§ Motion made, and Question proposed, 3. "That a supplementary sum, not exceeding £37,330, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1916, for Expenditure in respect of Diplomatic and Consular Buildings, and for the Maintenance of certain Cemeteries abroad."
§ Mr. ASHLEYI certainly require some information with reference to this Vote. There may, of course, be a very good explanation, but it does seem to me, when we are told by the Government that economy is an absolute necessity, extraordinary that our commitments abroad should be so largely increasing. Therefore it is only natural we should ask for some explanation of the reason for the increase. It appears to me to require a very clear explanation why we are going to spend this substantial extra sum of money on the Residency at Cairo. I quite appreciate that in the revised estimate it is probably quite right that £49,740 should be spent instead of the original estimate 1086 of £12,410 on Consular buildings and other matters connected with the Consular and Diplomatic services, because, since the War has broken out, our obligations abroad in neutral and friendly countries have very much increased, and therefore it may be perfectly legitimate in this case to spend more money in providing better housing accommodation for our diplomatic and Consular representatives. But I want some further information on the subject. I want to know why we should sanction this large sum of £37,330 for new works, alterations, additions, and purchases, including funiture, in connection therewith at the Residency at Cairo. Personally, I am not inclined to agree to vote this sum unless we have a very clear explanation on behalf of the Government.
We had before the War, and have so far as I know now, a very excellent building where Lord Cromer and Sir Rennell Rodd resided. It is just outside the city of Cairo, by the side of the river, surrounded by ample grounds and constitutes a residence not unworthy of the chief Power which controls the destinies of Egypt. Now, because we have declared a Protectorate over Egypt, and have a High Commissioner instead of a Consular Agent, we are asked, at this moment above all, to spend the very large sum of £37,000 in enlarging and beautifying this building, and in purchasing extra ground. It seems to me insanity. It is not as if the British representative was badly housed before, and surely what was good enough for Lord Cromer and Sir Rennell Rodd should be good enough for the present High Commissioner. If the Government thought it necessary to enlarge the grounds, surely they might have waited until the end of the War. It is not to be supposed that land in Cairo will go up appreciably in value after the War is over, and to my knowledge for a sum of £37,000 the Government could have bought some hundreds of acres in the district where the Residency is situated. I will defer any further remarks until I have heard what explanation the Government have to give on this subject, and will content myself now with saying that I am not prepared to assent to the passing of this Vote without a very clear explanation of the reasons for it.
§ The FIRST COMMISSIONER of WORKS (Mr. Harcourt)I think I can make the matter perfectly clear, and I hope I shall be able to satisfy the hon. Gentleman in this matter. This additional 1087 ground is wanted, and has been wanted for some years, not for the extension of the Residency, which is not a residence, but is used for office purposes. There is a great congestion of room for office work in the Residency, and recently the pressure has become much greater owing to the change of our status in Egypt. Land adjoining the Residency has been in the market for some years. During the boom years in Egypt the price asked for the land was £12 per square metre. When values went down, the price fell to £7 or £8 per square metre. The year before last an offer for the land at £6 10s. per metre was refused. Circumstances have now arisen which make the owner willing to sell the land to any purchaser for £3 10s. per metre. The Commissioner in Egypt and the Foreign Office thought it was a matter of great importance to acquire it, and the Commissioner is of opinion that at that price it is a very good bargain. There was undoubtedly an anticipation that if we did not buy the land which we want now it would pass into other hands, and we should find ourselves paying a very much higher price for it in the future. The Egyptian Government were therefore asked to negotiate the purchase of the land, which they have successfully done, at that price, and the Supplementary Estimate will enable us to refund the sum so paid to the Egyptian Government.
§ Mr. ASHLEYHow much is there of the land?
§ Mr. HARCOURTI am told it is about three acres. In addition to that, there are two accommodation roads thrown into the bargain without any cost, and there is also on the site a half finished house which may probably be adapted for office purposes. The hon. Gentleman is in error in thinking that we are spending any money here for alterations, additions, new works, and furniture. That is the heading under which the Estimate appears, but we are now only concerned with the purchase of this land, and it is not intended during the War to spend any money in building or even in adapting unfinished buildings. This was a moment at which we could acquire the land, and it was understood that we should lose the chance of doing so if we did not take it now. The price is regarded as a very favourable one by those who know the locality, and certainly it is about one quarter of the price which was asked in the period of boom.
§ Mr. ASHLEYPersonally, I am not the least satisfied with the right hon. Gentleman's answer, and I think if I could look inside his mind he probably agrees with me, although he has, naturally, officially to defend this transaction. What does he tell us? He says that this land is wanted for offices. Why do you want three acres of land for offices? You have enough room upon it for the Home Office and the Foreign Office. It is a very large area of land, and I cannot conceive why it is necessary to spend £37,000 in buying three acres of land for the Residency in Cairo in order to build offices upon it, even if it were necessary, which I cannot see, to have these offices near the private residence of the High Commissioner. Surely it would be quite possible to have the offices a short distance off. It does not always follow that a man's office is in his back garden, as is apparently necessary here. As to the price, we all know that the prices paid for land in Cairo were ridiculous. If the Committee will believe me, land was sold during the boom time in Cairo at a higher price than was paid for any land in the City of London. Even if, as the right hon. Gentleman says, the land was valued at £12 per metre in the boom time, it does not follow that £3 per metre is the right price to pay now. Therefore, with all respect to him, I cannot see that it is necessary to spend £37,000 upon three acres of land, only to build offices upon it.
§ Mr. HOGGEI wish to associate myself with the criticism which has been made with regard to this transaction. If hon. Members will divide the £37,000, which is required for these three acres, by the figure three, they will discover that what the Government is doing is to pay £12,000 per acre for three acres in Cairo during a period of war. I have always wondered why the Germans wanted to reach Egypt. I now begin to understand that the Consular buildings there may have some attraction for the German Emperor. This is a most extravagant proceeding. I cannot understand how we stand to-day with regard to it. We are told by the First Commissioner of Works that the scheme has been negotiated already by the Egyptian Government, and that the land has been bought and paid for, so that practically what we are asked to do is to agree to the payment of that money without knowing anything at all about the transaction. That may be the ordinary practice, but it is not 1089 business to come to this House, after you have bought three acres of land at £12,000 an acre, and ask us to agree to it. I suppose that the sum having been paid, we shall have to foot the bill, but I desire to associate myself with the criticism offered by the hon. Member opposite (Mr. Ashley) with regard to the extravagant waste in spending this amount of money in the purchase of land during a period of this kind. I could say a great deal more, but what would be the use of it? The transaction is done, and we cannot make anything of it, except agree with the criticism offered by the hon. Member, and say that we think this is a bad transaction, a wrong transaction, and a very wrong transaction, when we remember that everybody on the Front Bench is now preaching economy to the nation.
§ Commander BELLAIRSI only rise for the purpose of asking the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, who is in his place, whether this transaction can be completed beyond recall without the sanction of Parliament?
§ Sir F. BANBURYUnless my memory serves me wrongly, there is a very great meeting going on this afternoon at the Guildhall, where three or four Cabinet Ministers have gone, at considerable trouble, to preach economy. It would be a very good opportunity if those of us who are here should endeavour to follow their example, and initiate a little economy in this place.
§ Mr. HARCOURTI do not know whether the right hon. Baronet is alluding to the economy on the Vote of the Office of Works for this year. It amounts to £630,000.
§ Sir F. BANBURYWe should like it to be more, because we are spending £5,000,000 a day, and £630,000 a year is not a very great saving. I should like to know, with regard to this transaction, what took place and what is taking place now? Where are the clerks now who are to occupy these offices when the work is completed? I assume they are in some building or some house doing their work, and I should like to have some reason why the present building is not good enough for them. If they have been doing their work during these troublous times in the present building, could they not have gone on in that building, and then, if at the end of the War, it was found desirable to lodge them in more 1090 luxurious circumstances, perhaps we could buy three acres of land which costs less than £12,000 per acre. I do not know what kind of building it is proposed should be put up on these three acres. My knowledge of building is not very extensive, but I should imagine that to erect buildings covering three acres of land would cost a considerable sum of money. If the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs is going to speak, perhaps he will kindly answer my questions.
§ Mr. WHITEHOUSEOn the Paper this is described as a Supplementary Estimate, not only with respect to Diplomatic and Consular Buildings, but also for the maintenance of certain cemeteries abroad. Are we to understand that the whole of this Vote is required for this land only, and that no part of it is for the maintenance of certain cemeteries, and, in that case, why is that heading included?
§ Mr. HARCOURTThat is the heading of the Vote under which I am bound to put it down.
Mr. RUTHERFORDPersonally, I have every sympathy with the Government in this matter. I have been to most of the capital cities in the Middle and East of Europe and also in other places, and I have always been struck with the parsimony of the British Government in these matters as compared with the display made by the other countries, more particularly by Germany, Austria, Russia, and France. It is the same thing in Bucharest; it is the same thing in Sofia; it is the same thing in other places. I am one of those who take the view that in the eyes of Eastern people especially it is advisable for the British Government and the British representatives to be as well housed, to have as large and as beautiful a garden, and to have all the equipage, appearance, and state at all events to match those of the representatives of other countries. I am sorry to say that in almost every one of these places, particularly those in the East of Europe and those analogous to Cairo which I have personally visited, we do not make the appearance, keep up the style, and impress the people to anything like the extent which any patriotic Englishman visiting these places would like to see us do. If this is going to vastly improve the housing and homing of the British representative in Cairo, do not let us look 1091 at this paltry amount. Although no doubt it is a big sum to give for land to add to a garden at a cost of £12,000 an acre, yet the people on the spot are probably better judges of these matters than we are. I appeal to the Committee to bear in mind the great advisability of doing everything in the presence of these Eastern peoples in a manner at all events equal to the appearance that is put forth by other nations, with whom, in every respect, we have to compete. We have to compete with them as regards trade, influence, and all kinds of other directions. We make a very poor show up to date in all these places by comparison, and I appeal to the Committee on this occasion not to look at this question as if it were that of £12,000 an acre for an additional garden, but to look at the question from the point of view of the Imperial interests of a country like our own.
§ The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Lord Robert Cecil)I sympathise very strongly with what members of the Committee have said regarding the necessity for economy, and I quite agree that the present time is a very bad one for making expenditure of any kind. I am sure that is the view of the Egyptian Government also. I am perfectly certain they would not have recommended expenditure of this kind unless they were quite convinced that in reality and in truth—as I hope to be able to satisfy the Committee—it is really an economical operation and not an extravagant one. Those of us who have had the advantage of seeing the Residency at Cairo will sympathise a good deal with what the hon. Member opposite (Mr. Rutherford) has said. Of course, we all know that the history of our position in Egypt is a very peculiar one, that for a very long time the only position which our representative there occupied was as one of the Agents-General—a comparatively unimportant diplomatic officer who lived at Cairo and advised the Egyptian Government. As the Committee remembers very well, the course of historical events was such that he gradually acquired more and more influence and a stronger and stronger position in the country until in effect, I will not say he was the ruler of the country, but he was by far the most important person, and culminated, in the latter part of Lord Cromer's term of office, by his being by far 1092 the most important person in Egypt, and who really exercised a degree of authority over an extent of land and of population which made him second only to the very highest official in the British Empire. I venture to say that anybody who saw the official Residency of our Agent-General will agree with me that it certainly did not err on the side of extravagance or ostentation. Although I am far from recommending either extravagance or ostentation, I do not think the Committee should forget that fact when considering this proposal.
What are we told by those who actually do the work? We are told that, as time has gone on, this building, which had not only to house the Agent-General and his family, but to provide offices for the very large amount of official work which he had to do, was getting more and more unsatisfactory and unsuitable for its purpose, that it was really impracticable to go on indefinitely with such very important duties that had to be discharged in that building without some extension. We are advised that in the strongest possible language, and from my experience in the matter, I should entirely assent to that as a very probable statement of fact. Therefore some enlargement of the premises has really become absolutely necessary, and that has been recognised for some time past. I have heard that the portion of the ground on which the Embassy stands is becoming more and more built over, and it is difficult to find any other site, and the obvious thing therefore was, if possible, to extend the existing building. There was this offer of the three acres adjoining. It had long been thought a desirable acquisition by the Agent-General. It was offered at £12 a square metre in the boom year. It gradually came down to £8, £7, £6 10s., which was the last offer they had. Then came this exceptional opportunity for buying the land, supposing they were right in thinking it absolutely necessary for the extension. They found they could buy at £3 a metre land which had once been offered at £12, and it was very unlikely ever to fall below £3 a metre, but will probably be of much larger value in years to come. That seems to me just the kind of occasion on which, even in times of great economy, expenditure is justifiable. If you get an opportunity of buying what is really essential for your business at a price much lower than is likely to be 1093 offered in any future period, it is an economy and not an extravagance to purchase. That is really the whole case. My hon. and gallant Friend (Commander Bellairs) asked whether the transaction was complete. I understand it is. The offer had to be accepted or rejected. The Treasury was, of course, consulted and approved the proposal, as did the Home Government. The transaction was entered into, and I understand the land has been purchased. So far the Egyptian Government are quite in accord with the general view that they do not propose to start building at present. They propose to wait till after the War, and will not incur any further expenditure till a more favourable opportunity comes. It appears to me under these circumstances that the expenditure is wholly justified, and in this case, as in many others, the only safe course for the Committee to take is to trust the man on the spot.
§ Mr. MALCOLMI have nothing to say against this Vote, and I think it is high time the Agency was sufficiently enlarged. I want also to associate myself with what has fallen from the hon. Member (Mr. Hogge), who pointed out in what an impotent position the House of Commons is, when it is only asked to foot the bill after the money has been paid and the negotiation has been finished. A case in point came to my notice only the other day when I was passing through Paris where a large building is going to be taken for the Government—I saw some indication of it yesterday in the newspapers—for viséing passports. A large building has been apparently taken. I suppose there are salaries to be paid—I know there is a staff to be engaged—for things which might very well have been done by a small enlargement of the existing Consular service. We cannot deal with that until after the transaction is completely through. It is a very unfortunate position for the House of Commons to find itself in. I do not say whether it is right or wrong, but it shows the impotence of the House of Commons that it cannot deal with these matters until there is no more to be said.
§ Sir F. BANBURYI presume the House can always reject a Vote, and the money will have to be found by someone else, so the House of Commons has power in that direction. I think my hon. Friend (Mr. Rutherford) was a little mis- 1094 taken as to the object of the purchase of the three acres. I do not understand that it is for a garden at all.
§ Lord R. CECILWe shall not build over the whole three acres now, but the object of buying the site is to enlarge the building.
Mr. RUTHERFORDIf I had dreamt that you were going to build on the whole three acres and that that was the intention of buying, I should have felt inclined to oppose the Vote myself. I certainly understood that all that was going to be built was an extension of an office, in which case the greater portion of the three acres would be a garden.
§ Sir F. BANBURYI asked what was happening now. I understood it was for an enlargement. I asked, where are the people housed now who are going to be put in the new building? I understand they are now housed in the Consular buildings, and that they are uncomfortable in them, and that more space had been required for some time, and is still required. That may be so, though I do not see that that necessitates the purchase at present. When my hon. Friend says they asked £12 a metre, it is quite easy enough to ask any price you like, but you have to find someone who will buy it, and the asking of a price does not fix the value of an article. If I asked £5 for this pair of spectacles, for which I gave half-a-crown, it would not make them of the value of £5. I should like to ask why it is necessary to obtain such a very large site? Surely, if the people in question had been working in the Consular buildings up to the present, a very much smaller site than three acres would have given them the required accommodation.
§ Lord R. CECILI understand this was the only way in which any extension could be purchased at all. You cannot buy just what you like. You have to buy what you can get.
§ Sir F. BANBURYIf you are offered a large portion of anything you can generally get a smaller portion, or you might offer to buy the whole and resell the other. Is it contemplated that the land which is not required will be resold? That would be a way of finding out the real value.
§ Lord R. CECILI do not think there can be any doubt that if it is not required it will be the object of everyone to re-sell it in order to recoup the cost, but it is not a good time to re-sell at present.
§ Sir F. BANBURYI understood that we had made an extraordinary bargain and that we had bought something extraordinarily cheap which was going to turn out very advantageous. The moment I talk about re-selling I am met with the answer, "It is a very bad time to sell anything." I do not quite understand it. At any rate we have an assurance from my Noble Friend that when it is possible to sell, and if it is not required, a portion of the land will be sold, so that the proceeds may go towards the cost of building the new offices, and that is something.
§ Mr. R. McNEILLMy Noble Friend, persuasive as he always is, has made a defence which seems to me quite inconsistent with the proposal of the right hon. Gentleman beside him. My Noble Friend told us how much he was in agreement with my hon. Friend. (Mr. Rutherford), who, with his knowledge of Eastern capitals, said that our country made a very poor show. That is very likely true. I am not familiar with these places, but I have often heard that that is the fact, and in normal times no one would be move ready than I should to join in voting money to enable us to make a better show. My Noble Friend agrees with that, and he lays stress upon the poor residence that our agent has there, reminded us how the importance of Cairo has grown and implied that the residence is now entirely out of keeping with the dignity of the nation. That is all very well, but the right hon. Gentleman who introduced the Vote took care to say that this was not required for any extension of the residence itself. It is not for making a more magnificent residence and it is not for improving the gardens. On the contrary, it is entirely for extending buildings and offices. It is not invariable for even a Cabinet Minister to live in a building which is contiguous with his office. It would be no great hardship supposing that the Agent-General, or whatever this dignified officer is called, had to use a Rolls-Royce to motor to the office. We have not been told why it is necessary that these offices should adjoin the residence. We have not even been told what the offices are. Offices is a general term. It sometimes means kitchens, dairies and so forth. Is it offices 1096 in that sense—an addition to the back premises of the residence? If not, what offices are they? Are they something corresponding to the Home Office, the Local Government Board and the Foreign Office? Surely we might have a few more details in order to be in a position to judge whether or not it is essential.
5.0 P.M.
We are told that during the War, at all events, nothing is going to be done and no building will take place. In other words, for the moment, at all events, all we are asked to do is to give to the British agent in Egypt an allotment of three acres and a camel. I suppose we are all quite ready to do that. The question is whether the price we are asked to pay is a reasonable price for this land. My Noble Friend has given us no information as to what his opinion is based upon, but he tells us it is a very favourable price and one not likely to be improved upon. What reason is there for accepting that view? We are told that the price originally demanded was £12 a metre, it came down to £8 and £7, and the last offer was £6, and now it is £3. I should say the inference from that is that in three months it will come down to £1. What reason has been given us for supposing that we have managed to get in not only on the ground floor but in the area? It is quite likely that so far from having made an excellent bargain we have made rather a poor one. The right hon. Gentleman gives us this scanty information about what appears to be a transaction of very doubtful utility having regard to the circumstances of the moment. Then we are told by my hon. Friend (Mr. Hogge) that we have nothing to do but to foot the bill. That is the only thing in my hon. Friend's speech with which I disagree. I do not see why we should foot the bill. I should have thought that it was an essential right of the House of Commons to consider this question before the transaction is finished.
§ Mr. HOGGEIf my hon. Friend and the rest of the hon. Members will agree to reject this Vote, I am willing to vote with them against paying this money; otherwise, as I said, nothing will be done and' we shall foot the bill.
§ Mr. McNEILLAfter that explanation I do not differ from my hon. Friend. This is a matter which is not of consuming importance. We are not going to prolong the War by refusing this Vote, and I think it would be a very good lesson to 1097 the Government if we took this opportunity of really showing the Government that the House of Commons can put its foot down and refuse to vote sums of money which it is asked to vote without having any opportunity of judging the matter beforehand. If my hon. Friends carry this to a Division I shall vote with them.
§ Mr. BRYCEPerhaps the Noble Lord and the First Commissioner of Works may have information which would guide us. Do they know what amount of this three acres is intended to be covered by buildings? Have they got any plans? Can they tell us, also, whether this area of three acres actually touches the existing demesne? I understand it does. It would be absurd to buy three acres if you are only going to use a comparatively small amount of that area for the erection of buildings. I cannot conceive, as the right hon. Member for the City (Sir F. Banbury) said, that it can be possible to cover these three acres with buildings. You could put the Home Office, the Foreign Office, the Local Government Board, and the Board of Trade buildings on three acres. It must be an altogether extravagant amount of land to buy for any possible extension of the Residency which is required. What the hon. Member for Liverpool (Mr. Rutherford) said is quite true. I know most of these foreign countries, and our representatives there are generally very badly housed. I believe at Salonika our Consulate was miles out of the town, entirely inconspicuous, whereas the German and Austrian Consulates were in very prominent positions in the city and had very large compounds round them, positions adequate and worthy of the great nations which these Consulates represented. On the other hand, ourselves, in the great majority of cases all over the world, are very badly housed and very unworthily housed. Therefore I have great sympathy with anyone who proposes that money should be spent for the purpose of having adequate housing for our representatives; but, at the same time, I think that three acres is a very large amount of land to cover with buildings. Perhaps the Noble Lord can tell us exactly what amount is to be spent upon the buildings. There must have been some plan and design of how the land is to be covered before the land was bought.
§ Mr. WHITEHOUSEThe right hon. Member for the City of London has stated that the Committee have received an assurance from my Noble Friend that any of this land that is not required for the extension of the building will be sold. I did not understand my Noble Friend to give any such assurance. I would like to ask him, before the Vote is disposed of, whether he accepts the statement made by the right hon. Baronet (Sir F. Banbury).
§ Mr. DILLONThis is a singularly interesting Debate. I have taken part in dozens of similar Debates in the past, and to hear hon. Members coming here at this period of the twentieth century and complaining of the House of Commons being put in an unfair position by a process which has been the habitual practice of this House for thirty years, to my knowledge, is very refreshing. It is rather edifying to hear hon. Members who have sat for a considerable number of years suddenly waking up to the evils of this system. I have protested many times in regard to these matters, but on the present occasion I find myself, to my amazement, in warm sympathy with the Government. I can speak with all the more force because I have been, as some hon. Members know, for long years a vigorous opponent of our system in Egypt. Whatever may have been the evils of that system, and whatever may have been the injustice which marked its inception, for good or for evil, you have now obtained a Protectorate over Egypt. Our representative in Egypt is no longer a Consular Agent, or the holder of some other ambiguous position. He is a great Officer of State, representing this country, and clothed with all the authority which comes from this Empire, being the Protector of Egypt. In view of that fact the House of Commons in the new and preposterous spirit of economy which is now being preached all over the place, haggles about buying three acres of land in Cairo for the purposes of our Consulate, the future home of the representative of the Protector of Egypt. How do you know that you would ever get the chance of buying that land again? How would you like it if it had been bought by some German agent and if you found when the War was over you could not get a single acre of land in the neighbourhood of the Consulate? Hon. Members say that three acres is a good deal too much. I do not think it is too much land considering the present position of our representative in Egypt, if he is to 1099 remain there. That is another question, but so long as he does remain there he should have an ample garden and enclosure and fair and full accommodation for his officials, and so that he can do his business in a dignified manner. That appears to me to be common sense and sound reason. To say that because we are now at War, and when this opportunity has been made available, which may not in all human probability be available after the War is over, we should hesitate to expend the sum of money asked for, is to my mind perfectly ridiculous. The fact is that what has been said by the hon. Member for Liverpool is absolutely true. Much of our present misfortunes and troubles in these Eastern countries are due to the fact that we have allowed ourselves to be outshone and outfaced by other countries. Those other countries have bought newspapers and carried on propaganda, and they have sent Ministers far superior to our Ministers in every way and supplied with ample money—
§ Mr. DILLONYes, princes. At any rate they have had much higher standing, and in many cases they have been of greater ability, and they have been supplied with ample money to carry on propaganda and to carry on what does tell in all parts of the world, and especially in the East, and that is, a rather sumptuous method of living and of display. It is the fact that I think very little of the whole of our Egyptian system, but in the crisis in which we are placed, accepting that system as a fact which cannot be displaced, at the present time, at all events, I think it is the height of folly to criticise or harass our Government because they have done what, in my opinion, is an extremely wise thing.
§ Colonel YATEI want to offer my most hearty congratulations to the Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs, and the First Commissioner of Works, for their pluck in having seized the occasion to buy this land. Three acres of land in Cairo is nothing compared to three acres of land in London. Three acres in an Eastern land is nothing. We want large, extensive grounds, and the only fault that I have to find with the Foreign Office, or the Office of Works, or one of our earlier Consular Agents in Egypt is that they did not have sufficient land when the Residency was first established. Despite the 1100 cry for economy that is now going on, and the exhortations to economy by the Government, although they give us so little actual practice of it, I am glad to say that they have gone in for this expenditure at the present time, and are not allowing such an opportunity to slip for the acquiring of the necessary land. I hope that it will make a great difference to our Residency in Cairo.
§ Commander BELLAIRSI am quite willing to believe that the transaction which the Government has carried out is a sound financial transaction. I also think it highly likely that the three acres might have been covered with very undesirable buildings, or they might have been bought by a German agent. I also think that in the East it is extremely important, seeing that appearances go for a great deal, that whoever represents the British Government should be well housed in every sense of the word. What I think the Committee complain of is that it was endeavoured to smuggle the Vote through without an explanation. But for the hon. Member for Blackpool (Mr. Ashley) rising—I think he was the only hon. Member who called attention to this matter—the Vote would have gone through without any explanation whatever. Surely, when the Government carry through a transaction above the heads of the House of Commons and without the sanction of the House, they should come forward and offer an explanation of the transaction in the first instance, when the Vote is submitted, rather than attempt to allow it to go through without any explanation whatever.
§ Mr. WHITEHOUSEMay I ask whether my Noble Friend will reply to the question I put to him?
§ Lord R. CECILWhat I said was that if it turned out that this land that was being bought was more than was actually required for our purpose—I do not mean to say that the Agency is to be compelled only to keep actually the bit of land that is built over; that would be absurd—we should, of course, be naturally anxious to sell it. I should have been glad if hon. Members could have seen the actual plan. It is difficult to convey to the House what it is, but it is one of those cases where an existing building cuts off a corner site which is enclosed by a road, and you really have to buy the whole thing or none at all. It is one of those cases in which you cannot get anything except the whole plot when it was offered. I think the Committee will 1101 recognise that this is a transaction which any private individual would certainly have embarked upon if the opportunity offered.
§ Mr. BRYCEThe Noble Lord has not told us whether he has got any plans of the buildings which he proposes to erect. Does he know anything at all about them? I would like to associate myself with what has been said by the hon. Member for East Mayo (Mr. Dillon). I agree with the hon. Member for Liverpool (Mr. Rutherford). If it is proposed to have a garden, I would support that. We want our great official in the East to have plenty of space round him, and to have a garden where he can go out in the evening and smoke his cigarette, and where he can have garden parties, and so on. You want that kind of thing out there. It is absolutely necessary for the honour of the country that our representative in these regions should be adequately and worthily housed. I did not gather from the Noble Lord or from the First Commissioner of Works that it was proposed to make an elaborate kind of dwelling for the chief. Apparently it is only some offices they mean to build. How much are we to spend? Surely there is some kind of idea what kind of buildings are to be erected.
§ Mr. HARCOURTNo plans have been made for the erection of a new building on the site, and the price paid for the site includes an uncompleted building which is there now, completed up to the first floor, and which we are informed could be very suitably converted into offices when it is completed. We propose to spend nothing in completion work or in building during the progress of the War. I think I can explain to the Committee what the site is. Let hon. Members imagine that this box (the Treasury Box) is the site. There is the Nile on this side and the road on the other. The site we have bought is a three-cornered piece, bounded on one side by the road, and on the other by the Nile. The building which exists, and which would probably be adapted and completed, stands in the centre of this three-cornered piece. I am sure that it is a good bargain, and I hope that the Committee will approve of it.
§ Question put, and agreed to.