SERBIA. (Hansard, 17 February 1916)

§ Mr. BOOTH

I would like to put a question to the Foreign Office, and I certainly thank the Noble Lord for his courtesy in being here at this time. Before putting the question, I would like to say that since the House met the Government has appointed a Committee upon the Insurance Act which has been received with satisfaction by all the workers in the approved societies, and I tender my thanks to the Government for having set up that Committee at a crisis in the fortunes of the Act. I believe that it will help to bring about sound finance and give satisfaction to all parties concerned. We all of us wish that the Report of the Committee should come before the House as early as possible, and I believe that no time is being lost. I would like to ask the Noble Lord whether the Government are in a position to give this House and the country any information in regard to the relations of this country with Serbia. I do not propose to discuss that matter, but I will again ask that some light be thrown both upon our past relations and our present attitude. If the Government say they cannot give us any information now, of course I will wait. But I would like to point out to them that a great deal of painful reading comes before our notice, and since I last referred to the matter the feeling of many of us who are watching the history of Serbia has been rendered more poignant, because we have read of the way in which hospital nurses and doctors of our nationality have been received with acclamation by the people who have been under the impression that the British were going to save them, and who have given cheers for the British Army and then have had to give up all hope and tramp the mountains, many of them never reaching the coast. I have 393 to mention that as an additional reason why I press the matter. If the Government cannot yet make a statement in regard to the past, can they now say if they regard Serbia as not merely an Ally, but an Ally to whom they owe much? Recently they issued a pronouncement in regard to Belgium. I was very pleased to see it. Can the Government make a similar pronouncement to cheer the Serbians? Suggestions are made which I cannot credit, that the Foreign Office still has a sort of leaning towards Bulgaria. I think that in the past there has been a considerable amount of friendship shown to the Bulgarians by the Foreign Office. I regret to say that the "Times" correspondent in the East even yet shows a great leaning to that Power which is fighting against us, and which behaved in such a dastardly manner to one of our Allies. I have not heard any protest from the Government of the atrocious conduct of the Bulgarians in stabbing the Serbians in the back, and in doing atrocities quite as bad as anything the Germans have done in Belgium, when that nation was trying to fight two Empires so much bigger than itself. I trust that some message, if it cannot be given to-night, will be given at an early date, and that some pronouncement will be made on behalf of the Government which will put the British nation in a right position with that gallant and loyal Ally which has suffered so much and which looked so long for help towards us—for help which never came.

§ The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Lord Robert Cecil)

I am sure that the House would not wish me, at this hour, or on the present occasion, to enter into any account of the past policy, or further policy of His Majesty's Government with regard to Serbia.

With regard to the past, I do not myself think that anything can be added to what my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs has already said on that subject. Nothing can be added at present to that, and with regard to the future the statement of the Prime Minister last autumn is on record. I have not got it before me, and I will not attempt to quote it from memory, but I must say it seems to me to give a perfectly clear and intelligible account of 394 the policy of this country towards Serbia, and to that policy the Government will, of course, adhere.