§ "That an additional number of Land Forces, not exceeding 1,000,000, of all 1799 ranks, be maintained for the Service of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland at Home and Abroad, excluding His Majesty's Indian Possessions, in consequence of the War in Europe, for the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1917."
§ Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House doth agree with the Committee in the said Resolution."
§ Mr. PRINGLEI want to make one or two observations on this Vote. I think it is essential that the House, before finally agreeing with the Vote for an extra million men, should know whether these men are to be soldiers. At the present moment we have about 4,000,000 men under arms, but a very large percentage are not soldiers; they are being used under military law for civilian purposes. Consequently, before we assent to a further increase in the armed forces of the Crown, I think we should receive some undertaking from the Minister in charge that this further million are going to be bond fide soldiers, employed for the purpose of the European War, and not for the purposes of industry in this country. I do not wish to go into details as to the numbers of men at present employed in that way; but I know, for example, that there are several thousands of men in the part of the country which I represent who, not for a temporary matter or for an emergency, but since the month of July, have been continuously employed in ironworks on military pay. I think we ought to know, first of all, whether this new million men are to be enlisted as soldiers, and, if not, if they are to be enlisted for the purposes of being used as workmen under military law. We ought to know, also, whether they are going to be paid at military rates of pay, in competition with civilians who are earning wages under normal conditions. I think that my right hon. Friend should give us some assurance on that point.
Mr. TYSON WILSONI would like to empmasise what the hon. Gentleman has said. The military representatives in many parts of the country are taking men who are doing the most essential work it is possible for workmen to do. I will give an illustration. I had a letter on Tuesday from Louthborough. A man had been working for a company there, making aeroplanes for the Government. He is 41 1800 years and 3 months old. He got exempted in August for a period, and now he has been again called up. The firm do not want to lose this man, and say he is necessary for carrying on the work, but the military representative refuses to release him or to suspend his calling-up notice. He says that this man will have to pass his trade test, and that then he will send him to Farnborough, to the Government aircraft works on the same day. I had a letter from Farnborough, saying that Government men had been released from the factory there to go into the Army. It is not playing the game to release skilled men that are absolutely required to make aeroplanes, for their places cannot be filled in a day or two. It is most unfair, particularly to men of that age, to put them into the Army, send them to Farnborough, and put them on military pay for doing work of just the same kind that they were doing before in the shops from which they were taken. I put a question to-day with regard to the men engaged in ship repairs in the Liverpool and Birkenhead district. I have heard quite within an hour or two that on the Birkenhead side of the Mersey matters are far worse than on the Liverpool side. The workmen of the country ought to know exactly where they stand. They are living in a state of fear and trembling. So long as these men are engaged in work of national importance—I do not mean the kind of work imposed upon them by tribunals—but their ordinary work, if it is accounted to be work in the interests of the nation they ought to be left there. The hon. Member should make it as clear as he possibly can that men engaged in essential work shall not be drafted into the Army so long as their services are required, and so long as they are doing the work they are engaged in at present.
§ Mr. MACPHERSONIf my hon. Friend had heard me yesterday he would have known that I pointed out quite clearly that this Vote was a purely technical Vote. It is merely to regularise our position. At present we have a Vote for 4,000,000 men. The Colonial Forces are included in the British Forces; consequently it is necessary that we should have this additional Vote. It does not mean taking any more men from the industrial centres of the country; it is simply and solely to regularise our position.
§ Question put, and agreed to.