs. Varian and Company have obtained the contract with the Commissioners of Irish Lights for the supply of brushes during the year ending 31st March, 1912, subject to the usual conditions as to hours of labour and rates of wages, and I have no doubt the Commissioners will take any steps that may be necessary to see that these conditions are fulfilled.
  Mr. W. ABRAHAM: The hon. Gentleman has not answered the question as to whether the Board of Trade will make inquiry into the allegations contained in the question—that these contractors do not pay the fair rates of wages?
  Mr. TENNANT: I am not aware that the company has departed from their usual custom, but if the hon. Gentleman will give me a case I will have inquiry made into it.

  Government Contracts (Fair-Wages Clause).
  Mr. EDGAR JONESasked the First Lord of the Admiralty, whether the firm of Guest, Keen, and Nettlefold is on the lists of Admiralty contractors; and, if so, whether he will inquire into the grievances of the moulders on strike at their Dowlais works, and, if satisfied that the firm is not complying with the fair wages conditions of the Admiralty, whether he will remove the name of the firm from the Admiralty lists?
  Mr. McKENNA: The firm in question are on the Admiralty list. No complaint has been received in respect of the wages paid by them under the Fair-Wages Clause of Admiralty contracts. Current Admiralty contracts with the firm do not include moulders' work. Questions relating to grievances of workmen on strike would more properly be addressed to the President of the Board of Trade.
  Mr. C. DUNCAN: Is the First Lord aware that this particular firm is the worst wage-paying firm there is in the country?
  Mr. McKENNA: I am not aware that that is so. As a matter of fact on Admiralty contracts no complaints have reached me.
  Mr. EDGAR JONES: Does not the right hon. Gentleman suspect that perhaps other wages paid are on a par with these, and will he not inquire?
  Mr. McKENNA: Until I have had complaint there is no ground for inquiry. If the hon. Gentleman will give me grounds for making representations and inquiries I shall do so.
  Mr. GEORGE ROBERTS: Is it the practice of the right hon. Gentleman's Department to recognise a firm as fair provided that on Government work they pay the recognised rate of wages, though not in other Departments?
  Mr. McKENNA: We have no knowledge of the rates of pay that firms pay for work except our own. We have no general right to go and inspect the whole of the contractor's works except so far as they do work for us and upon our work. I have no knowledge of what affairs outside are. On our work I understand they have been paying a fair wage.
  Mr. TYSON WILSON: Did not the Government give us a promise when the Fair-
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  Wage Clause was before the House that any firm that did not habitually pay the standard rate of wages would be struck off the Government list?
  Mr. McKENNA: I am not aware that that statement was made. The statement was the payment of fair wages upon Government work. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh, oh."]

  Metalliferous Mines Act (Moor Row Accidents).
  Mr. GEORGE ROBERTSasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he is aware that, in addition to the accident at Postlethwaite's Iron Ore Mine, Moor Row, of which his Department is cognisant, three other accidents have occurred, namely, on 8th March Robert Maxwell sustained a poisoned arm through fall of ore, on 19th April Jonathan Barrie sustained blood poisoning through bogie accident, and on 23rd May the wrist of J. Payne was sprained through defective platform; if he will state why the provisions of the Metalliferous Mines Act were not complied with by these accidents being reported; whether he is aware that a former employé in the mine, a trade union delegate, has been victimised for reporting accidents in order that compensation might be secured; and whether he is aware that, as the district inspector resides over 100 miles distant from Moor Row, he is not in a position to make himself effectively acquainted with the management of the mine?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: I have received particulars of these accidents from the inspector of mines, who informs me that in his opinion they were not accidents of the class which, under the Act, have to be reported immediately on their occurrence. Maxwell was injured through a piece of ore catching him on the hand while dressing the roof. He was off work for a fortnight. Barrie had a finger jammed between a bogie and prop. The accident was not in itself serious; but subsequently, as the injury did not heal properly, the finger had to be amputated. Payne slipped off a plank, and sprained his wrist; but has now recovered. All the accidents will be included in the return which the owner is required to make under the Notice of Accidents Act at the end of the year. The inspector cannot ascertain that any employé has been victimised for reporting accidents, but he finds that a trade union dele-

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  gate who considered himself unfairly treated as to his working place left of his own accord some weeks ago. It is the case that the district inspector lives over 100 miles from this mine, but that does not prevent him making himself well acquainted with the management of the mine. As a matter of fact, an assistant inspector specially assigned to metalliferous mines and quarries resides within three miles of the mine, and reports regularly to the district inspector.

  Factory Act Particulars (Magisterial Decision).
  Mr. RAMSAY MACDONALDasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether his attention has been called to the decision of a Marlborough Street magistrate, on 2nd June, dismissing an information laid by a factory inspector against a master tailor under Section 116 (Particulars Section) of The Factory Act, 1901, on the ground that only men were employed by the giver-out of work; whether he is aware that if the magistrate's ruling is sustained it will place the majority of out-workers in the wearing apparel, boot and shoe, and other trades outside the scope and protection of the Particulars Section; and what steps, either administrative or legislative, he proposes to take in the matter?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: Yes, Sir. My attention has been called to the decision in question which raises a very important point, and by my instructions application is being made to the magistrate to state a case for the decision of the High Court on the point.

  Chinese Pork.
  Mr. FELLasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Agriculture, if his attention has been called to the consignment of Chinese pork which has recently arrived at Liverpool, and which is to be cured into bacon and in that form is to be sold to persons in the United Kingdom who will be kept in ignorance of the source from which it has come; and if he has power to insist that such bacon shall be sold under its proper description and stamped or marked with the name of the country of origin?
  The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the BOARD of AGRICULTURE (Sir E. Strachey): I have no official information as to the consignment to which the hon. Member refers, but in any case the
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  Board have no power to take the course suggested.
  Mr. FELL: Is the hon. Baronet aware that this stuff is being sold as home cured bacon, and under these circumstances will the Board take some steps in the matter?
  Sir E. STRACHEY: I am afraid the Board has no power in the matter, but I will make further inquiries if the hon. Member likes.
  Mr. FELL: I should be very pleased if the hon. Baronet will make further inquiries.

  NATIONAL INSURANCE BILL.

    SMALL DIVIDING SOCIETIES.
    Sir CHARLES HUNTERasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if, under the National Insurance Bill, the members of the innumerable small dividing societies would have no option but to liquidate and join one of the approved friendly societies?
    The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER (Mr. Lloyd George): Societies which have not enough members to qualify singly as approved societies will be able in the great majority of cases to surmount this difficulty either by becoming affiliated to some larger organisation or by becoming federated together. A dividing society cannot administer the National Health Insurance on the dividing principle, but it can establish a separate health insurance department on the accumulative principle for the purpose of the National Health Insurance. I understand that the societies are contemplating taking this course.

    CASUAL AND INTERMITTENT LABOURERS.
    Mr. LANSBURYasked what provision he proposes to make in his insurance scheme for those casual and intermittent labourers who will be squeezed out of employment by the process of decasualisation which ho hopes will follow the putting into operation of that part of the Bill dealing with unemployment?
    The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the BOARD of TRADE (Mr. Tennant): The Unemployment Fund cannot, of course, support permanently the burden of persons continuously out of work, but I would point out that any process of decasualisation that may result from the operation of the scheme is bound to be slow and gradual.
    Mr. LANSBURY: Is it any easier to be squeezed out of employment gradually?

    MAINTENANCE AND MEDICAL TREATMENT.
    Mr. LANSBURYasked, with reference to the National Insurance Bill, what provision it is proposed to make for the maintenance and medical treatment of such insured persons amongst the deposit contributors as do not recover from their ill-health by the time the money standing to their credit, less the Government deductions, is exhausted; and is it intended that such persons, notwithstanding that compulsory deductions have been made from their wages for insurance in a compulsory scheme as insured persons, should become a burden upon the poor rates and themselves classed as paupers?
    Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: In the last resort deposit contributors will no doubt still have to have recourse to the Poor Law, but this will only happen when they have drawn by way of benefit, not only the whole amount of the compulsory deductions from their wages, but the employers' contributions and the State contributions as well. Under existing conditions they would usually have to resort to the Poor Law at once.

    SUPPLY OF MEDICINE AND DRUGS.
    MARQUESS of TULLIBARDINEasked whether the right hon. Gentleman is aware that a per capita payment for the supply of drugs will deprive insured persons of many remedial agents, and whether, in the interests of insured persons, the Commissioners will frame a scale of prices based on the cost or market price of the commodity; and whether, in that event, insured persons would be permitted to obtain their supplies from any registered chemist accepting such a scale?
    Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: The supply of drugs is, under the Bill, a matter for the approved societies and the local health committees, who need not adopt a per capita system. The Insurance Commissioners are not specially empowered to interfere, except in so far as they must, as a condition of approving any society, satisfy themselves that the society is providing the benefits prescribed by the Bill.
    MARQUESS of TULLIBARDINEasked whether, under the present proposals of the National Insurance Bill, the supply of medicines and drugs may be under the control of the friendly societies; and, if so, whether, in view of the fact that such an arrangement will have a deleterious effect upon the trade of those who have gone to expense and trouble in qualifying under
    20
    the Pharmacy Acts, the interests of such people will be safeguarded by stipulating that the supply of medicines and drugs must be carried out by qualified chemists under arrangements direct with the Insurance Commissioners?
    Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: As I stated in reply to the Noble Lord, the Member for the Newton Division, on 29th May, the approved societies and local health committees retain under the Bill precisely the same freedom as friendly societies at present have in regard to the supply of drugs. It is, of course, desirable that these bodies should employ qualified chemists for the purpose, and I have no doubt the interests of the chemists will be most favourably affected by the operation of the Bill.

    EMPLOYED PERSON RECEIVING BOARD AND LODGINGS.
    MARQUESS of TULLIBARDINEasked whether since under paragraph (e), Clause 7, of the National Insurance Bill an employed person receiving board and lodgings from his employer will receive no sickness benefit, it is proposed to exempt employers and employed who work under these conditions from the contributions exacted by the Bill from employer and employed?
    Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: The Noble Lord appears to have overlooked the fact that sickness benefit forms only a moderate proportion of the benefits included in the National Health Insurance, and that the contributions may be required to provide against future liabilities, more especially in respect of disablement benefit, as well as against the liabilities immediately arising.

    ANNUAL AVERAGE CONTRIBUTION.
    Mr. GODFREY LOCKER-LAMPSONasked whether the contributions stated in Table T, page 23, of the Report of the Government actuaries represent the full annual contributions for the seven-ninths of the benefits chargeable against employed and employer in the case of a contributor who pays for fifty-two weeks without a break; and what is the annual average contribution so paid allowing for non-payment by the contributor during sickness or unemployment?
    Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: The contributions referred to are those which must be paid in respect of the portion of the year for which contributions are due under the Bill, not for the whole fifty-two weeks without a break.
    Mr. WORTHINGTON-EVANS: Can the right hon. Gentleman say what portion of the year?
    Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: I am afraid I must ask for notice of that question.
    Mr. GODFREY LOCKER-LAMPSONasked (1) whether, in arriving at the contributions applicable to age sixteen, stated in Tables S and T, page 23, of the Report of the Government actuaries, any abatement has been made from the full tabular value of the liabilities by reason of the fact that no sick benefit will be allowable in case of sickness during the first six months after entry into insurance and no disablement benefit in respect of disablement during the first two years after entry into insurance; (2) whether, in arriving at the contributions for a person aged sixteen, in Tables S and T, page 23, of the Report of the Government actuaries, any abatement has been made from the full tabular value of the liabilities by reason of the fact that under Clause 8, Sub-section (7), paragraph (d), of the Bill no sick benefit will be allowable in respect of sickness which began during the first six months after entry into insurance or disablement benefit in respect of disablement which began during the first two years after entry into insurance; if any such abatement has been made, will he obtain from the Government actuaries a supplementary report stating on what data the same is based; (3) whether, in arriving at the contributions applicable to age sixteen, as stated in Tables S and T, page 23, of the Report of the Government actuaries, any abatement has been made from the full tabular value of the liabilities by reason of the fact that no sickness benefit or disablement benefits will be paid for any period during which the insured person is provided with board and lodging by his employer; if any such abatement has been made, will he obtain from the Government actuaries a supplementary report stating on what data the same is based; and (4) whether, in framing the estimates exhibited in Table V. of the Report, pages 25 and 26, the Government actuaries have made any specific allowance for the non-payment of benefits in the cases dealt with by Clause 8, Section 7, Sub-sections (d) and (e) of the Bill, or whether the amount saved under these sub-sections has been regarded by the Government actuaries as a margin of indefinite value.
    Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: The actuarial calculations were based on the precise conditions for the receipt of benefit which are set out in the Bill. The extent of the margin is stated on page 23 of the report. I cannot promise to ask for any further calculations from the actuaries until I have ascertained from them whether the materials available are such as to make the calculations asked for of substantial utility.

    EMPLOYERS' CONTRIBUTION (ALIENS).
    Mr. WILLIAM THORNEasked if the right hon. Gentleman is aware that a numbers of employers employ both aliens and British subjects; and if he can state whether it will be compulsory for such employers to pay an insurance contribution with respect to both aliens and British subjects?
    Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: The answer to both parts of the question is in the affirmative.

    PROPOSED AMENDMENTS TO BILL.
    Mr. MARTINasked the Prime Minister if he will give a day for the purpose of discussing the constitutionality of the arrangement made between the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Leader of the Opposition, under which proposed Amendments to the National Insurance Bill are to be censored by a small committee appointed by the two Front Benches?
    The PRIME MINISTER (Mr. Asquith): No, Sir; I see no occasion for such a discussion.
    Mr. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN: Does the Prime Minister accept the suggestion in the question that any such arrangement was made?
    The PRIME MINISTER: No, Sir.
    Mr. MARTIN: Was not the proposal made by the Chancellor of the Exchequer across the floor of this House to the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition, and accepted by him?
    Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: Certainly not. No such suggestion was ever made. The hon. Member is perfectly wrong.
    Mr. BOOTH: Is it not a fact that what really happened was that he offered to meet any group of Members in any part of the House, and discuss the matter with them?
    Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: Hear, hear.

    APPROVED SOCIETIES.
    Mr. SILVESTER HORNEasked what modifications, if any, in the qualifications of approved societies will be made in the National Insurance Bill to allow the industrial insurance societies and companies to qualify as approved societies under the Bill?
    Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: Industrial insurance companies and collecting societies are engaged not on health insurance but almost exclusively on life insurance, and evidently could not assist, as they are, in the administration of the National Health Insurance. But, of course, if they are prepared to create self-governing organisations capable of administering the National Health Insurance on the principles adopted in the Bill, the Government will welcome their assistance.

    EMPLOYED CONTRIBUTORS.
    Mr. GOLDSMITHasked whether a clerk in receipt of a fixed salary of less than £160 a year, who receives a share in the profits of his employer's business, which together with his salary amounts to more than £160 a year, would have, under the National Insurance Bill, to insure as an employed contributor?
    Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: If the clerk's share of profits were part of his regular remuneration he would be excluded by paragraph (f) of Part II. of the First Schedule.

    WIDOWS NOT EMPLOYED.
    Mr. EDMUND HARVEYasked whether, under the scheme of the National Insurance Bill, it is intended that widows who are not employed persons shall be entitled to become voluntary contributors at the rate of contributions and benefits applicable to ordinary insured contributors joining the scheme immediately after the passing of the Act?
    Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: The answer is in the negative.

    RAILWAY GUARDS' UNIVERSAL FRIENDLY SOCIETY.
    Mr. JOYNSON-HICKSasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he is aware that the restriction of the National Insurance Bill to societies of 10,000 members would cut out such an institution as the Railway Guards' Universal Friendly Society; and, if so, whether he could see his way to reduce such number to 2,000?
    Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: I anticipate that difficulties of the character referred to by the hon. Member can be surmounted by means of federation or affiliation; but I have already stated that I am prepared to consider any suggestions which may be put forward as to numbers.

    PENITENTIARIES AND LABOUR HOMES.
    Mr. JOYNSON-HICKSasked whether a woman in a penitentiary laundry or a man in a labour home of the Church of England Temperance Society, both of whom agree to give their labour in return for board, lodging, and medical attendance, receiving no money wages at all or a small money wage by way of pocket money, will be within the provisions of the insurance scheme; and whether, in that case, the institution will have to pay both the employer's and workmen's contribution?
    Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: The answer to both parts of the question is in the affirmative.

    LANDLORDS AND SICK TENANTS.
    Sir HENRY KIMBERasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he would reconsider Clause 51 of the National Insurance Bill, seeing that thereunder debtors and tenants, upon obtaining sickness benefits, would be legally exempt from fulfilling obligations they had incurred, and considering the possible loss to an individual who happened to stand in the position of landlord, who would be compelled to house a sick person and his dependents for a length of time up to twelve months without payment; and, if it is intended that a sick person shall receive these additional benefits, will he include them in the list of benefits under the Bill or else relieve his landlord of the necessity of housing him gratis?
    Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: I will refer the hon. Member to my reply to the hon. Member for the Ecclesall Division of Sheffield on the 24th May.

    ORPHANAGES AND VOLUNTARY HOMES.
    Sir HENRY KIMBERasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he is aware that orphanges, voluntary homes, and similar institutions view with apprehension the provisions of the National Insurance Bill, under which they would be involved in considerable increased expenditure per inmate per annum; and whether, having regard to the fact that such inmates are under no disadvantage

    25
    whatever in times of sickness, but, on the contrary, are provided in every case of sickness with first-class medical advice and regular attendance, he will propose amendments to the Bill providing that both payments and benefits during the period of residence in homes should be suspended?
    Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: There is a manifest objection to excluding unnecessarily persons not otherwise provided for from the National Health Insurance since those excluded may come into insurance later in life and bring with them heavy risks to be borne by the whole body of contributors, nor do I believe that the persons responsible for the management of the institutions referred to would wish that their inmates should take an inferior position when they go back into the world. I have some hope, however, of arriving at a reasonable settlement of the difficulty.

    ACTUARIAL CALCULATIONS.
    Mr. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN: May I ask when the Chancellor of the Exchequer proposes to lay on the Table the further actuarial calculation he promised on the Second Reading of his Insurance Bill. I refer particularly to two requests I made to him at the time—one, as to the actuarial value of the benefits to soldiers and sailors, so as to satisfy us that the soldiers and sailors are getting their full proportion of the benefit; and a similar calculation, as to the benefits to women as separate from those granted to men.
    Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: I will see that they are placed on the Table as soon as I can possibly get them from the actuaries.

  Register of Licence Annual Values.
  Mr. BRIDGEMANasked whether the right hon. Gentleman will state when he expects that the Register of Licence Annual Values to be compiled under Section 44(2) of the Finance (1909–10) Act, 1910, will be completed; and what proportion of the whole is already completed?
  Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: The register is practically complete in the case of hotels, and of public-houses and beer-houses over £500 annual value, in which cases the annual licence value is an element in the calculation of the licence duty under the exsting law. I am not yet in a position to say when the Register as a whole will be completed.

  Outport Clerical Federation Petition.
  Mr. CHARLES DUNCANasked the First Lord of the Treasury whether he is aware that no reply has been received by the Admiralty and Outport Clerical Federation to the petition forwarded to the Admiralty in January, 1908, on behalf of the writing staff at the Admiralty and Royal dockyards; and whether, in view of the fact that the reply to this petition was included in the recommendations of the Macnamara Staffing Committee, which made its report in September, 1909, and that an announcement cannot be made pending the decision of the Government on the matter, he can fix a date by which the decision of the Government on the Committee's recommendations will be communicated to the petitioners?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: Certain proposals were made by the Admiralty in the course of last year which, having regard to the conditions of service of similar classes in other Departments, the Treasury did not feel able to sanction. Pending further communications on the subject, I am unable to fix a date for the announcement of the decision.

  Feeding of Necessitous Children Bill.
  Mr. RAMSAY MACDONALDasked the Prime Minister whether the Government will grant the necessary facilities for the passage of the Bill introduced by the hon. Member for West Bradford to legalise the feeding of necessitous children during holidays, in view of the simple character of the Bill and the measure of support behind it in this House?
  The PRIME MINISTER: No, Sir, I am afraid that, in existing circumstances, I cannot promise facilities for this or any other private Member's Bill.

  Motion for Adjournment (Rule Against Anticipation).
  Mr. FELLasked if the right hon. Gentleman proposes on Tuesday to again move that the Debate on the Motion for Adjournment over the Coronation Recess be not restricted by the rule against anticipation?
  The PRIME MINISTER: The answer is in the negative.
  Mr. FELL: Would it be possible to do this?
  The PRIME MINISTER: No, Sir; there is not the faintest reason for it. Last week we had a discussion on the Vote on

  27
  Account in Committee and on Report and on the Second Reading of the Consolidated Fund Bill. To-morrow the Third Reading of the Consolidated Fund Bill is down for discussion.

  Fall in "Gilt-Edged" Securities.
  Mr. FELLasked if the right hon. Gentleman's attention has been called to the fall in values of what are known as gilt-edged securities; and if, between 1st January, 1906, and 14th June, 1911, Consols have fallen 9¾ points and Irish Land Stock 10 points; and if he is aware that the necessity of writing down the values of the holdings of these stocks is diminishing the profits and taxing the resources of many sound financial concerns; and if he proposes to confer on the subject with the high financial authorities to obtain their opinion on the causes of the depreciation and the remedies to be taken to counteract them?
  Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: The answer to the first three questions is in the affirmative. As regards the fourth, I may say that I have kept in constant touch with the best-informed opinion on the subject, and I find that there is general agreement amongst those most competent to judge that the decline which has taken place in these and other gilt-edged securities during the period in question arises in the main from the continued operation of the same causes which brought about the still heavier and more rapid fall that took place in the prices of similar securities in the preceding period—e.g., between 1898 and 1906, when Consols fell 23 points, or an average of nearly three points a year, against an average of about 1½ points a year since 1906, and the old type of 2¾ per cent. Guaranteed Land Stock 22 points, or an average of 2¾ points a year against an average of about 1½ points for the new type (which only came into existence in 1904) since 1906. These causes were: (1) The general rise in the value of money, due to the enormous absorption of capital in warlike operations—more particularly the South African and Russo-Japanese wars; (2) Competition of Colonial Securities for Trustee Funds, resulting from the admission of these securities to the category of Trustee Investments by the Colonial Stock Act, 1900; (3) Heavy Government borrowing for Irish Land Purchase and (prior to 1906) for warlike operations, and also for other so-called "capital expenditure." The first cause
  28
  affected gilt-edged securities throughout the world. The second and third affected our own stocks more particularly. The second is very important, since (prior to 1900) home securities had the monopoly of trustee funds, under all trusts not specifically providing for investment otherwise. As regards remedial measures, I am advised that, so far as State action is concerned, the most important are the maintenance of adequate provision for the redemption of debt and the avoidance, as far as possible, of new borrowing. That steps have already been taken in these directions will be seen by comparison of the figures relating to debt reduction since the present Government came into power, and up to 31st March last, with those of the previous five years. From 1st April, 1906, to 31st March, 1911, there was a net redemption of debt amounting to £55,918,000, as compared with a net increase in the previous five years of £85,056,000. Even excluding that portion of the South African war debt created in the former period (namely, £92,000,000), the net decrease in that period was only £6,944,000. As regards new borrowing for services for which the Exchequer is directly responsible, the comparison is even more striking, namely, a reduction from £128,293,000 (or leaving War Debt out of account, from £36,293,000) in the first five-year period, to £13,500,000 in the second five-year period.
  Mr. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN: I will not attempt to cover the ground which the right hon. Gentleman has traversed in his answer, because it would be impossible for me to do so. I do not complain of the statement, but clearly it would not be becoming of me to argue it now. I wish to ask whether the right hon. Gentleman thinks it quite right to omit from his reasons for the fall in the price of Consols in the earlier period he has chosen for comparison with the later period, the final reduction of interest under Lord Goschen's conversion scheme, about which he did not say one word?
  Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: I have heard that statement made before, but surely everybody purchasing securities at that time would know perfectly well that he was purchasing with the knowledge that in a year or so his interest would be reduced to 2½ per cent. Consequently all that would be discounted, and the mere fact that for a year or two, or for two or three years at the outside, he would be receiving 2¾ per cent. interest as against

  29
  2½ per cent. would not make any appreciable difference in the price of the security.
  Mr. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN: Is that not precisely the reason why the price was falling in the earlier years?
  Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: No; the right hon. Gentleman is perfectly wrong. That would not affect the price during the years to which I have referred. Those are years when it was very well known that the interest was to be reduced to 2½ per cent.
  Mr. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN: Did not the right hon. Gentleman take as the beginning of his period the year 1898, and does he mean to say that the price of Consols at that time was not being affected and did not continue to be affected by the knowledge that there was to be a reduction of interest?
  Mr. FELL: May I ask whether the right hon. Gentleman can see no way of preventing this continuous drop in Consols and other gilt-edged securities which he says has taken place, considering all the steps he has taken have been in operation for some time and have had no effect?
  Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: The hon. Gentleman knows perfectly well the Colonial Trustee Investment Act is still in operation, and that is the really one substantial difference between our gilt-edged security and gilt-edged securities abroad. Prior to that Act British Trust Funds had to be invested in British securities, tout since then it has been possible to invest them in other securities. That is a continuing operation, and it must have an effect at the present time.
  Captain FABER: May I ask whether—
  Mr. SPEAKER: I think this is a subject more suitable for Debate.

  Old Age Pensions.
  Mr. GOLDSMITHasked whether under the National Insurance Bill any additional benefits received by an insured person from an approved society would be taken into account when calculating the means of that person's income under the Old Age Pensions Act?
  Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: There are nine classes of additional benefits specified in Part II. of Schedule 4, and I fear I cannot pronounce upon the interpretation of the Means Clauses of the Old Age Pensions Act in relation to each of the nine
  30
  within the limits of an answer to a Parliamentary question.
  Mr. WORTHINGTON-EVANS: Is it possible for the right hon. Gentleman to say whether any single one of these additional benefits will be excluded from the means of a person in calculating whether he is entitled to an old age pension or not?
  Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: If the hon. Gentleman will put a question down in reference to any one I shall be very happy to give him an answer.
  Mr. SCANLANasked if the Local Government Board have taken away from. Mrs. Margaret M'Gowan, of Gortnadrung, parish of Rossinver, barony of Cartbury, county Sligo, the old age pension allowed to her by the local pension committee, and which has been paid to her from 1st January, 1909, until the 21st May, 1911; and on what evidence the Local Government Board proceeded in annulling the decision of the pension committee?
  The CHIEF SECRETARY for IRELAND (Mr. Birrell): A question was raised by the pension officer concerning the pensioner's age and the Local Government Board on appeal decided that she had not attained the age of seventy years. The pensioner did not know the date of her birth, and could furnish no evidence of age. Her name did not appear in the return of her family in the Census of 1841 and her family could not be traced in the Census of 1851.
  Mr. SCANLANasked upon what grounds the Local Government Board stopped payment of the pension awarded to John Healy, of Carnamodda, county Sligo?
  Mr. BIRRELL: In this case a question as to the pensioner's age was raised by the pension officer, and on appeal the Local Government Board decided that Healy had not yet attained the age of seventy years. Healy was unable to furnish any evidence that he had reached the statutory age. His name did not appear in the return of his parents' family in the Census of 1841, while in the return of 1851 his age was given as nine years.

  Birkbeck Bank.
  Mr. GEORGE TERRELLasked the total amount of the depreciation on the stocks and shares which the Birkbeck Bank held on 28th April, 1909, and which it continued to hold on the date of its closing, the stocks and shares on both dates being respectively valued at current market rates?
  Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: I have made inquiries of the Board of Trade, and I am informed that the Birkbeek Bank, at the date of its closing, held a very large number of different stocks and shares; and to ascertain the total amount of depreciation on the stocks and shares which the Bank held on the 28th April, 1909, and which it continued to hold on the date of its closing, would entail a very considerable amount of labour. It is consequently impossible for me to give the answer to the hon. Member to-day. All the members of the Official Receiver's staff and all the officials of the Birkbeck Bank are at the present moment working at the highest pressure, but if the hon. Member will repeat his question on a future day, with ample notice, I shall be very glad to give him the information he desires.
  Mr. RUPERT GWYNNEasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what sum is estimated in the assets of the Birkbeck Bank and Building Society as being invested in land, buildings, and mortgages, and what sum in Consols?
  Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: Speaking in round figures, the sum estimated in the assets of the Birkbeck Bank and Building Society as being invested in land, buildings and mortgages is £1,430,000. This includes the bank premises. The Official Receiver reports to the Board of Trade that he hopes the whole of this sum will be realised in full, without any loss whatever. With regard to the amount of Consols held at the present time by the bank, I am informed that delicate negotiations for the sale of the whole of the securities of the bank are actually in progress, and both the Official Receiver and the special manager appointed by the Court think that it is undesirable, in the interest of the depositors, that the figures of any particular holding should be made public at the present moment.

  Maharaja of Benares.
  Sir JOHN JARDINEasked the Undersecretary of State for India whether any change of status has been effected in regard to the Maharaja of Benares and his relations with the Government of India; whether any territories have been constituted a native State and placed under his control; whether any change has been so operated in the status of the inhabitants of such territories; and whether legislation will be necessary?
  The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for WAR (Colonel Seely): My hon. Friend has asked me to reply to this and the following questions. The Maharaja of Benares has been established as a ruling chief, with full powers, subject to the suzerainty of his Majesty. Certain districts previously administered by the British Government have been constituted as a State and granted to his Highness under the restrictions and conditions necessary for safeguarding to their residents the rights and privileges which they have enjoyed under British administration. The residents in question have thereby become subjects of the State of Benares. The Secretary of State is advised that no legislation is necessary for these purposes.
  Sir JOHN JARDINE: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether it is the theory of the Government of India that such cessions of territory involving such change of status can be made without the authority of legislation in ordinary times of peace, I mean, when there is no question of actual war, or of the termination of war?
  Colonel SEELY: I am afraid I can hardly reply to a broad question of policy of that kind. I will tell my hon. Friend a question has been put, and no doubt he will give an answer.

  Deaths from Starvation in India.
  Mr. GINNELLasked the number of deaths of human beings from starvation in India in each of the last ten years and in the whole period?
  Colonel SEELY: The information asked for by the hon. Member is not forthcoming from the mortality returns of British India, as they do not show "starvation" as a separate cause of death. In times of famine special efforts have been made to secure a correct record of all deaths attributable directly to want of food, but without much success. In the 1907–8 famine in the United Provinces not more than eleven deaths were thus recorded. Famine mortality is due to the consequences of insufficient food, not to entire want of it.

  Plague in India.
  Mr. GINNELLasked of the six-and-a-half millions of human beings known to have died of plague in India within the last ten years, how many died of bubonic plague and how many of pneumonic

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  plague; and whether the Government propose to convene an international medical conference in India next winter to devise means of counteracting this scourge?
  Colonel SEELY: The returns of plague seizures in India do not distinguish cases where the symptoms are bubonic from those that take septicaemic or pneumonic forms. But it may be said that more than 90 per cent. of the cases take the bubonic form. There is no intention of convening an international medical conference in India to deal with the question of plague prevention. The scientific problems have already been elucidated by the Joint Commission organised by the Royal Society and the Lister Institute, and the practical application of the Commission's discoveries is a matter for the Indian Government.

  Irish-Cured Herrings and Mackerel.
  Mr. BOLANDasked the Chief Secretary for Ireland whether, in view of the proposed adoption of an official brand for Irish-cured herrings and mackerel, the Department will take the necessary steps to utilise the Irish national trade mark for this purpose?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The Irish national trade mark has not been utilised for the purpose referred to. While the national trade mark indicates origin, the official brands for Irish-cured herrings are mainly required to indicate quality, size, and packing. The Department of Agriculture are taking advantage of Section 62 of the Trade Marks Act, 1905, to register their proposed brands.
  Mr. BOLAND: Would it not be possible to incorporate in the proposed brand the Irish national trade mark?
  Mr. BIRRELL: I do not think it is a question of patriotism, but of business. It is much better herrings should have a mark, not of their origin, but of their quality, size, and packing.

  Intermediate Education Board (Ireland).
  Mr. BOLANDasked whether in the recently issued rules of the Intermediate Board, any and, if so, what changes have been made from those issued last year, in which the Irish language was penalised and preference was given to German; and whether, in the awarding of exhibitions, any discrimination is now made against those students who elect to be examined In Irish?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The division of the modern literary course into two sections, to which the hon. Member and others objected as unfair to Irish, will cease to exist under the new rules. In the year 1912 students may present themselves for exhibitions in a group of four honour subjects, two at least of which shall be selected from French, German, Irish, or Latin. The maximum marks allotted to each of these honour subjects is the same.
  Mr. BOLAND: Can I take it, therefore, that any discrimination against Irish is now being removed?
  Mr. BIRRELL: Certainly, there is no discrimination. The candidates will have their selection from French, German, Irish, or Latin.

  National Commissioners of Education (Ireland).
  Mr. LONSDALEasked the Chief Secretary if his attention has been called to the violation of Rules 105 (a) and 108 (b) of the National Commissioners of Education, whereby teachers are deprived of increases of salary to which they are entitled on promotion to a higher grade; if he is aware that the National Commissioners are in favour of the abolition of the standard numbers test, which has been applied in these cases; and if he will represent to the Treasury the hardship of the present arrangement and urge them to provide the small sum per annum to enable this grievance to be removed?
  Mr. BIRRELL: My attention has been frequently called to this matter. In the case of a considerable number of teachers promoted to the First Class it is impossible to give a corresponding increase of salary at once as the number of teachers receiving the higher rate of salary is limited. The Commissioners of National Education have more than once suggested such a re-adjustment as would permit of promoted teachers receiving the higher salaries at once, but this might ultimately entail a very considerable charge, and I am not prepared to press it upon the Treasury at present having regard to the concessions which I have recently obtained from them for the benefit of Irish Education.

  Alleged Intimidation and Assault (Curraclough, County Cork).
  Mr. NEWMANasked the Chief Secretary whether his attention has been drawn to the case of a farmer named Richard

  35
  Kingston, residing at Curraclough, Lissarda, county Cork, who, with his family and servants, has been boycotted at the instigation of the local branch of the United Irish League for the past eighteen months, the reason alleged for the boycott being that Kingston refuses to surrender a farm which he has occupied for thirty years, and which he has recently purchased outright under the Land Act of 1903; and, seeing that Kingston is now under permanent police protection and unable to purchase the necessaries of life for himself and his family, will he state what action he proposes to take?
  Mr. BIRRELL: Summonses have been issued against a number of persons for intimidation and assault in connection with this matter and are to be heard tomorrow. It is not desirable to discuss the case while these summonses are pending.
  Mr. NEWMAN: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman if it is a fact that the petty sessions court before which the case will be tried contains at least two members of the United Irish League?
  Mr. BIRRELL: I really cannot tell what may foe the relations of all the members of these petty sessions. All I know is the court is sitting to-morrow.

  Land Purchase (Ireland).
  Mr. SCANLANasked whether it has come to the knowledge of the Congested Districts Board, in connection with the estate of the late Colonel Parke, Dunally, county Sligo, that Mr. Hewson, the agent, has been endeavouring to dispose of part of this estate to a tenant farmer named Armstrong, who already owns an economic holding; whether the part of the estate which the agent is endeavouring to dispose of is at present, as well as a house situated upon it, in the occupation of J. Hever, who has occupied a house on this estate for over fifty years; and whether, in view of the nature of the proposed sale, which would necessitate the ejectment of Hever and his family, the Congested Districts Board will take steps to prevent the proposed sale, and to secure the whole of this estate for the relief of congestion?
  Mr. BIRRELL: I am informed by the Congested Districts Board that Mr. Parke contemplates selling one detached field of about twelve acres to an adjoining farmer, but they have no information as to the name of this farmer or the nature of his holding. As the proposed sale is not under
  36
  the Land Purchase Acts the Board have no power to interfere. The Board have under consideration the question of purchasing this estate.
  Mr. SCANLAN: In view of the fact that the estate is situated in a congested area will the right hon. Gentleman represent the facts to the Congested Districts Board and ask them to take means to compulsorily acquire the whole of this estate, including that portion which the landlord desires to sell privately?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The Congested Districts Board have full knowledge of all the details of this estate.
  Mr. SCANLANasked whether the Congested Districts Board have made offers for the purchase of the Jones estate and the Hippsley-Sullivan estate, situated at Grange, county Sligo; whether the offers have been accepted; and, if not accepted, what steps the Board propose to take for the acquisition of these estates?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The Congested Districts Board have decided to make an offer for the estate of Captain H. H. Jones, comprising certain townlands in the parish of Easky. The Hippsley and Sullivan estate has been offered for sale to the Board, and a decision will be come to regarding the purchase of the property as soon as practicable.
  Mr. LONSDALEasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he is aware that, notwithstanding the decision of Mr. Justice Barton in Lynders estate (Irish Reports (1) 1910, page 231) that the signing of an. agreement under the Land Purchase Acts does not determine the tenancy, nevertheless the Commissioners of Inland Revenue in Ireland are valuing the farms of deceased farmers who have signed agreements to purchase, but who have not had their farms vested before their death, on the basis of a purchased farm instead of being valued in accordance with Sub-section(l)of Section 61 of the Finance (1909–10) Act, 1910; and, seeing that though valuing the farm on the basis of a purchased farm they decline to give the representatives of the deceased the benefits of Sub-section (3) of Section 61 of the Finance (1909–10) Act, 1910, relating to the payment of duty by instalments owing to the vesting order not having been made and the purchase completed, will he state what action he will take?
  Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: The Commissioners of Inland Revenue hold that a

  37
  farmer, who has signed an agreement to purchase under the Land Purchase Acts, although he remains the legal tenant, is nevertheless, in addition, equitable owner of the fee of the purchased farm, subject to the tenancy. He is the real beneficial owner, and the case, therefore, does not fall within Sub-section (1) of Section 61 of the Finance (1909–10) Act, 1910. The benefits of Sub-section (2) of that section would, however, be given to such a case.

  Local Government Elections (Ireland).
  Mr. GINNELLasked the Chief Secretary whether the Irish Local Government Board took any action on the public notice given them to secure the secrecy of the ballot at the recent local government elections; whether they are now convinced of the impropriety of appointing as returning officers county officials interested in the return of particular candidates; whether the Board still sustain those officials unless an action is brought; how many complaints have been received within the last three weeks, notwithstanding this attitude of the Board; and if he will state the result of the complaint relating to the county council election in the Cooraclare Division of Clare?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The Local Government Board have no jurisdiction to enforce the provisions of the Ballot Act with regard to the preservation of the secrecy of the ballot. The appointment of returning officers is vested in the county councils, who are at liberty to appoint either their own officials or such other persons as they desire. It is customary during the progress of each election for the Board to receive complaints from persons who are dissatisfied with the conduct of the elections, and this year has been no exception. The Board have, however, no jurisdiction to inquire into such complaints, as the conduct of the elections can only be questioned on election petition, and they replied to this effect in the case of the complaints made to them as to the proceedings in connection with the election of county councillors for the County Electoral Division of Cooraclare.

  Public Libraries Act (Ireland).
  Mr. PATRICK WHITEasked the Irish Secretary if the amount leviable in Belfast under the Public Libraries Acts exceeds annually the sum of £11,900; whether the total amount leviable in Dublin is about £3,750 annually; and what
  38
  steps he proposes to take to place on terms of equality the reading citizens of Dublin and Belfast?
  Mr. BIRRELL: I understand that the figures mentioned in the question are approximately correct. I am informed that the Library rate for the City of Belfast in the current year amounts to l½d. in the pound. The Libraries Bill at present before the House empowers Dublin and other county boroughs to levy a rate of like amount.
  Captain CRAIG: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the standard of education in Belfast is much higher than in other parts of Ireland?
  Mr. BIRRELL: No, Sir.
  Mr. PATRICK WHITEasked the Irish Secretary whether the Corporation of Belfast is empowered for the purposes of the Public Libraries Acts to make a levy of 2d. in the £; whether the Corporation of Dublin is limited to a levy of 1d. in the £; and whether he will take steps to remove the disparity in the provisions for the reading public in the two cities, having regard to the desire of the citizens of Dublin in favour of enlarged powers and extended facilities exceeding even those of Belfast?
  Mr. BIRRELL: In the case of Belfast the extension to 2d. was authorised by a local Act, and I am not aware that there is any desire on the part of the Corporation of Dublin to have any further extension of the limit beyond that provided by the Bill at present before the House.
  Mr. PATRICK WHITEasked whether in the Local Government Bill, 1908, power was given to corporations, town commissioners, and urban and rural district councils to levy an additional 1d. in the £ for the purposes of public libraries; and whether in any legislation relating to public libraries those bodies will be empowered to make a minimum levy of 1d. in the £?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The Bill of 1908 authorised an increase of 1d. in the rate leviable for the purposes of public libraries, subject to the approval of the Local Government Board. As regards the latter part of the question the authorities referred to have general powers to levy a maximum rate of 1d. in the £, but there is no intention of making this rate a minimum rate.

  Army Pensions and Bonuses.
  Mr. FALLEasked the Under-Secretary of State for War if Peter Williams was discharged from the Hampshire Regiment in 1888 after over twenty-one years' service, character very good, and a pension of 1s. 1d. per diem; that he then in 1889 entered the Army Ordnance Department at Tipnor, and was discharged in 1909 without receiving the bonus he considered due to him after twenty years' service; and if he will consider Williams's claim to this bonus?
  Colonel SEELY: I find on inquiry that Peter Williams is not entitled to receive any gratuity under the Superannuation Acts.

  Declaration of London.
  Mr. BUTCHERasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether, in view of the fact that the question of the legality of the conversion of merchantmen into warships on the high seas is left unsettled by the Declaration of London, the International Prize Court, when established, would not, under the Hague Conference of 1907, be entitled and bound to decide all questions relating to such conversion in accordance with what the majority of that Court might conceive to be the general principles of justice and equity; and whether such decisions of the International Prize Court would not be binding upon and enforced against British subjects; and whether His Majesty's Government still adhere to their expressed views that, in the event of an International Prize Court being established and the Declaration of London being ratified, our position as regards questions left unsettled by the Declaration will be the same as it has hitherto been?
  The UNDER-SECRETARY for FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Mr. McKinnon Wood): It is impossible to discuss these complicated matters within the limits of the reply to a question, but the subject will be dealt with fully in debate within a very short time.
  Mr. BUTCHER: In view of the forthcoming debate on the Naval Prize Bill and the Declaration of London, is it not right that Parliament and the country should know the views of the Government before the debate comes on?
  Mr. McKINNON WOOD: The views of the Government will be clearly expressed on that occasion.
  Mr. BUTCHER: Cannot the hon. Gentleman give an answer to a comparatively simple question?
  Mr. McKINNON WOOD: No discourtesy was intended in my reply. I have tried to give an answer, but I could not reply to the question in less than ten minutes.
  Captain CRAIG: Do not the Government change their views from day to day?
  Mr. McKINNON WOOD: No, Sir.
  Major ANSTRUTHER-GRAY: Is it not worth while spending ten minutes in order to elucidate the views of the Government?
  Mr. BUTCHERasked which, if any, of the Powers represented at the London Naval Conference have up to the present time ratified the Declaration?
  Mr. McKINNON WOOD: The Declaration has not yet been ratified by any Power.
  Mr. BUTCHER: Have any other Powers acceded to the Declaration?
  Mr. McKINNON WOOD: All the Powers that were parties to the International Conference have signed the Declaration.
  Mr. BUTCHER: But have any of the Powers not party to the International Conference acceded to the Declaration?
  Mr. McKINNON WOOD: I must ask for notice of that.
  Mr. BUTCHER: How many years will have to elapse before the Declaration can be amended?
  Mr. SPEAKER: That is a question of which notice should be given.
  Mr. BUTCHERasked the Prime Minister whether, in view of Article 69 of the Declaration of London, which provides that none of the signatory Powers can denounce the Declaration until the end of a period of twelve years, beginning sixty days after the first deposit of ratifications, this country will not, during that period, be deprived of all right to insist on any improvements in the Declaration; and whether, in view of these facts, he adheres to his statement at the Imperial Conference, on 2nd June, 1911, that, by ratifying the Declaration of London now, His Majesty's Government did not in the least prejudice their freedom of action in regard to advocating further improvements in the future; and whether His

  41
  Majesty's Government attach any value to their alleged freedom of action in regard to advocating such improvements?
  The PRIME MINISTER: I see no reason to qualify in any way the statement referred to. The great advance in international law and practice marked by the Declaration of London is happily secured for a fixed term of years. That provision does not at all preclude any of the parties to the Declaration from advocating still further progress in the way of international agreement, and our freedom of action is, in the opinion of His Majesty's Government, not less valuable than it was before.
  Mr. BUTCHER: Does the right hon. Gentleman anticipate any other Powers will accept an improvement in the Declaration, and, if so, cannot that be provided for before ratification of the Declaration rather than after?
  The PRIME MINISTER: No, Sir, the Declaration is such a substantial advance that we heartily desire its ratification at the earliest possible moment.
  Mr. NEWMANrepeated his suggestion that this Debate should not be conducted on party lines.

  Payment of Poor Law Guardians.
  Mr. NEWMANasked the President of the Local Government Board whether he is aware that resolutions have recently been passed by the Toxteth Park and Holborn Board of Guardians to the effect that, owing to the exacting nature of their duties, it was desirable that each guardian should be paid a salary of not less than £150 per annum; whether he has received similar resolutions from any other boards of guardians; and will he say whether the payment of salaries for those holding the office of guardian could be made a charge on rates by the sanction of the Local Government Board?
  Mr. BURNS: I have received a resolution from the Toxteth Park Board of Guardians and from one or two other boards in favour of the payment of guardians for their services. The answer to the last part of the question is in the negative.

  Customs Port Clerks.
  Sir HENRY KIMBERasked the Secretary to the Treasury whether he is aware that the Customs Port Clerks have hitherto proceeded to the highest appointments
  42
  in the Customs service without further examination, and that the number of appointments with a minimum salary in excess of £300 per annum now held by Customs Port Clerks who have so proceeded is approximately 40.3 per cent. of those below, even excluding the appointments in the Secretaries' and Accountant and Comptroller-General's Offices, while the corresponding percentages for the Customs outdoor department, Excise clerks, and Excise outdoor department are 7 per cent., 15.3 per cent., and 8.2 per cent, respectively; whether, in the amalgamation of the Customs and Excise services, provision will be made to preserve to Customs Port Clerks this same relative superiority; and whether the percentages for the Customs Port Clerks and the Customs outdoor, if collectorships be left out of the calculation in each case, are 31.1 per cent. and 6.8 per cent., respectively.
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: This matter is under the consideration of the Amalgamation Committee, and I am unable to make any statement in advance of their report.

  Finance Act, 1907 (Irish Clergymen).
  Mr. LONSDALEasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if clergymen in Ireland are deprived of the relief granted by Subsection 7 (b) of Section 19 of the Finance Act, 1907, because surveyors of taxes hold that the occupancy of a manse or rectory is not part of the emoluments of office; and if he will direct that fresh instructions shall be issued to surveyors of taxes, so as to ensure that clergymen shall get the relief intended by the Finance Act, 1907?
  Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: I am not aware that the relief granted by the Sub-section referred to has been refused to any individual who is entitled thereto; but if the hon. Member will furnish me with particulars of a specific case I will cause inquiry to be made.

  Murder of Indian Official.
  Mr. CHARLES ROBERTSasked for information with reference to the murder of Mr. Ashe at Manizachi.
  Colonel SEELY: A telegram was received at the India Office last night to the effect that Mr. Ashe, collector at Tinnevelly, was shot in the chest by a Brahmin on the morning of the 17th June while sitting in a railway carriage with his wife and shortly afterwards died. The

  43
  murderer took refuge in an adjoining building and finally shot himself. The motive of the murder is unknown. The murderer has not been identified.

QUESTION OF PRIVILEGE.

  COAL MINES REGULATION BILL.
  Mr. EUGENE WASON: I desire your ruling, Sir, on a point of Order which I venture to think affects the rights and privileges of hon. Members of this House. In Grand Committee B, which is considering the Coal Mines Regulation Bill, last Thursday the hon. Member for Mid-Lanark (Mr. Whitehouse) called the attention of the Committee to a letter which he had received enclosed with one from Mr. Robert Baird, and the enclosure contained reflections upon two hon. Members of this House, the hon. Member for the Mansfield Division of Nottingham (Mr. Markham) and the hon. and learned Member for North-West Durham (Mr. Atherley-Jones). In the letter the writer described himself as the secretary to the Associated Coal Owners of Scotland, and in the enclosure it was stated with reference to the remarks made by Messrs. Markham and Atherley-Jones—
  "It is quite evident that these gentlemen have either wilfully or ignorantly misrepresented the position of Scotland in respect of accidents."
  Is it not a breach of the privileges of this House that hon. Members should be accused in a Grand Committee upstairs of either wilfully or ignorantly misrepresenting the position. I am directed, Sir, as Chairman of the Committee, to bring the matter to your attention, which I have done at the earliest possible moment, and I shall be glad of your ruling.
  Mr. SPEAKER: I do not think it will be necessary for me to give any formal ruling on the matter if I read to the House a letter which I have received to-day, and which I think the Committee and the House will probably consider satisfactory. It is dated 16th June, and addressed to the Speaker. It is as follows:—
  "'At the meeting of the Grand Committee B which took place yesterday, attention was called to a document which had been sent to some members of the Committee by Mr. Robert Baird, as secretary of the Associated Coal Owners of Scotland.
  "In this document was a statement containing the following sentence:
  "It is quite evident that these gentlemen (Messrs. Markham and Atherley-Jones) have either wilfully or ignorantly misrepresented the position of Scotland in respect of accidents.'
  "This statement had been originally prepared for the information of the members of our associations and had not been intended for general circulation.
  "At the last moment it was decided to include it with other documents issued to members of the Grand Committee on the Scottish Coal Owners behalf. By inadvertence the expression now complained of was not deleted.
  "I desire as Chairman of the Scottish Coal Owners' Committee, frankly and unreservedly to withdraw it, and to express regret that it was circulated.
  "I have the honour to be,
  "Right Honorable Sir,
  "Your obedient Servant,
  "JAMES J. FORGIE."
  Under these circumstances probably the House and the Committee will rest satisfied with the apology which has been made and will not wish to carry the matter further.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
Sir HENRY DALZIEL: I do not know whether it will be for the general convenience of Members if the Prime Minister will tell us how many items of the Agenda he wishes to dispose of to-day?.
The PRIME MINISTER: I am told by my right hon. Friend who has charge of the business that we ought to get the orders down to and including the Second Reading of the Old Age Pensions (No. 3) Bill, and also the Committee on Labourers (Ireland) [Advances, etc.], and the Second Reading of the Board of Education Scheme (Alnwick Corporation Payment) Confirmation Bill [Lords.]
NEW MEMBER SWORN.—James Ian Macpherson, esquire, for the combined counties of Ross and Cromarty.

BILLS PRESENTED.
  DISEASES OF ANIMALS. CONSOLIDATION BILL.
  "To consolidate enactments relating to the Diseases of Animals; and for other purposes incidental thereto," presented by Mr. GEORGE GREENWOOD; supported by Sir David Brynmor Jones, Mr. Dickinson, Mr. Llewelyn Williams, and Mr. White-house; to be read a second time upon Monday, 3rd July, and to be printed.

  MINISTRY OF LABOUR BILL.
  "To establish a Minister of Labour for the better organisation of the labour market, for the prevention of unemployment, to regulate and in certain cases prohibit child labour, and to establish a general minimum wage for adult workers,"

  45
  presented by Mr. LANSBURY; supported by Mr. Keir Hardie, Mr. Barnes, Mr. Jowett, and Mr. Snowden; to be read a second time upon Tuesday, 4th July, and to be printed.

CONSOLIDATED FUND (No. 2) BILL.
Considered in Committee; reported without Amendment; to be read the third time to-morrow (Tuesday).

TELEPHONE TRANSFER (CONSOLIDATED FUND, ETC.).
Considered in Committee.
(IN THE COMMITTEE.)
[Mr. EMMOTT in the Chair.]
4.0 P.M.
The POSTMASTER-GENERAL (Mr. Herbert Samuel)The POSTMASTER-GENERAL (Mr. Herbert Samuel) moved, "That it is expedient to authorise the Treasury to advance out of the Consolidated Fund—

(a) Such sums as may be necessary for paying the cash portion of the purchase money of the Undertaking of the National Telephone Company, and a sum, not exceeding £4,000,000, for the further development of the telephone system;

(b) To issue terminable annuities or Exchequer Bonds for paying off that portion of the purchase money which is not payable in cash, and to borrow by means of terminable annuities for the purpose of providing the money necessary for any advance out of, or in payment to, the Consolidated Fund;

(c) To provide for the payment of superannuation allowances to transferred officers out of moneys provided by Parliament, and for the payment of terminable annuities and the principal of and interest on any Exchequer Bonds out of moneys provided by Parliament for Post Office services, and if these moneys are insufficient, out of the Consolidated Fund."

The Resolution which I now move, and the Telephone Transfer Bill, to be founded on that Resolution, will enable the accomplishment of a very great transaction to take place, the transfer to the State of the business of the National Telephone Company, a great corporation, with £6,000,000 of capital, employing some 18,000 men and women, and supplying for the use of the public about half-a-million
46
telephone instruments. I think it will be for the convenience of the Committee if I make a statement now in moving this Money Resolution—a formal stage, but one which might be questioned and opposed if no statement were made now—in lieu of making a statement on the occasion of the First Heading of the Bill. This is the consummation of a policy which was decided upon in 1905 by the Government of that day, when the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Austen Chamberlain) was Chancellor of the Exchequer and the present Lord Derby was Postmaster-General. At that time the policy of transfer to the State of the whole telephone business of the country was sanctioned by Parliament. I think it will conduce to brevity if I make a brief statement of the events which led up to the measure which I now present to Parliament. In 1880 the telephone was first introduced as a practical means of communication, and various companies were formed to develop its use. Previous to that date Parliament had by statute conferred on the Postmaster-General a monopoly of electrical communication from place to place, and the courts held that this monopoly covered electrical communication, not only by telegraph instruments, but also by instruments subsequently invented, which were termed telephones. Licences were, however, granted by the then Postmaster-General to the various companies on payment of a royalty, the licences then or subsequently granted having to expire on 31st December, 1911. The original companies amalgamated from time to time, and in 1889 this process of amalgamation was completed, and the National Telephone Company, as we now know it, was formed with a monopoly of the telephone business of the country, except so far as the Post Office had at that time a few provincial exchanges open serving comparatively a small number of subscribers.
In 1896 the Post Office purchased all the trunk wires provided for the joining of the various great towns of the country together by the National Telephone Company, and has since that time exclusively worked them. In 1899 Parliament authorised such municipalities as desired to do so, to compete in the telephone business and start systems of their own. In 1902 the Post Office opened exchanges in a large part of London, which have since had very considerable development. In the year previous to that the Post Office had agreed with the National Telephone Company that at the end of that com-

47
pany's licence, that is on 31st December of this year, the Post Office would purchase the company's plant in London on certain terms. That agreement was discussed in the House of Commons and was approved. In 1905 an agreement was made on the same lines covering all the rest of the country, and it is that agreement which now comes to be consummated. At that time, in 1905, there were various alternatives before the Government of the day and before Parliament. Things could not possibly have been left precisely as they were. The company's licence running out in six years, it was necessary to provide against the events which would occur when the licence terminated. One alternative would have been to leave the service in the hands of the company, and to promise them an extension of their licence when their original licence terminated, but it was held, and I feel convinced for my own part, it was wisely held, that it would be wrong to leave a service which had become so essential to the social and commercial life of the country in private hands, uncontrolled—a service which in its nature is a monopoly, which can be most conveniently and economically worked as a monopoly in any district in the hands of one authority. The second alternative would have been for the Post Office from that time forth, during the intervening six years, to create a great alternative plant of its own throughout the country, and at the end of the company's licence, to use that plant in lieu of the company's plant, the whole of the company's plant being thrown aside and discarded and not purchased by the State. It was felt that that would be a great waste of what is, in fact, a valuable national asset, and that, if that were done, there would be no inducement of any kind to the company to keep its plant up to date, to provide for development during the interval, and to arrange for continuity of service at the end of the company's licence. Consequently the Government of that time entered into a draft agreement with the company to purchase the plant on equitable terms, a course allowing for the development of the system meanwhile, and for continuity of the service to the public on the occasion of transfer.
The substance of that agreement was as follows, that on the date of the termination of the licence, that is 31st December next, unless the Postmaster-General fixes
48
a later date, and I may say there is no intention of fixing a later date, when the business of the company came to an end, and when it legally could not carry on its business any longer, the Postmaster-General should purchase the plant, which includes land and buildings, at its value in situ, no payment being made for goodwill, no payment being made for past or future profits, and no payment being made in respect of compulsory purchase. These were the provisions inserted, because the company's business, as I say, existed solely by virtue of the licence held from the Postmaster-General, and if things were left to take their course, the whole business would come to a sudden stop on 31st December, 1911. Therefore, it was by no means inequitable that the plant should be purchased on what is generally known as tramway terms. The Postmaster-General was given, by the agreement, the right to object to any portion of the plant on one of two grounds, either that it had not been provided according to agreed specifications, or that it was unsuitable for the actual requirements of the Post Office system on 31st December of this year. The precise interpretation of these words is now under consideration by the courts. Goodwill payments, however, under the agreement had to be made in respect of private wire service provided by the company which was not provided by virtue of any licence of the Postmaster-General— that is to say, wires connecting premises, or parts of premises, belonging to the same parties. Goodwill payment has to be made in respect of this equal to the profits of the last three years. Also there-is the special case of Portsmouth and Brighton, where the company's licence under the Act of 1899 had to be extended till 1926, and goodwill payments may be claimed in respect to that period.
Mr. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN: I suppose these extensions were because the municipality was given a licence running over the term?
Mr. HERBERT SAMUEL: Yes, it was because the municipalities of Brighton and Portsmouth had started systems of their own with licences terminable in 1926. The Act passed in 1899 provided that where municipal licences were granted to run beyond the year 1911, the licence of the company was also to be extended for an equal period, and that on the occasion of the purchase goodwill payments could be required in respect of that period of exten-

49
sion. That applies only to these two cases. The value of the plant was to be ascertained by agreement, or, failing agreement, by the Railway and Canal Commission. This draft document was presented to the House by the then Postmaster-General, and was referred by the House to a Select Committee in that year, 1905, which carefully investigated the whole question, heard evidence from the Post Office, the company, and other parties, and ultimately presented to the House a report approving the agreement, with some slight modifications, which were thereupon embodied in the agreement. The question was debated in the House of Commons in that year on the report of the Committee, and the House acquiesced in the terms of the agreement. Recently preparations have, of course, been made between the company and the Post Office for carrying this agreement into effect, according to the letter and the spirit of its provisions. A joint inventory has been proceeding for some time of the plant of the company—a vast undertaking, as the Committee will understand—but there is, I regret to say, little or indeed no prospect of an agreement being arrived at between the two parties as to the value to be attached to the plant. The divergence of view between the company and the Post Office is so great that no negotiation is likely to bridge the gulf, and it is fully anticipated that the matter will have to be referred —as provided in the agreement—to the Railway and Canal Commission to determine the precise amount of money to be paid to the company for its plant, on tramway terms. Clause 1 of the Bill which I shall introduce if this Resolution is accepted will authorise the Treasury to borrow to pay the sum awarded by the Railway and Canal Commission, as the amount due to the National Telephone Company in accordance with the agreement which was sanctioned by the House of Commons six years ago.
There will also be a provision in the Bill relating to a sum, which amounts to about £1,600,000, which is in the hands of the National Telephone Company, and which represents subscriptions paid in advance by telephone subscribers. This sum has been gradually accumulating year after year, and has been invested by the company in its own business, and, of course, it has paid for part of the plant which we shall purchase. This sum of £1,600,000 must be handed over by the company in cash to the Post Office on the occasion of the transfer, and it is proposed
50
that the Post Office shall do as the company has done, that is to say, use this. sum of money as part of the capital invested in the business, and thereby save borrowing on the market to an equal extent, and save interest and sinking fund on the amount. This will be a benefit to the subscribers of the National Telephone Company, whose money it will really be; strictly speaking, which is being so used; because pro tanto it will cheapen the cost of running the service by reducing the amount payable on interest and sinking fund and will thereby pro tanto enable subscriptions to be lower. The agreement requires that one-fourth of the purchase money shall be paid in cash by the Postmaster-General to the company, and this sum of £1,600,000 will be used as a set off against the sum payable in cash to the company. It is necessary that a Clause dealing with this particular point should appear in the Bill, and that is why I mention it at this stage. The Post Office has been taking very active steps for some time past with a view to equipping itself for the conduct of this great addition to its existing business. It is, of course, highly essential in the interest of the commercial community, and, indeed, in the interest of the whole community, that our telephone service should be managed as efficiently and as economically as it conceivably can be. In spite of some little irritation which occasionally attaches to the use of the telephone, I think that very few of us would desire to be without the telephone altogether. Its value can best be gauged by imagining the extreme inconvenience which would be caused if it were absent. It shows the rapidity with which our civilisation advances on the mechanical side that an equipment which thirty years ago was unknown is now considered to be absolutely indispensable.
The Post Office has had considerable experience for some years past in the management of the telephone through the development of its own system. When the trunk wires were bought from the company in 1896 they were purchased for the sum of £450,000. The Post Office has invested in the development of trunk wires an additional sum of nearly £5,000,000, and, although I am far indeed from claiming that the trunk wire system is by any means perfect—I look to a very large development, extension, and quickening of the trunk wire system—still I think there will be a general consensus of opinion that in the last few years it has shown considerable improvement on the system as it previously

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existed. It is frequently the custom to compare our trunk wire system with that of the United States, and it must be admitted that between some of the large cities of the United States there is a rapidity of service which has not yet been attained in the United Kingdom. But, on the other hand, it should be remembered that the charge made for the use of the trunk wire service in the United States varies between 250 and 300 per cent. more than the charge made in this country, and that it would be easy for us to give a service as rapid—or what is called a no delay service—in the United Kingdom if we were allowed to charge 5s. a call between London and Liverpool, which would be more or less equivalent to the American charge. Another £5,000,000 has been spent by the Post Office on the rest of the Post Office telephone system in London and the provinces. We have now over 100,000 telephones connected with the Post Office system. Again, though there is much room for improvement in the future, there has been a degree of improvement in the past, and especially in the recent past, which holds out the hope that further improvement will accrue in years to come. The number of telephones belonging both to the Post Office and the Company ten years ago was 200,000. There are now 600,000, but this number is quite inadequate to our population. The telephone system in my view and in the view of my Department can be considered as being in little more than its infancy, and we look forward to multiplying the existing number two, three, or four-fold in the not distant future. We are providing for a very large development subsequent to the transfer. The Treasury is already empowered under existing statutes to spend another £2,000,000, which has not yet been borrowed—that is to say, there are £2,000,000 of unexhausted borrowing powers remaining. In the Bill I propose to ask for power being given to the Treasury to raise as occasion requires an additional sum of £4,000,000, over and above what is required to purchase the National Telephone Company's plant, for future developments of the trunk service and the local service where it may be found that profitable extensions can be made.
We have been very closely watching the development of the telephone system in the United States—the country which was its original home, and where it has
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reached its highest development. For many years representatives of my Department have been visiting the United States in order to acquire information there. The head of the telephone branch of the Post Office has been to the United States, and the chief engineer has also made an exhaustive study of the telephone system there. The telephone traffic managers have only just returned. We have established a system of travelling scholarships for Post Office engineers which will enable them to go over to the United States for considerable periods in order to make a minute study of the telephone in that country. The Secretary of the Post Office recently visited Sweden, and we are contemplating visits by other officers to that country where telephony is so widespread and provided at remarkably cheap rates. We are also going to experiment with automatic and semi-automatic exchanges. We recognise in this work that this is a highly specialised business which certainly cannot be conducted on routine methods, and we are very much on our guard against the possibility of the future progress of telephony in England being hampered by what may be called the dead hand of the State. Certainly the system will not be thrown into the routine of the Post Office Department. We are on our guard against over-centralisation. The responsible officers in the districts will be given a large measure of local control, and we mean to use to the full the experience and capacity of the company's staff in connection with work in which they are experts. The company's managers will be kept at telephone work, and they will be given a very large measure of discretion in their own sphere.
It has been said that the Post Office is not to be trusted with the management of this business, because Post Office inefficiency has been proved by the fact that our telegraphs are worked at a loss which now amounts to about £1,000,000 a year. If there was anything in that doctrine by itself, it could be easily countered by the argument that Post Office efficiency is proved by the fact that our postal service is conducted at a profit of about £5,000,000 a year. As a matter of fact neither is inefficiency proved in the one case nor efficiency in the other if the results are merely viewed from the point of view of total figures. There are other factors of great importance which have to be taken into account in forming an estimate of that character. The loss on the telegraphs is

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due to four causes. In the first place there are the low Press rates which are quite unremunerative, and which were granted by Act of Parliament at the time of the transfer of the telegraph business to the State. These very low Press rates account for a loss of about £200,000 a year, and it is sometimes amusing to read newspaper articles asserting that the inefficiency of the Post Office is proved by the telegraph loss, and that therefore the telephones ought not to be entrusted to our hands, when the fact is that under Parliamentary pressure we gave unduly low Press rates. These same newspapers are at this moment enjoying the unremunerative rates which they would be very unwilling to surrender.
Sir HENRY DALZIEL: Can the right hon. Gentleman give the name of one newspaper?
Mr. HERBERT SAMUEL: I could give sheaves of cuttings.
Sir HENRY DALZIEL: Give me one.
Mr. HERBERT SAMUEL: Many newspapers have taken the course of arguing that the telephones ought to be transferred to something in the nature of a telephone authority instead of the Post Office, as a telephone authority would be less amenable to Parliamentary pressure, whereas the Post Office is amenable to such pressure, the result of which has been a loss of £1,000,000 a year on the telegraphs. Secondly, we have deliberately extended the telegraph system in the rural districts for general purposes of national development in a way that a commercial company would not have done. It has been done with the sanction of Parliament and by various Governments with their eyes open, knowing that a loss would accrue, but believing that it was well to spend some part of our postal surplus in incurring that loss rather than leave the rural districts unprovided with telegraphic facilities. Thirdly, when the telegraphs were on the point of paying their way, and when the earlier deficits were being made good, the House of Commons stepped in and rejected, a good many years ago, the advice of the Postmaster-General of that day, and insisted on a system of sixpenny telegrams which are in very many cases unremunerative, and which account for a considerable portion of the loss. But even sixpenny telegrams might have been made to pay in the course of time if it had not been for the intervention of the fourth consideration, namely, the development of
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the telephone itself, which has been actively fostered by the Post Office, and the effect of which has been to take away a most remunerative part of the business— the short distance telegrams between different parts of the same towns.
Telegraphy has completely altered its character in recent years. The bulk of the telegrams used to be telegrams despatched short distances, but now the bulk of telegrams are becoming more and more telegrams which are sent over long stretches of the country, and which are not of a remunerative character at the sixpenny rate. When the average cost of dealing with a telegram now as compared with twenty years ago is considered, you find that a telegram dealt with now is a different thing from what it was twenty years ago owing to the advent of telephony. The fact that there has been a loss on the telegraphs is not due to inefficiency, but it is owing to the operation of these four reasons. While the telegraph system does not pay, I think the House of Commons would prefer that there should be a loss paid out of the postal surplus than that either the Press rates should be raised or that the country districts should be without facilities, or that the sixpenny rate should be increased, or that the substitution of telephony for telegraphy should be hampered.
I am, however, now being pressed to promise immediate reductions in the existing telephone rates, and those who complain that the Post Office is not to be trusted to manage the telephones in a business-like way because it is too much open to pressure are often themselves the first to bring political and other pressure to bear in order to secure an immediate reduction to rates which might be of unremunerative amounts. I have also been asked to refer this question of rates, prior to the transfer, to a Select Committee of the House of Commons in order that the existing rates might be examined and a new scale devised. There is one objection to that course which, I am sure, every Member of the House will agree is a conclusive objection, and it is that we do not know what the cost of the telephone company's plant will be. It has to be determined by arbitration by the Railway and Canal Commissioners. The capital cost of the plant will, of course, be a predominant factor in fixing the rates to be charged. In connection with this exceedingly expensive plant the capital investment is a most important factor in the balance-sheet, and it would be perfectly impossible at the present

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moment, when the value of the plant is undetermined, to fix what should be charged for the use of that plant. If a Select Committee were appointed this Session there would be no data to place before it on which it could act, and I venture to say that the Committee would have no course open but to report to the House that it was unable to consider what were the proper rates to be charged for the telephone service as it had no estimate of the capital value of the telephone system and of what would have to be charged year by year for interest and sinking fund.
Therefore I propose to make no general change of any kind in the rates charged for the use of telephones now, and to leave the matter over until after the award of the Railway and Canal Commission. Subsequently a revision of existing rates will be necessary for two reasons. One is that at present there is inequality. Two different men in the same town are paying different rates for the same services, because one man may happen to have had his telephone before a certain date and another has had his telephone after that date. Those who had what is called a flat rate, a single sum paid for an unlimited service, have their telephones at one price. Those who have come on at a measured rate, that is to say a rate which is in proportion to the use that is made of the telephone, have to pay at a different rate, and they have, in most cases, no alternative open to them. Therefore inequality exists, and one man may find his neighbour paying a considerably less sum than himself for precisely the same service. That cannot continue indefinitely, and if, for that reason alone, it will be necessary to have a general revision of telephone rates. In the second place a considerable number of subscribers are receiving their services at below cost price under the old unlimited service rate.
I had shown to me the other day the record of one particular subscriber at Newcastle who makes on the average 160 calls a day on his telephone, for which he-is paying £7 10s. a year, or a rate of about twenty-five calls for a penny, which is, of course, exceedingly unremunerative to the Telephone Exchange, and also results in the line being almost continually engaged, with the consequence that there are many ineffective calls, and that other people's time is wasted, and the time of the Exchange is wasted as well. Although that is an extreme case, there are many cases
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in which subscribers are receiving a service below cost price, and the consequence of the continuation of that must be either that the loss must be made good by the State when the service is taken over, which I think we shall all agree is a most undesirable consummation, or else that the large user must be subsidised by the small user being charged an unduly high rate for his measured service. Therefore it will be necessary to have a general revision of rates after the valuation of the company's plant has been completed, and I hope that after these unremunerative agreements are terminated the present measured rates may be reduced because they are undoubtedly higher than they need otherwise be on account of the existence of the unremunerative flat rate agreements.
When that revision comes, the rates should, I think, be fixed in accordance with three principles. First, the chief essential of telephone service is efficiency. Speed and accuracy are essential, and it would be very false policy to put the rates so low that the maintenance of high efficiency of the service would be impossible. Subject to that condition, the second principle, I think, would be that it is to the interest of the State and the community at large to encourage a very wide use of the telephone by great numbers of small users, because the more persons have telephones in their houses or places of business the more value is the telephone to each one of the subscribers. The third principle is that the telephone should pay its own way, and should not require any subsidy from the taxpayer; while, on the other hand, it should not be required by the Exchequer to contribute any large surplus in relief of general taxation. Telephone users ought to have the benefit of their own subscriptions, and the telephone system should pay its working expenses, should pay interest on the capital invested, and should pay Sinking Fund charges and a margin of profit, and if there is any surplus that surplus should be used in lowering the rates or in giving other advantages to the subscribers. I propose, therefore, that when the valuation is completed a revision of rates should be undertaken on those lines by the Post Office, and I propose also that if that revision is not generally acceptable—and one can hardly be sanguine enough to expect that everyone will agree to any proposal, no matter what it is—that the question should then be submitted to a committee of inquiry for examination, which should either be a Select

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Committee of this House or else a Committee consisting of representatives of the chief commercial bodies of the country, and of others who have great interest in the efficient conduct of the telephone service.
One or two suggestions have been made as alternatives to the transfer of the telephone system to the State. When this subject was discussed by the House very thoroughly in 1905 municipal telephones were then being advocated by many people, and, previous to that, in 1899, there was a considerable movement in favour of municipal telephones. For my own part I favour thoroughly the policy of municipal trading, and the ownership of monopolies by municipalities, where it can be shown that they can be set up and efficiently managed by local public bodies. But after very careful study of this subject I have myself come to the conclusion, which I submit to this Committee, that the management of telephones is not really a suitable enterprise for a local body to conduct. In the first place the local service is being more and more connected with the trunk service, and probably in years to come the custom of communication by telephone from town to town will be very largely and very rapidly increased. If you have the trunk system in the hands of the Post Office while the local exchanges are in the hands of the municipalities of the various towns, then you will inevitably have friction and difficulty in arriving at a system of speedy communication between the various towns of the country. If the whole system is in one hand then it is easy to investigate complaints and easy to detect faults. The Post Office is not able to escape from its responsibility by putting the blame on the local authorities, and there is no local authority which is able to escape responsibility by putting the blame for inefficiency of service on the Post Office.
Nor is the municipal area the natural telephone area. The natural telephone area has a town for its centre, and all the suburbs and surrounding villages, whose economic life centres round that town, should be connected with the exchange in that town. These areas frequently, one might almost say usually, are not all comprised within the municipal area, and difficulties would consequently arise and did arise when municipalities engaged in this business—difficulties of service to surrounding districts, and difficulties arising from questions of rates, of finance, of way-leaves. Next, there are all the economies in conducting the business of telephony to
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be gained by management on a large scale. A Government Department which will at once have over 600,000, and may very shortly have a million telephone subscribers, can place its contracts to much greater advantage than a municipality which may have perhaps ten, fifteen, or twenty thousand subscribers, or even a smaller number. Not only that, the Government Department has at its command highly skilled, and therefore necessarily highly paid expert advisers, always watching new developments, always experimenting, always looking out for possible improvements in the telephone service. Municipalities, even the greatest municipalities, cannot cope with the expense of having skilled experts of that character. Again, a Government Department can easily obtain capital, if the House of Commons gives its sanction, for its needs in advance of requirements, which is most necessary in developing the telephone service, while the municipalities are not nearly so well situated in that regard. It may be said that businesses conducted by Government Departments have the disadvantage that comes from the lack of private profit, and therefore the lack of public interest; but if there is a disadvantage from that point of view it equally attaches to municipalities, who are no better situated in that respect.
This proposal of municipal management of telephones has been the subject of experience. As I have said, in 1899 Parliament authorised municipalities which desired to do so, to undertake the business of telephony, and it was announced that the Postmaster-General would grant licences freely to any municipal body which desired to set up a telephone system. There are several hundred local authorities which were in a position to undertake this work if they so desired. Of those hundreds it is known that about sixty considered the advisability of setting up municipal systems. Thirteen did actually apply to the Post Office for licences, and all were granted those licences. Of the thirteen, six actually set up municipal services. Of those six only two now survive, two of them having been sold to the Post Office, and two having been sold to the National Telephone Company. So that so far as the experience of the past has gone, it seems to show that telephony is not a very profitable or desirable sphere for municipal enterprise. With regard to the two corporations which still retain the telephone system, those of Portsmouth and

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Hull, the licence of the Portsmouth district extends to the year 1926. I have offered to purchase, if they so desire, their system on terms similar to those which we are paying the National Telephone Company, or alternatively, I have offered to sell to them the National Telephone Company's plant in Portsmouth for what we are paying for it. But neither offer has been accepted by the Corporation, and therefore in Portsmouth both the Post Office and the Corporation systems will be in existence. With regard to Hull, I am still in communication with the Corporation, but in any case it is not proposed that the service in Hull shall be worked by the Post Office from the end of the year. There is no demand from any municipality elsewhere for municipal telephone service. Some individuals and associations in Glasgow advocate it, though no official request has, I think, been made by the Glasgow Corporation itself. I think, therefore, that it may be generally assumed that municipalisation as an alternative policy is now generally abandoned.
More recently a suggestion has been made, which has been supported by the London Chamber of Commerce and one or two others, that a Telephone Authority should be created on the lines of the Port of London Authority, which should, without the control of the House of Commons or any Government Department, conduct the whole business of telephony. I am myself opposed to this suggestion on several grounds. One is that such an Authority could not be fully representative without being too large to be workable. You have to consider in this matter every interest in the country. You have to consider every district in the country. It is not like the Port of London, which affects directly only one locality. The system of national telephony affects every portion of the whole of the United Kingdom. It would be necessary that small users should be represented as well as large users, and that rural districts should be represented as well as town districts. I see no prospect that any Board could be created which would fully represent all the various interests and districts that would be entitled to representation, and I feel convinced that the excluded interests would very soon begin to complain of this despotic authority which would be subject to no control from any quarter. The House of Commons is, in my opinion, the only sufficiently representative body to have the ultimate control over so wide-
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spread and so important a service as the National Telephonic service. There is the question of wayleaves. Unless special statutory authority were given, the new body would not enjoy the wayleave rights possessed by the Postmaster-General, and Parliament might hesitate before conferring such rights on an authority under no form of public control. Again, the telephones are inextricably connected with the telegraphs. Underground cables have been laid all over the country, and thousands of miles of poles have been erected for the support of wires, some used for the telephone service, and some for telegraphy. It would be a most unbusinesslike and most uneconomical proposal to endeavour to set up new poles everywhere, to lay new underground cables, and also to have separate buildings for the telephone system and the telegraph system. An alternative proposal might be that the telephone authority should also have the telegraphs, but then they should also, of course, take over the telegraph loss of a million a year, and that is not contemplated by those who advocate this proposal. It would also totally break up the whole organisation of the Post Office system. On the other hand if it were not the telegraph authority, we would have the telephone system in one hand and the telegraphs in another. This would result in so wasteful a system, and cause so much friction among the officers who have to deal with the two services, that the proposal would be found to be utterly impracticable in its working. This proposal is advocated partly on the ground that an authority of this character would be able to secure cheaper labour than would a Government Department. I think in all probability that, to some extent, is true, but, on the other hand, if the employés are paid at a lower rate, such an authority would pay more for capital borrowed from the public than a Government Department would pay when borrowing on the security of the State. As I pointed out before, capital expenditure is a most important item in connection with telephones, far more so than with telegraphs, and undoubtedly an increase of half per cent. or even one per cent. in the rate of interest would more than counterbalance any saving in the cost of labour employed. Of all the various proposals for the control of the telephone system, this proposed telephone authority seems by far the worst and most impracticable.

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I come now to the provisions which will be included in the Bill with respect to the transfer of the Telephone Company's staff to the employment of the State. It is, of course, very desirable and necessary that the company's employés should foe taken over by the Post Office. Not only would it be exceedingly unjust, after all their years' service, to deprive them of their existing employment, but, also, I think the Post Office would be very glad to have their services to cope with the enormous increase of business which will accrue with the transfer. Lord Stanley, in the year 1905, proposed that these employés of the Telephone Company who received less than £700 a year salary, and had more than two years' service, should be taken over by the Post Office, unless there was unfortunately shown an abnormal sick leave rate in any particular case. I propose to redeem that promise, but to extend it further, and not only to take over those who have more than two years' service, but to take over the whole staff, no matter what their length of service may have been. The pay which they are to receive from the Post Office will be in very many cases greater than they are now receiving from the National Telephone Company, and in no case will it be less, unless their rate of pay has been abnormally raised by the company within the last few years in view of, or in connection with, the transfer. But in no case will the pay be less than the normal rate of payment of the Telephone Company's system. The conditions with regard to leave, and with regard to sick pay in the Post Office service will certainly be better than those of the company. Both with respect to leave and sick pay the company's servants will very considerably benefit by the change. With respect to their position as regards seniority when they are members of the Post Office staff, that is a question which has caused great difficulty; it will take some time to adjust, and it may be necessary in some cases to have separate seniority lists; but in no case will the years of service with the company be left out of account in regard to seniority, and the present officers of the company will have the full benefit to which their years of service entitle them.
The question of qualification in the various grades of Post Office employés is also one of great importance both to the officers and the Department, and a departmental committee is now investigating the subject. The matter is so important that I think I must trouble the House with
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some details. I am sure the hon. Members have had representations from some of the 18,000 members of the Telephone Company's staff, and I make no apology for dealing with the subject. The company's servants are divided into two classes, those that are pensionable and those who are not. In 1896 the company established a pension fund to which all the officers receiving over £100 a year salary, roughly more than £2 a week, paid 2½ per cent. from their wages by way of contribution to that fund, and an equal amount was added by the company. The Post Office, on the other hand, has two classes of servants, but they are not divided in that way. We have our established staff, and our unestablished staff. The established staff get various rights and privileges, and are entitled to pension; the unestablished class are paid a gratuity on leaving the service. The existing pension system under the company cannot be combined actuarily with the conditions which obtain in the Post Office, and therefore it will be wound up on the transfer of the company to the State. Of the two classes of the company's servants I take first those who are pensionable, who are now contributing to the company's pension fund and who are entitled to pensions. On leaving the company's service they will have two options: They can either take their share, whatever it may be, of the pension fund into their own pockets, and then come to the State, starting afresh to qualify for pension in the Post Office service; and then we say, "There will be added to your service to the State an additional two years as pensionable service in respect of your past service with the company." The officers take whatever right they have in the existing pension fund, and then qualify for pension in the Post Office, getting two years' additional service. That is in accordance with Lord Stanley's policy.
But it has now been decided to give them an alternative option, which, I think, will be found probably far more advantageous from their point of view. They may surrender to the Postmaster-General, that is to the Exchequer, whatever sum their share of the company's pension is worth. They assign it to the Postmaster-General, and in exchange they will be given State pension rights in the offices to which they will be appointed, counting the whole of their past service as though it had been with the State, and not with the Telephone Company—that is

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to say, that their past service with the company during which they contributed to the pension fund will be counted as service rendered to the State. If they were original members of the pension fund, established in 1896, then the whole of their past service with the company will count as service to the State for pension purposes in the offices to which they are transferred. Almost the whole of the pensionable officers of the company will be transferred to established posts in the Post Office, and therefore pensionable posts. They will receive as pension more than was provided by the company's scheme, and they will no longer be liable as previously to a deduction of 2½ per cent. from their salaries. A very small number who are now pensionable will be transferred to offices in the Post Office service, such as the Solicitor's Department, which cannot be established without disturbing arrangements which are uniform throughout the Civil Service. But with respect-to them, I am most anxious that they should not be made to suffer any inequality or injustice, and I am arranging that they should be given an allowance in addition to their salary which will be an equitable-equivalent for the pension rights which they would have had if they had been placed upon the Government establishment, but which they are not going to have. I think that probably will be a satisfactory solution to all parties. It is a somewhat difficult problem which, fortunately, affects only a handful of men.
5.0 P.M.
With regard to the other and larger class of servants of the company who are not subscribers to the company's pension fund, and who are not regarded by them as pensioners, a very large number of them will fall within the class of established Civil servants, although they do. not correspond to the pensionable class when they come to the Post Office. In fact, fully four times as many of the company's servants will be placed on the establishment of the Civil Service as have hitherto been in the pensionable class while with the company. These officers have desired that all their back service with the company should count for pension as service with the State, although they were not pensionable under the company, and although they paid no contribution for pension rights, and they ask that the State should assume the obligation of paying pensions with respect to services which it has not had, while not receiving in exchange an accumulated pension fund
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from the company. The others will hand over to us their share of the pension fund. These servants have nothing to hand over, and the company in the past made no accumulation to provide them with pensions. Yet we are asked to pay pensions without any equivalent being given to us in respect of the whole back service of these officers. The cost of this has been calculated, and I find that it would involve, if these pensions were paid, a bonus of £700,000 for those servants of the Telephone Company. There is only one instance in which such a course has been taken in the past, and that was when the original telegraph companies were transferred to the State, a transaction which has ever since been recognised as having been conducted on most extravagant and wasteful lines, when vast sums of public money were given with both hands in order to settle difficult problems which had arisen at the moment, with the result that the telegraphs have been charged ever since with excessive liability in respect of these transactions. There was the precedent of the Sub-Marine Telegraphs Company, in which certain officers were transferred, and of officers of local authorities transferred to the county councils on their formation, and of the officers of the water companies transferred to the Metropolitan Water Board; but if those cases are examined, it will be found that the pension rights of the officers concerned were always safeguarded as existing rights and those precedents did not create new rights. There is no precedent, therefore, except that of the transfer of the original telegraph companies to the State, for counting for pension on the transfer to the public authority service which was not regarded as pensionable by the previous employers. This matter was referred to the Select Committee which sat in 1905 to consider the purchase agreement, and the whole subject was carefully investigated by that Committee of this House. The same claim was made by the staff for all back service to count for pension when they were taken over by the State, and the Select Committee reported against that demand. But we do not propose to stand upon the strict letter of justice. We propose to give those officers not only better pay, not only better leave conditions, not only better conditions with regard to sick pay, not only new pension rights which they have not had before, charging for those pension rights no 2½ per cent. as they

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would have been charged by the Telephone Company, but, in addition, we propose to add two years to their service with the State as a bonus qualifying for pension in the Civil Service. That is in accordance with the recommendation of the Select Committee.
Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: And all pensionable?
Mr. HERBERT SAMUEL: Not only those who are pensionable under the Telephone Company, but all those who are not pensionable, and they are a very much larger number of people, including almost all the operating class, but who will be pensionable when transferred to the State and when they come upon the established Civil Service I think the Committee may feel that in taking over the telephone staff we shall be acting not merely with equity towards them, but even with generosity. With respect to the details of the Bill, I shall be most happy to consider any representations which may be made either from Members of this House or persons outside interested in the matter. I trust that the Committee will forgive me for having detained it at such great length with a statement which is in lieu of a statement introducing the Bill itself. I trust that the acceptance of this Resolution and of the Bill founded upon it may be the precursor of the successful accomplishment of the great undertaking with which my Department is being charged. I beg to move.
Mr. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN: The right hon. Gentleman certainly need have made no apology for the length of his statement. It was a very businesslike statement, and he has not occupied time with matter which is irrelevant to the subject which we have under consideration. On the contrary, if I have any complaint of the right hon. Gentleman's statement at all, it is that he did not tell us a little more. I do not find fault so much with what he has said, as that he did not tell us a little more about the financial arrangements. I gather from the Resolution you, Sir, have just read, though I do not think the Postmaster-General mentioned it, that as regards the portion of the purchase price of the Company's plant which is not to be paid in cash, that the Bill will propose to raise the money in terminable annuities.
Mr. HERBERT SAMUEL: Or exchequer bonds.
Mr. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN: I do not know why exchequer bonds are introduced. I should have thought on the whole, that terminable annuities were eminently the right form of financial weapon with which to deal with a situation of this kind. You would thus fix the date by which the capital liability would be extinguished. I do not know whether the Postmaster-General in the course of any reply he may make to critisisms which may be raised, will be able to tell us anything about the currency of those terminable annuities or of the exchequer bonds which he proposes to issue, or whether he will be able to give us any further details as to the raising of the fund. I am quite certain not merely the small number of people represented actually in this House, but also the larger public outside will be interested to know how what is a very large financial transaction, and the provision of a great sum of money is to be carried through with the lest inconvenience to the money market and with the least expense to the Government. The character of the right hon. Gentleman's survey of the proceedings in connection with the telephone system, really relieves me of the necessity of travelling over the ground. I have a special interest in it because although I was not Postmaster-General either at the date of the agreement for the purchase of the London Telephone Company, or at the date when that agreement was extended to the whole of the country, I was connected with both those agreements, first, as Financial Secretary to the Treasury, and afterwards, as Chancellor of the Exchequer. I am glad to find, after the speech of the right hon. Gentleman, that some of the rather fierce controversies which raged round those two agreements, and especially the first of them, are now definitely closed, and that the Government which made those agreements is justified alike by subsequent experience and by the verdict of their successors.
I remember for instance, as the Postmaster-General has reminded us, that a very strong claim was made at that time that municipalities were the proper people or the proper authorities to work the telephone system. I entirely agree with what the Postmaster-General has said upon this subject. I am not quite certain whether I go as far as he does in regard to municipal enterprise generally, but if the telephone system of the country is to be worked by a public authority at all, and I agree it must,

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then every reason which brings you to the conclusion that it must be worked by a public authority will bring you also to the conclusion that it must be worked by a national authority. No other authority can deal with the whole country, can reconcile all the interests that have to be reconciled, or can make a system which is not a sectional system, but a thoroughly national system. Let me say that I am not quite certain that if we had a free slate, the Postmaster-General's would be the best Department for a national authority. The right hon. Gentleman dismissed with a few sentences of criticism the suggestion that you might have a special telephone authority. He said that he thought no such body could be created sufficiently representative of the various interests that are concerned. I agree that that would be so if you constituted your authority out of representatives chosen from particular interests, but I am not certain that if we had a perfectly free slate, and a perfectly free hand to do as we pleased, that it would not be wise for the House of Commons, even at this stage, to create a telephone authority, national in character, acting for the whole nation under powers conferred by Parliament, but not subject to the same kind of perpetual pressure to which the Postmaster-General, and every Postmaster-General, is exposed in this House. No doubt this House is the most representative assembly we have in this country, and if it always remembered that it represented the country and public interests as a whole, perhaps there would be no better control over the Postmaster-General when he controls telephones. But we all know that this House represents not only the country but every kind of little sectional and personal interest, and that it is very difficult for Members of this House in the consideration of such questions as arise from time to time, always to disentangle and keep clear national interests from the smaller local or personal interests, and to maintain the supremacy of the whole interests of the country over those local and personal interests.
I believe in some of the Dominions, and notably, I think, in Australia, having tried Parliamentary control through Ministers of their national railway systems, that they have decided that it does not work well, and that it is better to have an independent railway authority which relieves Members of the excessive pressure of such small interests as those of which I
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have spoken, and relieves their time for Parliamentary work, and sometimes frees the controlling powers of their railway systems from pressure to which it is not in the public interest to give way. But though I differ in the abstract from the Postmaster-General, I do not think I differ very much as to the practical question with which he is now concerned. I do not think, having our telegraph system as it is, that you could disentangle that from the telephone system, or could possibly set up a separate authority to work the telephone system from that which now works the telegraph system. If that be true of the telegraph and telephone systems, it is only one degree less true of the telephone and Post Office systems, which often have grown up side by side in the same buildings. That therefore, is not a question of practical politics, as far as I am concerned. All that I desire to do is to support the Postmaster-General, and whoever is Postmaster-General, in creating, first of all, an official public service, and then in maintaining it on the highest level of public utility.
The Postmaster-General laid down three principles by which he proposed to act. I heartily accept two of them. I differ from the third. Let me say at once that I do not pretend to be speaking for a party or for anyone except myself. I think it is quite possible that I may find hon. Members on the opposite side who agree with me, and I am quite certain some hon. Members on my own side disagree with me. In any circumstances this is not a party question, and is not going to become so. I speak as a Member of Parliament on my own responsibility, committing no one but myself. I agree that the first thing is that the service should be efficient, and that to seek cheapness at the expense of efficiency is a foolish policy which could lead to nothing but disaster. I agree in the second place that it must be the first object to encourage the wise use of the telephone, even if that involves the maintenance of rates at a higher figure than would be necessary if engaged in only doing a paying business. Users who may be asked to pay a little more than they would otherwise, in order that the telephone might be carried more widely into scattered districts and country places, get after all their compensation in the fact that their own powers of using the telephone are extended with every fresh subscriber brought on to the system. With those two considerations, those two principles laid down by the Postmaster-General, I am therefore in hearty accord. Where I

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differ from him is, when he says that the system is not to be worked for profit. I am glad that he lays it down that it is not to be worked at a loss. There are systems of public utility which must be worked even at a loss which cannot be avoided, but this is not one of them. Nor in my opinion is this one of those public services which ought to be provided at the expense of the State as regards capital, at the risk of the State as regards the conduct of the whole business, and at the cost of the State as regards the amount of time and labour and responsibility for its officials which is involved, without the State getting an adequate monetary return for the services which it renders.
Mr. HERBERT SAMUEL: I said there should be a moderate profit.
Mr. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN: I misunderstood the Postmaster-General; I am very glad.
Mr. LOUGH: What is a moderate profit?
Mr. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN: The Member for West Islington asks what is a moderate profit. Five per cent. on the capital, I think, would be a moderate profit. I do not think that under any circumstances it should be allowed, if we can do it, to sink below that level. It may be higher, it ought not to be less. I do not want to be dogmatic about the exact profit that should be derived. May I take an illustration from municipal affairs. I remember many years ago when the Birmingham Corporation did a thing which has become very much more common since, and it brought out the gas and water undertakings and carried them on thenceforward as public services. They drew a distinction between the two. They said, "A free and plenteous water supply is necessary to the health of the community, and we will not take for that any more than the cost of the service. We will never seek to make a profit, and if we make a profit, as soon as that profit is secured and assured we will give it back in reduced rates to the consumers, and we shall get the advantage in the better health of the community." But with the gas undertaking they decided to put it upon a different footing. "There," they said, "it is the citizens generally who find the money and take the risk through the corporation, and they are entitled through the corporation to a return upon that money," and from the gas undertaking they expected to get, and they have got something like £25,000
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a year in relief of the rates. They have not asked, and I do not say the Postmaster-General should ask that all the growing profit, if growing profits there are, and I hope they may come from, the telephone system, should be shared. I think they should not always, as a matter of course, go to the telephone system, but a portion ought to be reserved for the benefit of the taxpayers as a whole, at whose risk and through whose Government, the service is provided and carried on. I am glad I misunderstood the Postmaster-General. If he will take care that there is a moderate profit I do not think we will differ very much as to what a moderate profit is.
There are two other considerations that I wish to bring before the House and one is with regard to the charges. I think the House will readily accept the statement that the Postmaster-General is not yet in a position to make any definite change in the rates charged or chargeable for the telephone service. But whenever the time comes I hope that the Postmaster-General is going to bear in mind the case of the small user. I have received representations from my own constituency and elsewhere which sometimes overlook the case of the small user in their anxiety about the case of the big user. I am not here to say for a moment that you cannot fairly do in your telephone system what is done in so many other cases, and make some reduction in the charges to the man who is a large customer. But I am here to say that the appeal which has been made to me, and which I think has been sent to many public authorities and accepted by them with too little consideration, means an appeal for an unlimited use for a limited payment, and that it is not in the interest of the telephone system and the vast number of its users. It means, as the Postmaster-General has said, that the little user has got to pay more to give the very big user the advantage of the system at a charge below cost price. That is not a system that ought to be adopted, and, for my own part, whether speaking as a Member of Parliament or as an ex-Postmaster-General, or as a subscriber to the telephone exchange system, the Post Office system, I say I think that the fairest and best charge is that of the London Post Office system—a minimum charge for a minimum use, and a measured rate thereon, subject to such qualifying conditions as you like to make in regard to large users, but never giving them a ser-

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vice at less than cost price, and at the expense of the small users who certainly are not those who can best afford to pay it. The more people you will be able to induce to take the telephone the better, and therefore your object ought to be to have as many users as possible and to have a lower minimum rather than a lower maximum charge.
The only other observation I wish to make is one of very general application. The only thing I regret about the assumption by the State of the whole of the telephone system is the great addition which it makes to the number of public employés. No man can look political facts in the face without seeing that it is a danger, a possible danger, in our public life, and a very great danger to our children and those who come after us. Whether we ward off these dangers or not depends upon the ability of this House to remember, as I said at the beginning, that it is the guardian of the interests of the nation, and must not sacrifice the interests of the nation to the interests of individuals, however well organised or clamorous they may be. I am quite certain that the State will always desire to be fair with its employés and even generous to them, and I think the Postmaster-General has shown by the terms which he has sketched to-day for the taking over of the staff, and on which so far as I am able to form an opinion whilst listening to him I congratulate him, the State will always desire to act fairly by its employés, but there is a growing danger, from the political pressure put upon Members in this House, in the enlargement of the number of employés in the public service. That is a danger which Members of this House always have in their minds, and it is upon the courage and resolution and public spirit of individual Members that our success in coping with the danger depends. I do not believe any Member who will take the trouble to inform himself of a case, and having got that case made up, meets a public official in his division—a question say whether he has not carried out the wishes of the local people or given what they wanted— has, as a rule, anything to suffer from. For myself, speaking as one who was a Postmaster-General a little time before the General Election, at which there was a very strong opinion opposed to me, when I had no choice but to stand by my guns, and defend the action of the Postmaster-General, and my colleague, a later Postmaster-General who was responsible. I do
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not believe that the Post Office officials in that case in my own Constituency were affected in the political vote they gave by their position as postal servants. I believe they voted like other citizens upon public grounds, and I believe, if we are true to ourselves, they will do so in future, but unless we have courage to tell them when they are in the wrong, when the public interests are against theirs or their interests and the public interests are not the same, every fresh addition to the number of employés in the public service will be a danger to the State, and must in the long run prove disastrous.
Mr. LOUGH: I was not privileged to hear the full statement of the Postmaster-General as I would have liked to have done, but I was engaged in introducing a deputation to another Minister at the same hour, and perhaps I ought to apologise for intruding, even for a few minutes, upon this discussion. There is one point upon which I feel very strongly, and in which I took the keenest interest in days gone by, and I hope the House will forgive me for referring to it. I was glad to hear that the right hon. Gentleman, and I congratulate him upon it, is giving the cold shoulder to this presumptuous idea which has been started in some quarters that we should create a new telephone authority. As one who has gone through the whole fight against the existing company in Parliament, I say it is amazing that this idea should be started and favoured by such a pretentious body as the London Chamber of Commerce, just at the time when the State is taking over the telephones. I listened with the greatest interest to the right hon. Gentleman who has just sat down, and I hope he will forgive me for saying that he is getting very well into the habit of the Front Bench of being very clever in skating over thin ice, and I must say he dealt with this matter very nicely. He gave it a certain amount of approval and then drew back, and would not say any more than that when circumstances were so and so, then perhaps a new authority might be created and that probably that new authority might be a better than the State, and then he turned off to some more safe ground. I congratulate him upon the discretion which he showed in dealing with this very delicate matter, but I desire to say to my right hon. Friend the Postmaster-General that if he has any truck with these people—and they are rather influential and rather good at getting up an agitation, and I have found that things they have started sometimes

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go a long way—if he has any truck with them he will get into trouble. He will take a retrograde step, into a position from which many of us thought we had finally extricated the Government. It is all very well to speak about the increase of the number of public servants, but we who have followed that question, especially in connection with the telephones, know that whatever the advantages or disadvantages in the number of public servants may be they are tolerable compared with the burden of a monopoly in connection with a thing like the telephone service which is a far greater curse to the State, and I am, therefore, glad that the Postmaster-General has stated, as I understand, that he will give no favour to an idea of that kind in any way.
If I may say so, he made a most excellent speech, although I am dealing with it at second hand, and his second point, I understand, dealt with the question of making a profit. I can hardly believe that the right hon. Gentleman said he would work the thing without making a profit on the working so long as he got his expenses paid. He spoke of a moderate profit, but that is a vague expression. It all depends upon who estimates the moderate profit. Over in Ireland, for instance, a moderate profit would be a very small profit indeed, and nobody over here would be satisfied; they would not call it a profit at all in some parts of this country. But there are other countries in which a moderate profit is estimated in a different way. This matter ought to be dealt with. The right hon. Gentleman who has just sat down, when asked by me what did he mean by a moderate profit, said 5 per cent. Of course, 5 per cent. charged for interest and depreciation. Something which would just clear the State. Quite so; but I would not agree to it if he means 5 per cent., after interest and depreciation have been provided for, to go to the taxpayer in the same way as the ratepayer gets it in some municipalities. I should say that so long as the expenses are paid, and there is a certain margin for depreciation and interest, the remainder should be spent upon the proper working and the improvement of this great concern.
I hope my right hon. Friend will bear in mind the necessity of development, especially in agricultural districts. We in cities are disposed to think, owing to the great use we make of the telephone, that we are a sort of monopolist of the service.
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May I remind my right hon. Friend that in country districts, even if there be only a small user of the telephone, it is extremely useful. It saves long journeys of ten or twenty miles, that use the whole day of a man, being made, A single message saves the journey. Therefore, I hope, that in considering the possible development of the system my right hon. Friend will do all he can to favour the rapid development of the telephone in agricultural districts in all parts of the country. This is a matter which I believe is more closely connected with the agricultural development of this country than we often think. If we assist those who are engaged in this great industry, and if their methods were more up to date, I believe our agriculture would be in a much more prosperous condition. I do not think that on the whole my right hon. Friend need be frightened with regard to the question of increasing the number of public servants. The only thing needed is for us in this House to have a little courage in dealing with these sort of agitations. I believe we shall be able to develop some little courage of that kind, or more of it, when we get salaries paid to us. Our work is done rather badly now, because we are only amateurs. When we recognise that we have a duty to do, and that we have a business to attend to, in regard to these things, then I believe this House will be able to develop a system of resisting all unfair pressure, which will not then be nearly so serious an evil as at the present time. At any rate it will not grow into a thing that we may view with any great alarm. I am delighted that my right hon. Friend will not look with favour upon a new telephone authority, I venture to assure him with long experience in regard to this matter that such a step would be looked upon with great disfavour.
Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: I do not want to follow the right hon. Gentleman who has just sat down into a discussion on the payment of Members, but he must not take it that we in any way agree with him that the payment of Members will make it any easier to resist pressure—rather we think it will make it more difficult. I entirely wish to associate myself with the words of my right hon. Friend the Member for East Worcestershire (Mr. Austen Chamberlain) with regard to the possibilities of trouble in regard to the increased number of public servants we are taking on. The more so, Mr. Emmott, because I am going to venture to put before the

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Committee the case and position of these public servants. I am bound to say that this is not the first time I have put the case of the telephone staff before the House. Some two years ago, when there were wholesale dismissals on the part of the National Telephone Company, I had the honour of putting the views of the telephone staff before the House. I found the staff most reasonable. I should like to say publicly to-day that having been in communication with them a good deal during the last few weeks, and having received a deputation last week, I found the representatives of the telephone staff exceedingly reasonable and exceedingly desirous of meeting what I think are the wishes of the House in regard to their position under the Government. After all it is of benefit not merely to the Members of this House, but to the public service generally, that its public servants should be satisfied as to their position. We are going to take over some 18,000 new public servants, to take them from a service where they have perhaps been in more close touch with their employers than they will be under the State. It is essential in the interests of the State that we should not merely have them contented and working well, but I think we ought to lay down in this House definitely, once for all, the conditions upon which they are to be taken over, and upon which their position, their pay, their pensions, and their seniority are to be worked. Of course it is exceedingly difficult to deal with a Bill, or what one believes to be the proposals of a Bill, without seeing it. I rather gather that this discussion is to more or less take the place of a First Reading of the Bill; that then the First Reading itself will be taken as a formal act, and that the next opportunity we shall have of discussing this Bill will be on the Second Reading. I should hope that the Postmaster-General will at least give two or three weeks after the printing of the Bill before the Second Reading comes on in order that these staffs who are affected may have the opportunity of thoroughly considering the Bill. I think, then, it may save the time of the House if the position of the telephone staff is explained so that it may not take up so much time as otherwise later. The Postmaster-General has told us in effect the lines of the Bill in regard to the staff, but I have a letter in my hand from the Postmaster-General's private secretary (Mr.
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A. S. King) received on 24th April. In that the right hon. Gentleman says that:
"the Bill will empower the Postmaster-General to admit into established service any member of the company's staff! "
on certain terms. That Bill empowers the Postmaster-General not merely to do this or that, but the whole position is to be left entirely to the discretion of the Postmaster-General.
That was not the decision of the Committee of this House in 1905. That was not the position of Lord Stanley—as he then was—in the speeches which he made to this House later in 1905. I do not propose at this juncture—I do not think it is necessary—to call the attention of the House either to the position in detail of the Committee or the speeches of Lord Stanley. It may be necessary possibly to do that later in the course of the Debates on this Bill and in Committee. Suffice it at present to say that the Committee of 1905, and Lord Stanley himself, distinctly laid down certain lines upon which the staff would be taken over, upon which the staff should work, and through me the staff now ask—and I think they are entitled so to do—that those lines should be definitely included in the Bill, and that the whole thing should not be left solely to the discretion of the Postmaster-General. I have no quarrel with the discretion of the Postmaster-General. I am quite sure he would exercise it admirably. But the right hon. Gentleman will remember that in a recent speech he himself told the public and the staff that the Postmasters-General were a fleeting race. I hope— political changes apart—that the present Postmaster-General will not be so fleeting as his predecessors; and that he will not go till he flies with his colleagues of the Cabinet—a consummation, from our side of the House, devoutly to be wished. I venture to remind him that he himself having, as I believe, the best intentions and the best desires in the world to deal fairly with the staff, may not be Postmaster-General when the staff come to be dealt with at the end of 1911–12. Therefore it would only be right and fair that the Bill should include definitely—in order that we, the Members of this House may express our opinion upon them—all the conditions upon which the members of the staff are to be taken over. I say that the more because I think in one respect at least the Postmaster-General has mis-misunderstood, quite unwillingly, I know, and has exaggerated to this House, the attitude taken up by the staff.

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I assume the Postmaster-General will in his Bill include all those matters that were included in Lord Stanley's Memorandum in 1905? I will not trouble him therefore to-day, but I would like to ask him whether he is going to include in the Bill those questions of waiver of Civil Service examinations, waiver of medical examinations, etc., upon which I think there is no dispute, no difference of opinion whatever, between the Postmaster-General and the staff, but which the staff do certainly hope and expect will be included in the Bill and laid down definitely so that there shall be no possibility of error upon that point? What I should like to point out with regard to the speech of the Postmaster-General this afternoon is the hardship that I think is bound to occur to those members of the staff performing similar duties who are not under his suggestion going to be put upon the established staff of the Post Office. The Postmaster-General told us that there are many, or a very large proportion, of the staff of the National Telephone Company who will become established with the staff of the Post Office. But upon what basis is he going to differentiate —and I think the House is entitled to know—between those members to be put upon the establishment and those members who are not? I understand the Post Office puts upon its established staff—the Postmaster-General will correct me if I am wrong—those members of the staff who are reasonably reckoned as being members of the permanent staff. So soon as a class of men, or a man, is regarded as on the permanent staff, they or he are put upon what is called the established staff. I believe I am right in saying that some 60,000 or 62,000 Post Office servants are to-day what is called "established." I want to put to the right hon. Gentleman that almost the whole of the telephone staff can to-day be put upon the established staff, because the Telephone Company's staff has been enormously reduced during the past few years. To be more strictly accurate, I should say it has not been increased as much as it otherwise would have been increased if this agreement with the Post Office had not been entered into. I believe the Telephone Company's staff in 1905 numbered 14,000. When the agreement was made it was reckoned that by 1911 that staff would have risen to 23,000 or 24,000. Owing to dismissals and the lack of constructive work during 1907–8–9, that staff is now at a figure pretty well known, and, therefore, the Telephone Com-
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pany have worked with a minimum staff. It will therefore be simple justice to the staff, and no detriment to public service, to put them upon the established staff of the Postmaster-General. May I put very shortly—because I do not want to go to-day into details—the claim for establishment of the Telephone Company's staff? I give it at the earliest possible moment in order that the Postmaster-General may consider the matter between now and the Second Reading of this Bill. I think the desire of the staff is not quite so extreme as the Postmaster-General put before us this afternoon. I gather his idea of the wishes of the telephone staff is this: that everybody, irrespective of their service, should be taken into the staff of the Postmaster-General; and, irrespective of whether they had contributed to the pension fund or not, should have their years of service counted for pension purposes? That, I think, is what the Postmaster-General said this afternoon.
Mr. HERBERT SAMUEL: If put into an established class?
Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: If put into an established class, yes. I thought the right hon. Gentleman put before us this afternoon that it was the desire of all the members of the staff, irrespective of whether they are put upon the established class or not, to have their service counted for pension purposes.
Mr. HERBERT SAMUEL Mr. HERBERT SAMUEL dissented.
Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: Then I think there is not much between the Postmaster-General and myself upon that point. May I then put what I consider the claims of the telephone staff? I think the Members of the House, when they come to consider it, will not feel the demand unreasonable. Members of the company's pension fund— that is, that those 2,000 of the company's staff who have been continuously in the office for at least two years, ask that they should be transferred to pensionable offices in the service of the Postmaster-General. I do not use the word "establishment" there, because so far as I can make out, this mysterious word "establishment" has different meanings—one from a pension point of view and the other from the general service point of view. Therefore the first point those members who to-day are members of the pension fund wish is that they should be transferred to offices in the Post Office, or a

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class of office in the Post Office which carry with them pensions, so that a man or woman who is now working for his pension, paying money for it, may go on from the moment of transfer working for a pension under the Postmaster-General. The Select Committee of 1905 recommended that, and it was enforced by Lord Stanley. I feel that there there will be no difference between the Postmaster-General and his new staff upon that point.
Secondly, that the members of the staff who have been pensionable in the company's service for at least two years, and who, if in the Postmaster-General's service would have been in a pensionable position, shall be transferred to a pensionable position. To that I am not quite sure the Postmaster-General would at the first blush agree, but I think the House will see that it is a reasonable proposition. It has not been declined by the Postmaster-General, and I understand it is still open to discussion between the Postmaster-General and his advisers in the Post Office on the one hand and the telephone staff on the other. I trust he will see that those of the staff who are now in a non-pensionable office, but doing work which will be pensionable work in the Post Office, will be put in a pensionable office as soon as they go over to the service of the Postmaster-General.
Mr. HERBERT SAMUEL: They are a very large number.
Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: Thirdly, that members of the staff performing duties similar to those performed by members of a pensionable office should be transferred to a pensionable office. That is practicably the same point. The Postmaster-General told us that with the National Telephone Company the pension service began at £100 a year. There are to-day a considerable number of operators who are earning upwards of £90 and getting near to the point when they would get into the pensionable service. With probably the next rise of salary they will become members of the pensionable staff. Those operators when taken over should be put into the pensionable service. I come, lastly, to a point dealing, not merely with pensions, but with the whole question of past services. The National Telephone Company's employés ask that the whole of their past service when they are taken over by the Post Office shall be counted as if it
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were service in the Post Office. That does not involve that everybody who is to-day working with the National Telephone Company should have his past service counted for pension purposes. What it involves is that a worker who to-day is working in a pensionable office for the National Telephone Company should have his past services counted for pension purposes, but if he is not working for a pension his past services should still be counted for everything other than a pension—for the purpose of seniority, for the purpose of holidays, sick leave, and so forth. There are rules in our Civil Service relating to matters apart altogether from the question of pension. I make that suggestion I think rightly on behalf of those 18,000 persons who are being taken over by the State, and who have been working for what is practically a national service all those years. The Postmaster-General has never suggested that they ought not to be taken over. He has spoken in the very highest terms of the work and capacity of the 18,000 employés of the National Telephone Company, and in common justice, when they are taken over they should be put on exactly the same footing as if their past years of service had been service for the State instead of service for the National Telephone Company. That is not an unreasonable demand, and is not a demand without precedent. It is a demand which this House has recognised on many occasions. When the Water Board was constituted in 1902 the whole of the past services of the employés of the different water companies were counted by the new Water Board. Then there was the case of the Port of London Authority, created three years ago. When the Chancellor of the Exchequer made that bargain with the dock and port authorities the whole service of the employés of Docks and Port Authorities in London was counted as service under the new Port of London Authority. Then, as the Postmaster-General said, there is the precedent when the telegraph service was taken over.
But there is a more important precedent still, and I call attention very especially to it. It is the precedent of the submarine companies who were taken over in 1889. When these companies were taken over by the Post Office this Clause was not given to their employés. What was the result? The result was continuous agitation amongst those who were becoming, and did become, servants of the State. The continued unrest of those servants of the

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submarine cable companies taken over continued until 1897 when this House passed somewhat tardily an act of justice, giving those persons exactly what they asked in 1889, and what I am asking for the servants of the National Telephone Company—the right of counting their past services with the private company when they are taken over by the State. I venture to suggest that unless that right is conceded to the Telephone Company's employés exactly the same position of affairs will arise as occurred in the case of the submarine telegraph employés in 1887. You have 18,000 people going over to the service of the State, with many of their points granted by the Post Office I admit, but without having had settled the great point as to past service, which does not mean only pensions but which means seniority, sick leave, holidays, and in effect, their position in the public service. You will have 18,000 men and women with that grievance. You will have, I do not like to say discontented servants, but servants not as contented and as loyal as you would otherwise have. I venture to submit it would involve no additional cost, or a very small additional cost indeed, to remedy the grievance. I suggest to the Government that we should grant this act of justice, an act which I have shown the Committee is entirely in accordance with recent precedent, and which would I think make the 18,000 additional servants of the State thoroughly contented and thoroughly satisfied with their position.
6.0 P.M.
Mr. HELME: We have listened with sympathetic interest to the lucid statement of the Postmaster-General, and I think he may be congratulated on the fact that he has carefully considered the various points that have been pressed upon him and his predecessors during the past six years, since the time that the Select Committee recommended to this House the purchase of the National Telephone Company's system. Having served upon that Select Committee I would just like to press upon the Government one or two points which were carefully considered by that Committee, namely, that we should under the Post Office develop a system of the highest level of efficiency at the lowest possible cost, and thereby give to the public the opportunity of extended use of the telephone, which is so essential to the national and domestic interests of everyday life. When evidence was brought before the Committee it was urged that munici-
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pal management would secure cheaper and at the same time as effective a service as could be desired, and it was with regret that some of us heard from representatives of the Post Office the opinion expressed that the extension of the system under the Post Office would not necessarily lead to a reduction of charges. Evidence was brought that on the Continent lower rates were charged than had been adopted by the National Telephone Company, and it was pointed out that if Sweden could have a subscription rate of £2 15s. 6d. per annum for a private service, extended to those requiring it for business purposes with the addition of a small entrance fee, surely we might hope that in England a service could be developed that would allow domestic interests of life to be further considered. Then, again, we had evidence that in Stockholm they had a service radius of forty-three miles—eighty-six miles in diameter — for which the annual charge of only £5 a year was made, including trunk charges. A very important principle lies in the question of whether the flat rate shall be charged or the measured rate. I venture to urge that it is not the dislike of the measured rate system that has caused such strong expressions of opinion to be brought before the Government as the fear that the charges shall not be at the lowest reasonable cost. It is, therefore, with great satisfaction we have heard the statement of the present Postmaster-General confirming the statement made by his predecessor to a deputation that waited upon him that the Government would, when taking over this great undertaking, make it, as has been expressed to-day, their first object to develop the department for the advantage of the subscribers in the first instance, having regard to the commercial and financial interests of the undertaking, rather than make it a profit-raising department for the relief of the charges of the State and the reduction of taxes. I have been a party to the consideration of the matter by representatives of municipalities and Chambers of Commerce on various occasions, and I was glad to hear the promise given by the Postmaster-General this afternoon that after he had taken over the undertaking and worked it for some time and formed a correct judgment as to its cost he will then in facing the arrangements of charges, if they are proved not to be satisfactory, call to his assistance in these matters the representatives of Chambers of Commerce and other public authorities of the country. The one feeling held by the commercial

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classes was in favour of a flat rate. It was stated in evidence before the Select Committee that in Glasgow a flat rate of £5 5s. provided all that was necessary for the ordinary commercial subscriber under the unlimited system. If the Postmaster-General can work out a system that will allow the subscription to be reduced it will be welcome news to the commercial classes in face of the fear that is so firmly held that the rates are going to be increased to a prohibitive amount. If the interest upon the invested capital and a sum sufficient to cover the sinking fund, if that is arranged for, then, after all, due regard will have been given to the solid financial interests of the country for advancing and securing the money. I think the users of the telephone system have the right to expect lower rates.
No one is prepared now to advocate the development of the municipal management of telephones. Years ago that view was strongly held on the ground of economy, but it is expected now, under the capable administration of the Post Office Department, we shall have the advantage of a system which will give the highest possible results at the lowest possible cost. Therefore, I think, the Postmaster-General is justified in rejecting the proposal of the Select Committee that nothing should be done in regard to purchase between 1905 and 1912 to prejudice the ownership and management of any telephone installation. We are justified now in giving up the principle of municipal exchanges, and I think the Government is right in refusing to hand over to any other authority the management of this great and important Department, seeing that it is so interwoven with the telegraph system. The Postmaster-General has referred to the interchange-ability of the system in regard to wires and the use of poles and subways, and evidently he is justified in embarking upon this scheme. I think he has fully considered the public interest in all its bearings, not only with regard to general management, but in regard to the treatment of the officers of the National Telephone Company, who will no doubt feel that the Government intend to give them just and sympathetic consideration in regard to any claims they may fairly make upon the Government.
Mr. STUART-WORTLEY: I have one or two questions which I wish to ask the
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right hon. Gentleman. Probably he will remember I was the Chairman of the Select Committee on the agreement of 1905. I wish to ask when shall we have the advantage of seeing the Bill in print, and is there likely to be any long delay in circulating the Bill in its printed form? Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman will also state in his reply how he proposes to deal with the recommendations about medical examination of the staff. That is one of the principal subjects for which members of the stall have shown anxiety in their correspondence with me. The decision of the Select Committee was that consideration should be shown to municipal telephones, although that was a decision in which I did not personally concur. I am glad that the Postmaster-General has taken a bold course, and has done what was foreseen by those who had carefully considered the matter would be the right course, and has decided to make a uniform system. It is obvious the service must be uniform all over the country; it must have the support of the public, and as it will be financed by public money, it must be under the direct management and control of a Minister responsible to this House, who must ask for and receive from time to time a renewal of the confidence of this House. I think on the whole the policy which the Postmaster-General outlined in his speech, from the point of view of the public, is satisfactory. I hope when we see the Bill we shall find that a full measure of justice has been done to the servants of the National Telephone Company, whose rights ought to be fully safeguarded, and who ought to have secured for them the rights they had under the agreements sanctioned by Parliament and recommended by the Select Committee.
Mr. MORTON: I am glad to know that the Postmaster-General practically proposes to take over the whole of the staff of the National Telephone Company. With regard to superannuation and pensions the right hon. Gentleman has sketched out to-day a fair offer. Something has been said about the establishment of a telephone authority. I can quite understand there is a great deal to be said in favour of a municipal authority for telephones. Up to the year 1905 there was a strong feeling in this country—especially in the London telephone area, where we had a number of meetings in the City of London, representing the local authorities of that area—in favour of the establishment of a municipal authority. There is a
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great deal of difference in a municipal authority and the authority which has been suggested in this Debate. The municipal authority usually sits with open doors, and they have to go to their constituents now and then. In the City we have to go to our constituents every year. I have watched some authorities like those which have been suggested, and the first thing they do is to shut the door to the public and the Press, and keep everything as dark and secret as possible.
There is no comparison between an authority of that kind and the Post Office Department under the control of the House of Commons. Under the system suggested by this Bill we can, by questions, and occasionally by debates on the Postmaster-General's salary and other occasions, actually bring to bear upon any particular case everything that is necessary, but we should have no such power with the authority which has been talked of, and I am glad the Postmaster-General has satisfactorily disposed of this question. I am quite in favour of the right hon. Gentleman making a profit out of this business if he can, and there certainly ought not to be a loss. There is a general feeling that the cost of using the telephone might be considerably reduced. No doubt the City of London was in favour of a flat rate, and we think in the London telephone area we ought to have an unlimited user for a rental of not more than £10 per annum. That would probably pay the Postmaster-General as well as anything else. I know the charge must depend upon the purchase price, and that has got to be settled. We all know that the enormous purchase price of the telegraph system ruined the whole affair. I have hopes that the settlement of this question will show that we have not paid too much for this undertaking.
There are two other questions which I desire to put to the Postmaster-General. In the first place, I wish to know what Committee he proposes to send this Bill to? Some questions have been raised by those interested in the City of London in regard to easements, and unless there is some means other than a Committee of the whole House we shall have no means of bringing these matters forward. What Committee does the right hon. Gentleman propose to send this Bill to? The Postmaster-General stated that the Department had spent £5,000,000 since 1905 on the construction of telephone exchanges in
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London and elsewhere. Will the right hon. Gentleman tell me how much has been spent of that total in the London telephone area as distinct from any other area? I recognise that Parliament has already settled that the telephone system should be bought, and we are only settling to-day the question of how to find the money. I know we could stop the whole business by refusing to find the money, bur we are not likely to do that after the long discussions which have taken place upon this question.
The question of easements and the position of the telephone users after the system has been taken over by the Postmaster-General are questions which we ought to have an opportunity of discussing before this matter is quite settled. I have spent a great deal of time with the local authorities who have been considering this question during the last fifteen years, and there is no doubt that the telephone system should be developed in the best interests of the people. The Government must settle this question as soon as possible. I hope it will be settled, not in the interests of speculators and adventurers, but in the interests of the business of the country. I am sorry to hear to-day that the Americans are so far in advance of us in this matter of the telephone. We pride ourselves, I suppose, on being as much advanced as other people, but it is worth while bearing in mind, now we are told that the Americans are a long way in advance of us in their telephone service, that the service there is under a private company and that they are obliged to look after their customers better than a Government Department. I congratulate the Postmaster-General on having nearly completed this purchase, and I hope he will satisfactorily settle all the details, and that he will not be obliged to pay too much for his whistle.
Mr. PETO: I want to point out two or three things which the Postmaster-General omitted altogether from his speech. He referred to the experience of the Post Office in the management of telephony since 1896, and he admitted the trunk wire system was not perfect. He went on to refer to the main allegation that the Post Office authorities would probably make a failure of the management of the telephones, because the telegraph system was at present run at a loss. The Postmaster-General did not refer to an argument which is very much stronger than any

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analogy. I understand the proportion of running expenses to revenue of the telephone business they had managed since 1896 is 74.4 per cent., whereas the proportion of running expenses to revenue of the National Telephone Company is only 58 per cent. Another point which seems to me more important than the loss of £1,000,000 a year on the telegraph system is the question of what profit these two telephone managements have made. We have had a little discussion as to what is a reasonable profit. I understand the profit on the telephone system managed by the postal authorities have been on an average 3½ per cent., whereas, leaving out of account the payment of royalties by the postal authorities, the profit made by the National Telephone Company is very nearly 9 per cent. That seems to me very much more to the point than the question of the loss on the telegraph system.
There is one point to which I should like to call attention with regard to the loss on the telegraph system. The Postmaster-General gave four reasons why that loss was annually incurred. They were very excellent reasons. He laid stress and emphasis on the fourth. I took a note of it. The principal and fourth reason he gave why the telegraphs did not pay any longer was the great telephone development in the country, and he especially pointed out that the telephones were taking up all the short telegraph business. That seems to me a fairly strong reason why the huge future development of the telephone system should not all be put in charge of the postal authorities of this country. They are running the telegraph business of the country, one of the principal handicaps of which is the competition of the telephone. If we are to have a vastly more efficient and extended telephone system, the telegraph business of the country will be worse and worse, because the two are obviously in competition with each other. Every hon. Member knows perfectly well there are many old-fashioned people, apart from business people, who will not be bothered with a telephone, and who prefer to send a telegram, and, of course, when you look up your Exchange Book, you find a great many of your correspondents are not on the Exchange at all. The Postmaster-General proposes an enormous development of this system, which is probably going, in a large measure, to kill the telegraphs. Therefore, if only for that reason,
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I should like to see a telephone authority set up in this country whose sole business it would be to watch over the development of the telephone system and to bring it up to a standard of efficiency similar to that which obtains abroad and make it of the same amount of use to the people as the telephone system is, for instance, in the United States of America.
I want to say a word or two about the comparison with the United States of America, which is constantly made by the Post Office in their literature. I understand in America there are seventy-six telephone subscribers per thousand of population whilst in this country there are only fifteen per thousand. It is obvious we have a great deal of leeway to make up before we arrive at that standard. The Postmaster-General, in addressing a deputation on 27th February—I was pleased to note he said the same thing to-day—said he looked forward to a development in the telephone system, two, three, or fourfold. I do not think the Committee ought to leave the subject altogether before they have a definite idea of what the development of our telephone system four-fold really means. The Postmaster-General told us we have 638,000 telephone exchanges at present in this country. If you multiply that by four it means over two-and-a-half million telephone exchanges, and, even if we have two-and-a-half millions, we should not have anything like the number they have in the United States of America in proportion to our population. We should require to have 3,192,000 telephone exchanges in this country to arrive at the same stage of development as the United States have arrived at to-day. I emphasised the word "to-day" because we have had no indication from the Postmaster-General as to how many years this multiplication by four in our telephone service is going to take. That is an important point, and one which I think will interest the hon. Baronet the Member for the City of London (Sir F. Banbury).
The Committee ought to realise the capital expenditure involved. If we are to have two-and-a-half million telephone exchanges it will mean an investment of £75,500,000 sterling, and if we are to get up to the United States standard it will mean an investment of a long way over £100,000,000. Therefore, the question of what is a reasonable amount of interest or profit is one eminently to the point, and I want to carry the Committee back to the comparison I gave between the rate of profits earned by the National Tele-

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phone Company, a private company, on its undertaking, and the rate of profit earned on the relatively small capital now invested by the Post Office in their part of the undertaking. A private company that can show a record of management yielding nearly 9 per cent. of profit is an authority, or company, or whatsoever it may be, that is most likely to be easily able to raise a huge capital of seventy-six-and-a-half millions or a hundred millions. Those are points which certainly ought to be considered in authorising the expenditure. I notice Mr. Faithfull Begg said he did not believe the Postmaster-General had any real conception of the magnitude of the undertaking. He quoted the case of one of the officials of the Post Office, a Mr. Lee, who said at Liverpool:—
"It is almost appalling to think that the trunk service, purchased in 1896 for £450,000, now stands at £5,500,000 of capital."
The development in fourteen years so far is a mere flea bite to the development we are to go in for if we are to come up to modern requirements or the telephone service of the United States of America. I now want to deal more with a detail point. Everybody admits that the success of the telephone system of this country must depend upon its efficiency and upon the degree with which it meets the popular demand. I want to see what indication we have of the Post Office conception of efficiency, and of meeting the popular demand from what the Postmaster-General held out as one of the great improvements he is going to bring into force in the present year. I refer to the Farmers' Telephones. By the courtesy of the Assistant-Postmaster-General, I have received one of the green circulars sent out, and I must admit the advantages set out in that green circular to farmers and residents in rural districts are really most attractive. The farmers understand they can get a telephone for £3, provided, among other conditions, there are five subscribers, and the advantages set out in the circular include latest information of market prices, the opportunity of making arrangements for the sale of their produce and stock, calling in the doctor, calling in the veterinary surgeon, calling in the fire engine in case of a fire, arranging with the railway company as to sending off their produce, and, finally, making arrangements with their friends and neighbours when their work is over, I suppose of a social character.
I want to take a concrete case. We all want this thing to be a success, and I
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take a concrete case to see how many of these advantages held out in the green paper the farmer will get for his £3 a year, and I find the sole advantage in the ease of Ramsbury, a village about which I have had a good deal of correspondence lately, will be the last one, the opportunity of communicating with his friends and neighbours. I have had a letter from there. They perfectly understand the point, and they say, if they want to communicate with their friends and neighbours, they can open the window and shout across the street, and they do not, therefore, want a telephone for that purpose. They do want a telephone, however, to call the fire-engine, the doctor, or the veterinary surgeon, and they do want to communicate about market prices and the sale of their stock and all the other things. There is not yet a telephone exchange at Ramsbury. It is proposed to form one, and I received a letter the other day in which the Assistant-Postmaster-General said a sufficient number of subscribers has been obtained, and a telephone exchange will shortly be arranged. Ramsbury lies about four and a-half miles from the railway station at Hungerford, and six miles from Marlborough, the nearest market town. The nearest firestation and the nearest veterinary surgeon are at Hungerford. All these are outside the range of the exchange to be instituted. I mention that, although it may appear to be a matter of detail, because I want to appeal to the Postmaster-General to introduce a more liberal, and, I think, a more business-like system in starting these farmers' exchanges. The Postmaster-General, in his speech, said the telephone area ought to have a town for its centre. That is exactly my complaint. It is true, in the case of Ramsbury you can exchange one call to Hungerford, the nearest place, for two calls, to which you are entitled for your subscription. In the case of Marlborough it costs more.
I say the telephone will be practically of no use to the farmer at this £3 subscription unless it puts him into communication with his nearest market town, the nearest railway station, the place where are to be found the veterinary surgeon and the fire engine; in communication indeed with all the people who he is likely to have to call up in the course of his business. He would not be satisfied to pay the £3 a year if the only privilege will be communicating with his immediate friends in the neighbourhood; the system must be made more generally adaptable for the use

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of farmers. The Postmaster-General said that as soon as they knew what they were going to pay for the National Telephone Company's system they would go into the question of the revision of rates. He quoted an example, I believe it was in Liverpool, where a man got telephone calls at the rate of twenty-five for a penny. I quite appreciate the point he desired to make, but what I want him to make clear is this: When the Post Office takes over the telephones are we to understand that existing agreements will be allowed to run out their full period, or will it be necessary, in the case of subscribers, say, for one year, to have their contract terminated on 31st December and to enter into a fresh agreement on 1st January? The same question also applies to deposits for calls which have to be paid in advance. I desire to ask whether these will automatically and smoothly transfer themselves from the National Telephone Company to the postal service? Whether we are likely to get this huge development of the telephone system of this country or not is quite open to doubt. We are asked to compare ourselves with the United States. I do not suppose any hon. Member of this House would think that that was necessarily an absolutely perfect comparison. Nearly all the conditions of trade in America run on exactly opposite lines to those in this country. Personally I believe the Postmaster-General is a very good prophet. I believe we shall have a development of agriculture and trade in the near future which will admit of a huge development of the telephone system because we shall, in the very near future, get rid of a fiscal system which atrophies all agricultural development.
Mr. FALLE: I have listened with great interest to a speech which seems to me to be generous, if I may say so, inasmuch as the Postmaster-General appears to be willing to treat the employés of the National Telephone Company generously. If we wish to have good servants we must make them happy and contented. I trust, when we come to read the speech and when we see the Bill, that this impression will re main. When the right hon. Gentleman spoke of the pensions that these officials will take up, he said there were two alternatives. He said they might either take their share — I suppose that means cash value with interest—and then start afresh with two years' credit to their service, or that they might surrender their share and
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get a State pension. Of course that State pension would not be less than the pension they would enjoy under the National Telephone Company. He also said they would be taken on as Civil servants; that they would not lose their seniority, and that they would not be placed in a position in any way inferior to the one they occupied under the National Telephone Company. That is all I wish to ask in regard to the National Telephone Company's servants. Now I want to inquire as to municipal rights in telephones. I want to know as to their rights in regard to trunk calls, and as to the upkeep of the telephone poles. It would be an advantage to Portsmouth if it were allowed to purchase the Government system of telephones and work it especially to the island of Guernsey, where the rates are very much cheaper than on this side. If Portsmouth thinks it can run the telephones cheaper than the Post Office, I do not see why it should not have the right to do so. I should like to ask the right hon. Gentleman to give me some idea of the terms on which he would be prepared, first of all, to allow Portsmouth to buy the rights in the Post Office telephone there, and, secondly, what he would be prepared to pay for the municipal rights?
Mr. DAVID MASON: I wish to ask the Postmaster-General: (1) Is the Postmaster-General aware that the National Telephone Company refuse to increase the number of exchange lines connected with subscribers' inter-communication switch-beards in the country unless these subscribers are willing to change their old "unlimited" rate system to the new "measured rate" system while allowing same to their London subscribers? (2) Whether the coercion of subscribers in this way, which, if successful, would largely increase the cost of the installation, would have any effect on the price the Government is ultimately called upon to pay the company? The right hon. Gentleman has told us it is a very expensive matter. Naturally if you cut down the unlimited rate and put people on the measured rate system it will increase the cost. If the cost is increased now it will probably lead to an increased price under the arbitration when the whole plant is taken over. Perhaps the Postmaster-General will be able to answer these questions. I wish to congratulate him on the very admirable and businesslike statement in which he has placed his resolution before us.
Mr. SNOWDEN: I rise simply for the purpose of associating myself with the remarks which have been made by hon. Members on behalf of the staff of the National Telephone Company. I had not, the privilege of hearing the Postmaster-General's statement, but I am given to understand that in this matter it was very satisfactory. I certainly hope he will give the servants of the National Telephone Company not only justice, but that he will, as he can afford to do, treat them generously. I wish to raise one question with regard to a certain class of National Telephone employés—the contract managers—who are very much disturbed by a rumour which has been circulated to the effect that they are not to be taken on to the established staff. These are men with positions and salaries ranging from £150 to £300 a year. They are positions of considerable responsibility. The holders are in contact with the public and have the supervision of the commercial side of the business. They are men who have been promoted from positions which are to be placed on the established class, and they consider it would be very unfair if, in consequence of having some special aptitude they are to be made to suffer in this way. I hope the Postmaster-General will be able to give me some assurance that their claims will be considered.
Mr. HERBERT SAMUEL: A considerable number of questions have been asked by various hon. and right hon. Gentlemen, and I will endeavour to answer them seriatim. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Worcestershire inquired as to the form of securities to be issued by the Treasury in payment to the National Telephone Company where it is to be otherwise than in cash. The original agreement between the Postmaster-General and the National Telephone Company was that these payments should be made in the form of annuities. The Company has since made representation to the Treasury that these annuities are not of a character easily marketable, and that they would prefer payment in the form of exchequer bends. If the company treat the Post Office well in regard to the transfer we shall be prepared to meet their views in regard to the security. There is a very small question of money involved. We take power in the Bill for the Treasury to issue annuities, or in lieu thereof exchequer bends repayable in a period of not more than twenty years. A number of hon. Members have raised questions
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in regard to the staff, and before I proceed to answer them I should like to make one point clear. I said that in certain circumstances employés of the company would have two years' service added to their service to the State to qualify for pensions. I should have mentioned that that, of course, only applied to those who had been in the service of the Company for two years or more. If a person cornea into the service only a week or month before the transfer obviously he or she would not be entitled to add two years to the State service, but any less period than two years will be added to the service in that case. If such a person has been in the service of the company one year one year will be added, but if he or she has been in the service two years or more then the full benefit of the bonus will be receivable.
The hon. Member for Brentford (Mr. Joynson-Hicks) suggested that all these undertakings which I have given should be embodied in the Bill, and not rest merely upon the basis of a Parliamentary statement. Many of them are of a character which it would be exceedingly difficult to put in the form of a Clause in an Act of Parliament without making it a very long Bill. We are putting into the Bill all that requires legislation, and with regard to the rest in Parliament a Minister's word is as good as his bend, and just as I am honouring all Lord Stanley's promises and going somewhat beyond them, I have no doubt that any successor of mine would fulfill any undertaking given by me across the floor of the House. It is the practice for the Ministers of the day to give undertakings without it being thought necessary that those undertakings should be embodied in an Act of Parliament. I can assure the hon. Member, however, that they will receive equal attention.
The hon. Member asked which of the company's servants will be established when they are transferred to the State, and the answer to that is those of the company's servants who will be doing work which is being done by classes already established, that is the obvious line of distinction— those who are doing the same work as classes already established. When employés come into the service to do the work of a class already established, then they will be established. He put forward some claims on behalf of the staff. The first is that those members of the staff who are now pensionable by the company should be pensionable when they are taken over

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by the State. The hon. Member for Blackburn also raised this point. I made it clear in my speech, or I endeavoured to do so, that almost all those who will be pensionable under the company will be pensionable under the State, and those who are not will receive an equitable addition to their salaries, which will compensate them for not having pension rights. In one way or another they will be fairly and equitably treated. It is impossible to put the solicitors and their clerks upon the establishment. If it were done it would be necessary to put all the Post Office solicitors on the establishment, then other Departments which have got solicitors must also have all their solicitors and all their staff put on, and the Treasury, for various reasons, object to that. There was a rule established after very full consideration a few years ago, for various reasons into which I need not now enter, to the effect that the clerks of the solicitors of the departments should be regarded as unestablished. Those clerks who are taken over will receive conditions which will compensate them as individuals for not being established officers of the Crown, and the same will apply to any other individuals. I may say in regard to some of them these conditions have not already been decided, but in one way or the other they will receive favourable treatment.
Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: Are the solicitors and their clerks the only officers who will not be put on the establishment?
Mr. HERBERT SAMUEL: It is in question whether certain classes which are not now established in the Post Office might not be brought within the established system. That is not yet decided in two or three cases, and therefore it is undesirable for me to mention particular classes, because it is possible that one or two classes not yet established may be established. On the other hand it is conceivable they may not. This is a matter which is still under deliberation, but if they are not placed on the establishment those particular offices will receive a compensatory allowance. The hon. Member also asked if men doing work for the company which would be established if in the Post Office, will be established when they come into the Post Office. I have already made it clear that they will be. Then Tie raised the question that all past service should count as Government service, whether a man is on the pension fund or
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not. That I dealt with fully in my speech, and I stated that it is argued that the State should pay pensions in respect of service which is not theirs and which is not pensionable under the company.
Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: That is a point I may have misunderstood in the right hon. Gentleman's speech, and my point was not that past services should necessarily count for pension, but that past service, if it were pensionable service, should count in regard to a pension.
Mr. HERBERT SAMUEL: I will deal with that, but I think the hon. Member was also dealing with the position, so far as length of service is concerned, and so far as privileges are concerned which depend upon length of service—seniority, amount of annual leave, and so on—and was asking that service with the company will be regarded as though it had been service with the State. It will so count for those purposes. The right hon. Gentleman opposite the Member for Sheffield asked when, the Bill will be introduced. It will be formally introduced as soon as I get this Resolution, and I hope that may be to-morrow. Then the right hon. Gentleman also raised the question of medical examination. There will be no medical examination for the servants of the company, and neither will there be any literary examination of the type which is demanded before entrance into the Civil Service. Persons who have got a very unsatisfactory sick leave record' in the immediate past will, of course, be exceptionally treated. The hon. Member for Sutherlandshire asked me what Committee this Bill would be sent to, and in reply I may say that I was hopeful that it might be taken in Committee of the Whole House. With regard to that, however, my right hon. Friend the Patronage Secretary will undoubtedly consult the convenience of Members of the House. I understood the hon. Member to ask one particular question as to assessments in the City. I am discussing that question to-morrow with a deputation of City proprietors and owners and possibly some decision may be arrived at. That and other points of a minor character can, of course, be better and more expeditiously settled behind the scenes than in the House or in a Standing Committee. The hon. Member asked me how much was spent by the Post Office on London exchanges. Up to 31st March, 1910, the amount was £3,630,000. By far the greater part of the expenditure

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of the Post Office on local exchanges was in London. The hon. Member also commented upon the fact that the Americans were so much in advance of us in respect to telephony, but I ought to have mentioned that there are several particulars in regard to telephones in which we are ahead of them, such as sending express messages by telephone and telegrams. There are many matters in which they would be able to profit by our example, and do contemplate profiting by it, so that the comparison is not entirely against us.
Mr. MORTON: Will the right hon. Gentleman allow me to say that I sent a message across to Detroit only last autumn and it was telephoned to the man.
Mr. HERBERT SAMUEL: The hon. Member for Devizes raised a point as to the amount of our profits compared with those of the company, but he should remember that so far as the local provincial exchanges are concerned the company had the whole of the cream of the country and the Post Office starting later secured only the inferior districts. Many of them the company would not take, and if we were to consider commercial profit alone the Post Office would not deal with these districts. But we have to consider the public interest and whether we can by making some sacrifice at the beginning develop a good and useful service in years to come. I am not quite sure that I accept the figures given as accurate, and I shall therefore enter a caveat in respect to them. Again the hon. Member raised the contention that because the Post Office was interested in the telegraphs, which are contrary to the interests of the telephone system, therefore it may be expected to hold back telephones so as to prevent their interference' with the maintenance of telegraph revenues. That is a contention which has been already advanced in a pamphlet which has been circulated to Members of this House, but I am quite convinced that the idea is wholly unfounded. It makes not the smallest difference to the Post Office whether telegraphs or telephones are most useful. Our sole interest is to serve the public. I protest against the idea that the Post Office cannot be trusted to do justice to the telephones on account of a desire to protect the interests of the telegraphs. The hon. Member for Devizes asked me how many years it would be before we secured the full development of telephones to which we
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looked forward. That must, of course, depend upon two things—upon the rates to be charged for telephones and upon the efficiency of the service. The rates to be charged depend a good deal upon what we shall have to pay the Telephone Company, and, therefore, we have every reason to hope that the price will not be an excessive one. The lower the price is the more cheaply shall we be able to supply the service to the subscribers and the more rapid will telephone development be. It is impossible for me to give any accurate forecast in regard to any particular number of years when one is dealing with conditions so uncertain.
Mr. PETO: Does not it depend still more upon the development of trade, industry, and manufactures?
Mr. HERBERT SAMUEL: We anticipate that there will continue to be satisfactory development in trade, industry, and manufactures so long as we maintain our existing Free Trade system. The hon. Member also inquired whether existing agreements would be allowed to run out, or whether there was any prospect of their being suddenly cut short, if there is a revision of the rates. There is no power to terminate an agreement which has been made for a term of years, and we do not propose to take any new powers. An agreement will run out its natural period; most of them are terminable on a notice which is brief. I am also asked if new agreements will be necessary after 31st December. No, they will not be necessary, but will continue on the same terms. The hon. Member for Portsmouth asked with regard to pensions. He said he assumed that the pensions which would be received by the employés of the company would not be less than what they would receive if they remained with the company. The general system of pensions by the State is considerably more generous than that of the company, and, further, we make no deduction of 2½ per cent. as the company does. I am not in a position to say that no case would occur in which a man may not lose by sacrificing his existing pension rights and taking State pension rates, but then he is not obliged to do that. It is left to his own decision whether he will retain his share of the existing fund or transfer it in exchange for the State rates. The hon. Member asked me a question with regard to the details of the terms on which I have offered to

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purchase the corporation system in Portsmouth. The matter is exceedingly detailed, and I think perhaps he has not seen the correspondence. I will send him a copy rather than endeavour to deal with the matter across the floor of the House in minute detail. In answer to the hon. Member (Mr. D. M. Mason), the profits earned by the company have no relation to the sum which will be paid to the company. The company will be paid simply for the value of their plant, including land and buildings—so much for poles, insulators, and so on per thousand or million, as the case may be, and the amount which they receive from their subscribers will not have any bearing on the price which we pay. The scale of pensioned rates was settled before my time in an agreement between the Post Office and the company, and I am afraid I am not acquainted with the reasons why a preference was given to London, but I will inquire into the matter. I have not gone into it closely, because I decided some time ago that it is quite impossible to disturb existing rates until we know what the general scheme is to be. It will not do to make a small change on 1st of January next year, and then perhaps within a few months to make a second change and put people on another scale of rates. It is necessary to make one alteration at one time, therefore I have not gone closely into the point about which the hon. Member asked me. It only remains for me to thank the Committee very cordially for the reception which they have given to this Resolution.
Mr. PETO: Could the right hon. Gentleman say something in regard to the small rural areas and the use of the telephone by farmers, and whether they can communicate with the nearest market town and the nearest railway station?
Mr. HERBERT SAMUEL: The question is what is to be the area of the exchange— that is a question which must be decided on merits in the particular case. If the village is a very long way off from the town it will not be reasonable for the farmer to pay £3 a year to have connection with a distant town. It must depend to some extent on the situation of the particular village. We cannot lay down any definite rule. We cannot say that every farmer shall have a telephone to a fire engine. It must depend where the fire engine is. In the hon. Member's case I understand they have arrangements already made by which
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they can communicate without extra charge to the market town, one call to the town being regarded as equivalent to two local calls.
Mr. PETO: One call to the town where the station is is equal to two local calls.
Mr. HERBERT SAMUEL: I do not think it is possible to lay down any universal principle, but I will look closely into the matter, with special reference to the case that the hon. Member has mentioned. I quite see that facilities are desirable if the exchange is situated in a village, but even if it costs 2d. I should think it is worth while to telephone to the fire engine or to inquire the market rate of the day.
Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: I should like to ask whether, in regard to this question of the staff, the right hon. Gentleman will circulate with his Bill a memorandum stating exactly what their position is. At present the staff has to pick out, partly from the right hon. Gentleman's speech at a dinner, partly from the letters of his secretary, partly from Lord Derby's speeches, and now from his speech to-day, exactly what their rights are to be. That is, of course, unsatisfactory.
Mr. HERBERT SAMUEL: I am much obliged to the hon. Member for his suggestion, and I will gladly adopt it.
Question put, and agreed to.
Resolved, "That it is expedient to make provision for other matters in connection with the transfer to the Postmaster-General of the property of the National Telephone Company."
Resolution ordered to be reported to the House to-morrow (Tuesday).

TELEGRAPH CONSTRUCTION BILL.
Order for Second Reading read.
Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a second time."
Mr. HERBERT SAMUEL: This is a purely departmental measure of no general public interest. It deals with the regulations between the Post Office and railway and canal companies, and relates to telegraph and telephone lines which cross a railway line or canal as the case may be—not those which run along it, but simply those which run across it, which go from a road to a road, or from private property to private property. The Post-

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master-General has the right of wayleave over railway lines with regard to most railways, but the company have a right to maintain the wires themselves. It is obviously very inconvenient for them to maintain a small piece of wire, which may be ten or fifty yards, forming part of a wire running along a long stretch of road. They, however, maintain the wires which run along their railways, but do not maintain the wires which cross them. The Postmaster-General has hitherto paid the company as though they did maintain the wires, and it is in order to relieve ourselves from this payment for services which are not rendered that we have introduced this Bill. The companies have met the proposal in a very reasonable spirit. The officers of the Department have had negotiations with the railway companies in respect of this Bill, and they accept the principle, and a number of Amendments have been agreed between the Department and the companies with a view to meeting any reasonable objections which the companies have raised. These Amendments will be inserted in the Committee, and on that understanding I believe the Bill is unopposed. Negotiations have also been proceeding with the interests representing canals, and an Amendment will be inserted to exclude canals over which we have rights under the Act of 1863, thus excluding very nearly all the canals of the country. This is a hybrid Bill, partly public and partly of a private character, and after Second Reading it will go to a mixed Committee appointed partly by the Committee of selection and partly by the House, and there representations will be received from parties interested, and details which may still be unsettled can be examined impartially by the Committee. I trust on that understanding the House will pass the Second Reading.
Mr. NIELD: The last statement the right hon. Gentleman has made has considerably relieved the position which I otherwise should have had to take up. For weeks past I had a notice on the Order Paper to move the rejection of the measure. That becomes totally unnecessary when I am told the Bill will be examined upstairs before a Select Committee. The interests which I represent are public interests, which do not, strictly speaking, come within the definition of canals. The objection I raise to the Bill is the power given to the Postmaster-General to go be-hind agreements that he has already made
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under which he gets wayleaves, and according to Clause 1 it is not merely across a canal, but underground. Apart from the question whether or not he shall take power, as he does here by Clause 2, to go behind any agreement or award made against him for payment of wayleave, he is also able to insist in all cases on doing the work himself. I am interested only as a member of a public body which manages navigation and I have no personal interest at all. Very large sums of money have to be paid in interest and repayment of loans, and therefore it is necessary that the revenue of this body should be kept up as far as possible, and that is the reason why any agreement already in existence under which sums of money are paid, and they are very numerous, by the Government, should remain intact and should not be taken away under the general proposals of the latter part of Clause 2.
Then with regard to another question which is quite as important, that of the right of the Postmaster-General to undertake repairs on the river or canal bank, and possibly cause disturbance of the soil, I suggest that he is able to make the arrangement he tells us he has done with the canal and railway companies that he will afford facilities whereby the work shall be done under the supervision or to the satisfaction of responsible officers of the conservancy, who know the weaknesses of the banks and therefore will be able to help the Post Office as they have done in the past. I do not think any difference has seriously arisen between the Conservancy Beard and the Department, in regard to the very many wayleaves which cross and recross and go along part of the river banks, and he will find them as reasonable in the future as they have been in the past. I bring that specially before the Postmaster-General, because a great deal of the artificial river which has been constructed in the last hundred years, and made applicable for the purpose of trade, runs between high embankments, and it is therefore very necessary that the engineer of the conservancy should be able to have some controlling power over the Post Office officials and that the work should be done to their satisfaction or under their supervision. I am quite sure the Postmaster-General will give these suggestions the best consideration he can, and that when the Bill goes upstairs he will have them debated if a settlement in regard to these matters is not arrived at before then.
Question put, and agreed to.
Bill accordingly read a second time.
Ordered, "That the Bill be committed to a Select Committee of Five Members, Three to be nominated by the House, and Two by the Committee of Selection:
That all Petitions against the Bill presented Five clear days before the meeting of the Committee be referred to the Committee:
That the Petitioners praying to be heard by themselves, their Counsel, or Agents, be heard against the Bill, and Counsel heard in support of the Bill:
That the Committee have power to send for persons, papers, and records:
That Three be the quorum."—[Mr. Herbert Samuel.]

OLD AGE PENSIONS (No. 3) BILL.
Order for Second Reading read.
Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a second time."
Sir FREDERICK BANBURY: I do not wish to discuss the provisions of the Bill at this stage, but in agreeing to the Second Reading I have to say that there may be one or two little points to be dealt with in Committee.
Mr. BARNES: I want to offer a few observations in regard to this Bill. In the first place I think on the whole I ought to express satisfaction that the Government have at last made some effort to deal with the defects found in the Old Age Pensions Act of 1908. No one wants to cavil at that Act unnecessarily. On the whole it has worked fairly well. On the plan of welcoming half a loaf when you cannot get the whole loaf I welcome this Bill, but I am sorry that the Government, while they were at it, have not decided to make a complete job of it. I think this Bill and the Bill which was brought forward recently by the hon. Member for South St. Pancras (Captain Jessel) are rather narrow in their character. The defects of the Old Age Pensions Act may be said to have relation to questions of nationality, residence and income. It has been found there have been extreme cases of hardship in the case of women who have married foreigners. Although these women have been left widows, they have been deprived of old age pensions, notwithstanding the fact that they have reared
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families in this country. An effort is now to be made to deal with that point, but so far as I can see the Bill does not deal with it as a matter of principle. I find, for instance, that a person who has married an alien will not be disqualified under certain conditions, but these conditions are very onerous. For instance, a woman must satisfy the pension authority that she would, but for marrying an alien, have, fulfilled certain conditions, and then the Clause goes on to provide "that at the date of the receipt of any sum on account of a pension, the alien is dead." I take it that even if this Bill were passed a woman who marries an alien, no matter at what time of life, and the alien is alive at the time she comes to be seventy, that fact would of itself be sufficient to disqualify the poor woman. It seems to me that that is not removing the disqualification at all. I think we should have an explanation of that.
There are other provisions in the Bill, all in the nature of disqualifications. There are conditions with regard to the residential qualification. We had in mind three-years ago that some residential qualification would be necessary, and we inserted, I think without sufficient consideration, twenty years. There was nothing in the-Bill to indicate that the twenty years should mean residence in the country immediately previous to the application being made, but that has been regarded as the proper interpretation. This Bill lays it down that an applicant shall have resided in the country twelve years out of the twenty years immediately prior to the application. I submit that even that may leave a great deal under which complaint might easily be made. For instance, if a person lives sixty years in the country and then goes away, he would, under the terms of the Bill, at the age of seventy, be disqualified if he came back then. I think that there again this Bill does not satisfy requirements, and does not meet the representations which have been made not only from this side of the House but also from the other side. So far as I could gather from the statement made a week or two ago persons should get pensions if they have lived in this country during what may be called, the productive period of their lives. Surely the productive period in the life of a man is before the age of sixty. I would suggest that a far better way would be to take a long period, and to provide that a person shall not be disqualified if he or she has lived a certain

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period in this country. It ought to satisfy a11 reasonable requirements if you go back forty years before the application is made. If a person has lived in the country twenty years out of the forty, I think that should be sufficient to cover all reasonable requirements.
As to the case of a man who has suffered in prison, I find that this Bill does not carry out what I understood to be the intention of the hon. Gentleman when lie spoke on the introduction of the Bill a week or two ago. I understood him then to say that the period of ten years within which a man has suffered imprisonment was to be wiped out of the Bill altogether. For my own part, I think it ought to be. If a man has been imprisoned, surely that ought to be held as having purged the offence. I think that was a good old principle of English law and practice. I think we ought to have that principle embodied in the Bill, because there are many men who have suffered in prison for small and trivial offences. We had an instance brought to the public notice only a few months ago of a man who had been put in prison as a passive resister because he had not paid a fine imposed by local magistrates who were opposed to him on political grounds. Under this Bill it is proposed to substitute two years for ten years, but that unfortunate individual after undergoing a term of imprisonment would still have to wait two years before he could get his pension. My hon. Friend the Member for Blackburn (Mr. Snowden) Bays it would have to be imprisonment without the option of a fine. This man had the option of a fine and did not pay it. I take it that this forms a new offence. In any case I submit that the period of two years is far too long, and, as a matter of fact, there should be no period at all. The whole provision seems to be silly and vindictive, and when the Bill comes before the Committee I shall try to get that provision knocked out of the Bill.
It appears to me that the provisions of the Bill in regard to income are not only not improvements, but entirely reactionary in character. I take the provision whereby it is proposed that a man shall not get a pension if he has more than £300. That is really what it means. It is stipulated that a tenth part of a man's wealth shall be taken as constituting his total income. Therefore, if a man has £300, he will not be entitled to a pension. I am entirely opposed to that, and indeed I am entirely opposed to all the provisions in regard to income. I believe this Bill is
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creating a great many unnecessary offences, and is setting up a condition of things under which lying and misrepresentation will be practised. If you were to leave out this provision in regard to income you would probably find that you would not get many more applications, because you would be getting into the region where men and women would be so well off that they would not think of claiming pensions. I think you should put pensions on the same basis as elementary education. Give them to everybody if they claim them under certain conditions on the ground that everybody has paid into the fund from which pensions are drawn. I want pensions to be paid as a civic right, instead of being put on a compassionate basis. We are discussing a Bill which is supposed to be an improvement, but I say that it goes in the wrong direction.
I want to put in a plea for the friendly society member and the trade union member, and even for the old soldier who is in receipt of a small pension. I do not know why these people should be disqualified. We hear from both sides of the House from time to time speeches as to the great need of encouraging thrift. Here you have a form of thrift of the best possible description. The members of friendly societies and trade unions have throughout their whole lives been practising thrift in the best of all possible ways by pooling their small savings, and when they reach seventy years of age you make up the amount and count it as in-come. I hope when the Bill is going through Committee as many Members as possible will associate themselves to carry an Amendment exempting 1s. a day from income received by a man or woman who gets it as the result of membership of a friendly society or a trade union. I would put on the same basis the soldier or sailor who has gone through the service and is entitled to a pension of 1s. a day. These are some of the points to which I take exception. On the whole I welcome the Bill, though it does not go far enough. It does wipe out some of the most glaring defects of the Act of 1908. In Committee I and my Friends will try to get Amendments made in the direction I have indicated.
Mr. PETO: When we had a Debate in this House on Friday about three or four weeks ago, the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. Hobhouse) told us, in speaking of the Bill which was then being debated, the Old Age Pensions Bill of the hon. Member for St. Pancras

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(Captain Jessel), that the Government proposed to bring in a Bill to incorporate most of the things that were aimed at by that Bill. Now there are two things, one of which the hon. Member for the Black-friars Division (Mr. Barnes) has just referred to, which especially came out in that Debate, and I am greatly disappointed to find that neither of these, matters is referred to in the provisions of this Bill. One of them is the question of leaving out of account altogether in reckoning a man's means the whole, or some portion at any rate, of what he may be getting from his trade union or his friendly society as the result of many years of thrift. The hon. Member for Blackfriars says he hopes in Committee to bring in an amendment to deal with that point. I am quite a new Member in the House, but I should have been under the impression that it would be outside our power to propose an amendment which would impose any extra charge upon the Exchequer of the country. The hon. Member for Blackburn shakes his head, and I am delighted to hear that we shall be in order in doing so. Certainly I should like to see added to the Bill a clause which would exempt, say, 5s. a week from the means taken into calculation in allocating an old age pension, provided that that 5s. is the result of the personal thrift of the claimant and is derived from a pension or an annuity from a friendly Society or a trade union. If this does impose some charge on the Exchequer, which undoubtedly it does, there is another thing, which was mentioned in the debate a few weeks ago, which goes the other way and also is not mentioned in this Bill. It is well known that while many people are not receiving pensions or full pensions who ought to be receiving full pensions, a great many people are receiving pensions whose friends and neighbours know very well ought not to be receiving pensions, because they do not need them.
The Clause which I desire to have amended in this Bill is Clause 4 of the Old Age Pensions Act of 1908; Section 4, Subsection 3 of that Act imposes on the pension authority the duty of finding out what is in his mind. The Clause says:—
"If it appears that any person directly or indirectly deprives himself of any income or property in order to qualify himself for the receipt of an old age pension,"
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and so on. It has been found to be in practice quite impossible for anybody to find out what the motive of these particular transfers is. I would like to remind the House that under the Death Duty there is no question of what the motive of the person is who transfers any property within a period of three years of his demise. The mere fact of his having transferred the property within such a period brings the property within the scope of the Death Duty. I think in this case what is sauce for the rich goose is sauce for the poor gander. We ought to have no question of going into the motives of the transfer of this property, but we should have an amending clause in this Bill amending the section of the Old Age Pensions Act of 1908 to which I have referred, and placing a statutory time, say within three or five years of arrival at pensionable age, within which the transfer of property will not be allowed to count, and the property so transferred will be considered part of the property of the claimant. I hope that we shall be able to amend this Bill in that direction in Committee. I wish to take this opportunity of reminding the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary to the Treasury that though he did not pledge himself to all the points covered by the Bill discussed recently he gave us to understand that the most important of these matters would be dealt with. I have referred to what seems to be two of the most important of the questions, and I find neither of them in the Bill now under discussion.
Mr. SCANLAN: I rise to support the Second Reading of this Bill. The parent Bill has been very popular and has done a vast amount of good. I speak of my own Constituency, and I think that what I say of it applies equally throughout the whole of Ireland. It is recognised that that Act has marked a considerable social advance. I am sure that everyone who has felt the benefit of the Old Age Pensions Act either in individual cases or generally must welcome any improvements in the machinery for administering the scheme of old age pensions. I join heartily with the hon. Member for Blackfriars in the complaints which he has made, which are to the effect generally that the Amendments proposed are not as thorough-going as might have been expected on account of the various cases brought under the notice of the Treasury. Nowhere have the difficulties in administering the Old Age Pensions Act, which are ventilated in this House from time to time, been more experienced then

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in Ireland, and I have looked forward with considerable hope to having improvements made in this amending Bill which would remove grievances that exist in Ireland.
The House is aware that its time is occupied to a considerable extent day after day by inquiries by Members representing Irish constituencies as to cases in which they feel that grievances of real and substantial character do exist. As an instance of the difference between our position in Ireland and the position of parts of Great Britain I may mention that last year the Chief Secretary for Ireland, representing the Irish Local Government Board, stated in answer to a question put to him by me that up to March, 1910, in 4,588 cases the Irish Local Government Board had cancelled pensions which had been issued. In reply to a similar question the Lord Advocate stated that only in forty-four cases had pensions been cancelled in Scotland. The President of the Local Government Board for England (Mr. Burns) was too busy with his various other duties to be able to reply to a similar question which I addressed to him that year. When we consider these facts we must come to the conclusion that grievances do exist in Ireland which create a sense of injustice on the part of those people who have been deprived of their pensions. It has been admitted by the responsible Minister that the difficulty in Ireland with regard to the age qualification is that the Census Returns of 1841 and 1851 are inaccurate, and misleading and incomplete, and it has been admitted by representatives of the Government that certain Census Returns in Ireland are entirely wanting. The Act of 1908 does not contemplate that a person who has reached the age of seventy years should be deprived of a pension merely because the applicant cannot produce an excerpt from the Census Return which the Government themselves have admitted to be defective. In a large number of cases in Ireland it is impossible to produce such evidence from the Census Returns, and what is complained of in my own Constituency, and I believe generally throughout the country, is that when you have a local body like the local pension committee, who have local knowledge, who see the claimant and to come to the conclusion, apart from the evidence of the Census Returns, that the applicant is of the qualifying age of seventy, the Irish Local Government Board entirely disregard the evidence submitted to the local pension committee and considered by them to be satisfactory.
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I had hoped, as the result of complaints made by Irish representatives, that a direction would be given to the Irish Government Board in this amending Act that where it is impossible to produce-written evidence of age, in cases where the Census give no results whatever, they should have regard to the evidence of people known to be over seventy years of age who are prepared to make affidavits and say that the applicant is of the qualifying age. I think, however, it would be possible in Committee to have an Amendment inserted giving to the Irish Local Government Board some positive direction in regard to this matter. Another point on which the parent Act should be amended is in regard to the calculation of means. I do not think that the suggestion made in this Bill that the means should be taken as one-tenth of the capital value of the property of any person is satisfactory. I agree with the hon. Member for Blackfriars that the disqualifying of persons from receiving pensions on account of a conviction before a local petty sessions court is absurd. I agree with with him that if a person is punished in a. criminal court of justice, the punishment should not be followed by deprivation of a pension. As an illustration I may mention a case from the west of Ireland which was brought before the House a few weeks ago. A person was brought before a. petty sessions court and charged with an offence the slight character of which was shown by the fact that the justices merely ordered the person to be detained during the sitting of the court. This was without the option of a fine, and as the Act now stands and even under the amending Bill this conviction might be followed by serious consequences to that person. I submit that when this Bill is in Committee this Clause should be altogether omitted. Otherwise the Bill as introduced proposes amendment on various points on which amendment is necessary, and I heartily support the Second Reading.
Mr. SNOWDEN: My hon. Friend the Member for Blackfriars (Mr. Barnes) has put before the House various criticisms on the Bill with which I am in agreement, so that there remains very little for me to do except to very heartily and emphatically endorse what he has said. Like him, I am glad to know that the Government are seeking to amend the Old Age Pensions Act, although I think their action is somewhat late. It is considerably over two years since I spoke in this House, and

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urged the need of the introduction of an amending Bill dealing with all the points that are included in this measure. As my hon. Friend the Member for Blackfriars observed, now that the Government have taken up the consideration of this question they might have dealt with it in a more thorough manner. In regard to the disability under which the wife of a British workman would still labour when she has to qualify for a pension, I submit that what the Government has to do is not to recognise the pre-nationality of the woman, but that they ought to recognise the British nationality of the husband. The Bill proposes a new method of settling the yearly value of property owned by applicants for pension. I remember when the Old Age Pensions Bill was under discussion in Committee that the question of capitalising by way of annuity the property of an applicant for pension was considered, and I recollect that at that time there was in the House no measure of support at all for doing what is now proposed by this Bill. I remember very distinctly the speech of the then Attorney-General, now Lord Robson, in which he advocated the matter, and that the overwhelming majority of Members of the House impugned the justice of such a proposal as is now intended to be embodied in the Act of Parliament. I associate myself wholly with my hon. Friend the Member for Blackfriars and with the hon. Member for Wiltshire in their request that some consideration ought to be given to the case where an old man or even an old woman, after being for years a member of a trade union or friendly society, receives a pension as a result of their thrift.
I will go further than that. There are many ways and forms that the thrifty habits of the working classes assume. It is not every working man who can become a member of a trade union or a friendly society, and, therefore, I think that all forms of thrift are equally entitled to consideration. In the north of England, in the West Riding of Yorkshire, and in Lancashire, one of the commonest forms of thrift to provide for old age, is investment in house property; and the time when the working class family is able to save and to invest in such a way is during the ten or fifteen years when the children are working and still remain at home. In that period of time these workpeople, with their four or five children working, are enabled to save £200, £300, and £400, and this money is invested in house
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property. What does this Bill propose to do? It proposes to deprive people who have invested in property, money which is the result of thrift, of the right to old age pension. I cannot imagine that is the intention of Members of the Government. I remember the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of the Treasury (Mr. Hobhouse) when speaking on the Bill, introduced by an hon. Member opposite, three or four weeks ago, used what appeared to me to be an astounding observation in regard to old age pensions. He said that they were intended only for the poor and needy. That is not my idea of old age pensions at all. My idea of old age pension is that it is not a pauper dole. My idea of old age pension is that it is a recognition by the State of a lifetime of useful social service, and that men and women should be given pensions, just as civil servants, or soldiers, or other employés of the State are given pensions, regardless of whether they have other sources of income. The savings of a lifetime, after a great deal of sacrifice in order to escape the workhouse, are invested in property, and because they have been invested in that one particular form, the applicant who has so invested the result of his thrift through many years of self-denial, is to be deprived of the pension. On the other hand a person who lives in a house reaching a value of £310 or £320 can claim the old age pension under this Bill. So far as I can understand the wording of this Clause some very curious anomalies are likely to arise. It orders that:—
"The yearly value of any property belonging to that person (not being property personally used or enjoyed by him), which is invested, or which is otherwise put to profitable use by him, or which though capable of investment or profitable use, is not so invested or put to profitable use by him, the yearly value of that property being taken to be one-tenth part of the capital value thereof."
What does that mean? So far as I understand it, it means that if an applicant for the old age pension lives in his house, then the yearly value of that, or one-tenth of the capital value of the property, is not to be charged in estimating the income. Therefore, we may have side by side two people living in houses, one paying rent for his house, but owning a house elsewhere, and being disqualified from pension, and the other who lives in the house that he owns, being qualified for pension. I am quite sure of this, that never will any proposed amendment of the Old Age Pensions Act be so impossible as this. I am perfectly sure it will have the effect

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of losing the party tens of thousands of votes; it will arouse intense indignation amongst the most respectable and the most worthy section of the working classes of the country. I am amazed that the Government should have done such a thing, and I do hope that for their credit and for the credit of this House when the Bill goes into Committee, this objectionable and unjust Clause will be removed.
Mr. BOOTH: There is one small point to which I should like to call the attention of the Secretary to the Treasury. It has reference to the disqualification of the wife or widow of a man who chooses to reside abroad. As a rule, the man who goes abroad chooses either one of the Colonies or America. His wife has no choice in the matter. Her husband may decide to leave Old England or even Scotland to go to the Colonies or America, and his wife has no option but to accompany him. She does not want to divide the family and break up her home, and many women in these circumstances go abroad against their will. The man goes from his own choice, and his wife follows him to Australia or Canada or America as the case may be. Whether from family pride or because she wishes to be with her husband and children, the woman is compelled to go abroad. I submit that in these circumstances she should not lose her right to the old age pension if her husband should die and she returns to this country. The woman is not controlled by the same motives as the man, who leaves his country for one of the colonies because he wishes to work there, whereas his wife, because of her family affection, feels bound to follow him, and I think when she returns she ought to be entitled to old age pension. I am not able to suggest a Clause myself, for I am not an old enough Parliamentary hand, but I mention the point because it does appear to be unjust to women who have been compelled to go abroad with their husbands. Speaking generally, I approve of the action of the Government in bringing in this Bill. I believe it is an immense step forward in the right direction, and I believe many Members sitting on these benches appreciate the fact that the Government are going to proceed with this measure.
The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the TREASURY (Mr. Hobhouse): In saying a few words in reply to hon. Members who have spoken upon the subject under dis-
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cussion, it will be unnecessary for me to say anything upon the general principle of the Bill. I went into it in considerable detail on the occasion of the discussion which took place some few weeks ago, and I do not wish to weary the House with any repetition of what I then said. The hon. Member for Blackfriars was good enough to say that he felt some dissatisfaction at the delay of the Government to remedy lapses in the Act of 1908. The reason is that we had to wait for a period until we were able to collect together in one measure all the various discrepancies which arose from time to time. These discrepancies were not brought to our notice within the first six months or a year or even two years after the passing of the Act.
Mr. SNOWDEN: I brought every point in the Bill before the House within six months.
Mr. HOBHOUSE: The hon. Gentleman will admit that one swallow does not make a summer, and that one case of injustice and hardship does not necessarily prove that it represents such a general condition of things that it is necessary that Parliament should at once bring in a Bill to set matters right. Therefore until there was some general proof in regard to discrepancies, and until there was general evidence of hardship, not in the case of one area or another but throughout the country, we did not proceed with this Bill. Several points were raised by the hon. Member for Blackfriars. First of all there was the question of the British subject, and he suggested that it was rather a hardship that some persons should not be able to get the pension, unless the alien was dead, or the marriage was dissolved. But it may be quite possible for any married man to go abroad and continue abroad, neither contributing to the benefits given here nor to the industry of this country, and then return and take up his residence, and, after having had all the advantages of residence abroad, derive all the advantages of being a British subject.
Mr. BARNES: Could not the residential qualification be applied in such a case?
8.0 P.M.
Mr. HOBHOUSE: It would apply to twelve years, but should not apply so far as eight years are concerned. Under the; very extended business of this country, the mere alien could then return just on the critical border line and claim all the

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advantages of residence without having had any of the liabilities. That is not, I am sure, the wish of the House, and it is not our contention. Rather to avoid any possible collusion between the alien and his wife we have put in a provision that the alien must be dead or the marriage must be dissolved I do not think that that is an unreasonable qualification. If the hon. Member, to be perfectly frank, wishes to see everybody with a pension, irrespective of their means or irrespective of the righteousness of their claim—
Mr. BARNES: I am sure the right hon. Gentleman will not wilfully misrepresent me. We have always said we are willing to admit a residential qualification, and it is only with regard to means.
Mr. HOBHOUSE: That is the whole point of difference between us. I think the hon. Gentleman recognises that our provision in regard to the twenty years of residential qualification does, at all events, meet some of his objections. I believe some test of residence must be applied. Why, it may be said, make it twenty years or thirty or forty, or any time? Twenty years is, I think, a fair proof that the person concerned has really British citizenship, and in order to ease that period we take eight years out of it under the conditions set out in the Bill, so that I really think we have met the grievances which have in practice arisen. The hon. Member for Blackburn (Mr. Snowden) referred to the question of friendly society and trade union benefits. If you are not to exclude those as means, why should you exclude any means at all? You cannot make a distinction between various sources of income. Supposing you do exclude all these considerations, then we come back to the question of money, and the total abolition of any limit of income of that sort would represent, not a sum of £2,000, not some small, petty sum, but something like three millions of money. I hope the House in Committee will be quite clear as to what they are embarking on in making any such proposal as that which is now suggested. Investments of £300 or £400 in house property are not to be considered, according to the views of the hon. Member, and the persons having considerable amount of money are, notwithstanding, to receive old age pensions. From my point of view, I consider that those persons are
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not fair recipients of old age pensions, and I am in sharp antagonism to the hon. Member on that point. If you are to abolish those conditions, as the hon. Member proposes, you are embarking on an expenditure which cannot be less than between two and three millions of money. I do not know where that two or three millions is to come from, and I do not believe that the House, when it has to deal with the question, will adopt the view which the hon. Member recommends.
Mr. KELLAWAY: Is that based on the assumption that all over seventy draw their pensions?
Mr. HOBHOUSE: It is based on the assumption that these qualifying conditions are removed?
Mr. KELLAWAY: And that all over seventy draw their pension?
Mr. HOBHOUSE: That is the contention. The hon. Member for North Sligo (Mr. Scanlan) referred to something about pensions in Ireland being cancelled. I do not know that that subject is perhaps germane to the Bill which is before us. I may also remind the hon. Member that while 5 per cent. of old age pensions cancelled in Ireland is larger than in Scotland or England, the percentage of pensions in Ireland is greater than in those countries. I do not intend to go into details, but I think you will find that Ireland has not emerged unsuccessfully from the struggle* for pensions. With the remark that the census returns were incomplete, I agree, but I am convinced from experience that the advantage has not been entirely to the Exchequer, and that undoubtedly a certain number of persons have reaped advantage from the incompleteness of the census, as well as the fact that other persons have incurred some disadvantage by the incomplete census. I do not think that I need go into the other points which are-Committee points, and capable of discussion upstairs.
Mr. ESSEX: There is my point with, regard to the value of houses.
Mr. HOBHOUSE: I think all those are really Committee points, best discussed upstairs. The point arises in Clause 4.
Mr. SNOWDEN: My point is this: Supposing a person has, say, £400 invested in house property in one house, and that the person is in occupation of that house. Will that be regarded as property personally used and enjoyed?
Mr. HOBHOUSE: What is meant is to cover the point of the possession of either furniture, clothes, or personal equipment up to the extent of £30. Those hitherto have been taken into account. We propose to exempt them in future, and in order to make clear that they are not included, these words are inserted.
Question put, and agreed to.
Bill accordingly read a second time, and committed to a Standing Committee.

LABOURERS (IRELAND)— [ADVANCES, Etc.]
Considered in Committee.
(IN THE COMMITTEE.)
Motion made, and Question proposed, "That for carrying out the provisions of any Act of the present Session to amend the Law relating to Labourers in Ireland it is expedient:—

(a) To authorise the advance out of the Consolidated Fund of any sum necessary to meet any deficiency in the fund of suitors in the Supreme Court of Ireland; and

(b) To increase the limit on the amount which may be advanced by the Irish Land Commission for the provision of cottages and allotments under The Labourers (Ireland) Act, 1906, and in consequence to increase the limit on the sums which may be defrayed out of moneys provided by Parliament for the purpose of payments in respect of those advances."—[Mr. Gulland.]

Mr. CARLILE: I beg to draw attention to the fact that the Prime Minister this afternoon specified the Orders which he proposed to take, and this Order was not among them. The House was pretty full at the time, and I think it was perfectly well understood that certain Orders were to be allowed to go through, namely, Nos. 22 and 24. I do not propose to discuss the Bill, but I would appeal to the hon. Member who is in charge not to force this through, but to carry out the arrangement made by the Prime Minister.
Mr. GULLAND: The Prime Minister mentioned Nos. 22 and 24. It was found that those Orders would not go through very easily, and the alteration was made with the complete approval of the right hon. Gentleman opposite. My right hon. Friend consulted the Chief Opposition Whip, and he was quite agreeable that
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Nos. 20 and 21, being uncontentious, should be taken instead of Nos. 22 and 24. That is quite understood in all parts of the House.
Mr. CARLILE: After the explanation of" the hon. Member I have no objection at all.
Question put, and agreed to.
Resolution to be reported upon Monday-next, 26th June.

BOARD OF EDUCATION SCHEME (ALNWICK CORPORATION PAYMENT) CONFIRMATION BILL.— [Lords.]
Read a second time, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House for Monday next.—[Mr. Gulland.]

TELEPHONE TRANSFER.
Order for Committee thereupon read, and discharged.
ADJOURNMENT.—Resolved, "That this House do now Adjourn."—[Mr. Gulland.]
Adjourned accordingly at a Quarter after Bight o'clock.