CLAUSE 2.—(Registration Authorities and Districts.) (Hansard, 7 July 1915)

§ Mr. PRATT
I beg to move to leave out the word "central."
This and several consequential Amendments have the object of making the Registrar-General, acting under the direction of the Local Government Board, the registration authority for the whole of the country. I want to make the machinery as prompt, as effective, and as quick-moving as possible. Whatever our opinion may be, now that we are to have the Bill we want it to do its work as promptly and as efficiently as possible. The object of the Amendment is to have one authority, and one authority alone, to carry out the work of registration. The Registrar-General conducts the Census from the centre and not from the local authorities. He has a knowledge of the problems, and he has, indeed, much of the machinery ready to his hand, and I think that it would be 461 better to allow him to direct the whole of the machine for the whole of the country. It would secure, in the second place, the same standard of excellence all over the country. I am quite sure, leaving the matter to the different local authorities, that you would have a standard of excellence in one part much higher than in another, and for the purpose of speed and efficiency you do want to set the same standard all over the country. I do hope, in the third place, that the right hon. Gentleman will give us some definite promise that no expense is to fall upon the local authorities. This is entirely a national matter. Many of the local authorities are very hard pressed as it is, and they will be more hard pressed in future. I do think, therefore, that we should have a definite assurance that the local authorities are not going to be called upon to make any financial contribution to the cost of the work, but that it is to be a charge entirely on the Treasury. If the expense is to be met at the head, then the direction of the machine should be from the head. It may be advanced, and I believe it will be advanced, that one of the objects of the Bill is to use local machinery and local knowledge. I am sure the right hon. Gentleman will see at once that all the local machine and all the local knowledge can be harnessed by the representative of the Registrar-General. I think entirely on the one point of efficiency that the suggested change is a good one, and I appeal to the right hon. Gentleman to give it his consideration.

§ Mr. LONG
The Amendment really goes much further than I think the hon. Member himself quite realises. He suggests that the Registrar-General should do this work as he does that in connection with the Census because it would be more accurately done. It would certainly be more expensively done, because the Registrar-General is entirely dependent upon paid assistance. I have, of course, from the very beginning discussed the matter with the Registrar-General and I have had his personal assistance and advice. He tells me that he could not at all guarantee obtaining an enormous staff such as he has to obtain for the purposes of the Census at a time when all those difficulties exist to which reference has been made, whereas the local authorities can much more easily get local assistance. My objection to the Amendment is that it would alter the character of this register. It is really to be a local register carried 462 out by the local authorities with the aid of their own knowledge of their own localities, and many of the difficulties which critics of the Bill saw in the first instance I believe will be met by the fact that the register is to be made by the local authorities knowing the district and the people in the district, and not by a central authority acting through a mere stranger hired for the purpose. The hon. Member probably was not in the House when I made an announcement earlier in the afternoon with regard to the cost.

§ Mr. PRATT
No, I was not here.

§ Mr. LONG
I will very gladly repeat it as he has asked me the question. My statement was that it is the deliberate intention of the Government, and I am prepared to affirm it in any way that will be sufficiently satisfactory, that the entire cost shall be borne by the State and not by the local authorities. Our intention is to come to an arrangement between the Treasury and the Local Government Board as to the scale of expenditure, and we thought it well to take power to throw any expense beyond that upon the rates merely in order, if we find any local authorities recalcitrant and unwilling to accept our scale, that we should be able to say to them, "If you do not accept our scale you will have yourselves to pay the difference between ours and your own." It is only a sort of power in reserve which it is intended the Local Government Board should possess in the hope that the knowledge that such power exists will render the exercise of it altogether unnecessary. Our intention is that the cost shall be borne by the State, and there will certainly be no attempt to depart from that principle.

§ Mr. PRINGLE
The central registration authority is bound to accept every local authority irrespective of its means and resources for the purpose of making this register. It does seem to me that it would be much better to leave the Registrar-General as the central registration authority with a completely free hand in the selection of the local authorities for the purpose of the register. But as these considerations do not commend themselves to the Government I do not think that it is worth my hon. Friend's while to press the Amendment.

§ Mr. PRINGLE
I will ask the right hon. Gentleman's attention to a suggestion I threw out in perhaps a very incomplete form when we were discussing the Financial Resolution. My suggestion was that, for the purposes of making the register effective and complete, the machinery of the National Insurance Act should be employed. By means of that machinery the Government have secured an immense amount of information which they could very well use in connection with this register, with the result that the work could be much more economically carried out. Not only have you a considerable amount of information available from that source, but you also have the machinery for obtaining increased information in respect of all insured persons. It is ready to their hands, and if the Government will only use it, I think the work of registration will be done far more cheaply than is possible by the machinery provided in the Bill. There are 15,000,000 people insured under the National Insurance Act, both men and women, and in the ease of many approved societies there are collectors and visitors calling on these people at stated times. Other approved societies are in constant touch, through their local secretaries, with their members. The local secretaries know the insured persons and consequently they would be the likeliest people to get the form filled up with the least friction and irritation. In the interests of economy and with a view of avoiding friction I hope the right hon. Gentleman will agree to consider this matter. If he regards it as totally impracticable, I shall accept his decision.

§ Mr. THOMAS
I hope the right hon. Gentleman will not treat this proposal too seriously. There is strong objection to it from a practical standpoint. It is true there is a certain amount of information obtainable through the machinery of the Insurance Act, but it is not information requisite for the purposes of this Bill, and, in the second place, it can only be obtained through the trade unions and the approved societies, and these would immediately object, on the ground that it was putting additional work on their shoulders. Then there is the further point of view, that every week there are thousands of transfers from one society to another, and these would present a practical difficulty. Finally, the only approved societies that are in direct contact with the insured persons are the insurance societies through their agents, and if their power was used 464 to the disadvantage of the trade unions and the friendly societies, as it might easily be, it would cause endless friction.

§ Mr. LONG
I think the speech we have just listened to shows that there is a very strong divergence of opinion with regard to the suggestion made by my hon. Friend, with, I am sure, the single desire to effect economy. We propose to leave it to the local authorities to avail themselves of such assistance as they may think most beneficial. I do not propose to tie their hands in any special direction.