§ Whereupon Mr. SPEAKER, pursuant to the Order of the House of the 22nd February, proposed the Question, "That this House do now adjourn."
§ Mr. WHITEHOUSEI desire to raise a question with regard to the position of the men known as conscientious objectors, who are now somewhere in France. I am very glad to be able to raise it on an occasion when the personal anxiety of my right hon. Friend the Under-Secretary for War (Mr. Tennant) is happily less than it was when the subject was discussed before the adjournment of the House. I must remind the House what has happened in connection with the dispatch to France of a certain number of conscientious objectors. A few days before the adjournment of the House for the Whitsuntide Recess it became known that a further batch of men who were resisting, on account of their conscience, were being sent to France, and my right hon. Friend well knows the steps that were taken, and the representations which were made to him, to the War Office, and to the Prime Minister, to prevent this being done. As a result of those representations the War Office consented to issue an order stopping the dispatch of the men to France. Telegrams were dispatched to the various commands that were affected, requiring the men to be kept in England, but, owing to some error, or to the telegrams being sent too late—I am not complaining of that—the messages did not reach the commands in time for them to be acted upon, and the men were sent to France. I well remember my right hon. Friend's question "Why?" when the matter was raised in 112 this House as to whether these men could be brought back from France. If he will forgive me saying so, he supplied the answer at Question Time to-day, when, in reply to a question put to him, as to what had happened to these men, how many there were of them, and whether they were under detention or imprisonment, the right hon. Gentleman's answer was that he had no information.
I hope he will forgive me for saying I do not think this is the kind of reply we are entitled to receive on such an important question. I am very well aware of the multitudinous duties that fall on the right hon. Gentleman, duties which he discharges with such uniform courtesy and ability, and I know there are thousands of matters claiming his attention, but I must remind him that it is the constitutional duty and privilege of Members of this House to bring before the executive Government all cases requiring redress in this House, and this House is the place where we can obtain some sort of justice for people who are suffering unjustly. Therefore I make no apology, and I am sure my right hon. Friend would not desire me to make any, for having put the question to him to-day. It was my duty to put it. I had a right to put it, and I think we were entitled to a better answer than the statement that no information is available. I want to put this point: The case of the man in France is precisely the same as the case of the conscientious objector who remains in this country. By sending these men to France and by keeping them there, and by refusing information as to them, so far from solving the problem of the conscientious objector you are increasing public distress and alarm, and are needlessly introducing complications likely to prevent a settlement of the question.
§ Mr. WHITEHOUSEMy right hon. Friend asks "Why?" He surely does not deny that in this country an attempt is being made—I am not going to enter into details on the general question, but we are satisfied an attempt is being made with, as we think, my right hon. Friend's good will, to reach a satisfactory conclusion of the general question. An Army Order has been issued that a conscientious objector who is brought before a court-martial in this country and sentenced to imprisonment shall be handed over to the 113 civil authorities. If that is being done with regard to the conscientious objector in this country, why complicate the position by sending any of them to France, while they are resisting or undergoing punishment or detention for resisting, before they have been court-martialled, and before the Army Order which has been made can be acted upon? I say we are needlessly introducing complications into the question, and we are introducing them in such a way as to cause the utmost alarm and distress to the public generally. My right hon. Friend must remember that most serious accusations have been made with regard to the treatment of these men, not only in this country but also in France, and the right hon. Gentleman will remember that my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds (Mr. Harvey) put before him in some detail the case of a conscientious objector who had been sent to France, who was still resisting on conscientious grounds, and who had been subjected to the punishment known as crucifixion— a punishment under which men in the past have frequently lost their reason and in some cases have died. No denial was given to that. No attempt was made to deny the accuracy of the facts which my hon. Friend the Member for West Leeds put before the House. Therefore I say we have a right to demand information Jon this question. In view of these allegations, it becomes necessary to ask that the fullest information should be given. I appeal to my right hon. Friend to use his great influence to bring this matter to a satisfactory termination. Why any longer keep in France these men who are resisting and who arc absorbing the energies of other men in looking after them? Why not frankly recognise that they are on precisely the same footing as the conscientious objectors in this country and let them come back to this country and have their problems settled in the same manner as you will eventually settle, I trust, the problem of the conscientious objectors at home?
Here let me say that it does seem to be a tragic instance of national waste and inefficiency that these men both in France and this country, who are good men, who in many cases are high-minded citizens whom we greatly admire, whose memory will be with us after the War and will remain in many eases an inspiration, men of high gifts and willing in many cases to devote their gifts to national work of im- 114 portance unconnected with the War and outside the military machine, should be technically made into criminals and that they should be subjected in some cases to barbarous treatment and in many cases to rough and brutal treatment—treatment which I am sure is as repugnant to the country as it is repugnant to my right hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for War. I would urge him to lose no time in bringing this matter to a settlement. I should like to call his attention to the notice that was issued by the War Office on Saturday last, which appeared in Saturday's papers, namely, the reply to the allegations made as to the treatment of these conscientious objectors. The first part of this official communication said that these men who were sentenced to detention must undergo certain punishment and would not reach the next division for better treatment unless their conduct was exemplary and unless they conformed to the regulations and rules. They can only conform to those regulations and rules if they give up their conscientious objections, if they accept the military machine, put on the military uniform, and consent to drill and bear arms. The right hon. Gentleman will see that that statement is quite meaningless as far as it is intended to be a vindication of the methods at present used. If my right hon. Friend has before him a copy of the document he will see that it says in the second part that if a conscientious objector is tried by court-martial and the sentence is one of detention, which is the lighter punishment, he is kept in the Army under the charge of the military authorities and serves his punishment in a military prison or under the charge of the military authorities; but if he is sentenced to imprisonment, which is the heavier sentence, he is transferred to a civil prison. Merely to state this matter is to show how foolish is the present arrangement. The man who has the technically lighter sentence is kept within the Army, we do not reach any end of the difficulty and the problem is unsolved, but if he receives a heavier sentence on court-martial, he is transferred to the civil authority and the problem is in the way of being solved. Surely we might well abolish these quibblings.
§ Mr. TENNANTIt is the law.
§ Mr. WHITEHOUSEIt may be the letter of the law, but if a settlement of 115 this question is to be reached, we shall have to get behind the letter of the law and act in a new spirit. The only possible solution is that these men should be handed over to the civil authorities, and that their services should be used according to their ability and their principles in the national service, other than that of military work.
Mr. EDMUND HARVEYI am sure my right hon. Friend must be weary of having to deal with this subject. Probably he, more than any other man in this House, would welcome a settlement of the difficulties that it has aroused. I am sure many of us who have to raise it must feel sympathy with him in the difficulty that he has constantly had to meet. We continue to raise it not in any spirit of can-tankerousness, not in order to cause additional trouble to him and not even because we feel that suffering has been inflicted upon individuals, but because we feel that it is a question of justice, in which far more is at stake than the happiness of a certain number of men. We feel that the honour of the country and the great traditions of liberty and religious toleration are involved, that it is a matter which goes far beyond the happiness of a few individuals or the sufferings of a few individuals, right down to the very roots of our national life, and that it affects the traditions which we value most—an immense respect for individual conscience and for the liberty of religious opinion, which has been the proudest possession of this country for generations. Because we feel that, we feel we must continue to raise this question until the attitude of the authorities has changed and they recognise that a different solution must be found than that which has been arrived at at present.
I am aware that the high authorities at the War Office are giving serious attention to this matter. They have given a great deal of thought to it. I believe that they, too, are desirous of finding some solution of the difficulties as they see them. I, therefore, would press that this matter of the men who have been sent to France should be dealt with not in any pedantic spirit which merely looks at the letter of military law, but as a practical matter, as my hon. Friend (Mr. Whitehouse) has suggested, and that some solution should be found along practical lines. A number of these men had their cases dealt with 116 during the very earliest stages of the operation of the Military Service Act. I think it is admitted by everyone who has studied the operation of the Act that, in the early stages, the tribunals did not understand their powers and exercised them with the greatest inequality. In fact, only this afternoon I happened to be talking with a member of an Appeal Tribunal which dealt with a case of one of these very men. He spoke to me about that case, and said, "I have no doubt whatever that if we had dealt with it at a later stage we should have had a different result, but it came before us as one of the very first cases with which we had to deal." There we have a case where a member of the tribunal himself recognises that there was, shall we say a miscarriage of justice, at any rate, a result which would not have occurred at a later stage. When a member of a tribunal himself is willing to recognise that, it is not too much to ask the War Office to recognise the facts of the case, and see that these men—they are not very large in number—are treated in a reasonable way.
I do not want to go into the cases of the various individuals who are out there or to mention names, but I can speak from personal knowledge and say that there are men there of the very highest sincerity whose cases, had they been dealt with at a later stage or by different tribunals, would certainly have been dealt with in a very different way. There are persons in France who can cause nothing but embarrassment and difficulty to the authorities. It is a continual source of anxiety to a large number of people at home. The absence of communication is one of the difficulties which adds very seriously to that anxiety. My right hon. Friend said this afternoon that he did not know what the position of these men was. That has been the case with the parents of some of these men for as long a period in many cases as a month, and in some cases for a longer period. It is a very serious position for these families, when we know the rumours and reports which are spread from time to time—sometimes, happily, quite without foundation— of the way in which such men may be treated. I am quite sure my right hon. Friend appreciates that aspect of the case. I believe it is simply a matter of practical administration, and that, although there may be technical difficulties in the way of applying any such suggestion as the commutation of detention in a military prison to imprisonment in a civil prison, there are 117 practical ways which are within the power of the Army Council by which these men can be transferred, it may be, to a civil prison in the first instance, or it may be—it would be the wiser course—to some form of national service under civil control. I ask simply for a just and sensible treatment of the problem. I am quite sure my right hon. Friend is desirous of treating it in that spirit, and I feel confident that sooner or later he will be able to deal with it in that way.
§ 8.0 P.M.
§ Mr. TENNANTI am obliged to my two hon. Friends who have spoken for admitting that we at the War Office have not only given a great deal of time, which I know they realise we have given, to this subject, but that we are endeavouring to find a solution of it in a manner which will be conducive to the interests which they have at heart as well as to the larger interests of the Army. I recognise fully the spirit which moves my hon. Friends to bring this subject up before Parliament at the earliest moment after our meeting. I recognise that they are moved by the inspiration of those great traditions of liberty and religious freedom which all those who have sat in this House for some twenty years, as I have done as a Liberal, are proud to claim as part of our political creed. I recognise that spirit to the full, and that it is not only desirable but a duty to do what we can to vindicate and defend high-minded men, who may be, and possibly are, in some instances, in danger of being treated with injustice and in some eases with brutality. I should like my hon. Friends to reflect that in the course which they feel it their duty to adopt they may not only be seeking protection for those who are the true, the genuine and the deserving but they may be doing something also which they would desire not to do, and which I am sure they would desire not to do if they only thought that their action were conducive to that result. It is to create a large number of persons whose consciences were the last thing they thought of before the War, and who since the Military Service Act has been before the public has discovered it and found that that is a good way of getting away from doing their duty. I view with the greatest apprehension the number of persons who are created conscientious objectors by this kind of discussion, and by the agitation which is going on outside all over the country. I will beg my hon. Friends to reflect upon that aspect 118 of the case. I am sure they want to win this War as much as we do. I may take that for granted. It cannot be right that by action of ours we should prevent the Army from getting any considerable number of recruits to take part in defending the country against our enemies, and if hon. Members will only give that aspect of the case the consideration which it deserves I would ask them to do so, and I think they will see that some part of the agitation which is going on is very conducive to the result, of which we are so apprehensive and which we should all deplore. I utter that note of warning, because I feel it my duty to do so, and I hope my hon. Friends will not think that I am complaining at all. I am only indicating a real danger, and I know that if the House were not composed, as it is at present, almost exclusively of the defenders of conscience—if the whole House had been present—my remarks would have received some amount of support.
§ Mr. TENNANTMy Friends are all around me. I have all kinds of friends. The two hon. Members who have spoken have raised this subject in order to get redress for persons who are suffering unjustly. I want to know what evidence there is that there are any persons suffering unjustly. The first ground of complaint which they have made ought not to be brought against the War Office at all; but against the tribunal. For the tribunals I am not and cannot be responsible.
§ Mr. TENNANTYou might as well say, "Do not support the law of the land." I know certain hon. Members who do not support the law of the land. Indeed, I heard not more than ten minutes ago an exhortation that we might get behind the letter of the law. There are really limits beyond which any Minister cannot go. It is not a very proper exhortation to address to a Minister of the Crown, who is endeavouring to carry out to the best of his ability a very difficult matter of administration if you ask him not to abide by the law but to get behind it—not to administer the law in a pedantic spirit. That I entirely admit. I have no desire to introduce pedantry anywhere. I always deprecate it. But there are some things you can do and some you cannot—some which are legal, and some which are illegal—and to say, for instance, that we ought not to be 119 bound by our rule that a man who is undergoing detention shall not be handed over to the civil authority, while a man who is sentenced to imprisonment shall be, is to ask us to do a thing which is not possible. I really want to ask my hon. Friends further what they think is the difference of treatment of men who unfortunately have got into Combatant Corps in England and in France. I do not really think there is very much distinction. What we really ought to consider is not the Combatant Corps but the Non-Combatant Corps. The great majority, I should have thought almost the whole, of the conscientious objectors who are genuine men have got exemption from combatant service. [HON. MEMBERS: "No!"] Then I can only say how extraordinarily badly they must have pleaded their cause before the tribunals. I thought they were nearly all in Non-Combatant Corps. If not, what percentage? Ninety per cent.? I should think at least 90 per cent. would be in Non-Combatant Corps. It is the Non-Combatant Corps that I address myself to, and I am informed that the men who go out to France really do very well. They come to a different decision in their minds, and they have worked very well in non-combatant duties. If their consciences do not prevent them undertaking non-combatant duties, why should they? They have a sort of organism inside which prevents them fighting for their country but does not prevent them undertaking non-combatant duties.
§ Mr. MORRELLIs it not the fact that they are resisting service?
§ Mr. TENNANTI do not think so. That is a question of fact, but the information I have—it is true it is some weeks ago—was that they were getting on very well and doing admirably and helping their country. I am sure my hon. Friends would desire them to help their country. [HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear!"] Then why is there so much agitation to prevent them? That is what you are doing. To prove to the House that I am anxious to ascertain what are the actual facts of the matter I have to-day sent a telegram to France to find out how the Non-Combatant Corps is getting on, because there are other Non-Combatant Corps companies in this country who will very likely have to go. They are wanted in France, where they do 120 useful work for the nation, and if there seems to be, as I understand, every reason to believe that the Non-Combatant companies in France are doing their work and those for whom my hon. Friends are apprehensive are not really declining to obey orders, but are obeying orders—I think that is going on happily—what is the reason why we should not send out the other non-combatants'? I am sure my hon. Friend (Mr. Harvey), for instance, looks upon this from a large point of view—at least, I hope he does—and I should like him to be in agreement that if we can ascertain, as I hope we may, that good work is being done by the Non-Combatant companies in France, there will be every sufficient reason for sending out other Non-Combatant companies.
Mr. HARVEYI have no objection whatever to those who accept non-combatant service being sent out. It is entirely proper. And no doubt there is a large number of non-combatants in France who are willingly accepting this service, and doing very good work and working under I very good conditions. There is no reason whatever to complain of the way in which they are being treated. My point is entirely and solely directed to the position of those who have all along refused even non-combatant work and are in detention or under supervision for refusing to obey military orders of any kind. They are a limited number. There are some fifty of them in France now. There are hundreds of non-combatants doing honest work and doing it cheerfully and well. Those I do not refer to in the least. My plea is not that those who accept work as non-combatants should be prevented from going out to France—that would, of course, be foolish—but that those who have all along refused even this form of military service should not be sent out from detention in England to detention in France.
§ Mr. TENNANTI realise the distinction perfectly. It is very difficult to know how many there are—whether there are fifty or more or less than that number—in France now. I have no information at all that any member of these Non-Combatant companies are refusing to do work, but I shall be in a better position to inform my hon. Friend when I get an answer to my telegram. My hon. Friend (Mr. Harvey) also said he did not think the numbers involved in the matter under consideration were very large. I wish I thought so. I do not think the genuine 121 conscientious objectors are in large numbers at all, but I think the spurious are in very large numbers indeed. I really want to warn the House that we ought to do everything in our power to discourage anything in the nature of fraud. We ought to take the most vigorous steps against those who are proved not to have real conscientious objections but spurious conscientious objections, and I hope my hon. Friend will back me up in any rigorous measures which I think it necessary to take.
§ Sir W. BYLESI wish to say on my own behalf, and I believe I am speaking the opinion of my Friends behind me, that we entirely concur in the observation which the right hon. Gentleman has made in regard to men who availed themselves of a pretended conscience to shirk their duty to their country. I do not believe that any of us would have any pity or any mercy upon such men. The right hon. Gentleman also remarked that we had failed to find any evidence of men being ill-treated and oppressed and receiving cruel and brutal treatment. My own correspondence proves to me abundantly that there are many such men who, when they get into the hands of a military officer who has no sympathy whatever with conscience and who only wants to get men into the trenches, are treated with the greatest brutality. It may be in accordance with military law. I do not deny that it is. Military law is very severe upon deserters no doubt, and properly so, but for men who have a genuine conscientious objection to war to be treated like that is a very serious matter not only for them but for the country. I got a letter only this morning in which I am asked to inquire about a conscientious objector who during hit detention in military custody was knocked down, kicked and punched and dragged off to a dark cell. I do not like to be appealed to to bring up these individual cases, but it shows that this thing is going on. However, I only rose to ask that it may be made perfectly clear by the Government what is the position of the conscientious objector now. I understood that the Government had undertaken that the punishment of conscientious objectors should be referred henceforth to the civil authorities. I have had personal assurances from the Government that that is so.
§ Mr. TENNANTI think the hon. Member is mistaken. The assurance which he 122 is going upon was, I think, originally given by Lord Kitchener in the other House, and afterwards by myself in this House, and, I think, by the Prime Minister also. I am not quite sure about the Prime Minister. What we said, and have always said, and we have never said anything else, was that when a man has been given-imprisonment he can be handed over to the civil authorities, but we are not able to do that to the man who has only been awarded detention.
§ Sir W. BYLESI do think it is important that the public should understand what is the method of punishment that is to be adopted in regard to these conscientious objectors. The War Office circular, which was issued a few days ago, did not seem to me to make it at all clear. I still hope that the men with a genuine conscience, whom Parliament meant to exempt from military service, and to whom it gave the right to be exempted, should not be subjected to military punishment but to civil punishment.
§ Mr. SHERWELLI am quite sure that the entire House appreciates the spirit in which my right hon. Friend addressed himself to the consideration of this question to-night, but I must frankly say that I do not think that his speech showed a clear appreciation of what is the motive and strength of the case which is prompting those who are once more raising this question of the conscientious objector. My right hon. Friend uttered an impressive warning against the danger that lurks in the constant raising of this question, and he appealed to us not to lend our influence or support to the manufacture of conscientious objection. I would remind my right hon. Friend that that consideration may be pressed somewhat too far. If it is carried out as literally as my right hon. Friend appeared to suggest it would really prevent as a constraining motive the raising of the question of redress in almost every conceivable form of injustice, because it is impossible to raise the question of injustice in almost any connection without incurring the danger of appearing to lend aid to the defence and protection of fictitious objection. My right hon. Friend suggests that there has appeared to be the manufacture on a large scale of conscientious objectors, but I am not sure that that is a sufficiently conclusive or convincing diagnosis of the case. May it not rather be the case that the Government, and we all, are now in a belated fashion 123 discovering the real dimensions of this conscientious objection, and the real dimensions of those who are constrained by genuine and sincere conscientious convictions? I believe the Government have made from the outset a very calamitous mistake in misreading the signs of the times as reflected in the spirit of this nation. As the right hon. Gentleman quite generously admitted, those of us who have fought the Government on this question from the beginning are sincerely anxious to win this War. I speak for myself, because I have no right to speak for anyone else, but I believe that the whole of my colleagues in this matter are as sincerely anxious as the right hon. Gentleman himself that we should win this War. But our mistrust is that in the conduct and management of the War the Government may by their policy and by their methods imperil the successful winning of the War. I have taken my stand on this question from the beginning, because I believe sincerely that the Government have incurred great risks of weakening rather than strengthening the country in the methods and policy they have pursued.
My right hon. Friend suggested that the real responsibility in this question does not lie with the War Office but with the local tribunals. I would remind him that the War Office must charge itself with the responsibility and actions of these local tribunals. Some of us have a clear conscience on this matter. We challenged the constitution of these tribunals in the first instance. I pointed out in Committee that these tribunals, so constituted, might be admirably qualified to fulfil some of the duties with which they were entrusted, but the very nature of their constitution did not guarantee the necessary equipment for adjusting so difficult and delicate a matter as that of conscientious objection. When I raised that point in Committee the President of the Local Government Board disposed of my argument by saying that I was sneering at the municipal councils and the work of them. I did nothing of the kind. I only stated a truism. Everyone who knows the constitution of the local tribunals and the local authorities knows that they are elected for quite other purposes, and certainly are not necessarily nor even naturally the best equipped bodies for adjusting so delicate a matter as this. I would suggest to my right hon. 124 Friend another consideration. May it not be true that in their treatment of the conscientious objector they are really rendering themselves liable to the possibility of creating great national waste? We are hearing every day of the demand there is for forms of service in almost all directions, at home as well as abroad. We have the most pathetic appeals made to us to economise labour, to economise expenditure, and to provide new sources of recuperative strength for the effective carrying out of the purposes of the War. May it not be that the Government would do wisely to use the undoubted ability and power that does exist in the case of many of these conscientious objectors by employing their services in directions in which they can quite conscientiously and freely give their labour, rather than compelling them to take up duties which are contrary to their conscience, and in which they cannot render any effective service for the country? I cannot conceive how anyone with the knowledge of the lessons of this War before him can suggest for a single moment that to constrain men who are opposed to any form of military service to be soldiers, or to suffer certain penalties if they refuse to undertake military duties, can be any contribution to the real military strength of the nation. I do suggest to my right hon. Friend that there is outside this House, up and down the country—every hon. Member gets daily evidence of the strength of it—a large and growing number of persons who are gravely concerned at the treatment of the genuine conscientious objector, and I would submit to him, with all respect, that the matter is intrinsically of far greater importance than the War Office appears to recognise at the present moment.
§ Mr. MORRELLI confess that I was somewhat disappointed with the reply given by my right hon. Friend. I agree with my hon. Friend (Mr. Sherwell) as to the spirit of the right hon. Gentleman's reply. He was perfectly sympathetic in tone, he was friendly in tone, but it did not seem to me that he dealt in any satisfactory way with the specific point that has been raised by my two hon. Friends who introduced this question. They made it quite clear in their speeches that they were not concerned with the large body of men who had accepted non-combatant service. Those are not the men who have been arrested. Those are, not the men who are now under detention. 125 Those are not the men who are proving the genuineness of their convictions. The men who have accepted non-combatant service have taken a comparatively easy line. I do not blame them at all. It is a line which is easy for the War Office and comparatively easy for themselves. They are engaged in road making and various forms of work. Their case does not come before us at all. We believe that they are giving satisfaction, and we wish them well. We are concerned with a different question with the men who have said from the beginning, "We will have nothing to do with the military machine; it is against our conscience to take any part direct or indirect in the War." We bring up the case of some thirty of these men—the number has since been raised—who six weeks ago were taken over to France while still resisting orders. That is a very definite point, and it is proved by the fact that some of them were actually taken in handcuffs. The point we have raised again and again is why were these men ever sent to France. They can be of no military value whatever. They require other soldiers to be kept from their duties to look after them.
If they are sent to France certain obvious objections at once arise. They are liable to much more severe punishment than in this country. They are liable to be punished by having their hands chained together and held up over their heads and tied fast to a wall, like that (indicates), for a considerable time in the form of a crucifixion. This is a form of punishment which makes men faint. [An HON. MEMBER: "Torture!"] It can be described as torture. It was the form of punishment which was introduced when flogging was abolished as a substitute for flogging. These men, who are men of the highest character and education, when they get to France are liable, and we believe are actually subjected, to punishment of this kind. This is one objection. The next objection is that they are legally liable to be shot. Of course, we had an assurance that they are not going to be shot, and that the sentence will not be confirmed. Still, from many things that have happened in this War we are not satisfied that they should be left in France. The third point we make is, that if the War Office tried to stop these men going to France as they did, why, now that they have gone to France by a mistake, should they not be recalled? It is a very simple point which has been raised by my two 126 right hon. Friend really has met it. The point is this: On 8th May seventeen of these men who were resisting orders were sent over to France. We gave their names. Shortly afterwards sixteen more were sent to France. We know all their names. I can give my right hon. Friend all particulars about them. A little afterwards there was another batch of eight, and there were some others, making altogether about fifty men sent over to France whilst still resisting orders. Out of these men, of whom we have been unable to obtain information, except by indirect means, fifteen of the original seventeen were actually undergoing field punishment. If the Government mean sincerely, as I believe they do, to deal with this question in a sympathetic spirit, to get this question of the conscientious objector out of their way, why not recall these men from France as an evidence of their good faith? That is the demand which we make. My right hon. Friend may say what he likes about agitation. It is not agitation that has raised this question. It is the facts of the case. When you have, as you have now, over 1,000 men of the highest character and the best education, many of them in good positions, all of them well known, who are willing to undergo arrest and become criminals rather than take part in a war which they say is against their conscience, the problem is a very serious one, and it is time that it should be dealt with in a serious spirit.
§ Mr. LEIF JONESMy right hon. Friend has appealed to us as to whether we do not all, as much as he himself, desire to win this war. For myself I can say that from the beginning I have had as strong a desire as he has at the present time to win this war. It is because' I think that the Government and the military authorities are making the greatest possible mistake in the handling of this problem of the conscientious objectors that they are weakening the country at a time when we want all our strength developed to the utmost, and that they are magnifying by their own action this problem of the conscientious objector, that I support the demand which my hon. Friend made to-night. It is not our Debates in this House that are making this problem. It is the spectacle which is visible in different parts of the country of the treatment of the conscientious objector by the military who have them in 127 charge. I will give my right hon. Friend a case which was communicated to me by a Constituent of my own three days ago. This Constituent had gone to Richmond in Yorkshire to see his brother, who was a volunteer, and who was just going off to France. My friend was not a conscientious objector and his brother was not a conscientious objector, but, standing in the barrack yard with his brother, he saw a conscientious objector, who refused to put on a tunic when requested to do so, stripped of his trousers as well as his tunic, and marched back into the barracks in that state. My Constituent, moved to indignation by this conduct, lifted his hat to the conscientious objector as he passed him and said "Stick it out!"
Now I do not defend the action of my Constituent. It is a matter of opinion. I think that he was bringing himself within reach of the law. He was promptly arrested and was placed in prison and kept in custody for twenty-four hours. Then he was allowed to bail himself out. When his case came before the Court the military did not proceed against him, but allowed the case to be disposed of on his paying the costs, which he did. But I would point out to my right hon. Friend that my Constituent did not go to Richmond as a conscientious objector. He went as a supporter of the War, as a friend of his brother, a volunteer, who was going out to the front possibly to die for his country; but I am quite sure that he returned in a very different frame of mind from that in which he was when he went there owing to the treatment of this man which he had witnessed given by the military authorities who were there. My right hon. Friend does not seem to me to realise that this problem in its treatment by the military is created entirely by the form in which they have set up the Compulsory Act. It was a mistake to say to men who would not be soldiers, "You shall, after a certain day, be soldiers and be treated as soldiers, and be subject to military discipline." What you ought to have done was to say to these men, "You shall become soldiers or else be subject to certain punishment." Then the fact of refusing to be a soldier would have been a civil offence to be treated by the civil authorities in a civil prison, so that the offender would be subject only to civil punishment, and your difficulties would 128 not have arisen if you had shaped your Compulsory Act in that proper, sensible way.
Now you mix up the problem of men who will not be soldiers with the military machine. You give your officers trouble, you create sympathy with these men in quarters where you do not wish sympathy to arise. You injure discipline and the interests of the Army and weaken its power, and all to get these conscientious objectors out of the hands of the civil authorities into the hands of the military authorities. That is how the problem presents itself to me. My right hon. Friend does not seem to realise when he was talking about non-combatant service that there is no difficulty with the men who accepted. That is not our point. We are dealing with men who will not take combatant service—many of them will not take non-combatant service—who refuse to become part of the military machine. The moment you have got a genuine case of a man who will not become part of the military machine you had better not trouble the military machine with him, for by so doing you are weakening and not strengthening the country.
§ Mr. OUTHWAITEThe right hon. Gentleman said, and we realise that it must be so, that this question gives him and the authorities a great deal of trouble; but I cannot understand, seeing that is the case, why, when we are asking for such a very small concession which would remove one aspect of the trouble, he should not meet us in this matter. Here we have a cause of very considerable trouble and of grave concern which is being aroused in the country—I refer to the sending of men, who are recognised as conscientious objectors, over to France, where they are subjected to further measures in order to make them submit. Why should you do this? There is no question of large numbers of men, as the right hon. Gentleman suggested. It is said that we are depriving the Army of large numbers of men, whereas the fact is there are only some thirty, or at most fifty, men who have been sent over to France. I submit that this sending of Englishmen in chains to France will cause the right hon. Gentleman and the authorities a very large amount of trouble and difficulty. I noticed the other day that at a conference of the Baptists, a Nonconformist organisation of great influence in this country, one of the speakers said that 129 if one of these men was shot or killed in France it would split this country from top to bottom. Why raise this difficulty? Why prejudice the conduct of the War in the minds of great numbers of people, when by a simple method you could avoid all this trouble and difficulty? You have simply to say that you intend to punish them here, or force them to work here, or, if they refuse, to suffer here as others are suffering, but with the possibility of mitigation of their condition, as is occurring with others who are suffering under the civil authority here. The position of these men in France, which is a cause of difficulty, can be very easily dealt with, and I cannot see why their case is not met. The right hon. Gentleman is quite wrong if he thinks that I or any of my colleagues keep raising this question with any pleasure, for it is not so. In my own case I do it because I am virtually forced by letters which I get, and which contain statements as to the brutal treatment of these men which 130 I believe to be true. We have seen something lately of what may occur under the despotism of a military officer, in Dublin, and we know of cases, which are fully authenticated, of the brutal treatment of these men to whom we refer under the conduct of the military prison. We raise this question in the hope that the right hon. Gentleman will see his way to treat these men who have been sent over to France in the manner which we urge upon him, and we shall continue to bring this question to his attention until he can see his way to accepting the method of treatment which we have submitted to him.
§ It being one hour after the conclusion of Government Business, Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER adjourned the House, without Question put, pursuant to the Order of the House of the 22nd February.
§ Adjourned at Twenty-one minutes before Nine o'clock.