Commons Sitting of 19 October 1916

Preamble
The House met at a Quarter before Three of the clock, Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair.
NEW WRIT.
For the County of Fermanagh (North Fermanagh Division), in the room of Godfrey Fetherstonhaugh, Esquire, one of His Majesty's Counsel (Manor of Northstead).—[Lord Edmund Talbot.]
PENAL SERVITUDE ACTS (CONDITIONAL LICENCE).
Copy presented of Licence granted to John Langton, under the provisions of the Penal Servitude Acts, 1853 to 1891, to which are annexed conditions other than those contained in Schedule A of the Penal Servitude Act, 1864 [by Act]; to lie upon the Table.
MOTOR CAR ACTS, 1896 AND 1903, AND FINANCE ACT, 1916.
Copy presented of Motor Car (Hackney Carriage Plate) Order, 1916, Regulations made by the Local Government Board under Section 13 (2) of the Finance Act, 1916 [by Act]; to lie upon the Table.
INEBRIATES ACTS (SCOTLAND).
Copy presented of Eleventh Report of the Inspector for Scotland under the Inebriates Acts for the years 1914 and 1915 [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.
TRADING WITH THE ENEMY (AMENDMENT) ACT, 1916.
Copy presented of Supplementary List of persons, firms, and companies as to whom orders have been made under Section 1 (1) of the Trading With the Enemy (Amendment) Act, 1916 [by Act]; to lie upon the Table.
ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS.
  WAR.

    PRISONERS OF WAR.
    General Sir IVOR HERBERTasked the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign
    698
    Affairs whether he can state the circumstances under which Prince Salm-Salm, an active officer in the German Army, was released when a prisoner in our hands; whether any and what number of British officers were asked for in exchange for so important a prisoner; and whether on his release any undertaking was given by him or by the German Government that he would not bear arms during the War against Great Britain or her Allies?
    The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the WAR OFFICE (Mr. Forster): After full consideration of all the circumstances an agreement was reached with the German Government for the exchange of Colonel W. E. Gordon, V.C., interned in Germany, for Prince Salm-Salm, who was interned in Gibraltar. No undertaking not to bear arms during the War was given by either officer.
    Sir IVOR HERBERT: Is Colonel Gordon considered to be equivalent to an officer in the position of Prince Salm-Salm in the German Army, and is it not usual that there should be an equal exchange in these cases?
    Mr. FORSTER: The whole subject has been very fully considered.
    Sir IVOR HERBERT: As this matter is within the department of the Foreign Office, was this exchange carried out with the concurrence and approval of the Secretary of State for War?
    Mr. FORSTER: Yes.
    Mr. MALCOLMasked the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether Mr. Justice Younger's Committee has consented to the publication of its reports on German prisoner camps; and, if so, whether they will soon be circulated in a White Paper?
    Mr. JAMES HOPE (Treasurer of the Household): We propose to publish any Reports sent to us by the Government Committee which are likely to throw light on the treatment of our prisoners in Germany without detriment to their interests. Many of these Reports refer to a state of things existing some months ago, and in reading them that fact must be clearly borne in mind.
    Mr. MALCOLM: Has the Committee consented to the publication of these Reports, and will they be circulated with the White Papers?
    Mr. HOPE: The Reports forwarded by Mr. Justice Younger's Committee are

    699
    being considered with a view to seeing which part of them can be published without detriment. It is quite obvious that information might be disclosed which might act unfavourably on the treatment of prisoners.
    Mr. MALCOLM: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that the Reports have been in the possession of the Foreign Office a good many months, and will they make up their minds soon?
    Mr. HOPE: I was not aware of that.
    Mr. MALCOLMasked whether His Majesty's Government have yet arranged to send invalid civilian prisoners to Switzerland under the same terms as those which apply to French, German, and Belgian civilian prisoners of war?
    Mr. FORSTER: As the transfer of German invalid civilians interned in this country to Switzerland would be a matter of considerable difficulty, a scheme is now under consideration for the mutual repatriation of such invalids from this country and Germany on somewhat the same lines as to the method of selection and schedule of invalidity as now obtain for the transfer of combatant prisoners of war to Switzerland.
    Sir CHARLES HENRYasked whether the German Government are making allowances to the wives and families of interned civilian prisoners; and, if so, how do these allowances compare with those made to the wives and families of interned civilian prisoners in this country?
    Mr. HOPE: The reply to the first part of the question is in the negative; the second part of the question does not therefore appear to arise.
    Mr. MALCOLMasked whether any further Reports have been received from the American Embassy regarding the condition of British prisoner camps in Germany since 30th June; and, if so, when they will be circulated in a White Paper?
    Lord R. CECIL: Further Reports have been received. The question of their publication is still under consideration.

    CONSULAR OFFICERS.
    Major HUNTasked how many unsalaried Consular officers of foreign origin receive an allowance for office expenses
    700
    and part of certain stamp fees; and whether these payments are to be allowed in the future?
    The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Lord Robert Cecil): All unsalaried Consular officers receive either office allowances or fee allowances. These arrangements are made only in places where the appointment of a salaried Consular officer is not warranted by the amount of work to be performed, and where but for these appointments there would be no Consular officer at all, to carry out the routine and notarial duties which are required.
    Major HUNT: Is it not a fact that these foreign Consular officers gat a certain amount of money, and did not the Noble Lord say before that they did not get anything?
    Lord R. CECIL: If I did it was inaccurate. It is obviously very unfair to ask questions about the salaries of Consular officers and their expenses.
    Colonel YATEasked the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if any Consular certificates are at present being issued at any of our Consulates abroad, and, if so, if he will state the countries in which they are being issued, the nature; or classification of the certificates, and the fees, if any, charged for each kind of certificate?
    Lord R. CECIL: Besides the certificates mentioned in the Table of Consular and Marriage Fees, His Majesty's Consular officers in certain countries are now issuing certificates of interest and certificates of origin and interest, particulars in regard to which will be found in the "London Gazette" of 26th September, 1916. The fee for each of these two certificates is 5s.

    CHINA (BRITISH AND GERMAN CONCESSIONS).
    Colonel YATEasked how many German Consuls, post offices, telegraph offices, banks, and commercial firms are located in British concessions in China; and how many British Consuls, post offices, telegraph offices, banks, and commercial firms are similarly located in German concessions in China?
    Lord R. CECIL: Statistics on this subject are not available in the Foreign Office, but the information required will be obtained from His Majesty's Legation at Peking.

  DISTURBANCES IN IRELAND.

    INTERNED PRISONERS.
    Mr. GINNELLasked whether particulars have been conveyed to the Argentine Government of the charge, if any, against Mrs. Wetzger, an Argentine citizen now interned at Aylesbury; of the date of her arrest; of the reason why she was for six months after her arrest prevented from communicating with her husband; and whether a representative of the Argentine Government has been or will be allowed to interview Mrs. Wetzger apart from prison witnesses?
    The SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. Herbert Samuel: My right hon. Friend has asked me to reply to this. Mrs. Wetzger is not an Argentine citizen, but a German subject. The answer to the first and last parts of the question are, therefore, in the negative. She was arrested on 7th December last. She could have written to her husband before 15th January, but did not avail herself of the facility. At that date, owing to an attempt to smuggle a letter out of the place of internment, she was deprived of the privilege of writing letters for four months. Since the expiry of that period she has written several letters to her husband and other persons.
    Mr. J. P. FARRELLasked the Chief Secretary for Ireland whether three men, named Hubert Wilson, James Farrell, and Patrick Connaughton, are at present interned at Frongoch; whether no charge of any kind has been made against them; whether, in the case of Wilson, his only offence was to say that although he was not a Sinn Feiner he had sympathy with them, and in the case of Farrell he simply did not answer, through ignorance, a question put to him by the Advisory Committee; and will he undertake personally to inquire into these cases and direct the release of these men who have been now five months in custody?
    Mr. SAMUEL: My right hon. Friend has asked me to answer this question. The ground for the internment of each of these men was stated in the notice of the Order which was served upon him. They had full opportunities of stating their cases to the Advisory Committee, who recommended their continued internment, but I will inquire whether these are cases in which release could now be allowed under guarantees.
    Mr. FARRELL: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that two of these men, Wilson and Farrell, are absolutely innocent of any complicity, and that no charge whatever was made against them?
    Mr. SAMUELIf that were so, I do not think that the Advisory Committee would have recommended their internment.
    Mr. NUGENTWould the right hon. Gentleman supply us with a copy of this document these men are supposed to sign, so that we may have a look at it?
    Mr. SAMUEL: I have already stated the terms of it in answer to a question.
    Mr. NUGENT: Can we get a copy of it?
    Mr. SAMUEL: Yes.
    Mr. FARRELL: Do I understand that the grounds on which the Advisory Committee refused their release were communicated to them?
    Mr. SAMUEL: No, Sir; I should say probably not. The grounds on which they were interned were communicated to them, and were communicated to the Committee, who decided that the internment should continue.
    Mr. BYRNE: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the Advisory Committee dealt on the average with over 100 cases per day? What consideration could they give to any man's case, dealing with 100 cases in a few hours?
    Mr. SAMUEL: I think that the hon. Member is quite mistaken in stating "over 100 cases." If that were so, they would have completed their inquiry in sixteen days, whereas it took them several weeks.
    Mr. BYRNE: Was not the whole thing a farce?

    MAJOR PRICE.
    Mr. HAZLETONasked the Chief Secretary for Ireland whether he has ascertained that the name of Sergeant Jones was set out in Mr. John MacNeill's statement concerning his relations with Major Price; and whether any steps have been taken to secure evidence from him?
    The CHIEF SECRETARY for IRELAND (Mr. Duke): The name of Sergeant Jones was set out in the statement. He states that he was not present during any conversation between Major Price and Mr. John MacNeill.
    Mr. DEVLIN: May I ask whether it is a fact that it was not stated that he was present, but that he subsequently visited Mr. John MacNeill and pressed Mr. John MacNeill to accede to the request made to him by Major Price?
    Mr. DUKE: I do not think that was stated.
    Mr. DEVLIN: Yes, I may tell the right hon. Gentleman that it was stated.
    Mr. HAZLETON: How can the right hon. Gentleman claim that he has made any sort of investigation into this case when last week he denied in the House that the name of Sergeant Jones was even mentioned in John MacNeill's statement?

    CIVIL SERVANTS.
    Mr. O'SHAUGHNESSYasked the Chief Secretary if he can say what has been the result of the Wilson-Byrne Inquiry into the case of Maurice Collins, a member of the Dublin post office staff, who was suspected of having taken part in the recent rebellion; whether he is aware that Mr. Collins was released from Frongoch Internment Camp by the Advisory Committee on their having heard his statement; having regard to this fact, will he say whether there was any evidence against him that "was not before the Advisory Committee; if so, who gave it; whether it was given on oath; and, if no further evidence was given, will he say why he has not since been reinstated in his position?
    Mr. SAMUEL: Maurice Collins was released from Frongoch in July on the recommendation of the Advisory Committee. Subsequently the Commissioners appointed to review the cases of Civil servants alleged to be implicated in the rebellion, after hearing his statements at length, recommended his dismissal from the Civil Service, and he has been dismissed. They kept no formal notes of their evidence, and they inform me that they took no other evidence in this case beyond Collins' own statement, which was not on oath. The Advisory Committee, over which Mr. Justice Sankey presided, were concerned only with the question whether continued internment was or was not necessary in the interest of the public safety, and it by no means follows that because that Committee held that a person need not be kept any longer in detention he is. therefore, suitable to be reinstated and retained in the Civil Service of the Crown.
    Mr. NUGENT: Will the right hon. Gentleman publish the decisions of the Wilson-Byrne Inquiry and the evidence on which they relied, and is he aware that grave dissatisfaction exists in Ireland, and the impression is created that these Government officers are being penalised in the interests of the ascendancy gang who require offices?
    Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Gentleman is asking questions which the Home Secretary could not possibly answer.
    Mr. O'SHAUGHNESSY: Will the right hon. Gentleman publish the Report of the Wilson-Byrne Inquiry, and the grounds on which these men were dismissed from their positions?
    Mr. SAMUEL: That question was asked a few days ago of the Chief Secretary and was answered by him.
    Mr. O'SHAUGHNESSY: What answer did he give?

    CONVICTION OF JOHN MACNEILL.
    Mr. LYNCHasked whether he will submit to Members of this House the evidence on which John MacNeill was convicted in connection with the Dublin rebellion?
    Mr. DUKE: The proceedings of courts-martial are under the control of the Secretary of State for War. It has been pointed out to me that on 18th May last the Under-Secretary of State stated that it was not proposed to lay on the Table the proceedings of the court-martial in question.
    Mr. DILLON: Has the right hon. Gentleman's attention been called to the fact that in replying to a question of mine the Prime Minister himself promised to consider this matter some two months ago?
    Mr. DUKE: I was not aware of that, but if a question is put either to my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister or the Secretary of State for War I am sure effect will be given to the promise.
    Mr. DEVLIN: May I ask whether, in view of the fact that Mr. John MacNeill exerted all his influence to prevent the rebellion in Ireland, he will consider the desirability of having him released?
    Mr. DUKE: That is a matter over which, so far as I am aware, the Irish Executive has no control.
    Mr. DEVLIN: May I put the question to the Home Secretary?
    Mr. SPEAKER: It does not arise out of this question. The hon. Member should give notice of it.

    CAPTAIN BOWEN-COLTHURST.
    Mr. M'KEANasked the Chief Secretary if he will say whether Captain Bowen-Colthurst was certified as insane by any competent medical authority; and if he will state the name and qualifications of such authority and the date on which the certificate of insanity was given?
    Mr. DUKE: I am informed that Captain Bowen-Colthurst was found guilty, but insane, by the court-martial which tried him, and that before committal to the Broadmoor Criminal Lunatic Asylum he was examined and found insane by Dr. Dawson, Inspector of Lunatic Asylums, at present serving in Ireland as mental specialist to the Forces in Ireland.
    Mr. DEVLIN: May I ask whether the military superiors of Captain Bowen-Colthurst are also insane? Are they still retained?
    Mr. DUKE: I do not understand that there has been any trial or any conclusion on any matter of that kind.
    Mr. REDDY: Give them all medals.
    Mr. BYRNE: Is it not the fact that Captain Bowen-Colthurst was found unfit to control a section of the Army on the battlefields of France fighting the Huns, and will he say why he was allowed to run loose on unarmed citizens in Dublin?
    Mr. DUKE: Captain Bowen-Colthurst was never under the control of the Executive whom I at present represent in this House. He was at all times a military officer, and the Department which represents him in this House is the War Office, and no doubt if a question is addressed to the Secretary of State for War he will answer it. I am not able to do so.
    Mr. BYRNE: Can the right hon. Gentleman say whether he was under Major Price or not?
    Mr. DUKE: I have not the least idea.
    Mr. FLAVIN: Can the right hon. Gentleman say at what particular moment did Captain Bowen-Colthurst conveniently become insane?

    INTERNED AMERICAN CITIZEN.
    Mr. GINNELLasked whether particulars have been conveyed to the Ameri-
    706
    can Government or to the American Ambassador of the charge, if any, against Mrs. Evelin, an American citizen, inveigled ashore from a Dutch ship at Falkirk by the false pretences of a British naval officer, separated from her child, and now interned at Aylesbury; whether this separation and internment of an untried citizen of a neutral country is a breach of international law and of a pledge of the present Government; if there be any evidence against Mrs. Evelin why has she not been tried; why her wish, that the child should be sent to Mr. Evelin at San Francisco, has not been granted; and what is the intention of the Government with regard to this case?
    Mr. SAMUEL: My right hon. Friend has asked me to reply to this question. Mrs. Evelin is not an American citizen, but a German by birth and a British subject by marriage. The answer to the first part of the question is, therefore, in the negative, and the second does not arise. Mrs. Evelin is interned under Regulation 14B of the Defence of the Realm Regulations, and has made representations to the Advisory Committee, who advised that the order of internment should stand. Her child has been living at Aylesbury for some months past at the mother's own desire, and she sees her several times a week; arrangements are being made for the child's joining her father in South America.

    NEUTRAL COMMISSION (BELGIUM).
    Sir HENRY DALZIELasked whether Belgian workmen who work for the enemy in Belgium and civilian Germans in Belgium receive, and are entitled to receive, the regular quota of food allotted to the civilian population of Belgium and imported by the Neutral Commission; whether out of their earnings these Belgian workmen and civilian Germans are also able to purchase additional foodstuffs; whether this arrangement is in accordance with the agreement assented to by the British and German Governments, respectively; and whether the Government will communicate to the House of Commons the terms of the agreement for the importation and distribution of food in Belgium by the Neutral Commission and the German Government?
    Lord R. CECIL: The principles on which the Commission works are that no German can receive any supplies from it, no Belgian

    707
    who is earning enough to feed himself from native supplies at their present high prices receives anything from the Commission but bread, and any Belgian working under coercion by the Germans should be maintained by the Germans. If my right hon. Friend desires further particulars of the actual working of the Commission I shall be glad to give them to him, but I do not think it would be desirable to publish the agreement to which he refers.

    GREECE.
    Mr. LYNCHasked whether, in regard to Greece and the Grecian Isles, it is the intention of this country to recognise the Provisional Government established by M. Venizelos?
    Lord R. CECIL: I regret that at present I am unable to add anything to the answer given to the hon. Member for the St. Augustine's Division of Kent on the 17th instant. The question is one to be settled in agreement with the Allied Governments and not one in which His Majesty's Government can take separate action.
    Mr. LYNCH: This question is so urgent and I am so deeply dissatisfied with the entire action of the Government that, at the end of questions, I propose to ask leave to move the Adjournment of the House.
    Mr. BUTCHER: May I ask whether it is expedient and in the public interest to raise delicate questions as to our relations with Greece involving our Allies at this moment?
    Mr. LYNCHasked the Prime Minister whether, in regard to the situation in Greece, and also to the military operations in the Balkans, considerations of a secondary order have been allowed to intervene to the detriment of the chances of success of the Allies?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: No, Sir; this is quite untrue.

    PRINCE GEORGE OF GREECE (VISIT TO ENGLAND).
    Sir EDWIN CORNWALLasked the Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs if he can make any statement as to the nature and purpose of the visit of Prince George of Greece to this country, and as to his interview with the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs at the Foreign Office?
    Lord R. CECIL: The answer is in the negative. The visit of Prince George to this country is of a private character, and he has been received here as in Paris.
    Sir E. CORNWALL: Why was it publicly announced that he went to the Foreign Office?
    Lord R. CECIL: Because of the enterprise of the Press, I suppose.
    Sir RICHARD COOPER: Does the Noble Lord mean to imply that there has not been an interview between the Foreign Secretary and Prince George of Greece?
    Lord R. CECIL: I do not think it would be safe to read into my reply anything which I did not say.
    Mr. LYNCH: Could not the time of the Foreign Office be better occupied than in interviewing stray gentlemen from abroad?
    Commander WEDGWOOD: He is protecting "Tino."

    IRISH NEWSPAPERS.
    Mr. FARRELLasked the Chief Secretary for Ireland whether his Department was consulted before the recent restrictions on the sending of Irish newspapers to neutral countries and America were imposed; whether he is aware that a number of country people in Ireland with no knowledge of the intricacies of the regulations made have posted, and are posting, papers weekly to their friends in America, not one of which is either returned or delivered; and whether, seeing that a Press censorship exists in Dublin to control such matters, he will undertake to have these restrictions modified so as to allow papers which are censored in Ireland to be sent without further trouble?
    Mr. FORSTER: No, Sir. The Irish Government was not consulted before the restrictions in question, which were adopted as a measure of postal censorship, were imposed. These restrictions apply throughout the United Kingdom, and their object is to prevent the communication of military information by secret means. The Press censorship is not concerned. Regarding the second part of the question, the papers which are stopped are returned to the sender whenever he can be identified.
    Mr. FARRELL: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that we have a Press Censor

    709
    in Ireland, and that all the local newspapers have to submit to this Press Censor; and, that being so, why should they not be at liberty to send their papers direct to people in America?
    Mr. FORSTER: It is not really a question of the Press Censor. The hon. Member will understand that it is quite possible to convey secret information by making various markings or notes on the margin of a paper which has already passed the Press Censor. It is more a question of the Postal Censor.
    Mr. FARRELL: This is an important matter for the local newspapers in Ireland. Does the right hon. Gentleman think that it is fair that local newspaper proprietors in Ireland should have to send their newspapers to commission agents in London, who, of course, earn remuneration for themselves without any reference whatever to the rights of these people to communicate with their customers in America?
    Mr. FORSTER: I do not think that the hon. Gentleman is correct in saying that it is necessary to send the newspapers over here.
    Mr. FARRELL: I have seen the circular.
    Mr. FORSTER: The papers, I suppose, can be forwarded through the licensed agents in Ireland?
    Mr. FARRELL: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that these licensed gentlemen have to get permission to send on to America, and they have also to pay a commission?

    POLICE PAY (IRELAND).
    Major NEWMANasked the Chief Secretary for Ireland whether the recent increases in pay and bonus to meet the increased cost of living which have, since the commencement of the War, been granted to members of the police force in the Metropolis and country districts of Great Britain have been extended to the Royal Irish Constabulary; and, if so, will he say how the pay of a member of the Royal Irish Constabulary compares with that of a member of a police force in an average English or Scottish county?
    Mr. REDDY: Before the right hon. Gentleman answers that question, may I ask what is the pay of the district inspectors and inspectors who are already overpaid, and how it compares with the pay of the inspectors in England?
    Mr. DUKE: Perhaps my hon. Friend will put that question down. The statutory pay of the Royal Irish Constabulary was increased shortly after the outbreak of war, and a war bonus at the rate of 3s. 6d. a week for head and other constables of the force was granted as from 1st July last. Representations for a further increase of pay for this force and for the Dublin Metropolitan Police are at present under consideration by the Irish Government and the Treasury. The general comparison suggested in the last part of the hon. Member's question cannot usefully be made within the limits of a Parliamentary reply, as factors other than pay (such as allowances, housing accommodation, and general conditions of service) have to be taken into consideration, and they are not uniform.
    Sir E. CARSON: Might I ask the right hon. Gentleman if the inquiry now going on will include the pay of district inspectors?
    Mr. DUKE: The inquiry has taken account of the conditions of all members of the two police forces.
    Major NEWMAN: Is it not a fact that the increase in pay of 2s. per week took place before the War?
    Mr. DUKE: I believe the fact is that there was an inquiry before the War, but I gather from the official information that the order for the increase of pay, which depends upon an Act of Parliament, was made shortly after the outbreak of the War?
    Mr. REDDY: Is it not a fact that they are already overpaid?
    Mr. BYRNEasked the Chief Secretary if he will state the nature of the proposals which have been submitted to the Treasury to improve the condition of the Dublin Metropolitan Police; if they have yet been sanctioned; and if he will state from what date the new conditions will take effect?
    Mr. DUKE: The proposals which have been submitted to the Treasury cannot be published, as they have not yet been sanctioned. The date from which it is proposed that the new conditions shall take effect is subject to the same restriction. I expect to be able without long delay to make a further answer.
    Mr. BYRNE: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that in the year 1882 the Dublin police were on a level with the London

    711
    police in pay, and that since then the Dublin police have only received one shilling per week increase, whilst the London police have advanced twelve shillings?
    Mr. DUKE: Before I made certain recommendations with regard to the pay of the police, I ascertained, I think, all the salient facts with regard to the matter. I cannot recall whether the hon. Member has accurately stated the circumstances.

  MILITARY SERVICE.

    RECRUITING IN IRELAND.
    Sir J. LONSDALEasked the Chief Secretary for Ireland if he is now in a position to give full particulars of the number of recruits enlisted in Ireland since the commencement of the War and the number of men of military age remaining available for enlistment; and if he will give for each county in Ireland the number of men of military age at the outbreak of war, the number of recruits who have joined the forces, and the percentage of recruits to eligible men?
    Mr. DUKE: The particulars are being prepared. I shall be able to tell my hon. Friend next week what course the Government will take as to publishing them.
    Mr. HAZLETONasked the Chief Secretary for Ireland whether he is aware that, according to the official figures for 1911, the latest year for which they are given in Thorn's Directory, the number of occupiers of agricultural holdings in Ireland is 535,675 and the number of males of all ages engaged in agriculture is 721,669; and whether he can say what number of such persons is between the ages of eighteen and forty-one?
    Mr. DUKE: The figure 535,675 mentioned in the hon. Member's question represents the number of agricultural holdings in Ireland according to the Census of 1911 and not the number of occupiers as stated. Of the 721,669 males at all ages returned in the General Report of the Census as belonging to the agricultural class, it is estimated that 327,350 were eighteen and under forty-one years of age at the date of the Census.

    EMPLOYMENT EXCHANGES.
    Colonel GRIFFITHSasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he
    712
    will take steps for the immediate reorganisation of the Labour Exchanges throughout the country by reason of the number of men employed therein of a military age and replacing them with wounded or partially-disabled soldiers now fit for light duties?
    The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the BOARD of TRADE (Mr. Pretyman): The Employment Exchanges are now almost wholly concerned in work directly necessary for the prosecution of the "War, and a very large part of their work relates to the supply of labour for munitions. Nearly 1,200 of the staff have already joined the forces and their places have been taken by women or by men unfit for military service. This number forms a much larger proportion of the total male staff than in the case of industry generally or of the Government Departments as a whole This result has been achieved in spite of the special difficulties arising from the fact that a great part of the staff is scattered in small numbers through 400 Exchanges in various parts of the country instead of being concentrated in large numbers in the same building. It must further be remembered that the Employment Department being a very new one, the staff naturally contains a much higher percentage of young men than that of old established departments. The possibility of effecting any further substitution without detriment to the work is constantly under consideration, but I could not take the risk of carrying the process so far as to impair the efficiency of the Exchanges for carrying on work which is vitally necessary for the purposes of the War.
    Colonel GRIFFITHS: Cannot women conduct the whole of this work and by degrees be put in to replace the men?
    Mr. PRETYMAN: No, I do not think so.

    DEBADGED MEN.
    Mr. GEORGE TERRELLasked the Prime Minister whether he is aware that semi-skilled single men who have been debadged with a view to their being made eligible for service in the Army are being found fresh jobs by the Labour Exchanges; and whether, to save further conflict between the authorities, he will give instructions to the Labour Exchanges that no men of military age are to be found fresh employment without the consent of the military authorities?
    Mr. SNOWDENasked the President of the Board of Trade if the Employment Exchanges have received instructions not to find jobs for men of military age who are or have been employed in controlled establishments if such men are unattested, but on ascertaining that a man is not attested it is the duty of the Employment Exchange clerk to report the man to the nearest recruiting office; if he is aware that such action is distinctly in violation of the provision of the Military Service Act which allows two months in which to get other work; will he explain why the Employment Exchanges are acting in this manner; and if it be on the instructions of the Minister of Munitions or the War Office?
    Mr. PRETYMAN: The Employment Exchanges have been instructed that they should not assist men who are liable to, but are evading, military service, to obtain civil employment. No further instructions on the subject have up to the present time been issued by the Board of Trade to the Exchanges. They have under consideration, however, the issue of more detailed instructions dealing with the whole matter.
    Mr. THOMAS: Does that apply to skilled men being enlisted in the Army while skilled men are being brought from France, and can that waste be prevented?
    The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of TRADE (Mr. Runciman): No, it does not cover that question at all. This only applies to men who are evading military service.
    Mr. SNOWDEN: Did the right hon. Gentleman say Employment Exchanges have been instructed to make a discrimination between attested and unattested men and that when a man says he is unattested they have instructions not to find him a job?
    Mr. RUNCIMAN: No, I did not say what apparently is in the hon. Member's mind. What I said was that Exchanges have been instructed that they should not assist men who are liable to, but are evading, military service in finding civil employment.
    Mr. SNOWDEN: Will the right hon. Gentleman give an answer to my question whether any instructions have been given to Employment Exchanges to discriminate between attested and unattested men with regard to jobs?
    Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Member ought to put that down.
    Mr. SNOWDEN: I have it on the Paper. The right hon. Gentleman answered my question at the same time.
    Mr. RUNCIMAN: If the hon. Member had listened carefully to my answer he would have heard me further say that no further instructions on the subject have up to the present been issued.
    Mr. G. TERRELL: What does the right hon. Gentleman mean by men who are evading, or attempting to evade, military service? Does he mean that the Employment Exchanges are to endeavour to discriminate or ascertain what the man's intentions are?
    Mr. SPEAKER: If the hon. Gentleman wishes to ask a series of questions he might take the trouble to put them down. Otherwise he cannot expect to get answers.
    Mr. TERRELL: On a point of Order. It arises out of a question which I have addressed to the right hon. Gentleman?
    Mr. SPEAKER: It may well arise. A hundred questions may arise out of an answer given, but that does not prevent the questions being put down.
    Mr. TERRELL: I suggest that this is a most important matter.
    Mr. SPEAKER: I suggest that the more important the matter is the more necessary it is to put the question down.
    Sir R. COOPER: Does not your ruling equally apply to Irish Nationalists?
    Mr. SPEAKER: It applies to everyone, even to the hon. Gentleman himself.

    EXEMPTION CLAIMS.
    Colonel Lord HENRY CAVENDISH-BENTINCKasked the President of the Local Government Board whether every tribunal in the country furnishes a return to the Board showing the total number of claims for exemption received by each tribunal and the total number of exemptions granted by each tribunal; and, if so, whether he will give the information to the House?
    The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. Hayes Fisher): Returns were obtained from tribunals in May last, and my right hon. Friend proposes to ask for a

    715
    further return shortly. There are objections on the ground of public policy to publishing the statistics. I may mention that my right hon. Friend is in constant touch with the work of tribunals through his inspectors.

    GOWER LOCAL TRIBUNAL.
    Mr. SNOWDENasked the President of the Local Government Board if he will have a special inquiry made into the action of the Gower Rural Tribunal in respect of the case of H. V. Watters, an applicant for exemption from the Military Service Tribunal on the ground of being employed upon essential national work, and also on the ground of a conscientious objection, seeing that the chairman of the tribunal, a local land agent, had a grudge against the family of Watters, and had threatened that he would have his revenge, and another member of the tribunal had, nine days before the hearing of the case, been compelled to sign a withdrawal of certain charges which he had made against Watters, and also in view of the fact that Watters is the only agricultural mechanic and shoeing-smith in the district, doing the work for over fifty farmers who have petitioned the local tribunal, the Appeal Tribunal, the Minister of Agriculture, and the War Minister on his behalf; and will he also inquire into the conduct of Colonel Pearson, who at the hearing told Watters that he was a traitor and only fit to be on the point of a German bayonet or in a lunatic asylum?
    Mr. HAYES FISHER: My right hon. Friend is having inquiries made.

    JUDICIAL AUTHORITY (IRELAND).
    Mr. LUNDON(by Private Notice) asked the Attorney-General for Ireland whether instructions have been issued to resident magistrates in Ireland to the effect that in all cases under the Military Service Act no local justice of the peace is to be allowed to adjudicate?
    The ATTORNEY-GENERAL for IRELAND (Mr. J. H. Campbell): No such instructions have been issued. The question, so far as I know, has never arisen except in one case which is actually now pending and sub judice, therefore I must decline to say anything further about it.
    Mr. LUNDON: May I ask whether it is not the fact that in the particular case to which the right hon. Gentleman refers instructions were given to the resident
    716
    magistrate a fortnight ago that he was entitled to try the case himself, and as a result of these instructions the local justices have been unable to act?
    Mr. CAMPBELL: I have nothing to add to what I have said. Inasmuch as the case quoted is sub judice, I do not propose to refer to it any further.
    Mr. DILLON: Is the right hon. and learned Gentleman aware that this question has arisen and been the subject of dispute in previous cases; and is it not the duty of the executive Government to lay down, for the guidance of magistrates, what is the law in this matter, without its being fought over in the local Courts between the magistrates?
    Mr. LUNDON: Will the right hon. Gentleman answer my question: Whether instructions were issued to the local resident magistrate in this case not to allow the local magistrates to act?
    Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Member has dragged that in very improperly. That is not an urgent matter. It is a matter which has gone by.
    Mr. HAZLETON: As we are told by the Attorney-General that this case is pending, would he say why in a case which is sub judice he has issued these instructions that justices of the peace of the district are not to be allowed to adjudicate?
    Mr. SPEAKER: That is exactly the question which I have ruled is not urgent.
    Mr. CONDON: It is urgent in Ireland.

  DEFENCE OF THE REALM ACT.

    POLITICAL MEETINGS (IRELAND).
    Mr. HAZLETONasked the Chief Secretary for Ireland whether the recent Order in Council giving the police authorities power to prevent political meetings or processions likely to cause disturbance or disaffection is now in force in Ireland, and whether the earlier Order of the military authorities preventing all political meetings of every description without the prior permission of the police being obtained has in consequence been withdrawn?
    Mr. DUKE: The reply to the first part of the question is in the affirmative, and to the second part in the negative.

    HAY PURCHASES.
    Mr. CRUMLEYasked the Chief Secretary for Ireland whether, having regard to the losses sustained by small farmers in Fermanagh county by restrictions in the sale of hay, steps will be taken to have such restrictions removed immediately and to permit the farmers to sell their hay in the open market?
    Mr. FORSTER: In fairness to producers generally throughout the country, I am afraid it is impossible to consider the removal of the restrictions in the sale of hay, but I am not aware that they are involving the small farmers referred to in any losses.
    Mr. CRUMLEY: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that there is a scarcity of first-crop hay in the county of Fermanagh, and why should there be any restriction placed on these small farmers in the sale of their hay?
    Mr. FORSTER: The only restriction is in the matter of price.
    Mr. KILBRIDE: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the statement which he has just made is inaccurate? There are several small farmers in various parts of Ireland who have been restricted up to the present in selling in the open market hay unfit for military purposes?
    Mr. FORSTER: The hon. Member will remember that the Army Council has taken possession of all the hay in the United Kingdom. Licences are given if the hay is not suitable for Army requirements, and it can be sold for general use. The only restriction remaining is in the matter of price.
    Mr. KILBRIDE: What is the purpose of the Army Council in taking possession of all the hay if it is unfit for military purposes?

    DE VESCI ESTATE (QUEEN'S COUNTY).
    Mr. FITZPATRICKasked the Chief Secretary if he is aware that several small non-judicial tenants on the De Vesci estate, Queen's County, have received notice that their rents would be increased by 50 per cent. in some cases; and, as most of these tenants are uneconomic holders, many of whom have sons or relatives serving at the front, will he take steps to prevent such increase being made in the rents of these poor tenants?
    Mr. PATRICK MEEHANasked if he is aware that the agent of Viscount de Vesci has served notices on over seventy tenants on the Viscount's Queen's County estate demanding increased rents, in some cases the increase demanded being over 50 per cent.; if he is aware that the majority of these tenants hold small uneconomic bog holdings where their predecessors were planted in the famine days after being evicted from the good holdings on the estate; if he is aware that most of these tenants have sons or near relatives serving at the front; and whether he intends taking any action in the matter?
    Mr. DUKE: I am informed that a circular demanding increased rents has been sent to the tenants by the agent of the De Vesci estate, and that this has been done with a view to having judicial rents fixed. Out of 120 tenants, 75 are said to have agreed to increased rents. About ten of the tenants have bog holdings; three of the tenants are known to have relations in the Army. The matter is not one in which, upon the facts before me, the Executive could interfere.
    Mr. FITZPATRICK: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the effect of these notices has been to make several of these poor tenants pay increased rents?
    Mr. KILBRIDE: May I ask whether the Executive in Dublin Castle, under the advice of the Attorney-General, are now contemplating the advisability of making Lord De Vesci and his agent chairman and vice-chairman of the Abbeyleix Recruiting Committee?
    Mr. DUKE: If it has been contemplated, that fact has not been communicated to me.
    Mr. REDDY: Do you expect Irishmen to enlist under Lord De Vesci?
    Mr. HAZLETON: Would the Irish Government consider the advisability of putting the Defence of the Realm Act in force against Lord De Vesci?
    Mr. SPEAKER: That does not arise out of the question.

    TOBACCO CULTIVATION, IRELAND.
    Mr. GRAHAMasked the Chief Secretary if he is aware that about three years ago a. Mr. Keller was sent down by the Department of

    719
    Agriculture and Technical Instruction for Ireland to induce the farmers of the Kilcormac and Killyargey parishes to sow tobacco; whether they were informed that the tobacco when put on the market would fetch from 8d. to 10d. per pound, and that any profits the handlers made out of the tobacco supplied by the growers would be divided amongst them; whether he is aware that the growers for the past two years did not receive more than half the price stated, and that those who refused to sow tobacco this year were not paid the division of last year's bonus; and whether he proposes to take any action in the matter?
    Mr. T. W. RUSSELL (Vice-President of the Department of Agriculture,): The Department did not send Mr. Keller, their tobacco expert, to Kilcormac or Killyargey parishes, as stated in the question. On the inception of a scheme of experiments in tobacco growing, Mr. Keller, at the request of the rehandler, who had undertaken the experiment, visited the parishes named for the purpose of assisting the experimenter in explaining to prospective growers the conditions under which a Grant would be payable to the rehandler. The Department have no knowledge that the prospective growers were led to believe that they would receive the price per pound named, and they are satisfied that the tobacco for the past two years has been valued according to the current market prices. The division of profits is a matter entirely between the rehandler and the growers, and is not one that concerns the Department. The entire responsibility in connection with the carrying out of the experiments rests with the rehandler.
    Mr. GRAHAM: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that a State Grant has been given to encourage tobacco growing in Ireland; and is there no supervision by the Departments as to arrangements made by the handlers; and is it not the duty of the Department to see that the growers get the benefit of the Grant?
    Mr. RUSSELL: It is the duty of the Department to see that the arrangement between the handlers and the Treasury is carried out.
    Mr. GRAHAM: Where does the grower come in?

    POTATO CROP (IRELAND).
    Captain DONELANasked the Vice-President of the Department of Agriculture (Ireland) whether a large proportion of this year's potato crop in Ireland is diseased and unfit for food; and whether, in view of the scarcity of other articles of food and the prospect of a still greater scarcity in the spring, he will recommend that immediate steps be taken to prohibit the exportation of potatoes from Ireland?
    Mr. RUSSELL: The condition of the potato crop in Ireland, whilst giving rise to anxiety, does not appear to warrant the use of the term "failure" in the question. The mid-October reports show that, generally speaking, the yield is poor and disappointing. On some soils where disease-resisting varieties were planted, and where also spraying was effectively done, the crop is described as satisfactory. But it cannot be overlooked that the broken weather of September and its low temperature, as well as the excessive rainfall since October set in, must have an injurious effect upon the final crop return. The period of lifting the potatoes has now arrived, and until that process has gone further it is impossible to say with anything like accuracy what the outlook really is. In regard to export, I would point out to the hon. Gentleman that the Department have no power to prohibit the export of sound potatoes, and that, after all, with a yield last year of 3,710,463 tons, there was only a balance of 250,000 tons available for export without restricting supplies for human consumption and stock-feeding. I must ask the hon. Gentleman to be satisfied with the assurance that the Department are fully aware of the grave importance of the matter and that the position is being carefully watched and reported upon in every district of the country.
    Mr. KILBRIDE: Will the right hon. Gentleman give us the names of the different varieties of potatoes that he says are disease-resisting?
    Mr. RUSSELL: I should like to have notice of that question, but I can give the hon. Member one that does not resist—"Up-to-dates" have given way all over Ireland.
    Captain DONELAN: In view of the fact that potatoes are the staple food of the Irish people, would the right hon. Gentleman recommend that the exportation of potatoes from Ireland shall at least be

    721
    suspended pending further investigation as to the extent of the disease? It is really a very serious matter.
    Mr. RUSSELL: I have endeavoured to convey that the Department fully realise the seriousness of the matter; indeed, I used the word "gravity," but we cannot proceed without the fullest information. We are daily at work getting that information. The potatoes are now being lifted. I am in communication with the Chief Secretary on the matter. He was consulted this morning, before this answer was drafted, and I think it meets the case at present.
    Mr. O'SHAUGHNESSY: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the price of potatoes in the local markets in Ireland is twice what it was this time last year?
    Mr. RUSSELL: I am aware of that.
    Mr. FLAVIN: Has the right hon. Gentleman personal knowledge that sulphate of copper, the principal ingredient used in spraying potatoes, was so scarce in the summer that the farmers could not get it?
    Mr. RUSSELL: Yes; but I am also aware that in the poorest part of Ireland, the West, the spraying was exceedingly well done.

    NOVA SCOTIA STEEL AND COAL COMPANY.
    Sir H. DALZIELasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies what quantities of iron ore were exported by the Nova Scotia Steel and Coal Company to Messrs. Krupp and other German armament firms in the year prior to the outbreak of the War; whether the contracts with Krupp's contained any war clause extending the term of the contract by a period equal to that of the war or having any other effect; whether the iron ore mines have been shut down in consequence of the loss of the German market; and whether any use can be made of the output of these mines in connection with the production of munitions of war by this country or the Allies?
    The SECRETARY of STATE for the COLONIES (Mr. Bonar Law): An answer to the first two parts of this question was given by me on 25th January, to which I would refer my right hon. Friend. The Newfoundland Minister of Finance stated in his Budget speech on 18th April that,
    722
    owing to the increased demand for iron ore for various forms of war work, as well as for commercial purposes, the mines at Bell Island were being operated on a scale of unexampled activity.

    ROYAL NAVAL RESERVE.
    Mr. PETOasked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether officers of the Royal Naval Reserve, either permanent or temporary, against whom charges may be made in connection with the performance of their duties are, prior to their being dismissed from His Majesty's service and their commissions cancelled, entitled to an inquiry enabling them to defend themselves against such charges?
    The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the ADMIRALTY (Dr. Macnamara): No officer can be dismissed from His Majesty's service except by sentence of court-martial or disciplinary court. The reference is doubtless to cases in which officers temporarily employed by the Admiralty are discharged from the Service by Admiralty Order. In no case is any officer entitled to demand a court of inquiry.

    MERCHANT SERVICE.
    Mr. PETOasked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether any further progress has been made in respect to the adoption of a standard official uniform for the captains and officers of the merchant service; and whether, before any details are decided upon, these captains and officers, as the persons principally concerned, will be given the opportunity of due representation?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: The Admiralty have been in communication with a number of the principal shipping companies, and certain general conclusions arrived at are under their final consideration. The question has turned not so much upon the adoption of a standard official uniform for officers of the mercantile marine as upon the elimination of characteristics likely to cause confusion between the uniform work in the merchant service and the Royal Navy. As regards the last part of the question, if the officers of the mercantile marine desire to submit representations upon the matter, of course due consideration will be given to the same.
    Mr. PETO: Has the right hon. Gentleman taken any steps to ascertain the views of the leading representative officers in the merchant service.; and, in considering the question of a uniform, has he borne in mind the desirability of arranging for a uniform which will be a pride to wear and not a disgrace?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: The Admiralty are prepared to receive representations. I have said that if the officers of the mercantile marine desire to submit representations upon the matter, of course due consideration will be given to the same.
    Mr. PETO: Would the right hon. Gentleman call a conference of the officers similar to the conference he had with the leading shipowners?
    Mr. BUTCHERasked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether, in view of the fact that silver War badges are being granted to those who have served in His Majesty's naval forces since 4th August, 1914, and whose service has been terminated on account of wounds or on account of physical infirmity for which they are not themselves directly responsible, there is any similar provision for officers and others of the merchant service who may be permanently incapacitated from following their employment owing to wounds or injury sustained in engagements with the enemy or other causes directly attributable to the War; and, if not, whether steps will now be taken to issue a silver or other badge in cases of this kind?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: Officers and men of the mercantile marine serving under special engagements in His Majesty's commissioned ships are eligible for the award of these badges. As regards officers and men of the mercantile marine other than the above the matter falls to be dealt with by the Board of Trade.
    Mr. PETOasked the President of the Board of Trade whether distress exists amongst the wives and families in this country of our merchant captains, officers, and seamen interned in Germany and Turkey; whether, in view of the profits which continue to be made by shipowners and to the fact that the purchasing power of a sovereign is only equivalent to 12s. comparative with the economic position before the War, he will take steps to see that the Government scheme providing for a weekly allowance, £1 being the maximum, which is granted to the dependants of the interned captains, officers, and
    724
    seamen is substantially increased; and whether he will consider the desirability of doing this by making a small increase in the present premiums on the insurance of merchant ships under the Government scheme?
    Mr. RUNCIMAN: As I have on previous occasions explained to the hon. Gentleman, the allowance to which he refers is an entirely gratuitous one, and I regret that I cannot undertake to increase the amount of it.
    Mr. PETO: Can the right hon. Gentleman give me some reply to that part of the question which deals with the shipowners' enormous profits, which can certainly make some contribution to keep these people in reasonable comfort?

    NAVAL COURTS-MARTIAL (LEGAL EXPENSES).
    Sir C. KINLOCH-COOKEasked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether, in the case of a man in His Majesty's Navy being court-martialled and the charge against him dismissed and the man restored to his former position, the acquittal carries with it the right to have refunded to him the legal expenses incurred in proving his innocence; and, if not, will he explain why?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: Legal expenses incurred by an accused person in connection with a naval court-martial, in so far as they consist of expenses of witnesses, are paid by the Crown. The Crown does not pay the expenses of a legal adviser for the accused. The accused does not generally employ a legal adviser, but is assisted by a naval officer. As the prosecutor also is a naval officer, prosecution and defence are on an equal footing, and no reason is seen for providing the accused with a legal adviser at the expense of the State.

    LOSS OF H.M.'s SHIPS "NOTTINGHAM" AND "FALMOUTH."
    Mr. RONALD McNEILLasked the First Lord of the Admiralty if he can give the House any information as to the circumstances attending the loss of His Majesty's ships "Nottingham" and "Falmouth"?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: I must refer my hon. Friend to the official communiqué published on 21st August, to which I have nothing to add.
    Mr. McNEILL: Was not that communiqué confined to the statement that the two vessels were lost; and cannot the Admiralty now give more information?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: I think there was more than that. I will send the hon. Member a copy.

    NAVAL AND MILITARY PENSIONS AND GRANTS.
    Mr. SNOWDENasked the Secretary to the Admiralty what is the amount of separation allowance which can be granted to the parent of a boy under the training service regulations and, where an allotment of 2s. a week has been made by a boy, what is the maximum separation allowance which can be paid; and, if the sum be 1s. a week, will he take steps to have the sum increased in view of its inadequacy in cases where a larger loss is being suffered by the parent owing to the enlistment of the son?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: The boys to whom my hon. Friend alludes normally can only allot 2s. a week, and the Admiralty has no power to pay separation allowance in excess of half that amount. The payment is subject to proof of the parent's dependence on the boy prior to his entry, and it is usually found in these cases that if dependence existed at all the degree of dependence was very small. In exceptional cases, when the loss sustained is not covered by the separation allowance and allotment combined, the Statutory Committee is empowered to grant relief by means of a supplementary allowance.
    Mr. HOGGEasked the Prime Minister whether the rates of pension allowances for men, widows, and dependants of men classified under B and C of Army Form W 3291 are the same as for men on general service?
    Mr. FORSTER: Yes, Sir.

    SUGAR SUPPLIES.
    Mr. THOMASasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he is aware that working people are experiencing difficulty in obtaining adequate supplies of sugar, and that they strongly resent the prevailing practice of making the sale of
    726
    sugar dependent upon the purchase of other goods upon which no maximum price is fixed; and whether he proposes to take any action to ensure an adequate supply and more just distribution of this commodity?
    Mr. JOYNSON-HICKSasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he can make a statement as to the right of a shopkeeper to insist on a purchase of other articles at the same time as a purchase of sugar?
    The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER (Mr. McKenna): As my hon. Friends are aware, the Sugar Commission has been compelled, in the public interest, to impose restrictions as to the supply of sugar, but the Commission is most anxious that these restrictions should not press with undue severity upon the working classes. No objection has been raised to the practice referred to in the question because the Commission felt that if retailers were forced to sell sugar alone their stocks would be exhausted as soon as they were exposed for sale and only the first applicants would obtain supplies. In particular the working classes whose wages are paid at the end of the week would suffer specially. It is, however, a question whether some limit should not be placed upon the value of the goods which a retailer may require to be purchased at the same time as sugar is bought and this matter is now receiving the careful attention of the Sugar Commission.
    Mr. THOMAS: Will the right hon. Gentleman bear in mind the fact that the poorer a person is the more difficult it is for him to get the sugar, because they are making a limitation of 4s. to be spent on other food before a pound of sugar can be obtained? He will see the effect upon the working-class family.
    Mr. McKENNA: Yes. I understand that to be the hardship of the case, and we are going very fully into the matter.
    Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: Will the right hon. Gentleman do his utmost to make the limit as low as possible?
    Mr. McKENNA: I have already done so; but my colleagues rather think my suggestion goes too far.
    Mr. BUTCHER: Will the right hon. Gentleman come to an early decision as to this question of limiting the amount of groceries a grocer can require a person to buy?
    Mr. McKENNA: Yes. I will ask the Commission to come to a decision as quickly as possible.

    C. NESTLE AND COMPANY, LTD.
    Mr. JOYNSON-HICKSasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he is aware that the firm of C. Nestlé and Company, Ltd., is practically a German firm, 19,140 out of 20,000 shares being held by Charles Nessler and his family; whether the said Charles Nessler went to New York about eighteen months ago to escape internment; and what steps have been taken to wind up the company?
    Mr. PRETYMAN: In accordance with the recommendation of the Advisory Committee the shares held by enemy subjects in C. Nestlé and Company, Ltd., which carry on a hairdressing business, have been vested in the Public Trustee in order that they may be sold to British subjects.
    Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: When are they going to be sold?
    Mr. PRETYMAN: Will my hon. Friend find me a customer?
    Mr. G. TERRELL: Will you offer them by auction?
    Mr. PRETYMAN: Very probably.

    ROUMANIA.
    Major HUNTasked the Prime Minister whether, in view of the peril of Roumania and of the anxiety felt in this country on the matter, he can give the House the assurance that everything possible will be done by this country to save Roumania from the fate of Serbia?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: The situation in Roumania has been for some time past the subject of careful consideration by ourselves and our Allies in concert and everything which is possible is being done.
    Sir E. CARSON: When may we expect some information and a statement by the Government as regards Roumania, having regard to the general anxiety that prevails at present?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: I do not think—I am sure my right hon. Friend will agree with me—that it would be desirable to make a statement as to what is being done militarily in regard to the matter, but as soon as possible the Government will make a statement.
    Major HUNT: Will the Government give an assurance that they will not be too late again, as usual?

    NATURALISATION OF ALIENS.
    Mr. PENNEFATHERasked the Prime Minister if his attention has been drawn to the proposed changes in the French naturalisation laws, and if it is intended to make any changes in the British Nationality and Status of Aliens Act; and, if so, whether the resolutions bearing on the subject passed by the representatives of over 100 Chambers of Commerce in London in February last will be given full consideration?
    Colonel YATEasked the Home Secretary whether his attention has been drawn to the Naturalisation Act brought in by the French Senate; and whether, in loyal support of our Allies, he will introduce a similar Bill in this House?
    Mr. SAMUEL: I would refer the hon. Members to my answer on Tuesday last to the hon. Member for the Enfield Division of Middlesex.
    Sir E. CARSON: Will anything be ever done about naturalisation?

    WAR COMMITTEES.
    Mr. MacCAWasked the Prime Minister if he will grant a Return showing the various Committees appointed by the Government which are now sitting, with the names of members of each Committee, and the terms of reference?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: A list of Committees was issued in June last [Cd. 8256]. For the present, at any rate, I do not think that there is any need for the compilation of another list.

    ELLESMERE PORT DYEWORKS.
    Sir H. DALZIELasked the President of the Board of Trade whether the Ellesmere Port Dyeworks, owned by Germans resident in Germany, have been leased to Messrs. Levinstein, of Manchester; whether the British Dyes, Limited, a company in which £1,000,000 sterling of British money has been invested, was given an opportunity of tendering for the works; and, if not, can he give the reason?
    Mr. RUNCIMAN: The Port Ellesmere Works of Messrs. Meister Lucius and Bruning have been sold, under the provisions of the Trading With the Enemy Acts, to Messrs. Levinstein, Limited. Full guarantees have been given by Messrs. Levinstein that the company shall always remain under British control.
    The Board of Trade took the advice of scientific experts on the evidence submitted by Messrs. Levinstein and British Dyes, Limited, as to their respective ability to utilise the works in question for the manufacture of synthetic indigo. As it appeared from the report of the referees that, on the evidence submitted, Messrs. Levinstein were better qualified to carry on this particular manufacture by the process for which the Port Ellesmere plant was designed, the Board considered that no useful purpose would have been served by inviting competitive tenders, provided that Messrs. Levinstein were prepared to pay a price considered reasonable by the Court.
    Sir H. DALZIEL: Does the right hon. Gentleman suggest that the experts advised that British Dyes, Limited, should not have an opportunity of tendering? Did they have an opportunity of tendering?
    Mr. RUNCIMAN: No, Sir; they did not have an opportunity of tendering, because the referees advised that Messrs. Levinstein were better qualified to carry on this operation by the process that was established at the Ellesmere Port works.
    Mr. BOOTH: Are we to understand that the selling price to this firm was really fixed by the Government?
    Mr. RUNCIMAN: No; the Government had no choice in the matter. The selling price was considered reasonable by the Court, and was not fixed by the Government.
    Sir E. CARSON: Can the right hon. Gentleman say what the price was?
    Mr. RUNCIMAN: I cannot say without notice.

    NEW POLYPHON SUPPLY COMPANY.
    Sir H. DALZIELasked the President of the Board of Trade if the Advisory Committee appointed by him to advise on carrying out the powers of the Trading With the Enemy (Amendment)
    730
    Act, 1916, have recommended that in the case of the New Polyphon Supply Company, Limited, of Newman Street, W., and of Glasgow, factors of gramophone records, in which over 80 per cent. of the subscribed capital is held by alien enemies residing in this country and in Germany, the business should not be wound up, but that the enemy holding should be vested in the Public Trustee as custodian for the British-born children of the two German directors, Herzog and Ficker, now interned at the Alexandra Palace; if so, what were the considerations that prompted the Committee to take this ease out of the usual category, where if a firm under review by the Board of Trade has more than 50 per cent. of its capital held by alien enemies the Board of Trade can either wind up the business or eliminate the enemy holding by sale to natural-born British subjects, and treat the firm in this preferential manner; if the supervisor appointed by the Board of Trade recommended that the business should be wound up; and, if so, why was his advice ignored; and it there is any guarantee that after the War the Germans Herzog and Ficker will not return to manage the business and be in a position to allot themselves sufficiently large salaries to compensate them for the transference of their shares to the Public Trustee?
    Mr. PRETYMAN: The New Polyphon Supply Company, Limited, has dealt mainly with British-made goods, and the Advisory Committee, after hearing the representatives of British firms with whose productions the company had been supplied, came to the conclusion that the business is one which it is desirable to continue in British hands and recommended that the case should be dealt with by vesting the shares held by enemy subjects in the custodian for the purpose of sale to British subjects. The Committee informed the Board of Trade of a proposal which had been made on the hearing of the case for dealing with the shares of the German directors in the manner indicated in the hon. Gentleman's question, but the Board decided not to accept that proposal, and the shares will be sold in the usual way.

    POSTAL SERVICE (IRELAND).
    Mr. FARRELLasked the Postmaster-General whether he has further considered the question of a mid-day postal delivery to Granard in accordance

    731
    with the promise contained in his letter to the hon. Member for North Longford; and to what decision has he come?
    The POSTMASTER-GENERAL (Mr. J. A. Pease): The mid-day post to Granard has been suspended in pursuance of the general policy of restricting postal facilities in the interests of economy, and I fear that the cost of maintaining two posts a day could not be justified. But arrangements can be made to substitute a midday delivery (which would include the morning newspapers and day mail letters) for the present night mail delivery, if that course is desired by the residents generally and their wishes are expressed through the local authority.
    Mr. FARRELL: When the right hon. Gentleman says "suspend," are we to take it that in future it may be resumed?
    Mr. PEASE: At the end of the War all these matters will be reviewed.
    Mr. LYNCHasked the Postmaster-General whether he is aware that the mail service to Kilrush and other parts of West Clare is in an unsatisfactory condition, and that inconvenience has been caused to traders in consequence; and whether he will see that proper arrangements are instituted whereby the West Clare Railway Company may be enabled to supply the mail service as heretofore?
    Mr. PEASE: I will have inquiry made, and will communicate the result to the hon. Member.

    DISABLED SAILORS AND SOLDIERS (MEDICAL TREATMENT).
    Mr. HOGGEasked the President of the Local Government Board whether he can give the House the text of the agreement drawn up between the Statutory War Pensions Committee and the Insurance Commissioners for a scheme of medical treatment, including specialist advice for all disabled sailors and soldiers; whether it will be available in the Vote Office; and, if so, when?
    Mr. HAYES FISHER: As the scope of the agreement and its terms are not yet finally settled, I fear it is not possible for me to comply with the suggestions in the question. As regards the present position of the agreement, I would refer to the answer I gave on Tuesday last to the question of my hon. Friend the Member for South Paddington.

  MESOPOTAMIA CAMPAIGN.

    CLAIMS OF WIDOWS AND DEPENDANTS OF SOLDIERS.
    Mr. HOGGEasked the Secretary to the Local Government Board whether widows and dependants of soldiers who have died in Mesopotamia are excluded from participating in the benefits of the Statutory Committee?
    Mr. HAYES FISHER: The Statutory Committee have obtained a legal opinion to the effect that payments by them "can only be made in favour of members of the forces paid out of the public funds of the United Kingdom and their dependants." Hence the answer to the question of my hon. Friend appears to be that the widows and dependants of soldiers who have fallen in Mesopotamia can participate in the funds administered by the Statutory Committee if the soldiers were paid out of the public funds of the United Kingdom, but not otherwise.
    Mr. PRINGLE: Are we to understand that these soldiers, who form part of the Mesopotamia Expedition and are paid out of Indian revenue, get nothing from the Statutory Committee?
    Mr. HAYES FISHER: That is what we have been led to suppose by the legal opinion taken in the matter.
    Mr. PRINGLE: Will the right hon. Gentleman see that the Government takes steps to make provision for these men?
    Mr. HAYES FISHER: That is a question which ought to be addressed to the Secretary of State for India.
    Mr. J. SAMUEL: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the War Pensions Act is based upon a voluntary scheme which is entirely in the hands of the Statutory Committee, and can he say whether they would award any money in that case?
    Mr. HAYES FISHER: So far as voluntary funds are concerned it may be open to that interpretation, although I doubt it. If my hon. Friend desires it we will take further opinion as to whether it is possible to devote any portion of voluntary funds for that purpose.
    Mr. SAMUEL: The Act has not been altered.
    Mr. MacCALLUM SCOTT: May I ask whether any question of the scope of the

    733
    Statutory Committee as to what soldiers it extends to is a question for the Government of India?
    Mr. HAYES FISHER: As to the interpretation of the Act of Parliament which governs the distribution of these funds, if the Statutory Committee are in doubt they would take the opinion of the Law Officers of the Crown as to whether they could apply any of their funds to those fighting in Mesopotamia?
    Mr. MacCALLUM SCOTT: Is the question whether the powers of the Statutory Committee should be extended a question for the Secretary of State for India?
    Mr. HAYES FISHER: That would be a question for the Government.
    Sir E. CARSON: Having regard to the urgency of this matter, may I ask whether the right hon. Gentleman will bring the matter before the Secretary of State for India and have provision made for the widows and children of those who have lost their lives in Mesopotamia?
    Mr. HAYES FISHER: My right hon. Friend knows that I am very sympathetic in all these cases whether in my office or out of it. I will address a letter to the Secretary of State for India and the head of the Government asking whether there is any intention on the part of the Government to provide in any way for the victims of the Mesopotamia campaign in the same manner that the victims of other campaigns are provided for.
    Mr. PRINGLE: Cannot the Government amend the Act of Parliament which deals with the Statutory War Pensions Committee?

    AIR SERVICE.
    Mr. H. A. WATT(by Private Notice) asked the Secretary of State for War whether complaints have been received of the machines provided for the use of a squadron of the Royal Flying Corps which is due to leave for the front this week; whether these machines are a British copy of a successful French design; whether they have been reported as inherently unstable and dangerous in landing; whether only two of these out of five arrived safely in a recent squadron flight from one aerodrome to another; and what steps he proposes to take in the matter?
    Major BAIRD(representing the Air Board): The first trial of the aeroplane referred to
    734
    in my hon. Friend's question gave rise to certain criticisms. It was therefore sent to the Expeditionary Force for further trial in comparison with French-built machines of the same type, and the report on it was favourable except for two minor matters which are being attended to. The reply to the second part of the question is in the affirmative. As regards the third part, I am informed that the machine is not inherently unstable, and not unduly difficult to land, though no doubt not a. beginner's machine. Nothing is known of the incident referred to in the fourth part of the question. I may add that exactly the same type of machine is and has been for some time past constantly and successfully used against the enemy by the Royal Naval Air Service.

Prison Warders' Bonus (Ireland).
Mr. FARRELLasked the Chief Secretary for Ireland what is the cause of the delay in granting the improved terms of pay and bonus to the prison warders of Ireland; whether he is aware that this has now been promised on three different occasions, and yet not a penny extra has been paid; and when he hopes to be able to make it?
Mr. DUKE: The proposed increase of the ordinary pay of Irish prison warders is conditional upon the arrangement of a scheme of reorganisation. The consideration of the details of this scheme by the General Prisons Board, the Irish Government, and the Treasury has necessarily involved some delay, but the matter is now well advanced, and it is anticipated that the new scale, which will be retrospective, will very shortly be put into operation. The payment of war bonus to these officers under a recent Treasury circular has already taken effect.
Mr. FARRELL: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that this matter has been agitated for seven months, and a similar reply has been given on several previous occasions; and will he now try to expedite the matter?
Mr. DUKE: The object which the hon. Member has in view is very near fulfilment now.

Irish Eggs (Packing and Conveyance).
Mr. DONOVANasked the Vice-President of the Department of Agriculture (Ireland) whether he has received

735
representations from the Irish egg dealers in London asking him to inquire into the condition of egg transport from Ireland; whether hundreds of thousands of pounds' worth of eggs are smashed every year in transit from Ireland to London, the damage being attributable to bad packing, inefficient handling, and pilfering; whether in a recent consignment of 3,500 eggs from Ireland only 1,900 arrived intact; and as the export of eggs from Ireland is a valuable and important industry, what action he is prepared to take with the view of having the present defective methods of transport and handling of Irish eggs immediately remedied?
Mr. RUSSELL: A communication has been received by the Department from the provision trade section of the London Chamber of Commerce in regard to claims in respect of damage to consignments of Irish eggs. The complaints received by the Department go to show that considerable damage to consignments of Irish eggs has taken place. The Department have no knowledge as to the facts in regard to the particular consignment referred to in the question. The whole question as to the packing and conveyance of Irish eggs is engaging the special attention of the Department, who, by means of conferences with representatives of the railway companies and egg shippers, by the dissemination of information amongst packers, producers, traders, etc., and by inspections carried out at railway stations and ports, are taking steps to effect improvement.

ORDERS OF THE DAY.

  BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
  Mr. STUART-WORTLEY: Will the right hon. Gentleman kindly say what is the business for next week?
  The SECRETARY of STATE for the COLONIES (Mr. Bonar Law): On Tuesday, we shall give an opportunity for discussing the Report of the Public Accounts Committee, and we also propose to take the Committee stage of the Larceny Bill and the Charity Bills.
  On Wednesday, we shall take the Report stage of the Acquisition of Land Bill.
  On Thursday, we shall give an opportunity for discussing the Central Control Board (Liquor Traffic).
  Sir EDWARD CARSON: When does the Government propose to proceed with the Registration Bill?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: That is under consideration. It will not be next week. Perhaps my right hon. Friend would put down a question for Tuesday.
  Sir C. KINLOCH-COOKE: In view of the fact that the Prime Minister has promised a judicial inquiry into the transactions which have passed between the War Office and Sir John Jackson in regard to the Report of the Public Accounts Committee, will he make it clear that that part of the hutting arrangements made by the War Office will be excluded from the discussion?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: As the House knows, the Public Accounts Committee is one of the most important Committees in the House. The Chairman of that Committee has represented to the Prime Minister that there has been a great deal of misunderstanding as to its functions, and there are many other subjects besides that to which the hon. Member refers which ought to be raised. It is for that reason that a day has been given next week. As the subject to which my hon. Friend refers is sub judice, I should myself think that it should not be discussed until the Committee has reported.
  Colonel GRETTON: Will the opportunity which is to be given on Thursday for a discussion on the Central Contral Board take the form of a Debate on the
  768
  Notice of Motion which stands in my name or on one of the other Notices of Motion?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: There are several Motions. We will consider that, and let my hon. Friend know.
  Mr. DILLON: On what ground does the right hon. Gentleman say that these hutting arrangements are sub judice? They are not.
  Mr. BONAR LAW: I am only expressing my own view. As the Prime Minister has promised to give a Committee of Inquiry into that subject, I think that it is a subject which should not be discussed in advance before the Committee has reported.
  Mr. R. MCNEILL: In view of the fact that it cannot necessarily be treated as sub judice and that there is nothing out of order in discussing it. as pointed out by the hon. Member below the Gangway, would it not be better to defer the opportunity for discussing the matter until after the Committee has reported?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: I have considered that, at the request of the Prime Minister. It is obvious that some time must elapse before the Committee can report, and probably after that happens there maybe no opportunity of discussing the Report of the Public Accounts Committee at all. That is the reason why we have fixed a day next week.
  Sir E. CARSON: Will it be open to us, on a discussion of the Public Accounts Report, to raise the question of the unfairness of making charges against a man who has never been heard?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: Obviously the questions which may be raised are a subject for the decision of the Speaker, and I can say nothing upon it.

  GREECE.
  Mr. LYNCH: I beg to move, on a question of definite character and urgent public importance, "That the House do adjourn at a quarter-past eight to discuss the situation in Greece," and in order to indicate that urgency—
  Mr. SPEAKER: The situation in Greece is rather indefinite. The Third Reading of the Consolidated Fund Bill will afford the hon. Member an opportunity of discussing those matters which

  769
  he wishes to raise, if he thinks it in the public interest that they should be discussed.
  Mr. LYNCH: On a point of Order. May I not say this, that I intended to indicate the urgency of the situation—
  Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Member is now giving us a resumé of the speech which he will deliver later, if he waits and gets the opportunity.

  SITTINGS OF THE HOUSE (QUESTIONS).
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House, at its rising to-day, do adjourn until Tuesday next."—[The Prime Minister.]
  Mr. R. MCNEILL: I have already pointed out that now when we are sitting three days a week the number of questions crowded into those three days is so great that the whole purpose of Question Time is largely defeated During the present week there were 170 questions on Tuesday, 130 yesterday, and 160 to-day. On every one of those days there were between eighty and 100 questions which were not answered. That is due almost entirely to the fact that we are sitting only three days a week. In those circumstances, considering that the interrogation of Ministers is the only opportunity given to us of bringing before the Government a great number of matters of public interest, I do think that the House would require, while we are sitting only three days a week, that another quarter of an hour should be secured from the business of the day for questions. I am quite certain that Members of this House would consider this a great boon. The Prime Minister has never really given any decided opinion against this suggestion All he has said has been that the number of questions on the particular day on which I brought the matter forward was exceptional. But the present sittings which began a fortnight ago show that this is not exceptional, and that it goes on every day, and there is every prospect that throughout the autumn you will have this number of questions on the Order Paper every day; and that the go-by will necessarily be given to a number of them. In those circumstances I do very strongly ask my right hon. Friend—I do not say that he will be able to give a decision today—to put the matter before the Prime Minister and to use his influence in
  770
  order that such an amendment of the Standing Orders may be made as will give us more latitude in this respect.
  Sir E. CARSON: May I support the application which has been made by my hon. Friend. It is quite clear the only way in which private Members can bring matters of importance before the House is to interrogate the Ministers. We cannot bring in any Bill, and we cannot do any of the ordinary matters which are usual in peace time. While we acquiesce in that, it is quite plain that the House has shown that it requires a considerable additional time for these questions, and I am not at all sure that very often Question Time is not the most useful time. I hope that my right hon. Friend will communicate with the Prime Minister what I believe to be the general desire of the House, to have the Standing Order altered.
  4.0 P.M.
  Mr. BONAR LAW: Speaking for myself, I think there is a great deal of importance in what my hon. Friend has said, but the number of questions which can be discussed is naturally larger, because there are so many Votes of Credit. At the same time, a very large number of questions this week have remained unanswered in the House, and, without promising to do what my hon. Friend has suggested, I undertake to bring the matter before the Prime Minister.
  Colonel YATE: As we are only to sit three days a week, will the right hon. Gentleman arrange that we shall not be obliged to sit after eleven o'clock at night?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: Certainly it is the desire of every Member on this bench not to sit later than eleven o'clock.
  Mr. AINSWORTH: May I suggest that if hon. Members would kindly bear in mind the old rule of the House, that no Member should ask a question affecting another Member's Constituency without first consulting that other Member, a good deal of time might be saved? May I also suggest that a good deal of public time might be saved if Members who desire information would take the trouble to go first to the Public Office, where every Member of Parliament is immediately attended to, and he would get the full information he requires both for himself and his constituents?
  Mr. SAMUEL ROBERTS: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman to put before the Prime Minister the point which I have previously raised, that the number of questions to be put by each Member should be limited to two a day? We know that there has been a great deal of abuse of Question Time. In New Zealand the Government have found it was so abused that they abolished questions altogether, except written questions, and the Members have two hours on one day in the week when they are allowed to discuss questions. The reason of the action taken by the Government of New Zealand was told to me by a Member of the New Zealand Parliament the other day, and it was, as I have said, that Question Time in the New Zealand Parliament had been abused.
  Question put, and agreed to.

  CONSOLIDATED FUND (No. 5) BILL.
  Order for Third Reading read.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read the third time."

  TREASURY BILLS.
  Sir CHARLES HENRY: On the Third Beading of this Bill I wish to make a further inquiry on the subject which I raised before the Adjournment for the Recess, in company with other hon. Members—I refer to the question of the extension of Treasury borrowings on Treasury Bills. In the early part of August the amount of borrowings on Treasury Bills amounted to £850,000,000 sterling. Since that time further issues of Treasury Bills have been made, and I believe I am correct in stating that the amount is close upon £1,100,000,000 sterling; so that we may calculate that it is the intention of the Treasury to issue Treasury Bills to the extent of about £100,000,000 sterling per month. I am aware, and the House is aware, that since this subject was last raised, the Treasury has reduced the rate of interest on yearlings, viz., Bills issued for twelve months, to 5½ per cent., and now there is a flat rate of 5½ per cent. for Treasury Bills for all maturities which works out actually at 5¾ per cent. to 5 7–3 per cent. My objection to the continuance of borrowing by Treasury Bills is that by this method we are paying an extravagant rate of interest. I believe most sincerely that the credit of this country is as sound as a bell; I go further
  772
  and say that it must have surprised the Chancellor of the Exchequer the readiness with which money has been forthcoming for these short-dated securities. The liquid wealth of this country has proved to be beyond expectation. My right hon. Friend will doubtless reply, and rightly so, that through his method of short-dated securities and Treasury Bills he has been able to obtain the necessary amount to tide him over financial requirements. I quite agree, so he has. Treasury Bills have met with a good response, but that is not the point.
  When the Treasury offered the terms they did, it was obviously natural that money would be placed in these Treasury Bills and other short-dated securities. I believe that when we started voluntary recruiting, if we had offered the soldier an increased rate of pay, we might have got then a more ready response. I believe that this policy of raising money and of borrowing on short loan securities has been detrimental to the financial powers of this country. I believe that the high rate of interest has, I will not say impaired the credit of the country, but to a certain extent has lowered the financial prestige of the country. The expensive manner of raising money on Exchequer Bonds at 6 per cent. for three years is a method which I must say I prefer to Treasury Bills. I will tell the House the reason why. On these Exchequer Bonds the Income Tax on Bearer Bonds is deducted at the source, but the Income Tax on registered bonds is not deducted at the source, but the holders can be traced. The Income Tax on Treasury Bills is not deducted, and I believe in very many instances they escape coming within the purview of the Exchequer. I know, as I said on the last occasion, that in the case of financial houses the Exchequer will get their Income Tax in their return of profits. But I would like the Chancellor of the Exchequer to assure the House that private holders will have to make a return to Income Tax, because there is a view prevailing that really it is not income but an increase of capital.
  I have called attention to the rate of interest paid on Exchequer bonds and Treasury Bills—an extravagant rate of interest, and I do not think the Chancellor of the Exchequer will take exception when I say that the rate of interest he has to pay on these short-dated securities has been instru-

  773
  mental in decreasing the prices of giltedged securities. Take one example. In June, 1915, the last Loan was issued at 4½ per cent. It was issued at par. I believe I am correct in stating that the amount of that Loan now outstanding is approximately £900,000,000 sterling. About the end of September the price of the Loan issued at par was 92½, That does not tell the exact tale. In that 92½, nearly 2 per cent., or 1½ per cent. to 2 per cent., consisted of accrued interest, so that the discount on that Loan a few weeks back was not less than 9 per cent., which represents a depreciation of £80,000,000 sterling. My right hon. Friend knows perfectly well that when that Loan was issued, the banks and insurance companies and other institutions came forward liberally and subscribed, and I think they did expect more equitable treatment at the hands of the Treasury. I believe one bank alone subscribed £20,000,000 sterling, and, if they held that amount five weeks ago, the amount of depreciation was £1,800,000.
  Mr. J. M. HENDERSON: They are at ninety-five.
  Sir C. HENRY: I know they are at ninety-five, and I will tell my hon. Friend why. They recovered as soon as my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer made the statement in this House that it was his intention to issue a Loan when the time was opportune. Since then that Loan has recovered. There is another Loan, that of 1914, which was issued at ninety-five. What does that stand at to-day? At eighty-five. I believe that of the 1914 Loan, at the present time, there is outstanding only £62,000,000. The Bank of England entered into an obligation with regard to that Loan to advance up to March, 1918, at 1 per cent. under Bank Bate, the full amount an individual paid for the Loan. The sooner the Chancellor of the Exchequer relieves the Bank of England from that obligation the better it will be. There is another reason why I think this continued borrowing on Treasury bills is undesirable. My right hon. Friend does not know perhaps how many of them are held by neutrals. They go to America—a large number of them are going there. The right hon. Gentleman is not able to say into whose hands those bills get in America. In that country a large section of the banking community—I do not wish to exaggerate, but certainly a section of the banking
  774
  community in America may be described as pro-Germans, and it may be that a certain amount of these bills get into their hands, and the Treasury might be asked to pay them at a very inconvenient time. I know my right hon. Friend will answer that he has to resort to these Treasury Bills for the sake of regulating the exchange, and I am well aware of the desirability that there should be stability in the exchange. What I want to ask my right hon. Friend is, is it not reasonably possible to find some other form of investment for neutrals which would regulate the exchange? Could he not get a security for issue to neutral countries alone, some external bonds or Treasury Bills? We have at the present time I think—it is only a matter of conjecture—over £1,500,000,000 in short-dated securities, over £1,100,000,000 in Treasury Bills, and about £300,000,000 in Exchequer Bonds. It is appalling to think that we should be confronted with anything like that amount when the War is drawing to an end.
  I venture to tell my right hon. Friend that a Loan can be raised to-day with far greater facility than when the War is approaching to its end, or when it comes to an end. I feel sure of that, and I believe it is the opinion of a large number of people in the City. I do not ask him to take the House into his confidence. We do not expect that, but I do think he ought to tell the House what is his idea with regard to this large amount of floating securities. I referred just now to the desirability, if possible, of having special securities for neutrals. If I am correct in saying that the short-dated securities amount to £1,500,000,000, and, at the very outside, £300,000,000 is held by neutrals, it follows that the taxpayer or the country has to pay a rate of interest nearly approaching 6 per cent. to holders of short-dated securities in this country, and I firmly believe, if the Chancellor of the Exchequer or the Treasury had not procrastinated, or rather temporised, all that money would have been available at 5 per cent.
  I am now coming to a point in regard to which I hope the right hon. Gentleman will not give me an answer such as he gave on a former occasion. He seemed to think I was not justified in holding the view that his reason for deferring the issue of the new Loan was to be found in the obligation he had entered into with the 4½ per cent. holders,

  775
  that when the new Loan was issued they should be placed on the same favourable terms. I think the right hon. Gentleman on the last occasion did me a great injustice. He said I inferred he had some personal interest in deferring the Loan. Does my right hon. Friend imagine I would make such a suggestion? It is childish. I say the Treasury entered into an obligation with the 4½ per cent. holders that they should benefit by any more favourable terms as were given in the new Loan to finance the War, and up to the present, despite the high rate of interest they have been paying on short loans, that promise has not been redeemed. I can assure my right hon. Friend that that policy, or rather that method, has created not only resentment but indignation.
  I think the House is entitled to know whether the policy of the Treasury, or of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, meets with the full approval of the right hon. Gentleman's financial advisers and experts. I have the highest opinion of the ability of the right hon. Gentleman, and so have my Friends near me, but I think they will agree with me the right hon. Gentleman is not a financial expert, and has not had much experience in real practical finance. When my right hon. Friend was First Lord of the Admiralty—and here let me say that this country owes him a great debt of gratitude which it can never repay for the attitude he adopted at that time, and for the policy which he carried out in face of much opposition, a policy in which we are now reaping the benefit during this War—when my right hon. Friend was at the Admiralty he was no doubt guided in his policy by his naval advisers. I believe Lord Fisher was the First Sea Lord at the time, and the right hon. Gentleman's policy was conducted no doubt more or less in accordance with the advice of the experts. At the present time we have a civilian at the War Office. I have the greatest admiration for the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary for War, but I shudder to think how this War would be carried on if the right hon. Gentleman did not defer to his military advisers. As the naval forces and as the military forces of this country have to be martialled, so, too, have the financial forces of this country. It is of the highest possible importance, and I ask my right hon. Friend whether this piling up of
  776
  Treasury Bills and short-dated securities has the approval of the best financial opinion he is able to command. I do not expect him to state when he is going to consolidate some of these different short-dated securities by a Loan, but I do appeal to him to have some regard for public opinion. I do not know whether he has any fear that he will not get a fair response to a Loan. I think he will, provided he takes steps to lower the present rate of interest. He can only do so by withdrawing to a certain extent the supply of these Treasury Bills and Exchequer Bonds. I ask him to face the situation at the present time or in the near future, and to provide for future financial requirements by long-term loans. The country, I assure him, recognises his difficulty. So, too, does the City, and they will do all in their power to render him assistance.
  Sir THOMAS WHITTAKER: While I agree with a good deal of what my hon. Friend has said, there are some things which he has not mentioned which have an important bearing on this matter. He referred to the amount of money we have here from abroad. There are large holdings in our Treasury Bills by persons in neutral countries, and especially in the United States of America. My hon. Friend in his speech suggested lowering the rate of interest on these short-dated securities, but if that is done he will lose that money which we have got here, and it is very important that that money should be kept here. That is one of the difficulties which the Chancellor of the Exchequer has to face. We have a large amount of money in short-dated securities, and the right hon. Gentleman cannot allow it to slip away from this country for the sake of a ½ per cent. or even 1 per cent. interest. Everybody will agree it is not desirable we should have an ever-increasing amount of money here lent to us on short-dated securities. We have over £1,000,000,000 in Treasury Bills at three, six, nine, or twelve months, and there is a possibility that this large amount might be called up at an inconvenient period. I imagine that is one of the reasons which induced the Chancellor of the Exchequer to arrange this new issue of three-year bonds. Naturally he had to offer a higher rate than on the short-dated securities in order to get the money, if possible, transferred or diverted into these three years' securities. If people are to take their money out of

  777
  short bills at three, six, nine, or twelve months, and to tie it up for three years, they naturally require a higher rate of interest, and that, no doubt, is the reason why 6 per cent. was offered on these three-year bonds. It was to induce people to" invest their money for three years, and to transfer their holdings in short-dated securities to the longer period bills. At the same time the Chancellor of the Exchequer reduced the rate on Treasury Bills to 5½ per cent. right through, and the object, no doubt, was to give a solid advantage in the rate of interest on three-year bonds. It is not easy to see what else the right hon. Gentleman could have done in order to grapple with the position.
  The hon. Member who last spoke complained that there had been a heavy fall in the price of the War Loan, but as he also explained, prices have boomed since the statement of the Chancellor of the Exchequer with regard to his intentions respecting a new Loan. I should like to say how glad I was to hear that statement from the Chancellor of the Exchequer. It was necessary. There is no question there was a feeling in the country that the Government were not going to give holders of the 4½ per cent. Loan the benefit of the option of transferring to a new Loan which had been promised, and the continual issue of these securities going up to 6 per cent. had undoubtedly shaken the confidence of the public who were uneasy, and that caused the fall of the War Loan to 92½ . But as soon as the Chancellor of the Exchequer made his announcement, the price rose to over 95, and it looks as though with the option in hand 95 is somewhere about the price. 'When a country has been borrowing money in various ways by thousands of millions, I do not think you can regard the depreciation which has taken place in the 4½ per cent. Loan as a very serious one. The announcement that the option will be given to the public and that we may look for the issue of a Loan as anticipated, has, I am sure, given the greatest satisfaction. It was very desirable that an announcement should be made, because obviously the price at which the existing Loan stands on the market will have a material effect in determining the price at which the new Loan shall be issued. Therefore it is contrary to the interests of the Government that the existing Loan should fall in market price.
  778
  As to the time when the new Loan is to be issued, that, of course, is a matter which the Chancellor of the Exchequer must settle in consultation with his financial advisers. He has at his disposal the very best financial advice in the country, and it is not a matter that we can discuss here with any advantage. One thing may be said—that just recently, while the French Loan was being issued, no attempt could have judiciously been made here to issue an English Loan. We have now to face the general autumn expenditure, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer has to provide for that; and I have no doubt that, if he felt himself free to tell us, he could tell us that there are many other difficulties, in connection with exchange, for instance, to which my hon. Friend referred. The Chancellor of the Exchequer has had an enormously difficult job to face. Nobody in this country has ever before had to raise money by thousands of millions, and I think that when you look upon the matter as a whole, the way in which and the rate at which money has been obtained is a subject for congratulation. No doubt if you could have operated with present knowledge you might have done differently. But you have to act with the knowledge that is available at the moment, and I feel that we ought rather to congratulate than to criticise the Chancellor of the Exchequer. If there was a point of criticism, it was that the public were not quite certain about the redemption. But as soon as Parliament met and the Chancellor of the Exchequer had an opportunity of putting that matter right, he did so; therefore I think he did what could be done in that direction. The rate at which the Loan should be issued can only be settled by careful expert discussion of the situation, and, as I say, I would rather congratulate than criticise my right hon. Friend on what he has done.
  Sir F. BANBURY: I think we owe a debt of gratitude to the hon. Baronet opposite (Sir C. Henry) for having brought forward this extremely important subject. I regret very much that there are so few Members in the House to hear it discussed, because there can be no doubt that finance, especially in this War, when many thousands of millions of money have been raised, plays a most important part in the conduct of war. The hon. Baronet stated that he preferred Exchequer Bonds—by which I presume he meant the three years 6 per cent. Bonds—to Treasury Bills on account of the Income Tax He was under

  779
  the impression that there was considerable loss to the Exchequer owing to the fact that possibly certain people who held Treasury Bills did not enter in their returns to Somerset House the income derived therefrom. I cannot give any opinion on that, but I should have thought that the Somerset House authorities were quite competent to safeguard the interests of the country with regard to Income Tax. I myself have never found them wanting in claiming a sufficient amount. I very often think they claim a little too much; I have never known them to claim too little. As to Treasury Bills, I do not quite know the exact position now. I have never contemplated a situation in which we should find ourselves face to face with an issue of £1,000,000,000 in Treasury Bills. It may be that a considerable number of those bills are held by people who do not make correct returns. I cannot help thinking that the vast majority of them must be held by financial institutions, which have to make a return every year of their profits, and that in that way the Treasury do receive the Income Tax to which they are entitled.
  I object very strongly to three-year Exchequer Bonds, first of all, because I think the rate of interest is much too high, and, secondly, because Exchequer Bonds for three years do not appeal to anyone. Treasury Bills always appeal to what in the City is called the discount market. In the discount market there are a large number of people who, having surplus funds, desire to invest them for a few months. Treasury Bills on which they can borrow from the Bank of England are one of the finest classes of security for these particular people. They do not appeal very much to the public, because the public like something longer. But now the Chancellor of the Exchequer has issued Exchequer Bonds for three years. They do not appeal to the discount market, because the period is too long; they do not appeal to the investor, because the period is too short. The investor desires—and I claim to speak with some knowledge of what the investor desires—a permanent loan. As I think I have stated before, the ordinary investor, when he has money to invest, has a very troublous time. He probably sees his banker, who gives him certain advice; he sees a friend who he thinks has great knowledge of City matters, from whom he gets contrary advice; he sees his solicitor,
  780
  who also gives him contrary advice; if he knows a broker he will obtain advice from him, which in all probability is not the same as that which he has received from other quarters. The state to which such a man is reduced, added to the fact that he does not like to pay commission if he can possibly avoid it, makes him regard with dislike and abhorrence the trouble of investing his money. Therefore he likes to have something of a more permanent character, and he does not like a short three-years' bond. The Chancellor of the Exchequer has, in my opinion, chosen exactly the bond which does not appeal to anybody, and it is for that reason he has had to pay such an excessive rate of interest.
  Consider for a moment what the position of the Money Market was when the Chancellor of the Exchequer issued the 6 per cent. Bonds. It is a matter of common knowledge that the public were investing in railway debenture stock and similar stocks giving a return of something like 4¾ per cent. or 4⅞ per cent. Of course, the mere fact of the Government's offering 6 per cent. immediately upset all that market, and made the investor think that he was very foolish to take those classes of securities. After all, it is the Government who set the rate of interest. If anyone now wants to borrow money, those who have it to lend say at once, "We cannot lend it at less than the rate the Government are paying. If they are willing to pay 6 per cent., you must pay us the same or more." Therefore, the mere fact of such a high rate of interest being offered upset the market. It depressed all other securities, and the depression of other securities, especially if you are going to issue another Loan afterwards, is a thing to be avoided. In my day—and I have had some experience of issuing loans—I always advised that the time to issue a loan was when the market was rising, not when the market was falling. I have known people take steps to see that the market was rising, perhaps a little artificially, when they issued a loan. The Chancellor of the Exchequer has done his best to depress the market, and at the same time I understand he has made an announcement that he is going to issue sooner or later a permanent Loan.
  With regard to the 4½ per cent. Loan, when the right hon. Gentleman informed the House that he was going to issue that Loan, he stated that he was going to attach to it what the hon. Baronet terms

  781
  an option. I think the word is a very good one. In the course of my experience in the City I never heard of such an option being attached to any loan. I thought it was quite unnecessary, and that it might involve the Chancellor of the Exchequer in serious trouble later on. I said so in the House, but my advice was disregarded, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer issued the Loan with the option or condition attached. Instead, later on, of fulfilling that option, he continued to issue Treasury Bills to such an enormous extent that I think it was quite reasonable for people who held this Loan to think that that option was not going to be fulfilled. There are in the Act words to the effect that the option is only to be given in case the money is borrowed for the purposes of the War. That might mean that if sufficient short bonds were issued, and they were redeemed after the War, the issue would not be for the purposes of the War, but for the purposes of the redemption of an existing Loan, and therefore the option would not apply. I am not saying that that is so, but I can quite understand a clever lawyer—I do not see one on the Treasury Bench at the moment—arguing that that was the effect of the words. I can also understand a judge saying that Parliament does not put into an Act anything without a meaning. I have often read statements of judges to that effect; I am not sure that I always agree. It is the habit of judges to construe Acts of Parliament with that in their minds. A judge might say, "There are the words, and they have that meaning." Therefore it is not surprising that the ordinary investor, being unable to exercise this option, was frightened when he found three-year bonds at 6 per cent. were to be issued. I did not hear the announcement with regard to the new Loan. Is it quite certain that the Chancellor of the Exchequer is going to do this? I hope it is. I think we ought to have from the right hon. Gentleman a clear statement that he does intend to carry out the undertaking which he gave in connection with the issue of the 4½ per cent. Loan.
  The hon. Baronet said that, as far as he knew, there were £1,500,000,000 of short-dated securities at the present time. I do not know whether that is correct. Assuming it is, it is a very appalling fact. If the War ends, as we all hope it will, at a not too distant date, we shall be met with the obligation of redeeming
  782
  £1,500,000,000 of short-dated securities. Of course, this is only a matter of opinion. I do not set up to be a prophet. No one can say what the state of the money market will be at the end of the War. All one can do is to draw conclusions from what has occurred in the past and from what is going on now. At the present moment there is a Committee called the Treasury Issues Committee, of which I have the honour to be a member. That Committee was set up in order to prevent money being put into industrial securities, or any other kind of enterprise, unless it was in the national interest. That, I think, roughly, the right hon. Gentleman will agree with me, was the purpose of that Committee. We have, I think, exercised our duty to the best of our ability. There can be no doubt that after the War there will be a very large sum of money required for the various industries and the various undertakings in this country which will have to be financed. That is not the proper time to bring in a Loan—at least in my opinion—or for the Government to be obliged to bring out a permanent Loan. We will then be competing with a large number of other people, and the consequence will be that you will have a very large number of people competing for the money, and the rate of interest must go up. For some time I have said that the proper course for the Government—I said it on the Adjournment of the House when we discussed this matter before—
  Sir C. HENRY: It was on the discussion of the salary of the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
  Sir F. BANBURY: At that time there was considerable investment going on arising from the proceeds of sales. Then, I said, was the time you ought to have brought out your Loan. The Chancellor of the Exchequer replied to me that the sum was not a very large sum. I dare say it was not. But, whether or not, investors were at that moment "on the feed"—and those who go angling know that it is a desirable thing to throw out the line when the fish are "on the feed." The investor was then "on the feed," and could have been caught. That is just exactly what the Chancellor of the Exchequer did not do. I really do regard with very great apprehension the policy of the Government, which appears to me to be the raising of enormous sums of money by short-dated securities which will have to be met at the

  783
  time when probably everybody else will be requiring money and when a very large rate of interest will have to be paid. I think we owe a debt of gratitude to the hon. Baronet for having brought up this subject, because really it is a very, very serious subject, and it ought to be discussed in a very serious manner. It is not a subject which is well understood by everyone. Hon. Members, however, who understand it, and those members of the financial community in the City who understand it, ought all, I think, to take an interest in the matter and give their opinions upon it. I trust the few remarks I have made, with a view to help the Chancellor of the Exchequer, will be received by him in that spirit.
  The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER (Mr. McKenna): I share the opinion of the right hon. Baronet who has just spoken that my right hon. Friend behind me (Sir C. Henry) deserves a debt of gratitude for having raised this question. There is no subject which is of more vital importance to the conduct of the War, except the actual fighting in the field, than the due maintenance of our credit abroad. It is of the first importance that this House should be satisfied that the proper steps are being taken to raise the necessary funds to meet our needs. The House has shown to other representative institutions in the world an example of courage and endurance in facing the financial strain. This country has been subjected to heavier taxes, has raised a greater burden of debt, and has been willing to submit to greater pecuniary sacrifices than any other country, simply and solely because the representatives of the people in this House have had the courage to bear the burden. I should be the last one to complain of any advice or assistance that can be offered or obtained in this House, having regard to my own very happy experience during the eighteen months I have held my present office. I therefore approach the criticisms or observations of my hon. Friend behind me in no hostile spirit. On the contrary, I welcome what he said and am glad of the opportunity given to me to state to the House one or two facts.
  We have to remember that the amount of money which the State has to borrow is out of all proportion to any borrowings that have been conducted in the past. When the right hon. Gentleman who has just sat down speaks of the conditions of
  784
  the market in the City he speaks with as great an experience as any Member of this House. I certainly should not for a moment traverse his opinion upon any ordinary technical grounds relating to business in the City. But if he will allow me to tell him one thing, I should say that he does not realise or has a due sense of the proportion of the magnitude of the task which faces us when he says that I should get money cheaper. Very likely he is right if I only wanted a little, or even if I wanted the maximum, or the greatest sums which he has ever known to be raised in the City of London before this War. When, however, he remembers that we have now to raise these maximum sums about once a month, he will see that we have a state of things in which the old arguments as to what rate of interest is properly applicable do not apply. We can only find out by experience, by daily experience which is brought home to me every morning at my table, the result of our policy, as to whether or not we are successful in meeting our needs. Nobody can conceive for a moment that the Treasury which, after all, is supposed to be niggardly, would pay more money than necessary. We know from day to day and from week to week what we have to borrow. We know what we have spent abroad and how many dollars we have to find. I see every morning on my table a daily return of all which we have borrowed the day before and how much we have had to pay abroad, the different kinds of securities borrowed, and the rates of interest we have paid; and we have to judge day by day what we can do. In circumstances of that kind no a priori reasoning is going to help me.
  The House of Commons would have good ground of complaint against me if I failed in this matter. After all their interest is, first of all, to see that we have always the means to pay for our sailors, for the Navy, and for the Army, and to give that assistance which we have promised to our Allies. To put myself into that position I have to make sure of getting the money. My hon. Friend behind me said in effect—I am paraphrasing his words—why not establish two kinds of securities, and have two different rates of interest, one for short-dated securities in this country, and one for short-dated securities in America. Has he thought that proposal out? If he means by a short-dated security in America a security that is negotiable in this country it is quite obvious that unless the rate of interest were the same on both the

  785
  American securities would be taken out at the higher rate of interest and immediately discounted at a lower rate of interest in this country. If they are not to be negotiable in this country he is advising me to do what we have been doing for a considerable time. He is aware of what we have done in issuing Loans in the United States for what he would call short periods. Our last Loan for a two years' period was for 250,000,000 dollars. This is a short-dated security exactly of the kind which he describes. It is a short-dated security only serviceable in the United States, and not acceptable or negotiable here, and there is no reason why it should come into this discussion. The notion that a Treasury Bill should become current in the United States and not here would offer nothing to the United States which they have not got at the present time. My hon. Friend overlooks the most serious factor in the situation with which we are daily confronted. He raised an objection to a high rate of discount on Treasury Bills on the ground that these bills, in consequence of the higher rate, would be largely held abroad. We want them to be held abroad.
  Sir C. HENRY: I do not know that I said that. I know there are 300,000,000 held abroad.
  Mr. McKENNA: I welcome that, and I hope that there will be 400,000,000 held abroad. It is one of our many objects in offering these securities to the public as a State security that they will be held abroad. My hon. Friend must remember the task with which we are confronted. We have to pay at the present time a very considerable amount day by day in the United States. I suppose it will not last at that rate since this is far the worst period of the year. At the present moment, I suppose, it would not be too much to say that we have to find £2,000,000 a day for every working day of the week. That means a prodigious amount of dollars to find every six days. It would have been believed that task would be impossible had it not been realised that the amount a year ago was a very large Loan. I myself should have said: "I do not see how figures of that sort can be realised." But it is being realised at this moment! There is no reason to suppose it will not continue to be done, but we must have our hands free! We must not be told that we are paying too high a rate of interest. If we do not
  786
  raise money in the United States it means we must cut short our supplies from the United States, which means we cannot get all we need in the way of steel, wheat, copper, sugar, and other raw materials which, far more than finished goods, are absolutely essential for ourselves and our Allies. If that is the problem which faces us, we have to take that aspect of the case into account. Remember that our problem is not the simple one of raising the necessary money in this country, but of always being sure that we can raise the necessary money in the United States. My hon. Friend asks whether the Treasury policy has the approval of the best financial advice which is open to it?
  5.0 P.M.
  There have been two opinions expressed in this House, one by my right hon. Friend behind me, and one by the right hon. Gentleman opposite, both of whom are very high financial authorities, and who took almost diametrically opposite views of the action of the Treasury with regard to the particular issue of the 6 per cent. Exchequer Bonds. Of course, we never have unanimous advice from every high financial authority, because the high financial authorities do not agree, but I can say with confidence that the Treasury has the advice, and agrees with the advice, of the best financial opinion on the whole. We have critics amongst the high financial authorities. I do not contend that it is a unanimous opinion, but I can certainly say we have not failed to consult all the high financial authorities, and I can certainly say that the great bulk of the financial authorities have been on the side of the policy which the Treasury has taken. The right hon. Gentleman said that in issuing 6 per cent. Exchequer Bonds we had issued a form of security of which nobody approved.
  Sir F. BANBURY: Which appeals to no one.
  Mr. McKENNA: It is surprising to say that in a fortnight a security which appeals to no one was sold to the amount of £36,000,000. At that rate of interest it appeals, apparently, very successfully. Does the right hon. Gentleman think I can issue a Bond with any chance of success at a less rate of interest? We were already paying on our 6 per cent. yearly Treasury Bills 6⅜ per cent., and on our two-year War Certificates 6 per cent. We had a series of 5 per cent. Exchequer Bonds, the sales of which were steadily, even rapidly.

  787
  declining. We had before us the prospect of the issue of the French Loan on our market, which is certainly worth over 6 per cent.—much over, having regard to the improvement of the exchange which necessarily will take place during the course of "the Loan. So that we had before us a state of things in which we could be confident that 5 per cent. Exchequer Bonds, of which there were already three different varieties on the market, would not be sufficient to meet our demands. Five and a half per cent. would not be as good as our two-year War Certificates. We had no alternative except either to issue a long Loan, or to issue Exchequer Bonds at 6 per cent. We naturally took these Exchequer Bonds at a high rate of interest for the shortest period possible, three years only, in order to issue a security which would cost the least to the taxpayer. There is the other alternative of issuing a long Loan. The right hon. Gentleman laid it down as an axiom with which we shall all agree that it is not the proper time to issue a Loan when there is competition for money.
  Sir F. BANBURY: Not the best time.
  Mr. McKENNA: It is not the best time to issue a Loan when there is competition for money. The right hon. Gentleman knows that at this period of the year, almost without exception in his experience, the Bank Bate is raised. Every year for the last five years before the War the Bank Rate was raised at this period. It is raised in September or October almost invariably. I have a return for the last twenty-four years, in which I see that in eighteen of those years the Bank Rate was raised in September or October. As I have said, in the last five years before the War it was raised every year in September or October. That means that this is the period of the year at which, in the language of the right hon. Gentleman, there is competition for money. Out of his own mouth he is convicted of the opinion that this is a bad time for the issue of a long Loan. I concur in his opinion, and all my advisers concur in that opinion.
  Sir F. BANBURY: Will not the three-year Exchequer Bonds, which have been issued in October, fall due in October three years later, just at the period which the right hon. Gentleman says is a wrong period? No doubt January or February
  788
  would be considered the best time to obtain money, because generally money is easy at that time.
  Mr. McKENNA: I can assure the right hon. Gentleman that all these considerations are not left out. Out of his own mouth he is convicted of the opinion that this is a bad time of the year to issue a Loan—an opinion in which we all concur. As I have stated, it is my intention, and has never been anything but my intention, to ask Parliament to authorise the issue of a new long-dated Loan at a proper time and season, but the Treasury must be left to judge of the right season. We ought not, in the interest of the taxpayer, to be pushed into issuing a Loan against our own judgment, a Loan which for fifteen, twenty or twenty-five years might throw an additional charge upon the taxpayer when the taxpayer may reasonably look to us to safeguard his interest, and to obtain a long Loan for him on the best possible terms. We do not in the least shrink from issuing a Loan on the ground of the pledge that was given, that the old War Loan holders should have the right of conversion into the new Loan, but we are bound to look after the interest of the taxpayer and to choose that period of the year which, in our opinion, will be the best period to issue the Loan. I am just reminded that the 6 per Cent. Exchequer Bonds are not repayable in October, but in February, 1920, which the right hon. Gentleman thinks will be the most favourable time.
  The amount of our borrowing has been regular, and, as was pointed out, during the last two months we have increased very largely our reliance upon Treasury Bills. But the case generally is not quite as bad as would appear from the examination of the short-period Loans. We do not get at this time of the year—we have not at any period of the financial year up to date had the full advantage of our revenue. That is a factor which must always be borne in mind in considering what the burdens are going to be on the Treasury in the way of borrowing. During the first nine months of the year our revenue probably will not average more than, if as much as, £7,000,000 a week. I should think that would be on the whole an outside figure. Well, £7,000,000 a week for the whole year would give a revenue of £364,000,000. We have budgeted for, and I believe we shall obtain, a revenue of about £500,000,000. That means that the extra £130,000,000 to £140,000,000 will

  789
  all come in during the last quarter. Now, however depressing may be the figures of the issue of Treasury Bills during the present War, we hope by virtue of the revenue to be less reliant on Treasury Bills, or any other form of borrowing, to the extent of £130,000,000 to £140,000,000, than we are this quarter. That is a very material fact. That adds once more another argument in favour of the months which are such fortunate months in the opinion of my right hon. Friend.
  On one other point I would like to remove, perhaps, some of the gloom from the mind of my hon. Friend behind me. He spoke of the great depreciation of the 4½ per Cent. Loan. The case is not quite as bad as he makes out. In order to effect his purpose he took one momentary fluctuation in the price of the 4½ per Cent. Stock. The sales, as a matter of fact, have been very small. The price has been put down with hardly any dealings, and with hardly any dealings the price went up again. I do not think that any argument can be founded upon the momentary price and the fluctuation of the stock, particularly when the price to-day is 2½ points above the price he named. But even on his own figures his calculation was not accurate. He said it showed a depreciation of £80,000,000. He forgot to take into account that the 4½ per Cent. War Loan was not issued at par, but 98⅞ per cent., and when he deducts dividend at one end he must deduct dividend at the other. I have every hope that we shall see—of course, with fluctuations in the market—British credit stand at a figure which is not represented by 4½ per cent. at 95. We have stood the brunt of the burden, and I have not any doubt that we shall be able to bear the burden during the rest of the War.
  Our expenditure, unfortunately, as the Prime Minister stated in introducing the last Vote of Credit, has not, to say the least of it, gone down. Under two heads there has been an increase which cannot be described as other than material. There has been an increase in the expenditure on munitions, and there has been an increase in the advances to our Allies. I am sure that the House of Commons will not grudge an increase of the Budget estimate under either of those two heads. We are all united in thinking that the only limit to the munitions which we should issue for ourselves or send to our Allies is the capacity of the factories to produce them.
  790
  This is a war of munitions, and I should not feel that I was justified, at any rate at the present state of the output, in insisting upon any check being imposed upon our supplies. I feel also that our duty to the Allies is such that we are bound to consider their needs and necessities. If additional demands are made upon us, we have to meet them. All these burdens throw an additional charge upon us, but the London market has been able to meet it. Our resources are met day by day. We have not had difficulties in financing ourselves so far, and I see no reason why we should have difficulties hereafter. When the time comes there is no doubt the Loan recommended to the House will be of sufficient magnitude to dispel all the fears which have been put forward by my hon. Friend.
  Mr. DAVID MASON: I think the Chancellor of the Exchequer has entirely missed the point of the criticism of the hon. Baronet the Member for the City of London. What was his point? It was that the Chancellor of the Exchequer should deal with this matter now rather than after the War is over. My right hon. Friend was not going into any particular month, and the point which he wished to make, and which the Chancellor of the Exchequer did not deal with in his answer, was that he ought to bring out a long-term Loan, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer rides off by saying that October or November is a bad time to bring out a Loan. This continual trifling with the House of Commons and the criticisms made is rather unworthy of the right hon. Gentleman, and in his heart he must know that he really did not meet the criticisms which have been put forward by my right hon. Friend. I think we are very much indebted to the hon. Baronet who initiated this discussion. We feel that we are going over ground again which we went over in August, but we do this because evidently our criticisms have had no effect, and the answer made was for the Chancellor of the Exchequer to issue 6 per cent. Exchequer Bonds. For the Chancellor of the Exchequer to again refer to what he called the slight depreciation of the 4½ per cent. Loan is beside the point.
  The real point of criticism against that profligate and extravagant issue is the effect it has on other securities. The depreciation caused by that has run into millions. Ask any head of a great insurance company or great banker if the issue of a 6 per cent. security does not neces-

  791
  sarily depreciate all other securities. The result has been to penalise trade, to depreciate securities, and to bring down British credit. One is appalled to hear the right hon. Gentleman tell us that he has high authority, but why does he not quote it? None of us can find that authority. If we go into the City of London and consult stockbrokers, we find one unending tirade against this policy. I suggest to the right hon. Gentleman that what the investor is really looking for is rather a fair rate of interest on a long-term security. He would rather have a long security in Consols or a perpetual security bearing 4½ per cent., or even another bond for a long period bearing 5 per cent than these three-year Exchequer Bonds at 6 per cent. I think that is self-evident, and the advantage to the State and to British credit is that it does not go before the world that the Treasury and the British Government are borrowing on a 6 per cent. basis. You have Treasury Bills now amounting to £1,056,000,000 in short-dated securities upon the market, and we know that the advances made to our Allies and Dominions are to be paid to us in short-dated bills, and when we realise that our short-dated indebtedness approaches to nearly £2,000,000,000, we begin to understand what the problem is. What we feel is that this policy undermines and cripples our financial strength, and while not taking an exaggerated view and urging that this system should be done away with altogether, we suggest that a very considerable part of these issues should be dealt with in the manner suggested by hon Members of this House. The answer to our criticisms was the issue of this 6 per cent. Exchequer Bond.
  At this belated period the right hon. Gentleman is good enough to tell us that when a suitable time arrives he will, in conjunction with his financial advisers, consider the advisability of issuing a longterm bond. We ask the Treasury now to discontinue issuing this 6 per cent. Exchequer Bond. Why continue it. The consensus of opinion here and of many high authorities in the City is against it. The right hon Gentleman says that high authorities are divided. If that is so, let us have the high authorities who give that advice. Let us know who it is that seems to know and has this wonderful knowledge superior to all those other authorities who are well known to every average banker and any man who has any primitive knowledge of finance in this House. This con-
  792
  tinual flouting of the opinion of the House of Commons and the opinions of men who have made some study of this question and have consulted others is not justified. Where is the support of the policy practised by the Treasury? I fail to see it. The Chancellor of the Exchequer refers to some financial authority, but we cannot find this authority. I cannot find him, at any rate, and if the hon. Baronet the Member for the City of London can tell me who he is, I hope he will let us know. After all, we have to judge by the effect of a proposal, and the result of the depreciation of British credit caused by the proposals of the Chancellor of the Exchequer runs into millions.
  Mr. HOUSTON: And of securities.
  Mr. MASON: Yes, of securities as well. When we appreciate the heroism and self-sacrifice of our soldiers in France to-day and consider what is being done by this financial policy, it makes us feel that we are not playing our part. If you fritter away your resources you show a lack of appreciation of sound finance and you depreciate British credit. If you will not listen to the financial authorities in this House, what are we to do? I submit that the time is approaching when this House ought to have the courage of its convictions and vote against the Consolidated Fund Bill, or any which emanates from the Treasury, when we know that this is the way our finances are conducted. We have now got the Chancellor of the Exchequer up to the point of agreeing that when a suitable time arrives to issue a long-term bond he will consider it, and I wish to offer now a few observations as to the character of that particular security. There are two opinions in regard to that. The prevalent opinion in America is to issue at a fixed period a bond, perhaps running for twenty-five years, with the option of being able to repay it.
  The custom in this country and on the Continent of Europe and with the British Treasury is the perpetual security of a consolidated debt. If such a security is issued at a fair rate of interest in the first place it is a perpetual debt, and that makes it popular with the investor. I know the Chancellor of the Exchequer is anxious to attract investors, and if he offers Consols, that, naturally, is a long security at a fair rate of interest. I hope that course will appeal to the right hon. Gentleman, because of the fact that it is a long-term bond. If it is issued at a low price, or if in after years it falls to a low figure, then

  793
  the Treasury have the supreme advantage of being able to redeem by purchase in the open market such a debt. I do not think such a security is likely to go to a high premium in our time, and the probability is that for many years, as the result of this War, capital will be very much reduced, and the demand for capital may be very much increased. What is the advantage of a perpetual stock? If it stands below par it can be redeemed by purchase in the open market, and if above par then, one method adopted by a former Chancellor of the Exchequer was the process of conversion. The advantage of a perpetual stock as against a stock issued for ten years is that you are not faced again at the end of one period with the task of having to finance or refund the debt. I submit that there is a supreme advantage in having a perpetual stock in the loan to which I understand he is now coming. I hope that point will receive his consideration; and I will just say in conclusion that when one surveys the whole character of the present Treasury finance, when we know that to-day we are, as it were, financially bleeding at every pore, we have, in addition, an issue of 6 per cent. Exchequer Bonds. Why increase the rate of interest to 6 per cent. on Exchequer Bonds? The right hon. Gentleman said It was to relieve the purchase of Treasury Bills, but what do we find? We find that this has not even been successful, and they have gone up by some £40,000,000 or £60,000,000, and now amount to something like £1,056,000,000.
  We have at the present time borrowing going on through our 6 per cent. Exchequer Bonds, through Treasury Bills, and through War Savings Certificates, and we have the printing press turning out Treasury Notes at the rate of £1,500,000 a week, depreciating the currency, and, as admitted by the President of the Board of Trade, though the Chancellor of the Exchequer does not agree with him, having its effect upon food prices, thus increasing the pressure upon the poor and leading to further demands for war bonuses and increased wages. How can the right hon. Gentleman expect British credit to improve when he pursues this policy? This is the time, as it always is the time, to press for a greater proportion of the expenditure of the War being raised by direct taxation rather than by this policy of loans. I do not wish to be tied to the particular week or moment, but I suggest that the sooner a long-term
  794
  Loan is issued the better. The trivial answer of the right hon. Gentleman was to compare this period with previous periods. How unfair is that criticism? The periods with which he compared the present period were all periods of peace. The point which my right hon. Friend opposite made, and the point which I wish humbly to impress upon the right hon. Gentleman, is the necessity of funding this indebtedness now, or as soon as possible, and stopping the issue of these Exchequer Bonds. There are many issues of long-term securities below the Bank of England rate of discount. It is not that which governs the investor altogether. When a great bank or a private individual invests he does not rush to see what is the Bank of England rate of discount. He knows that is a temporary matter; and, if he can get 4½ per cent. on a perpetual security issued by the British Government, he regards that as an exceptional investment which is not likely to recur in his lifetime. I believe the right hon. Gentleman would have no difficulty in funding a great portion of this great indebtedness. He would strengthen the national credit, and it would also put him in fresh funds for carrying on the operations of the War.
  Mr. SAMUEL SAMUEL: I have rather a difficulty in speaking on this subject, because the last time I ventured to do so the Chancellor of the Exchequer told me that I represented nobody in the financial world, and I think he said the same thing to my right hon. Friend the Member for the City of London (Sir F. Banbury). I have ventured to point out to the present Chancellor of the Exchequer and to his predecessor the very strong objections that exist in the financial world to short Loans. The reason for the issue of Treasury Bills was never anything more than to tide over the temporary embarrassments of the Government before they received their revenue from taxation or before they wanted to issue a Loan. The Chancellor of the Exchequer told us, and, of course, everybody realises, that the expenditure is abnormal. We require £5,000,000 sterling a day. But we have known that for the last twelve months. We have to provide £1,700,000,000 or £1,800,000,000 per annum to pay the expenses of the War. We were told that by the Prime Minister, and it has been repeated, and unfortunately we have seen by actual operation that it is so. We were told that Treasury Bills were issued to protect this country

  795
  against the drain of gold to other countries. We were told that the Government were issuing these Treasury Bills to attract money from abroad. At the beginning of the War we had Treasury Bills of 3½ per cent. They were raised without notice to 4½ per cent., 4¾ per cent., 5 per cent., 5¼ per cent., and 5½ per cent., and there is a complaint in the City of London, and, I believe, throughout the whole country among those who come in daily contact with financial questions, that on every occasion when they have come to the assistance of the Government by taking up Treasury Bills they have been caught. We go to the Bank of England on a Thursday morning and buy Treasury Bills at 4½ per cent. or 4¾ per cent., and we find in the afternoon that the rate has been raised, and that the market has been let in.
  There is no possible reason or excuse for these violent alterations which are constantly taking place, and, however the Government may have been advised, we know perfectly well that one of the great ambitions of the Bank of England was to get control of the Money Market. We have had it stated that the Bank of England wanted to make the Bank Rate the effective rate on the market. They have never been and they never will be able to achieve that object. What have they done? They have utilised the Treasury Bills and the Treasury for the purpose of trying to achieve their ambition. We know perfectly well that they came to the great banks and told them, "You must not lend your money below 4 per cent. If you have spare money to lend, or if you want 4 per cent. for your money, we will give it you so as to take it off the market." If the Government wanted money, it was hardly the right way to go to work to try to put up the value of money. If a man in business wants to buy any material, he does not go all round making inquiries and send up the price before he goes into the market and buys. That is exactly the attitude that the Treasury have taken up. Knowing perfectly well their requirements, and knowing that if the War goes on for another twelve months they will require £5,000,000 sterling per day, or £150,000,000 per month, or £1,800,000,000 per year, they have put Exchequer Bonds on the market at 6 per cent., getting £20,000,000 in the first week and £16,000,000 in the second. When they
  796
  issued their 5 per Cent. Exchequer Bonds it was exactly the same.
  We know perfectly well the people who invest in that class of security. There is a limit to the amount to which they can go. As a rule they are people who have money temporarily in their possession, like the banks, the great financial houses, and bill brokers. The Treasury Bill has been the most convenient instrument in the market for ages, and a bill broker is in the habit of subscribing for Treasury Bills as the finest security that he can have. Confidence in Treasury Bills at the beginning of the War was shaken for a time by the action of the Bank of England, which for some reason best known to itself on 31st July, when there was almost a crisis in the City, refused to advance money on Treasury Bills, and thus actually helped that crisis. That was the principal cause why we had to have a Bank Holiday for a whole week. We have now to consider how we can best get over our present difficulties. We are told by the Treasury and by the Governor of the Bank of England that the object is to keep the gold in this country. Does the Governor of the Bank of England or do the Treasury believe that the mere issuing of a Treasury Bill is going to keep the money in this country? What is the custom? Bill brokers buy Treasury Bills so that they can borrow money from day to day on that security at the various banks, and have surplus funds which they can lend out. If the market can get a 6 per cent. Treasury Bill, and can borrow from day to day at 4¾ or 5 per cent., it id magnificent business for them. The Government are issuing Treasury Bills now at 5½ per cent. and anybody can go to the bank in the City of London, place those bills as securities, get money from day to day at 5 per cent., and make a profit. The Bank of England have been trying to get control of the Money Market, and to prevent the banks from lending this money from day to day at a low price. The Government will not see this. They continue to play into the hands of the Bank of England, because, I presume, the Treasury do not know any better.
  If you ask them who are their advisers, they will give you Lord this and Lord that, and their names no doubt appeal to hon. Members below the Gangway, and to the man in the street, but they carry no weight with people who have daily business relations with the Money Market and the City

  797
  of London. We want to know the experience of the man, and we can only judge by results whether the advice given to the Treasury is beneficial on the whole to the country. If you ask in the City of London, amongst the banking community, you will find that the names we hear do not carry any weight. We have never been told absolutely who they are, but rumours come out. The other day, for instance, we heard that the issue of these 6 per Cent. Exchequer Bonds was made from Harrogate. The adviser of the Government was taking the waters at Harrogate when the Treasury wanted to consult with him. The Governor of the Bank of England could not find anybody of sufficient knowledge and experience in the City of London, so he went down to Harrogate to get the advice of this great genius on finance, and to see what the results of the waters of Harrogate would have on the finances of the country. That was the history of those 6 per Cent. Exchequer Bonds, and, as has been mentioned, that issue has naturally had the effect of depressing every security in the markets of the United Kingdom. I think if the Government and their advisers were in touch with other countries they would find that it is not necessary to pay the rates they are paying, considering the very low value of money in all the other markets of the world. In Holland, for instance, the Dutch people can borrow money—and I know of English companies that have borrowed money there—at 3½ per cent. Does the Government think that holders of Treasury Bills, even if they were only 5 per cent., would sell them so as to take their money to Holland to get 3½ per cent. for it? In the United States the current rate at present in the market for borrowing and discount is about 4 per cent. The principal thing which should guide the Government and their advisers, if they know the various money markets of the world, is the value of what people can get for their money in other markets. We are not to-day, as we were, the centre of the finance of the world, because even at the present time we find that trade in South America that used always to be financed in London is to-day being financed to a great extent in New York. The same thing applies to, other countries. The restrictions that have been put upon the banking community in this country have had the effect of making merchants in various parts of the world look to other centres for the future. I would ask the Government to carefully
  798
  consider when they take action what the effect is going to be on the future prosperity of this country.
  We cannot afford to ignore entirely the future of this country. Coming back to the question of short loans, and the argument used that the putting of them into circulation was to safeguard the exchanges, I think the Government do not realise the great danger always hanging over their heads with this vast floating debt, It is easy to say, "We have issued Treasury Bills for twelve months." But if anybody were vicious enough to do this country an ill turn, they could come in. three, or six, or nine months and realise those Treasury Bills at any moment and take gold in exchange. You have got to realise that and to take your precautions. The very best way to do that is to issue a long Loan which is not to be redeemed and cannot be utilised in the same way; or you can, if you wish to guard the exchange, give exceptional terms to foreign holders. I know a company myself which went to the Treasury twelve months ago or more and told them they were prepared to take a large holding of Treasury Bills if the Government would guarantee them against the loss of exchange after the War. The Treasury refused to do so, and the money would probably have been withdrawn from this country were it not that a banker in the City intervened and proved to the Treasury it was in the interests of the country to give the guarantee, and they did so. That company did not ask for 6 per cent.; the rate then was 5 per cent. and they were satisfied so long as they were indemnified against loss of exchange. Naturally, when the Treasury Bills were put up to 6 per cent., they sold the 5 per cent. Bills in the open market and bought 6 per cent. Bills in exchange. You may say they were satisfied with 5 per cent., but they had a 6 per cent. thrust upon them.
  I believe that if the Treasury were to go the right way about it and to employ business men, they would find that they would be able to make arrangements with a large number of big holders, foreign holders, in Treasury Bills. I know that in neutral countries there are large numbers of neutrals whose sympathies are entirely with this country, and they are only too anxious to help them in every way they possibly can. The Chancellor made a reference to what the right hon. Member for the City said about the time of the issue of a Loan. Everybody knows

  799
  that there is an annual demand for money in the autumn in connection with the crops. We have to remit for the enormous quantities of grain and other season material we import in the autumn, and that always makes a demand for money. There is that demand this year, but there is this difference; that it is not made in the open market, because the Government have taken that out of the hands of the merchants, and the demand is principally paid for by the Government and their own borrowers. In normal times the bankers and merchants always provided for that demand, because they knew what would happen. The question of the two different securities the Chancellor spoke about would, of course, be an impossibility, unless the Treasury were to make some arrangement with the people who hold Treasury Bills, or Exchequer Bonds, to hold them subject to the rate of exchange being guaranteed until after the period of the War. As to the enormous fluctuations that we have had in Treasury Bills and Exchequer Bonds the Chancellor pointed out, I think with satisfaction to himself, that we have had in Treasury Bills and able sums of money' on those different securities. I am sorry to differ from the Chancellor in his opinion of the results. The bulk of the money is in Treasury Bills, but I think it is an admission of the failure of his schemes when we see that he has had to change so often with so very little result to the benefit of the Treasury. He told us that he found by degrees that the people who were prepared to invest in 5 per cent. two, three, or four-year Exchequer Bonds, were exhausted, and that they had to try further remedies to get those comparatively small amounts. Nobody, I think, will admit when you want thousands of millions that fifty or 100 millions is any good. He had to issue the 6 per cent. Bonds because the 5 per cent. did not find a ready market any more. When he comes to the end of the 6 per cent. Bonds what action is he going to take, and what is going to be the result on the Treasury? Is he going to issue 7 per cent., 8 per cent. and 10 per cent. The Treasury must realise that the buyers of that class of security are not unlimited. The right hon. Baronet the Member for the City said, rightly, that they are not popular.
  People want a permanent investment; what they like is a chance of getting something more than they put in. What is popular in the City is an issue of a security
  800
  at 97 or 98, irredeemable for ten years, and then redeemable over twenty or thirty years by drawings. There is an old adage that hope springs eternal in the human breast, and everyone who buys at 97 is perfectly certain he is going to be amongst the first drawings at 100. My suggestion to the Government is if they want absolute security they must issue a long-term Loan and for a gigantic sum.
  Sir F. BANBURY: They ought to have done so earlier.
  6.0 P.M.
  Mr. SAMUEL: They must have the courage to face the actual position as it at present exists. We have short-term bonds, for these Exchequer Bonds are short-term bonds, of between £1,600,000,000 or £1,700,000,000. We know perfectly well that if the War is to go on for another twelve months we have got to find £150,000,000 per month. Granted that you are going to have the Treasury Bills renewed, as they mature, there is one way, and one way only, for financing that, and that is by issuing a Loan of £1,800,000,000 or £2,000,000,000. You could issue that Loan payable for twelve months by, say, £150,000,000 per month. You have got into the position that you cannot avoid doing something for the holders of the old 4½ per cent. Loan, and you will probably have to issue a 4½ per cent. Loan at 96 or 97, and that would undoubtedly re-establish to a great extent the credit of the country, which must suffer by the Government paying such an exorbitant rate as 6 per cent. for their Exchequer Bonds. I believe that by such a means you will be able to reduce the interest on your Treasury Bills and to finance the War. You would not be able to do it by gold, because we do not require gold for our expenditure in this country. The; Chancellor of the Exchequer told us that our expenditure in America is something like £2,000,000 a day; that means that two-fifths of the total expenditure of the country is going to America. It seems almost incredible, but we have to accept his figures because we have no means of judging for ourselves. As £3,000,000 per day is spent in this country and among our Allies, it is not necessary to have gold for it, and Treasury Bills can be made to supply the amounts required for our foreign purchases by getting the foreigners to do what I know certain people have done, namely, undertake to hold Treasury Bills until after the War. I

  801
  will again urge, as I have urged before upon the present Chancellor of the Exchequer and the late Chancellor of the Exchequer, the enormous importance of not continuing to run the great risk we are running at the present time of being placed at any moment in a position in which we should have to pay gold in exchange for the securities that might be offered to us.
  Sir WILLIAM PEARCE: The hon. Member who has just spoken is a great authority on finance, and I hope the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who I have no doubt had a very good reason for leaving the House, after having told us that he consulted many authorities, will inform himself of what the hon. Member has said. In one part of his speech he dealt with the point I have risen to make myself, namely, that there is a great sense of disappointment at the country having reached at this time a 6 per cent. level, and there is a general consensus of opinion that that has been occasioned by not altogether successful management. I do not pretend to be a financial authority myself, but I meet a great many people who are authorities, and I must confirm what the hon. Member has said, that there is a good deal of dissatisfaction with the advice the Government have taken in these; matters of finance. The general impression is that the Treasury have been guided a good deal too much by the Bank of England. I do not wish to infer for a minute that the Bank of England's advice is not entirely disinterested. I believe it is. But my banking friends' opinions do not agree with the advice upon which the Treasury has acted, and which to a large extent has been given by the Bank of England. One can understand that the Treasury are very content to rely upon the Bank of England's advice, because, after all, the Bank of England are the official advisers to the Treasury, and it requires a good deal of courage, when a point of contention arises, to disregard the Bank of England and accept the advice of the other banks in the City of London. The point I want to make is that I am afraid the Treasury have been relying too much on one set of advisers. It might have been possible, if they had kept a more open mind, to not yet have reached the 6 per cent. plane. This constant change in the rate of Treasury Bills has been most unfortunate. If short-dated Bills had been kept at 4½ or not more than 5 per cent. interest, and an earlier Loan
  802
  proposition had been made for three years at 5 or 5¼ per cent., the difference in those two rates at the earlier period would have forced a great deal of money into the longer-dated securities. If that sort of measure had been adopted we should not yet have arrived at the 6 per cent. plane.
  Another point I wish to make—and nearly every Member will confirm what I have to say—is that there is a real sense of grievance—whether it is right or wrong—on the part of the holders of the 4½ per cent. Stock with regard to their conversion rights. They have always understood that those conversion rights were offered to them as an inducement to subscribe to the stock. I have wondered in my own mind whether, if the Government at an earlier date had offered these people some bonus or inducement to get rid of their conversion rights, it would not have been a wise proceeding. If they had offered some small increase, for instance, in the interest, say, 4½, 4¾, to 5 per cent., to be payable at once on the condition that the conversion rights were given up, the Government might have made a profitable bargain. I assume that eventually they will have to raise a long-dated Loan at a fairly high rate of interest. No one can listen to the Chancellor of the Exchequer without sympathising with him in the great difficulties he has to encounter; but I want the Treasury to realise that there is a sense of disappointment that we have arrived at a 6 per cent. basis, and that there is a very general complaint on the part of subscribers to the 4½ per cent. Stock that they have been unfairly treated.

  MILITARY SERVICE.
  Mr. RAMSAY MACDONALD: It is a very natural transition from money to men. The House has been discussing the question of the 6 per cent. borrowing, and there has been a universal regret expressed from all quarters about it. There is one consideration which has not been pointed out to the House which I shall put in a sentence, because it is a very good introduction to what I have to say upon another subject. That consideration is this: Whatever hon. Members here may say or feel, or whatever financiers may say on the subject, the man in the street is confronted with a somewhat unfortunate comparison, that when the nation wants money it has to induce people to give it to them. [HON. MEMBERS: "NO!"] It raises its money from 4½ to 6 per cent.

  803
  interest, and apparently it has not yet come to the end of the increase; but, on the other hand, when it requires men, it compels them to go. The contrast is a very striking one for the man in the street, and hon. Members may be assured that there is no topic that is more frequently and hotly discussed by the ordinary man to-day than this extraordinary difference between the conscription of life and the loaning of money. I want to raise this afternoon the question of men. I wish to appeal to the Government to try to be a little more economical with ability than it has been. I wish to enforce my appeal by giving two sets of facts. The first relates to the treatment of the single-handed business man in particular, and to a whole class of men who are not required at the moment, who have to come before tribunals, and who receive very imperfect certificates of exemption. What happens is this—I will give an actual case—a man in my own Constituency, running a small business which he has created himself and being in debt to the extent of about £200, he very honourably and honestly fulfilling his obligations under that debt, has to go before a tribunal. He puts his business case before it, and the tribunal issues a certificate of exemption, which is going to run for three months. At the end of the three months, if the applicant desires an extension of his certificate, he may appeal to the tribunal, but his appeal will not be heard unless the tribunal is willing that it should be heard.
  The purpose of the three months' notice is this: that if the man has to sell his business he may have a chance of selling it in a tolerably open market. If he is suddenly compelled to part with his business in order to join the Colours, obviously he has not the same chance of getting a proper price for it. What is the position of that man? How does he know what is going to happen to him at the end of the three months? First of all, the tribunal may not allow him to appeal again. It may say to him, "The matter is settled and you have to go now to the Colours." On the other hand, the tribunal may say, "We will give you another three months. It may be we will listen to your appeal, but will not extend it." If this man is going to take any advantage at all of the two or three months of grace which he has obtained from the tribunal he must now take steps to dispose of his business.
  804
  Then, at the end of the three months, he may present himself to the authorities and be told that he is not required at all. As a matter of fact, that has taken place. There are hundreds of cases—it may be they have happened in error, but I am sure the Local Government Board will see that it is a very natural error and an error that ought not to have occurred—there are hundreds of cases of business men who have disposed of their businesses, who have presented themselves to the recruiting officers when their period of exemption expired, and who have been sent back by the recruiting agents to do what? Nothing at all! They have got to turn their hands to something to which they are not accustomed. They have cut themselves off from their businesses and have to start life afresh, with the possibility that in another three months they will be called up and again have to go through the same unfortunate process. I venture to appeal to the President of the Local Government Board on this point. It is surely a very simple thing to give men some sort of guarantee that, if they are not wanted now, they will have sufficient notice given to them before they are called up, in order that they may dispose of what businesses they possess. That is my first point. These single-handed business men have a great grievance indeed against the Government or against the tribunals in regard to their not entering more sympathetically into the very difficult economic position in which they are, and in not helping them out of that position more successfully than has been done.
  My second class of case will, I am perfectly well aware, not be quite so acceptable to the whole of the House, or so popular; but even there I think I can appeal to business minds upon it. My second class of case refers to a certain section of conscientious objectors. This House, rightly or wrongly, as a matter of fact has recognised the conscientious objector, and recognised him not merely as a man with religious principles. That point is rather forgotten in our later Debates. The Prime Minister, on the 5th January, 1916, introduced his first Military Service Bill and referred to conscientious objectors being exempted, when something like a jeer went up from some parts of the House. After rebuking that jeer, he said:
  "Those of us who know the real facts of British life know quite well that there are a great many people belonging to various religious denominations, or to

  805
  various schools of thought, who object on conscientious grounds."—[OFFICIAL REPORT. 5th January, 1916, col. 957,Vol. LXXVII.]
  The Prime Minister admitted that there may be conscientious objections founded upon certain beliefs held by schools of thought which were not religious. They might be moral. Surely when the House of Commons has taken a decision, and when that decision has been embodied in the law of the land, it is fair that members of tribunals and other people should set aside their personal predilections and administer the law in a judicial frame of mind. We cannot have private opinions introduced on judicial benches. If we have, then we come to legal chaos. We have had some thousands of men who have tried to take advantage of these exemptions. They have failed, so far as the tribunals are concerned, to make good their case. The atmosphere of these tribunals has been a thing that the Local Government Board ought to have watched a little more carefully than it has done. I know the perfectly tremendous difficulties the Local Government Board has had. Theoretically these tribunals are judicial authorities, and it is improper that any executive authority should interfere with the free discretion of a judicial authority if that judicial authority is conducting its business as a judicial authority. This House relegated the whole question of who is to be exempted under the Military Service Act to this body of citizens, which was supposed to act absolutely impartially, if anything with a bias in favour of the man who is appealing, because they insisted that if a man appeals the military representative would have to prove that his appeal was not sound. So long as there is any fair-mindedness left and any desire that the law of the land should be respected, quite apart from its merits or its demerits, we must bring these matters before the House. To-night I only intend to give one illustration of what I mean. This is the sort of thing that happened before the Stockport Appeal Tribunal the other day, in the case of a man called Ellis. This Ellis was going through the usual examination—that futile examination, "What would you do if the Germans came?" and that sort of thing. A man who puts a question like that under the impression that he is discovering, unveiling and revealing a man's conscience, has not an elementary knowledge of how to test for the existence or non-existence of a conscience. The military representative said to this man,
  806
  "What would you do if some one were to knock you down?
  The Appellant: I should first of all get up again.
  The Military Representative: Suppose I was to get up from this table and knock you down, I suppose you would get up and run for a policeman and then go home and read your Bible?
  The Appellant: I am not so sure that I approve of the method you suggest.
  The Military Representative: Well, you had better be careful or it will not take me long to knock you down.
  The Appellant: I do not think, Captain Rigby, you would do yourself any credit by such an action."
  I am perfectly certain, whatever the opinion of individual Members of this House is, there are no two opinions as to who came out of that little bout with the best honours. This is not reported by the tribunal, and not reported apparently by the War Office. Surely it must be apparent to every Member of the House that a judicial court carried on in that atmosphere and in that style does not, and cannot, come to proper judicial decisions. If we get good judicial decisions, then I say the Local Government Board has no business to vary them or to interfere, and whether I like them or not, I certainly should be the last man, here or anywhere else, to suggest that a Government Department should interfere with decisions properly given by properly constituted bodies. Then the men go on. They are handed over to the military, and the usual process is gone through.
  Then there is a large section—an answer given yesterday to a question put it down at over a thousand—of men who are doing what is called national service. They go through the gaol, they are taken out and brought before what has been christened the Brace Committee and they are sent to the land, to road-making, and so on, to do what is called national service. Again I appeal to hon. Members to take the matter from a business point of view. This is a time when every penny in the country and every ounce of ability it has at its command should be used with a maximum amount of efficiency. I think there is no doubt about that, What happens to these men? There was a camp established at Dyce, and at that camp took place the death of a man of the name of Roberts, of whom I happened to know something. I was in that neighbourhood at the end of the summer, and just looked at the place myself. I saw the men at play, at meals, and at work, and I want to tell the House what impression I brought away from it. If hon. Members can imagine a bit of a slope on a hillside, with a huge quarry dump near the top of it and some tents pitched

  807
  at the foot of the dump, with green fields all round and a small village about a mile and three-quarters or two miles away, they will have the surroundings of the place. It had been raining, raining, raining for days. The roads from the station to the village were simply huge, swaying masses of mud. It was practically impossible to walk upon some of them on account of the engine traffic which had gone on between the quarry and the station The part of the camp used by the men was simply worked up into stuff which was half mud and half water in many places. It was all trampled upon. The grass in most parts had disappeared, and there they were living, playing football, and so on. That was their habitation. In the tents there was mud, just ordinary common unmistakable mud, and the men, in order to sleep at all, and to get anything like dry beds, had to take their firewood and build up a sort of little erections, and then they were told by the manager of the camp that they would not be allowed to do that because the wood was not provided for that purpose. It was meant for firewood, and was to be used as firewood. I asked what they did, and they said they declined to agree to his orders, and he said, "Very well, when the time comes for the wood to be used for firewood, you will have to take it from your beds and put them down in the mud." I suggested that they ought to take a few barrows full of the loose rubble stuff from the top of the quarry dump and put them on the floor of the tent. They said, "We started doing it, and they stopped us." I saw about three barrowfulls on the floor of one tent, and evidently the statement they made was perfectly true.
  Then take the men at work. You go up to the end, and you see twenty or thirty men—the most extraordinary creatures you ever saw. First of all, they looked as if every one of them had been twenty years on the road, and yet behind it all you saw the intellectual class of the men. It is a strange sort of combination of the intellectual life and the tramp. The men felt it very keenly One man I talked to about it almost broke down when I tried to joke about his personal appearance. There they are, with barrows and shovels, trying to do navvies' work. They could not do it. There is confusion. There is no order. They come up on to a narrow place and, instead of taking their turns, block each other and stand in each other's
  808
  way. Then they go up and have to get their barrows. Again there is irregularity and bad management. Down below, where the crushed stuff comes out, there is again too great a crowd of men getting in each other's way, and the riddles or sifters, through which the smaller stuff falls in order that the more valuable larger stones should be retained and be used for the making of roads were so blocked up that there was no sifting going on at all. Dust was coming down, and the large stones were all being shovelled into the barrows, and the dust was taken and dumped on to the trucks which were taking the stones to the railway station. It was really a most melancholy spectacle. You felt when you saw it. Here is this country at death grips with an enemy, fighting for its existence in a way it has never had to do before, and it ought to make every one of us bend our backs to do the work we can do, and demand that we shall have our opportunities of doing it given us by those who have the power and the authority to assign us that work. There were these men, about a hundred, doing work they were not trained to do, doing work they could not do, doing work they could not be trained to do, going on under the impression that this is national service. There is a complaint that they are not doing enough work. Of course they were not doing enough work. If the making of the roads had been my job I should have discharged every one of them. There were very few men there who were earning even the small pay they were getting. They were just getting in each other's way, and they were, to put it very mildly, very round pegs in very square holes. They are not doing what they ought to do; they cannot do what they ought to do. The work is just ordinary task work, given to men who are in gaol. There is no use our deceiving ourselves about that. The men had just come out of gaol, where they had been serving on account of their defiance of the Military Service Act. They were quite unskilled in that work. They were soft of muscle, their hands were blistered, their backs were sore, and some of them had had to go away on account of heart trouble because of the strain from the heavy work. They have gone past those years when a man can very readily be changed from one mode of life to another. You can train a young, robust fellow, with a certain amount of care and skill, so that he can be turned from a clerk to a navvy; but you cannot do that

  809
  with men who have got a little bit beyond that very adaptable and that very green age, when they can be bent to new modes of life, and if you try to make that change in these men too suddenly you endanger their health. The list of sickness at this camp was absurdly long. I have no information which I can personally vouch for later than the date of my visit.
  My point is that this was not national work. It was not useful work, because it could have been done far better by other men, working half the time, at double the wages, and they would have taken half the time to finish the whole job. There was no enthusiasm on the part of these men in their work. There was no incentive in the work. The men simply felt that they were being punished, and that they were asked to do this because the State wished to punish them. These men have got their conscientious convictions. Many of them said to me, "It would be the greatest pleasure in life to us if we could do what others are doing. But we cannot do it. We want to do something. We are teachers, we are clerks, we have been accustomed to run shops, and so on, and we want to help the nation in work which we are capable of doing, but instead we are shoved on to this impossible task, and asked to do work out of which we never can get any satisfaction. We do not feel, as we fill our barrels and empty them, that we are doing one stroke of work to help the country in the present crisis." What can you expect under such a state of things? It is sheer folly. It is waste. If you are going to punish the men, punish them honestly. If you say to these men, "You are criminals; you ought to be locked up; you ought to be confined," do it, but do it as reasonable men, and not in this sort of way by cutting off your nose in order to spite your face, because there are a certain number of men with whom you do not see eye to eye, and whose hearts do not beat with precisely the same rhythmic music that your own hearts are beating at the present time. On the day that I was at the camp the Home Office Committee was there, and my hon. Friend (Mr. Brace) was present. I met the Committee, and I am told that they accepted some reforms. The whole thing is utterly absurd and nonsensical. These men do not want comfortable beds; they do not want better food; they do not want shorter hours; they do not want easier work. They want to be put to something in which they feel that they can put their heart, and in
  810
  regard to which they can feel that it is work really useful to the State. You can take them from the camps which have been condemned; you can make their dwellings weatherproof; you can put them into billets in the village; but that is not solving the problem as a business man would solve it. My appeal is not for a soft heart, but for hardness of head. My appeal is not for sympathy for these men, but for common-sense treatment. My appeal is not that we should spend more money upon them, but that we should spend less money upon them and get more service from them. You will never do it in the nonsensical way which you are pursuing at the present time.
  National service must have two characteristics. It must have some relation to the training and capacity of the men who are doing the service, and it must have some relation to national needs. I have one or two cases here to which I hope the House will allow me to refer, because they show how very little relation there is between the capacity of the men and the service which they are supposed to do. Here is the case of a man who was working at the Record Office, compiling a book on mediaeval law. The Hampstead Local Tribunal sent him to work on a dairy farm.
  An HON. MEMBER: Quite useful work!
  Mr. MACDONALD: I quite agree. I wonder if my hon. Friend knows anything about dairies. Let me assume that he does not; perhaps I am wrong. However, I am not quite sure that if he was sent by a tribunal from an occupation where he could do very distinguished service to a dairy farm, where he might be in the way of the dairy farmer, that he would consider that the best service he could render. It is not enough merely to say that dairying is a good occupation. There are two things you require. You require a good man and a good occupation. If you put a bad man into a bad occupation, you spoil the man and the occupation as well. Of course, I quite agree that the more dairy work we can do the better for the State at the present time. I will take next the case of a market gardener near Blackpool, named Fletcher. He came before the Kirkham Local Tribunal, and was awarded non-combatant service on 3rd April. He appealed, and went before the Lancashire Appeal Tribunal, and on 28th April the non-combatant service was

  811
  withdrawn and he was sent for ordinary service. He came before the tribunal again. When he came before the tribunal it was stated that his work was not of national importance—that market gardening was not of national importance—and yet, before that same tribunal, another conscientious objector, who knew nothing of agricultural work, was given one month to consider whether he would accept market-gardening work as national service. Let me take another case. This is a case of a senior wrangler, who was granted exemption on 22nd September by the Cambridge Tribunal, and at the end of that time he was required to bring up some statement that he had found employment on the land. The point which was made by the hon. Member opposite in reference to the first case was present to my mind, and I said, "Perhaps that is the best thing for him." My informant laughed, and said, "He knows no more about the land than he knows about the sea. He has gone on the land, but instead of helping, although he is doing his very best to help, the fact is that he is only destroying what he is doing." Such is the report I have had.
  There is another case of a second wrangler, who considered it of national importance that he should get into print certain mathematical researches on which he had been engaged before they were anticipated. I am told this is a very definite case. He was making certain mathematical researches upon lines on which he knew others were at work, and he was just finishing them. He was only given time to find hospital employment. I think that is, perhaps, not a particularly bad case. But why was he not allowed to finish his own work? My point here is that where you have got brains, where you have got efficiency and training, the tribunals ought to take that into account, not from the point of view of the man—I do not care two straws about the man—but from the point of view of the nation, so that everything we can contribute to the nation individually at the present time shall be contributed first of all, before we turn to things we cannot do with any great distinction or any great acceptance. There is another case of a man who is an editor and lecturer on economics. The Hampstead Local Tribunal granted him exemption from military service conditional on his undertaking work on the land within twenty-one days. He appealed
  812
  against this decision on the ground that it was expedient in the national interest that he should be employed in work for which he was fitted by his training and qualifications. On 17th August the London Appeal Tribunal dismissed this appeal. Later, the tribunal approved of unskilled labour on a dairy farm as a proper occupation for this editor and lecturer on economics. I have various other cases, but it is not necessary to quote them. There are hundreds of similar cases, well authenticated cases, of men who are known personally to Members of this House, and about whom we have not only reports, but we have personal knowledge.
  I maintain that the first condition of national service, that it shall have some relation to the training and capacity of the person employed on national service, is being flagrantly broken not merely to the injury of the men, but to the very serious injury of the nation at the present time. The next condition is that national service shall have some relation to national needs. I will only trouble the House with one case. There are not quite so many cases of this sort as of the former, but there are scores of them. Take the case of the man Ellis, of Stockport, who had the bout with the military representative, to which I referred in an earlier part of my speech. This man claimed exemption on three grounds: first, that he was a conscientious objector; secondly, that his business was of national importance; and, thirdly, that serious financial and other difficulties would arise if he were not allowed to continue in his present occupation. His business was that of a manufacturer of some of those vegetarian and fruit foods that are beginning to be consumed more and more extensively, and which hon. Members are urged to consume during the War more extensively than they did before. This man had a very successful business which he had built up himself, and in which he was employing twenty women. As hon. Members may know, this is a sort of business in which you get what are called secrets, attached, secrets of mixture and so on, and nobody could carry on this particular business except this man. He was the only one in connection with the business who could keep it going, and if he went the business would close down and twenty women would be thrown on the market, with the result that the volume of his production would be taken from the volume of food for national consumption. He was told

  813
  that his business was not of national importance. First of all, he got one month's grace. He appealed, and the month's grace was cancelled. He went back to the local tribunal, who were told that if he had to go his business which employed twenty females would have to be closed. He was told that he would have to close it, and work as a labourer or something else in connection with some oil crushing business, the addresses of which they gave. That surely is a most unjust decision. I think it is very unfair from the point of view of the man, but I will let that pass, because there may be a difference of opinion about it. Surely that decision was most unjust from the point of view of the nation. The tribunal in that case has done something which definitely and specifically lowers the producing capacity of the nation of a material which people want very badly at the present time.
  There are two other things I would like to say. I may be told that those men must be punished. There was no punishment for them in the Act of Parliament. That is all a new idea. But suppose they were to be punished, how are you going to do it? Take this Ellis case again. This business has got to be closed, and this is what happens: He is liable for a weekly rent of 16s. If he cannot pay that, who is punished? Not Ellis himself, but the man to whom he has to pay the 16s. a week. It is paid to a local building society, which is a working-class organisation, and the first effect of the decision is that you punish not so much Ellis as the people who have loaned him the money—the building society, the working people who have been saving for a great many years to start such societies. Moreover, he is under agreement to pay certain loans which were made to enable him to extend his business some two or three years ago, and which he is paying back at the rate of £4 a month. That has got to stop. His women have got to be discharged. It may be that they can easily find other employment, but we have found that even then there are certain kinds of women who cannot find other employment. So that the punishment of this man himself, if that is the theory on which you are going, involves not merely loss to himself, but very serious and unjustifiable hardships upon people who do not share in his views and who have no relations with him except the ordinary business
  814
  relations that subsist between employer and employed and between debtor and creditor. That is most unfair. The tribunal on every ground ought to have allowed that man exemption.
  When one talks in that way one is very apt to be met with a very just observation that the men at the front sleep in mud, live in mud, and fight in mud, and why should not men, like those to whom I am referring, do the same? Well, it all depends upon what you mean. If I were going to improve matters in any way by putting these men into mud or by going into a mud hut myself, I should do it with great pleasure. But if you wish to compel men to do national service by sleeping on mud, you cannot do it. If, however, in order to impress those men with the gravity of the situation, you think that mud is economical, why is not everybody who asks for national service compelled to work in those conditions? The editors of great newspapers, those who write those articles who are exempted by tribunals from national service, how would they like it? I think that it is very just that they should have the experience. If they say that the men to whom I am referring ought to be kept in mud, that we ought to have no sympathy with them because they are in mud, how would these gentlemen like to be condemned to sit in their offices up to their knees in liquid mud, reduced to the temperature of zero every night, and be compelled to do national service in conditions such as those? What is artificial ought to be cured, because it has got no economy and no justification whatever. We have got no business to have those men in such conditions if we can reasonably remove them. The main point I have raised this evening is this, not in the interests of those men, but in the interests of the nation—cannot we use those men differently? Schools are being closed. Complaint is made that clerks are being asked to teach who cannot teach. I will not enter into that proposition. I would far rather allow those men to teach, even if everything said against them were true, than let the children run about like Red Indians in the middle of the streets of our large towns. In the one case you may have to correct errors afterwards, but it is far worse to leave the children to the abandonment of the abominable cinematograph shows, which are likely to destroy them and which are being multiplied,

  815
  while the schools, the only civilising influence you have got for great masses of the people, are being closed on account of want of teachers.
  Sir P. MAGNUS: I am not certain that schools are being closed.
  Mr. MACDONALD: I would agree with you with the greatest pleasure if I could, but there are many cases. I have got a case just now in which the school committee applied for a teacher who was essential and the tribunal refused to accede to the appeal. I know myself of teachers leaving school and their places being taken by uncertified old women. I have got a case of a woman of about sixty taking the place of a most competent and capable teacher of thirty. This teacher has been sent down to do afforestation. During the first week he has destroyed a considerable number of trees and very nearly chopped off his own legs. That is the sort of thing you are doing. If you are going to punish them, punish them like honourable persons, like common-sense men. If we are going to ask national service for them, let us give them national service to do, and not something which involves waste of material, inefficiency, ineffectiveness, and incompetence of supervision. I am disgusted that those things should be tolerated by the nation in the midst of the struggle in which it is at present engaged. I would appeal for business management. I would appeal for that state of mind which would put the industry of the whole country at the disposal of the country, so that by the co-operation of all the maximum amount of good shall be done to the nation at large.
  The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. Brace): I listened to the speech of my hon. Friend with care and with interest, and I listened for the practical programme which would have permitted us to deal with this problem upon more effective lines than we are doing at present, bearing in mind all the conditions surrounding the difficulties which we have to face. I listened with care because I thought that my hon. Friend would have told the House that there were other camps than the camp at Dyce. That camp which my hon. Friend criticised is only one of several camps, and by no means the largest of all those camps
  816
  which we have established for dealing with conscientious objectors. If the House will permit, I would like shortly to indicate where the men are working, and broadly what they are doing. At Clare there is a camp of fifty-eight conscientious objectors working, and the House will notice that my hon. Friend made no criticism of that camp. There is a camp at Newhaven which gives employment to 164 conscientious objectors. In the camp at Dyce there are 252 employed. There is another camp established at Kinlochleven, where there are fifty-three men working, and at Llanelly, in Carmarthenshire, there are two camps working upon waterworks, giving employment under Scheme 1 to eighty-seven and under Scheme 2 to thirty-one men, and at Weston-super-Mare we have thirty-two conscientious objectors working. At Wigton we have twenty, and at Newport twenty, and we have deprisonised two prisons, Wakefield and Warwick, so that we may have an opportunity of giving employment to conscentious objectors who would be held by the medical officers to be physically incapable of the outdoor work which we have to offer. My hon. Friend made complaint, in his usual graphic style, of the mud that was to be found at the Dyce Camp. Did he expect to find anything else than mud at a camp in wet weather? Is there anything unusual about finding mud at a camp where there are 164 men? If he had gone a little lower down the lines and seen the camp for soldiers he would have found mud there just as well.
  When he talks about the punishment of conscientious objectors he is really placing it much higher than the case would entitle him to place it. I am not sure that the whole of the conscientious objectors would thank my hon. Friend for introducing the matter to the House of Commons. What is the position of the real conscientious objector, the man who is moved by profound religious convictions to take a particular course? His position is this: "Relieve me of anything that may be a condemnation of what I believe to be my conscience and I have no complaint to make. I will do any kind of work." Those men are not making any complaint, and it would be rather interesting to find in the personnel of these camps who was behind this complaint. I am far from saying that the Dyce Camp is such as I would like it to be. In fact, when I went down there

  817
  and saw that there was a reasonable opportunity of correcting the legitimate grievances of the conscientious objectors, I at once exhausted all the resources at my command to correct those grievances. But the House will please remember that the Dyce Camp is not of a permanent character. It was simply a camp which was started for two months. It is being closed, and within a week from now the camp will be entirely disbanded. If I had requested the Treasury to find the money to hut those men for a two months' job, many hon. Members would make serious complaint against the Committee of which I am chairman and say that such expenditure was entirely unjustifiable. We thought that the conscientious objectors would be satisfied and ought to be satisfied so long as they were treated equally with the soldiers, and when we put the conscientious objectors in a camp at Dyce we simply followed what would have been done if we were supplying a camp for our soldiers. They were supplied exactly as a camp for soldiers would have been supplied. For their provisions we went to the military stores and got exactly the same kind of article as the soldiers got.
  Major NEWMAN: Had they boards in their tents?
  7.0 P.M.
  Mr. BRACE: No, but my hon. Friend says that objection was made because some of the man were using the granite out of the quarry to make their tents dry. This is the first I have heard of that. I have met the men and met the Committee. I spent some hours with them. I met every individual man who desired to make a complaint, and this is the first time I have heard of that. All I can say is that the Committee of which I am chairman can only deal with complaints of which we know. The camp there consists of twenty-seven bell tents, two mess tents, one store tent, and the necessary material for screens. The men are supplied with palliasses and bolsters, in addition to blankets and waterproof sheets ordinarily provided for soldiers in camp. They are provided with exactly the same full rations as are supplied to soldiers, and therefore we thought that in taking these steps we were indeed doing no injustice to the conscientious objectors. The Committee was profoundly moved, as I was myself, by the death of one of the members of the camp, and I am sure the House of Commons will join in an
  818
  expression of sympathy that there should have been such an occurence, which was much to be regretted. To be quite sure that it was one of those unfortunate accidents that might arise anywhere, under the circumstances of the camp life of any body of people, we requested the Scottish Medical Officer of the Local Government Board at Edinburgh, to carefully inspect the camp and to give a report. It is a. remarkable thing how rumours develop. I understand that the members of that camp very boldly sent all over the country the declaration that the Scottish Medical Officer to the Local Government Board had made a report to the effect that the camp was not healthy, and that the conditions: were such as ought not to exist. This was the medical officer's report of which I simply read the conclusion:
  "The general sanitary conditions of the camp at Dyce may be regarded as satisfactory. The health of the men is not likely to suffer from living in camp, as long as the weather keeps dry. Winter, however, is coining on, and arrangements might be made to now house them otherwise than in camp."
  Mr. WATT: Were they ever dry in Scotland?
  Mr. BRACE: The hon. Member is a very much better judge of the weather in Scotland than I am. I can only say that on this report of the British Medical Officer of Health there can be no serious complaint levelled against this place where the conscientious objectors are encamped, under conditions similar to those under which soldiers are encamped in Scotland at the same time. As to the work which the men do, of course it may not be as congenial as many of the conscientious objectors might desire, but it is not hard work. It is work such as men who have been passed as fit for the Army can do. All that they have had to do was to fill the barrows with stone and wheel them to the crushing machines, and after the stones had been crushed to load them into trucks, and when those trucks had been taken to a place some miles away, to lay the stones on the road as the ordinary roadmaker would do. These conscientious objectors may have some complaint to make about the Committee and the way it has treated them, but the Committee on its side has some complaint to make about the way in which some of the conscientious objectors have worked. If these men had been called upon to live upon what they earned they would have been in an entirely different position from what they were. These conscientious objectors, by some kind of calculation, have come to the

  819
  conclusion that five hours a day was their maximum, and they have put in actual practice the system of "Ca' canny," and have worked five hours per day. If it had not been that the camp was to be broken up, drastic action would have been taken. Let me state that this camp is divided into two sections. One at Longside; these objectors worked ten hours a day, and carried out all that is reasonably asked of them, but the section at Dyce have refused to work more than five hours, and what they did with the rest of their time I cannot say. We do not object to conscientious objectors having as much liberty as is possible, and I want to say frankly in the House of Commons that, on the whole, I would prefer that these men were housed in buildings rather than in tents. We did arrange with some local farmers to house them in farm buildings. On the whole, I do think that the conscientious objectors are not serving their own cause either through the mouth of my ton. Friend or through anybody else when they complain about the arrangements, which are the same as those made for our soldiers, who have to go to the front.
  Mr. MACDONALD: The hon. Gentleman has mistaken my point, which was that the Government seem to be absolutely incapable of using these men for national service in the way they ought to be used.
  Mr. BRACE: Unfortunately there must be a decision by someone, and the Committee which was set up decided upon the arrangements which have been made. The Committee are limited in their opportunities for finding employment. Does my hon. Friend argue that the making of roads is not a national service? Why should not a teacher take part in helping to make roads as well as anybody else? What is the use of coming to the House of Commons with the argument that a teacher is a man physically unfit to engage in the work of making roads? Our soldiers do not become soldiers without preparation. It takes some time to train them, harden them, and develop their muscles for the service of the Army. If these teachers and other conscientious objectors are as conscientious as they say they are, after their hands have become hardened and their muscles have been worked into condition, what reason is there why they should not make as good road makers as the ordinary man who is a road maker?
  Sir STEPHEN COLLINS: These roadmakers have been trained, but the conscientious objectors have no special training.
  Mr. BRACE: My hon. Friend is wrong. We do not expect the conscientious objector, on the first day, to be in physically fit condition or to be fully informed about the work upon which he is to be engaged; but surely when a man has had a month's training, and has become physically fit, there can be no serious inconvenience to putting him to this work of road making. I do not think it is any argument that because a teacher is a man of culture, or of high scholastic attainments, and of great education, he is less capable, on that account, of doing physical labour. That is an argument which I have combated all my life. I submit, and I have always contended, that the greater a man's knowledge and culture, the more complete his education, the more capable workman will he make. Therefore the schoolmaster, with his scholastic attainments, and when he is rendered physically fit, and his hands are hardened, can become as good a road-maker as anyone else. We are employing these men for the making of roads which are necessary for the public service. Why should not these conscientious objectors be engaged in doing that work? What is there in it which is degrading to them? Men are necessary, but men cannot be found. There is a great shortage of man-power, and it seemed to the Committee, when we arranged with the Road Board to employ conscientious objectors upon the roads, that they were asking these men to do real national service—indeed, work that would leave them physically better than when they commenced it. In addition to that, we are providing work for them at timber felling, and we are endeavouring to employ them in the best way possible. We have deprisoned Warwick Prison and Wakefield Prison. We have arranged for those prisons each to be a kind of communal centre for conscientious objectors who wilt be employed in the winter months at indoor work, and also for men who are physically unfit for outdoor work. There is the fullest liberty in those centres. They may have their leisure and their freedom within the Regulations, which are made as much for the convenience of conscientious objectors and their comfort as, indeed, for anything else.
  I shall be very much surprised if as a result of the trial of these camps we shall

  821
  find serious complaints from the conscientious objectors themselves. I can assure the House of Commons this has been to me the most confusing problem that I have had to tackle. I have been up against a psychology I could not understand. If my hon. Friend thinks that these conscientious objectors are angels and easy to deal with he has made a profound blunder. You may make an agreement with them to-day and they come with another to-morrow, and I can assure the House that it has been the most difficult and the most confusing problem. The guiding principle under which we acted was that we did not want to put them to anything which they might consider to be of an undignified character, and to the best of my knowledge and belief we have not done anything to make these men less manly at the end of this business than they were at its beginning. The whole thing has been arranged to give them employment in the national service under civilian control. Making roads may not be the kind of service these men like, but it was the best service we could offer. [An HON. MEMBER: "The only service?"] No; we have other services in which we employ them. Incidentally I might mention that at Weston-super-Mare, one of the most beautiful spots in the country, they are engaged in timber felling, and in time we shall be able to understand the problem very much better than at present. All I can say is that the members of the Committee, who include some old and tried Civil servants, have worked early and late to deal with this problem. If we had failed at all, it may be because we brought them out of prison earlier than we should have done, in our desire to deal with them as we would like, and as we are endeavouring to deal with them to-day. If there is any complaint against us at all, the complaint must be that we were anxious to do more than simple justice to the conscientious objectors. I have nothing to apologise for in regard to our dealings with them. When I have gone down to the camps I have told the men to form their own committees, to formulate their complaints, and then we would deal with them. But having gone to all this trouble, I do not think my hon. Friend will carry with him the whole vote of the conscientious objectors in these camps, individually or collectively, in any of the complaints he has ventured to make as to the treatment they have received. The conscientious objectors, in their own
  822
  interests, will want to leave an impression on the minds of this nation—if they are going to do justice to their high claims—they will want to leave the impression that so long as their objections have been met and they are not asked to do anything in violation of their consciences they are prepared to incur equal hardships with our soldiers at home and in the field.
  Lord HUGH CECIL: The speech to which we have listened will reassure many people on this subject. It is quite wrong, Parliament having decided to relieve the conscientious objector, to try and indirectly punish him. We all agree, I think, that if the hon. Member for Leicester (Mr. Ramsay Macdonald) could make out a case that there was behind the back of Parliament an effort to inflict punishment on the conscientious objector who had been recognised as such, that should be put an end to. But as the Under-Secretary for the Home Office truly said, the fact that a camp is muddy does not indicate a desire on the part of the authorities that it should be muddy. We all remember the frightful state of the Canadian camp in the autumn of 1914, but the circumstance that a camp is an uncomfortable place to live in, regrettable though it is, is a condition of things which is shared equally by the conscientious objector and the soldier, and is one of those things which is Inevitable.
  As to the rest of the case put forward by the hon. Member for Leicester, I venture to make this observation. It is, of course, quite true that it is very wasteful of national resources to use a man of intellectual capacity for manual labour, and unless you are going to adopt the proposition, which I am sure the hon. Member would not desire to do, that the State ought to take the manhood of the country into its hands and spread them wherever it thinks the most efficient labour will be obtained, you must recognise that the Military Service Act and all that has resulted from it, and is resulting from it, is merely an intrusion of the principle of compulsion into the general social system that it is bound to produce a lot of incongruities and inconveniences. Suppose you adopt what the hon. Gentleman suggests, and assign the conscientious objector with intellectual training to intellectual work, you will at once do two things open to objection. You will irritate a very large body of opinion which has been already irritated, which feels very keenly the sending of soldiers to

  823
  the front, which is always vainly calling for an ideal equality of sacrifice, and which would therefore resent what it conceived to be an act of favouritism to those whose sincerity it doubts. It is evidently public policy not to irritate any section of the community, if in so doing you would not do what it is necessary to do, i.e., distinguish between the sincere and the insincere objector.
  It is quite wrong to punish the conscientious objector who is sincere, but it is not wrong to have such a system of alternative labour as would afford a reasonable test of sincerity. I do not think it would be possible to give intellectual people intellectual work. It would put them in a favourable position, which would excite discontent in other portions of the community, and it would not test their sincerity in any degree.
  Assuming that the matter is administered in the admirable tone of the speech of the Under-Secretary, there is no ground whatever for complaint. But I do see great ground for complaint in the administration of the tribunals and the consequences of the system of tribunals. Of course, some tribunals are good and some are bad, but, on the whole, they are not a good court to deal with this sort of issue. They are often actuated by strong prejudices, and are hardly ever constituted of people with clear minds. It may be said that to alter this would require a fresh Act of Parliament; but, at any rate, I should like to see the whole subject of the conscientious objector taken away from the ordinary tribunals and placed under a special tribunal. What now happens is simply grotesque. You get a lot of people sent into the Army; they prove to be recalcitrant; you have the scandal of the struggle in the Army, a thing very mischievous from the point of view of discipline and of the good of the Army; you have these people tried by court-martial; you have them sentenced to detention; you have them coming back to the Army and again being recalcitrant; again they are tried and sentenced, this time to imprisonment. They are thus going through a sort of mill. Then they go before a tribunal which has had more experience in the matter, and you get a more or less systematic dealing with their cases. I am referring, of course, to the Central Tribunal, which deals with these men when they come out of prison,
  824
  and which does its best to distinguish between case and case and to meet all the difficulties.
  It would really be a far better plan to have a rule whereby nobody should be put into the Army at all until it has been definitely decided whether or not he is a conscientious objector. The process of putting the men through a kind of mill and then putting them to such work as making roads, or other work of national service, is grotesquely clumsy and ill-conceived. What I suggest is this, that when this stage is arrived at, whatever the preliminary inquiry of the magistrate handing the man over to a military escort, instead of being put into the Army he should be put into a prison on the same footing as a prisoner awaiting trial. His case should be investigated by a board to be appointed by the Home Office, and he should be given his choice. He might be told, "You are insincere altogether and you must go into the combatant Army or to penal servitude," or he might be told, "You are entitled to a certain degree of relief and you must go into the non-combatant service," or they would say, "Yours is a case for national service." But, whatever it may be, he should be required to give his consent to serve in writing. If he refuses his consent in writing, then he should be sent to penal servitude, and kept there until the conclusion of the War, or until he has signed his consent. In that way the Army would be kept clear of these struggles, for nobody would go into it who had not intimated in writing his willingness to serve, and the whole of the odious procedure that now obtains would thus be avoided. You cannot, after all, in the end deal with these people more severely than by sending them to prison. But here the man would have the choice of either doing the work offered him by the tribunal or going to prison. The sooner you propound that choice, and the sooner you get that man's decision, the better it is for everyone. In this way you would have a system which would work smoothly and easily and without scandal. I venture to press this suggestion again on the Government. I ask them not to leave this matter to be settled in a haphazard fashion by various tribunals, who send people into the Army or sentence them to terms of imprisonment, because I submit that such a system is open to the gravest objections, and fulfils no possible object.

  DEFENCE OF THE REALM ACT (MR. BERTRAND RUSSELL'S LECTURES).
  Mr. MORRELL: I do not propose to pursue any further this question of the conscientious objector, except to say I am certain that anyone who has followed this question closely, as I have done, will welcome most cordially the proposal made by the Noble Lord who has just spoken. If some sort of solution like that could be found, we should be saved the scandal of such scenes as occurred at Birkenhead a fortnight ago, when two men were really tortured in a public park in front of a very large number of their friends. Most of the difficulties with which this House has been asked to deal again and again would never have arisen if the scheme put forward by the Noble Lord, and more or less approved by a Committee, had been adopted. I hope my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary will take the matter into his consideration, and get the plan adopted. My object in rising was to call attention to another kind of case which has arisen under the Defence of the Realm Act. It is the case of Mr. Bertrand Russell, which was referred to at Question Time yesterday. In bringing forward this case I want to say at once I do not desire to claim any particular pity or urge that any particular hardship has been done to a single individual. I bring it forward, in the first place, because I believe it is typical of many other cases now occurring under the Defence of the Realm Act, and, secondly, because I believe it involves most important and fundamental principles of government—principles which cannot be disregarded without the greatest harm to the community.
  With regard to Mr. Russell himself, it is unnecessary for me to say anything at all. He is the bearer of a most distinguished name, he is a grandson of a Prime Minister, the descendant of a long race of distinguished men, and he himself has achieved distinction which no one will deny in the fields of philosophy and mathematics. Whatever people may say about his political opinions, no one will question his eminence as a thinker and philosopher. He has a reputation which extends far beyond this country, which is European in its extent, and extends also to America, where he is well known. Such a man, at any rate, you would expect would be treated by the Government, even I if he was in disagreement with them, with
  826
  fair consideration. I do not ask for any special favour. I say that he ought to be treated with fair consideration; I shall endeavour to show that he has been persecuted and pursued with a malignity which recalls the methods of the Middle Ages. I will take Mr. Russell's case from the beginning. At the beginning of this year Mr. Russell was attracted by the problem of the conscientious objector, and this at a time when the conscientious objector had far fewer friends than he has now, when his sincerity was denied, and when it required great courage to take up his case. Mr. Russell thought it was right that the, conscientious objector should have the protection which Parliament intended. For some time, at great personal inconvenience, he worked in the offices of the No-Conscription Fellowship, in order to obtain protection for these men. In the course of his work there Mr. Russell took part in preparing a leaflet entitled "Two Years' Hard Labour for Refusing to Disobey the Dictates of Conscience." The leaflet was of a straightforward character, simply describing what had happened in the case of a certain conscientious objector. That leaflet was distributed, and it came to Mr. Russell's knowledge that men who had been distributing it had been, in some cases, sent to gaol by magistrates. It seemed to him unfair that these men should suffer for the distribution of a leaflet, unless the author himself was prepared to take his part of the responsibility. Quite rightly he at once wrote to the "Times" a letter, saying in effect, "I am the man who wrote this leaflet. If any proceedings are taken they should be taken against me." As the result of that letter Mr. Russell was prosecuted and fined £100. In due course his furniture was sold to pay the fine. That was the first stage in what I describe as the pursuit of Mr. Russell by the Government. In present circumstances conviction almost invariably follows a Crown prosecution in such matters as these.
  I now come to the second stage. Mr. Russell was informed that an engagement of many months' standing to deliver at Harvard University, in America, a course of lectures on mathematical logic could not be carried out because the Foreign Office declined to allow him to leave this country. A letter was sent to the Ambassador at Washington, and finally a message was communicated to Harvard University that Mr. Russell was considered too dangerous a character to come and

  827
  deliver lectures on mathematical logic. Except for that action, Mr. Russell would now be on his way to America to deliver this course of lectures. His passport was refused. It was a heavy loss to him in every way, pecuniarily and otherwise. It naturally aroused a great deal of comment in the United States. He has received letters from the university regarding the action of the Government, and the matter has been commented on again and again in the American newspapers. Here you have one of the most distinguished living mathematicians, one of the best known philosophers in this country, not allowed to go to deliver a course of lectures on mathematics at Harvard University! Following that, the Council of Trinity College, Cambridge—I am not suggesting that the Government are responsible for this—took action to deprive Mr. Russell of his lectureship. I only mention that because it is part of the same principle of vindictiveness and persecution which the Government, by their action, seemed to be encouraging. Mr. Russell found himself prevented by the Government from lecturing on his own subjects in America and prevented by the Council of Trinity College from lecturing at Cambridge. He then made arrangements to deliver at various provincial centres throughout the country a course of lectures on the philosophical principles of politics. All the arrangements were made. The lectures, for which a fee was to be charged, were to deal solely with the principles of government. I have the syllabus here, and it includes such subjects as "Capitalism and the Wages System," "Pitfalls in Socialism," "Individual Freedom and State Control," "National Independence and Internationalism," and "Education and Prejudice." Mr. Russell himself, in a statement which he has issued in regard to these lectures, says:
  My proposed course of lectures on 'The world as it can be made' is not intended to deal with the immediate issues raised by the War; there will be nothing about the diplomacy preceeding the War, about conscientious objectors, about the kind of peace to be desired, or even about the general ethics of war. On all these topics I have expressed myself often already. My intention is to take the minds of my hearers off the questions of the moment—"
  Mr. STANTON: He did not do that at Cardiff.
  Mr. MORRELL: I am dealing now with the lectures he proposed to give.
  828
  "My intention is to take the minds of my hearers off the questions of the moment, and to suggest the kind of hopes and ideals that ought to inspire reconstruction after the War."
  He prepared a series of lectures, one of which was delivered by him at Manchester, and was also read last night at Glasgow. I will deal with that later. What course did the War Office take? It seems almost incredible that this distinguished mathematician, who proposed to lecture on the general principles of politics, should have been treated as he was treated. The War Office, taking their powers under the Aliens' Restriction Act and the Defence of the Realm Act combined, said that he was not to go into any area which was a prohibited area under the Aliens' Restrictions Act—an act intended to deal with aliens and spies. He might go to Manchester; he must not go to Liverpool. He might go to Surrey; he must not go to Sussex, because it is a seaside county. He might go to Cambridgeshire; he must not go to Norfolk. In fact, under this Order he was prevented from going to almost all the centres—Newcastle, Glasgow, Edinburgh—where he had arranged to deliver his lectures. Here you have a distinguished man, bearing the name of Russell, who is English right through, a man well known for his patriotism—whether you agree with his sentiments or not, whether you agree with his views on the War or not, he is well known for his love of his country, and for what he has done for his country—and you treat him as an alien and a spy. You make an Order under these absurd Acts saying that he is not to go into these prohibited areas. What are the reasons which led to this extraordinary action? They were given by the Secretary of State for War yesterday. The right hon. Gentleman said:
  "We had information from a very reliable source that Mr. Bertrand Russell was about to engage in the delivery of a series of lectures which would interfere very seriously with the manning of the Army—"
  In other words, to discuss before a select audience, who had paid for admission, such subjects as "Individual Freedom and State Control," "The Sphere of Compulsion in Good Government," and "Tyranny of Majority" was considered very dangerous and likely to interfere very seriously with the manning of the Army. The right hon. Gentleman also said:
  "I do not in the least care what the lectures are called, but they undoubtedly interfere with the prosecution of the War in this country, and lead to weakness, inefficiency, and, if tolerated, would hamper us in the prosecution of the War."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 18th October, 1916, cols. 539–40.

  829
  I wish the right hon. Gentleman were here to tell us whether he has ever taken the trouble to inquire into the subject matter of these lectures, or to satisfy himself in any way as to the action taken by his officials.
  Mr. CURRIE: Can the hon. Member say who was, or would have been, in the chair at Mr. Russell's lecture at Glasgow?
  Mr. MORRELL: I can. As a matter of fact the lecture was actually delivered last night, though not by Mr. Russell. It was delivered by Mr. Smillie, president of the Miners' Association. The gentleman in the chair was, I believe, a very distinguished man, named Sir Daniel Stevenson, an ex-lord-provost of Glasgow.
  Mr. CURRIE: Is that the same Sir Daniel Stevenson who suggested that Lord Roberts' pension should be stopped?
  Mr. MORRELL: I know nothing myself about Sir Daniel Stevenson. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman does?
  Mr. CURRIE: I may inform the House that that is so.
  Mr. MORRELL: All I know is what I find in the "Manchester Guardian," which says that he is an ex-Lord Provost of Glasgow. This lecture, which it would be criminal for Mr. Russell to deliver in person, was delivered by Mr. Smillie to an audience of a thousand persons—all of whom had paid for admission—with the result that they passed an unanimous resolution protesting against the action of the Government in persecuting Mr. Russell as they have done. What good do the Government think they have done by action of that sort? If these lectures were so bad for recruiting or so bad for the Army, as the Secretary of State says they are, what business has he to allow them to be delivered at all? Is it not gross negligence that they should be delivered in any circumstances?
  Mr. STANTON: Sinful!
  Mr. MORRELL: Ought he not at once to prosecute the man who read the lecture, Mr. Smillie, for having been guilty of these treasonable utterances? But if they are, as everybody knows they are, perfectly innocent and proper lectures, what is the good of having these Orders just in order to annoy a man who happens to be against you? In order to annoy Mr. Russell you have Orders of this kind
  830
  promulgated. We shall be told that Mr. Russell was asked to give an undertaking: that nothing he said would be against the regulations made under the Defence of the Realm Act, and that if he had given that undertaking the lectures might have been delivered. Why should a man be asked to give an undertaking of this sort before he may lecture? The War Office who were to receive the undertaking tell us that this man was to give a vague undertaking that he would say nothing of which the War Office would disapprove. If he says anything that is dangerous to the country the War Office or the Government have it in their power to prosecute him.
  Mr. STANTON: And they ought to have done it.
  Mr. MORRELL: Instead of that he has to give this undertaking! What would my hon. Friend have said if he had been asked to give this undertaking?
  Mr. STANTON: I will tell you that when I am on my feet.
  Mr. MORRELL: I just want to put it to the House what an absurd thing it is that a man of Mr. Russell's attainments and position should be subjected to this sort of perpetual persecution, and should be asked to give undertakings to the Government before he is allowed to deliver his lecture. The right hon. Gentleman the Secretary for War said that it was easier to prevent than to prosecute, that prevention was better than prosecution. Of course in a certain way it is much easier to govern by adminstrative order than by process of law. It is much easier to say: "Oh, no, we shall give an order to stop it beforehand rather than prosecute afterwards, and after treasonable utterances." It is easier, but is it the way to allow fair freedom of opinion in this country? Is it carrying out the undertaking which the Government gave when the Defence of the Realm Act was passed that they would not do anything to suppress fair political opinion? The thing is grossly unjust, and also a futile proceeding, for it will not lead to the suppression of the opinions for which Mr. Russell stands. It will cause him hardship, injustice, and loss, but it will only lead to the growth of the opinions which the Government wish to suppress. Therefore I would ask my hon. Friend when he makes his reply to assure us that this matter will be reconsidered, and that the Government will recede from the position

  831
  which they ought never to have taken up in attempting to suppress freedom of speech in this country.
  Mr. ASHLEY: I wish for a few moments to draw the attention of the House to two or three subjects which will fall within the province of the reply of the Financial Secretary to the War Office. The first subject is one to which, I think, he will not be able to give a considered reply, for I have only given him notice during the last hour or so, but it is the question of the treatment of the Territorial Force in France. The Whole House, I think, will agree that there is hardly any portion of His Majesty's Forces which deserves greater credit and ought to receive more gratitude from the people of this country than the Territorial Force. That force came to the aid of this country and saved the position in Flanders about December, 1914, when the old Expeditionary Force had been practically wiped out of existence by casualties and sickness. The Territorial Force held the line there for a good twelve months till the New Army went overseas and reinforced them, and enabled us in this country to see a far better aspect to the War than had previously been the case. Therefore, I think we in this House ought to inquire very carefully into any slight or improper treatment put upon the members, for at the end of the year to which I have referred they had become seasoned soldiers. If my information be correct—and I believe it is—I may say that in the Territorial Force in Flanders, and especially in the Artillery, there is practically no hope at all of any promotion. The same disabilities apply to a considerable extent to the Infantry of the Territorial Force. Quite recently the number of officers in a battery have been cut down to one half. When the senior officers are killed, wounded, or invalided, their places are filled by Regular officers from the Royal Regiment of Artillery. The same process goes on in the Infantry battalions. I do not think I state it too high if I put it that now in France there is practically no hope of promotion to any very high position for any officer in the Territorial Force.
  If that be so, I think that this House, at no distant date, ought to hear from the Financial Secretary or the Secretary for War why it is so. Surely at the present time our Army is one! We have no Regular Army, no Kitchener's Army,
  832
  no Territorial Army. All our Army is one! All the members have now practically equal experience. Our old Regular Army has ceased to exist, and I put it to the hon. Member whether the officers and men of the Territorial Force are not now fitted by their experience of war for the higher commands—at any rate for the command of battalions and the command of brigades. I would also ask the hon. Gentleman to inquire what are the Staff billets, and similar posts, in France which are given to officers of the Territorial Force. I believe I am right in saying that there is not one. At any rate you can number them on the fingers of one hand. This to a force which now numbers ten times the original Expeditionary Force, as it totals about 1,500,000 of men! Does the Financial Secretary or his office say that there are not to be found amongst that force officers perfectly fitted and responsible enough to hold Staff billets, or certainly the command of battalions and brigades? The Regular Army is a very fine body of men, but of all trade unions in the world the Regular Army is one of the closest. We talk about the regulations of the trade unions of the labouring classes, and also of the closeness of the legal profession. But in the Army the spirit of trade unonism is very strong. No doubt the disabilities under which the Territorials are suffering is a result of their being the lineal successors of the old Volunteers.
  In former days the old Volunteers were not fitted to take their part with the Regular troops because they had not sufficient training. What, however, I put now is that Territorial officers are perfectly capable of occupying the most experienced positions owing to the fact that most of them have been out at the front fighting and holding their own for so long. If the hon. Gentleman has any doubt as to the efficiency of the Territorial Force, let him ask the military authorities in India. I think the Commander-in-Chief in India will tell him that of all the forces now garrisoning India they are the best. If it is argued that you want professional soldiers for the higher commands, and that you must have men who have been trained from their youth upward as Regular soldiers to command battalions and to command brigades, especially in the Artillery, I would ask how is it, then, that the War Office permit the divisions which come from Canada, New Zealand, and Aus-

  833
  tralia to have their own officers? From the Divisional-General down to the youngest subaltern are men who have proved their worth and have done extremely well, and it will be found that in the proportion of 99 per cent. they have never had any previous training at all, but are men who have left their businesses in the Dominions and have come as officers of those gallant troops who have helped us. Therefore, if it is possible in the Dominions Forces for even a Divisional-General to be a man who probably has not been brought up as a professional soldier, I ask my hon. Friend to make inquiries and see why it is that our Territorial officers and men are slighted in the way they are and Regular officers are brought in over their heads. No promotion is given, and many heartburnings, and many bad feelings are engendered between the different branches of the Army which ought to be one, and in which promotion, if possible, ought to go in one line.
  May I pass from that for the moment to another subject? That is a subject which I have brought before the House previously, but which I want to impress upon the House again. I refer to the inefficiency and waste which still continues in the Royal Army Clothing Department. The House will perhaps know that Olympia, the great building where the Horse Show used to be held, has for some considerable time been a depot of the Royal Army Clothing Factory. Goods are brought up to it from the country. They are tested, examined, and passed for Army service. They are then forwarded to all parts of the country, and also overseas. The goods that pass through that building weigh many thousands of tons, and the value doubtless runs into millions. I mention that to show that what I wish to speak about is not a matter of a few bales of goods, but a matter of thousands upon thousands of tons. Hon. Members who have visited the place know that a railway runs within twenty yards of the building and the railway facilities, sidings, etc., are ample and up-to-date. How, then, are the goods brought to Olympia, and how are they sent away? Are they brought in by goods trains from the sidings and unloaded, checked, and then returned to the train? Will hon. Members believe that nothing of the sort is done? Will hon. Members believe that these thou-
  834
  sands of tons of goods, which pass in and out every month, are unloaded at a goods stations four or five miles away from Olympia, are carted across London in vans drawn by horses and motor lorries, which run at the rate of two miles to the gallon, are taken to Olympia, examined there, and then carted back to the goods station? The House will wonder whether it is credible that such a state of things could exist, and continue, with sidings within ten yards of the main door of the building—that this waste of the nation's man-power and money should be going on.
  8.0 P.M.
  The only explanation that I can give is that as the branch of the Royal Army Clothing Factory at Pimlico has got no station, when they started a new branch, they said, "We have always gob our goods by van, and I suppose we must go on in the same way in respect to Olympia." It seems never to have occurred to anybody there that they might make use of the railway sidings. In all seriousness, I would ask the Financial Secretary to look into this matter. There may be a reason for the processes that I have stated, though I cannot conceive it unless it be that the railway companies refuse to take the goods. If they do they ought at once to be made to take them. There is another matter. Army caps run into millions. They are now of two well-known sorts, the hard and the soft. The one is for Home service and the other for trench work. Contracts are running. Perhaps I should say three or four firms are doing the work, a large firm dividing a certain number of the old pattern and the new pattern caps amongst them. There is a deficiency in caps which are wanted for Overseas which no doubt could be made up. There is a large surplus of the caps of an antiquated pattern running to over a million which nobody wants, and yet the old-fashioned caps are pouring in by the score of thousands every week, while hardly any of the new pattern caps are coming in at all. All that is required is for someone to have the common sense to tell the manufacturers who are doing the two contracts side by side to stop making the old pattern and to turn all their energy to the manufacture of the new. It has not occurred to them, or, if it has, nobody apparently has the power to give the order. I saw myself the spectacle of an enormous

  835
  number of old-fashioned caps accumulating, and a great deficiency of the modern caps needed for our soldiers in the field. I would ask the hon. Gentleman if he could deal with these two points about the Royal Army Clothing Factory and the promotion of Territorial officers.
  Mr. STANTON: As one who, at any rate, for some considerable time has sat down, and almost exhausted his patience by listening to the generous remarks of people who, I think, were placed in a position to say something very much harder, I want to get on to the conscientious objector, and those friends of the conscientious objector who speak from the floor of this House. With regard to what has been said about Bertrand Russell, it is true he has been to Cardiff and other places, and it is also well known to every Member of this House that at Cardiff he said everything he could say in the way of traducing this country, his own nation. As far as words would carry him in betraying the nation, everything that man tried to do. I think it is disgraceful for anyone to get up in this House and champion his cause, merely because he is a man who is supposed to have great intellectuality, and a man whom the Americans would welcome. I do not know we have much to thank America for. The Americans have been none too friendly as regards our own country, and that Bertrand Russell should be welcome in America is no test of a true Britisher.
  I am astonished to think the House has wasted its time so long this afternoon on the troubles of the conscientious objector. What about our sons and brothers and others who are at the front? Do they cry out about a little mud in their camps? What about the boys whom I saw out at the front, my own son among them, up to their eyebrows in mud—boys who are risking everything? Yet we can find time here to cry out about the woes of the poor creature who is a conscientious objector in his own country's greatest hour of trouble. The Noble Lord on the other side has tried to excuse them by pointing out that they might be more usefully employed in our schools. But are we to give further powers to conscientious objectors and every anti-British crowd in order to prejudice and poison the minds of our children in the schools? I am absolutely opposed to anything of the kind. This House is too tolerant. It may be that you desire to show the greatest courtesy to Members,
  836
  and I have always stood up myself for freedom of speech, and have fought hard for it. I know their real feelings down in Wales. Occasionally, no doubt, there is a splash after a big I.L.P. meeting at Cardiff or a conscientious objectors' meeting at Merthyr Tydvil. I know what happens. Our people are loyal after all.
  I do think the Government has been too lenient, and I know the genial Under-Secretary of the Home Office would go all the way he could to extend fair play to all men and see justice done. But I think he is too kindly. We can ill-afford in this country to-day to coddle and canoodle around these people. It is disgraceful. My hon. Friend is smiling, and I do not wonder. I am astonished that men should dare show their faces after going round endeavouring to poison the minds of the people of this country—that they should be still unabashed and unashamed, and face, at any rate, the empty benches on the other side, knowing they are guilty of absolute, downright treason to their country. I can understand freedom of conscience. I have had to suffer for it, and have been in prison for my opinions, where some of these people ought to be now if conscientious objectors. There was a complaint made the other night about having to break stones and carry them in barrows. These people ought to be making mail bags or doing something else at Dartmoor. At all times we must support freedom of expression of opinion, provided it is not dangerous to the best interests of the nation. But these people have taken liberty upon liberty. They have trespassed in every direction which was most unfair and ungenerous. To clap them on the back, to coddle them, and to allow them to flaunt their shameful expressions in the House from time to time, is, I think, sufficient to disgust any honest man; and I do say, as one who has put up a big fight, a strong fight, always for labour, and always, I believe, in the interests of all that is best for my country, it is disgusting that we have to sit here and allow so much time to be taken up in hearing about the troubles of the poor conscientious objector. A crowd of them happen to be intellectuals, of course. They are school teachers, and because a school teacher has happened to tumble into the I.L.P. or join the Fellowship, is that any reason why he should not be doing his duty? Other boys in the trenches have to put up with mud and everything.

  837
  What about these people with their wretched complaints? If the country is not good enough for them, may we make it a condition that men like Bertrand Russell who want to leave do not come back? I will vote readily that he be allowed to go out of the country at once, and a crowd of his friends with him. Some of his hon. Friends here would not be missed. Instead of wasting our time with these people we ought to be doing something very much more drastic. In my opinion there is only one place for a man when his country is in danger, and even at this moment the danger is not passed, and everyone, man, woman and child, has still to strive. What are these people doing? Are they helping? They are not helping, but absolutely betraying the nation of their birth, and I say they are a disgrace to their country, and should be ashamed to come into this House. Above all, the Government ought to be ashamed of themselves to permit them to hold their meetings as they propose in Cardiff next month, and other places wherever they can. Then they will whip up all their old pals. Do not I know the game! It is only their friends who get inside the meetings, and then flashy reports appear in the newspapers. Friends of Germany! An anti-British khaki-dodging crowd! I am absolutely disgusted with them, and if I had my way I should do something very much more drastic than the Government will do now. But it is never too late to mend. I am a conscientious objector in the sense that my two boys to-night are out in the Somme push somewhere. Their brains have been trained, so far as I could afford it, but I did not forget their physical powers, and they have the necessary grit, and are not ashamed but are proud of their work, and so are the millions out there. I have looked round this House and noticed things, and they have left an impression on my mind of disgraceful treachery for some purpose or the other. The Government ought to be strong. I hope the Under-Secretary of the Home Office, instead of being so lenient, will be infinitely more drastic, because, after all, the Old Country is wondering why we have pandered to these people so long. For Heaven's sake, let us buck up and place these people where they ought to be. If they do not like breaking stones, let them make mail bags at Dartmoor, unless they will volunteer to leave their country for their country's good for ever.
  Mr. PRINGLE: I do not desire to follow the last speaker in his defence of the War Office, but only to congratulate the War Office on their defender. The hon. Gentleman has put an alternative with regard to the conscientious objector, but he apparently entirely misapprehends that that is not the alternative provided by the Government. He says, "Let them be sent to prison or leave the country." But the one thing the Government will not do is to allow them to leave the country, and that is one of the terms of the indictment of the hon. Member for Burnley against the Government in the matter of Mr. Bertrand Russell. We know Mr. Russell had been appointed to a lectureship in Harvard University, where he was to discuss philosophical subjects, and the Foreign Office refused him a permit to go upon this mission. Even on that point the hon. Member who has just spoken would admit the ineptitude of the Government, but the main point we have to discuss in regard to Mr. Russell this afternoon is their refusal to allow him to deliver a course of lectures in certain areas. One has already been delivered in Manchester, and I believe he is allowed to deliver them in some other towns. But apparently there is some occult reason only known to the War Office which makes it dangerous that he should speak in exactly the same way on exactly the same subject in other areas of the country. The Secretary of State for War told us yesterday the reason of this action on the part of the War Office. He said that if Mr. Bertrand Russell were allowed to deliver lectures on political ideals, he would discourage the manning of the Army. I could have understood the Government taking up that position at a time when we were depending on voluntary recruiting. At that time Mr. Bertrand Russell was allowed to speak all over the country on the War. He was allowed to discuss the diplomacy of the War and the whole British diplomacy from the beginning of the Morocco question up to the beginning of the present War. Obviously if his views were contrary to the national interests during all that period, he was preventing voluntary recruiting, and all that time the War Office took no action. But now, when he begins to deliver a series of purely philosophical lectures, the Government discovers, very strangely indeed, that this abstract discussion of political philosophy is going to endanger the national cause.

  839
  It being a Quarter-past Eight of the clock, and there being Private Business set down by direction of the Chairman of Ways and Means under Standing Order No. 8, further Proceeding was postponed without Question put.

PRIVATE BUSINESS.

  RHODES ESTATE BILL— [Lords]—(By Order).
  [Mr. MACLEAN, Deputy-Speaker, in the Chair.]
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a second time."
  Mr. KING: I beg to move to leave out the word "now" and at the end of the Question to add the words "upon this day three months."
  I think it very regrettable that a Bill of this character should be introduced into this House without a single word being said in its favour. Here we have a Bill vitally altering a great educational trust established not twenty years ago by one of the great Imperial statesmen of our Empire. It is being vitally altered, reduced in amount, robbed of certain endowments, and this proposal is put forward in this House without a single word in justification of it. I consider that a very regrettable state of things. I have approached one or two Ministers upon the subject, and I am disappointed to find how ignorant and uninterested they have been in this important question. I am very pleased to see that we have one member of the Cabinet on the Treasury Bench, and as the Attorney-General is interested in questions of Trusts, he may be able to enlighten us with the views of the Government in this case. The Attorney-General has recently been very much occupied, possibly in framing indictments or accusations against innocent people for fanciful offences under the Defence of the Realm Regulations, and he may not have had time to consider this Bill. I shall, however, invite his reply upon one or two leading points.
  I think the whole House will realise that, irrespective of party, we can all be proud, not only of Mr. Cecil Rhodes as a great builder of our Empire, but also as the greatest benefactor of education which this generation has seen. He left enormous sums for the benefit of education,
  840
  and he died on the 26th March, 1902, leaving property worth £6,000,000, and he endowed a very large number of objects at Oxford. Not only was his own college very largely benefited, but he established a very great number of scholarships, and altogether 160 scholars were enjoying scholarships previous to the War of £250 or £300 a year created by Mr. Cecil Rhodes. A large number of those were enjoyed by foreigners, and the total value of the scholarships founded at Oxford was about £150,000, and of that amount no less than £3,750 were enjoyed yearly by German students appointed from Germany, fifteen in number, and they were appointed on the nomination of the German Kaiser. A large number also came from the United States, and the rest came from various parts of the British Empire. Of course, when the War broke out the German scholarships lapsed, and the sum of no less than £3,750 a year could not be applied, and remained in the hands of the trustees. Early in the War my attention was called to this fact, and by a question I addressed to the Prime Minister I suggested that this sum yearly accruing to the trustees might be made available for the general purposes of the university, which was, and still is, in some financial difficulty. The answer of the Prime Minister to my suggestion is instructive. He replied:
  "I am in communication on this subject with the parties interested."
  It is, therefore, quite obvious that the sums which were falling into the hands of the Rhodes Trustees were under the consideration of the Prime Minister and the University of Oxford, together with the suggestion that the sum saved might go to the University of Oxford. Later on I asked again whether anything in this way could be or would be effected, and the answer given by the Prime Minister on 26th July last year was as follows:
  "The scholarships held by Germans at Oxford are now in abeyance, and nothing has been or can be paid in respect of them during the War. Any change would require special legislation."
  I take it from that answer that in July last year the intention of the Government and the trustees was to leave this matter over until the end of the War, which I think would have been the proper course to pursue. During the year I heard that some negotiations for an alteration were on foot, and I again addressed a question to the Prime Minister, and on the 21st of February this year the right hon. Gentleman announced in this House that:

  841
  "A private Bill is being drafted to deal with the matter."
  That was the first public pronouncement made to the world that this Bill was to be introduced. Later on I asked whether this Bill was the result of any consultation with the Government or the Board of Education, and the answer given on the 27th March last was in the negative. Therefore we may take it that this Bill, dealing as it does with a great Imperial question, and a great national property, has been introduced without any consultation with the Government or the Government Department mainly concerned. That is my first objection.
  My second objection to the Bill is that, although it vitally affects Oxford University and abolishes scholarships held at that university, it has been introduced without consulting any university authorities. Neither of the hon. Members representing Oxford University were consulted, nor was the Vice-Chancellor consulted, and I believe I am correct in saying—although not being a member of the Cabinet I am not in Lord Curzon's confidence—that he was not consulted in regard to this Bill before it was introduced. Therefore we may take it that it is a Bill coming from the trustees, and from them alone. What do they propose to do? This Bill has three main objects. First of all, to abolish the scholarships which have been previously held "by German students. Everybody must admit, from whatever point of view he looks at it, that you cannot either at the present time nor immediately after the War get back to the old state of affairs. Even after the War whatever the result may be, or whatever the terms of settlement, we cannot imagine with any pleasure or prospect of hope, the idea of the German Kaiser nominating fifteen scholarships for Oxford University. There must be a change of some sort. How do the Trustees propose to effect that change? They do it by abolishing the trust altogether. If hon. Members will look at the third Clause of the Bill, they will see that it starts on a very extraordinary and unusual principle. It proposes to absolutely abolish an educational trust which the people who propose to abolish it have themselves been carrying out, a trust which is for the benefit of education. It is the usual practice when any trust becomes inapplicable—I may appeal confidently to the Attorney-General to confirm my statement in this respect—to substitute another trust or so alter and modify the trust that the nearest possible
  842
  approach to the old trust shall be adopted. Instead of this, we have in the third Clause the proposal—it is the fundamental proposal of the Bill—that the codicil which founded these scholarships shall be revoked and annulled. The trust therefore is to be abolished. I admit that another trust will be set up in its place, but legally and also practically it is a very important point that the trustees should bring forward this Bill and start by abolishing the old trust. Since the War broke out, over two years ago, £3,750 per year have been accruing in respect of these scholarships, which cannot now be paid, and this sum, of course, stands still to the account of the trustees. If you abolish the trust and revoke it altogether, that accrued sum, instead of being held still for the purposes of education, will fall back into the residuary estate of Mr. Cecil Rhodes, and that means that every year of the War absolutely robs a public educational trust to the amount of £3,750, and adds that sum to the residuary legatees of Mr. Cecil Rhodes. Stated in that way, this Bill is nothing less than a scandal and nothing less than robbery. Certainly, putting it in the mildest way, I should say that it was the meanest Bill ever introduced by big men.
  Let me go on to another point which shows the same mean and unstatesmanlike spirit in the promoters. The Bill, though it abolishes fifteen scholarships of £250 a year each, or a total annual value of £3,750, will set up at some future date which is not named and which may be years and years hence twelve scholarships of £300 a year each, or of the total value of £3,600 a year. It therefore abolishes scholarships of £3,750 aggregate value, and sets up a fewer number of scholarships of a smaller aggregate value. The total value per annum of the scholarships which it is going to give in place of the old ones is actually going to be £150 a year less. I consider that simply means robbery of education and of the educational endowments of Oxford University, and even the Attorney-General, if he is the public custodian of charitable trusts in this country, can hardly get up in this House, though he does some extraordinary things at times, and perform the extraordinary feat of saying that it is a good bargain for the people of this country and for Oxford University to have twelve scholarships of £300 a year each in place of fifteen scholarships of £250 a year each. There is one other point which I must emphasise. This Bill

  843
  abolishing one set of scholarships and setting up another set makes no promise of any definite date when the new scholarships are to be established, and there is no authority which is to have a locus standi, or the duty imposed upon it to see that by a definite date the new scholarships are established. It may be, and it probably will be, years before these new scholarships are founded, and probably when they are founded they will be founded in such a way that there will be four one year, four the next, and four more the year after, so that they will not all come into operation at once. What does that mean? It means that every year nearly £4,000 is accruing, and it need not go at all into any educational trust until these new scholarships are founded.
  I object to this Bill, and even if I am alone in the House I shall fight it at every stage unless some modifications are made which will make it quite clear that by a definite date these new scholarships are to begin, and which will also give to some authority that can be relied upon to carry out their duty a clear indication that they are to insist that they shall begin on a certain date, or that such other educational facilities shall be given as may compensate for deferring the new scholarships which are to be founded. I oppose this Bill, first of all, as a mean Bill which robs education. It is a Bill promoted by men administering an immensely rich trust and is altogether unworthy either of themselves or of this country at the present time. The Bill is totally unnecessary, because anybody who has studied it will see that the Rhodes Trustees have absolute power at the present time to suspend any scholarship. Therefore, suppose we were to go back to peace, and suppose the conditions were such that the Kaiser resumed nominating scholarships at Oxford, there are actual provisions in the will of the late Mr. Cecil Rhodes which are quoted in the Schedule and which show that the trustees may at their own discretion dispense altogether with scholarships appointed under it. There is, therefore, no necessity for this Bill at all at the present time. My own opinion is that this question, as indicated in one of the Prime Minister's answers, might well be left over until after the War. There are several Committees of the Cabinet discussing the whole future of education, and it would be better in every way for a great educational trust like this not to be tampered with, doctored, and
  844
  especially not robbed, at the present time. Its future development or alteration might well be left until after the War.
  I am always glad to see the Noble Lord (Lord H. Cecil) present, and those who have studied the Order Paper will, I am sure, in many cases have welcomed the suggestion which he makes as an Instruction to the Committee. The Noble Lord calls attention to a point I have touched upon. The late Mr. Cecil Rhodes founded these scholarships not for Englishmen but for aliens, and he had the very fine idea, I believe a very true and noble idea, that the amity and progress of the world would greatly be assisted by young men of different nationalities meeting in the universities together. That has been pointed out by one of his biographers in these words:
  "Cecil Rhodes' life was devoted to advance any cause which would make for the greater friendliness of mankind."
  The "greater friendliness of mankind" is indicative of a great Imperial statesman. I ask myself whether this Bill, passed in the heat of war and depriving our enemies, justly perhaps, of educational advantages in one of our great university cities is really calculated for the "greater friendliness of mankind." I simply prefer to see at this time that if we do rob education or alter to the benefit of one party and the disadvantage of another party great educational trusts, that we should not rob the foreigner and aggrandise our people. If we are forced to take these away, why not offer opportunities to the Allied Nations who are so gallantly lighting by our side? I am sure those who remember what has happened in the case of the University of Louvain may very well feel that it would be a generous thing, at any rate, to give an opportunity to the Rhodes Trustees and at as early a date as possible to offer scholarships to Belgian sufferers. This is a matter which I shall not pursue at this time. I think I have said enough to show that this Bill is neither generous nor wise nor statesmanlike, and that it really robs education, and is unworthy of acceptance by this House.
  Mr. EDMUND HARVEY: I beg to second the Amendment. I do not wish to impute anything of an unworthy character to the promoters of this Bill. I am quite sure they wish to make the very best educational use of this money, which cannot be now used in accordance with the provisions of the will of the founder. But

  845
  I do feel that this is not the moment in which a general reconstruction of the proposals made by Mr. Rhodes should be made. It is perfectly possible under the provisions of the will to suspend the scholarships, at present not available, after the War, for a period, and during that time, calmly and clearly, and in consultation with the university authorities and others concerned, to make whatever new scheme may be desirable. In that scheme, although it may be desirable to take thought for portions of the Empire that have not been properly provided for in the original will owing to accident or the date at which the will was made, yet the main purpose of this particular codicil ought to be borne in mind—the binding together of nations by mutual understanding. I am very glad the Noble Lord (Lord H. Cecil) has put down his Instruction. I hope in some way or other it may be possible for the trustees to bear that in mind, and, if possible, at a later date, to reframe their proposals with that principle in view. I am sure it will be a course which they, in the long run, will not regret, and that it will be for the good of the university and for the good of building up of that international understanding which the great founder of that Trust had in view when he made this proposal in his will.
  Lord H. CECIL: The aspect of the case which I desire to put forward is a little different from that put forward by the hon. Member (Mr. King). I do not dispute for a moment the necessity of some such Bill. It is evident that it would be an absurdity and a scandal to continue any trust in favour of German subjects at a time like this. The only question which seems to me worthy of discussion in this House is what system you ought to set up in place of any system you are obliged to knock down. The proposal in the Bill is that these scholarships shall be transferred from German subjects to British subjects. I suggest it would be a still better plan for the allocation of these scholarships to be left altogether in the hands of the Trustees. I do not agree with the hon. Member (Mr. King) when he criticised the Bill for leaving things to the discretion of the Trustees. I am persuaded when you have got a board of trustees of great position and well able and qualified to enjoy the confidence of the House and country, that it is much better that they should have a free hand
  846
  to carry out what they have reason to believe the testator wished, or as nearly as circumstances make possible, and that they should not be tied and bound by Act of Parliament. If this Bill is passed it may regulate conditions for a great number of years to come. No one can tell during that long period of time what the circumstances may be. It may be, and my hon. Friend has informed me of considerations that weighed with the Trustees, that at present by far the wiser thing is to assign the scholarships to various places in the British Empire; but it is not desirable, as it seems to me, unnecessarily to limit the discretion of the trustees in future.
  In the first place, it is very lamentable that we are obliged to depart from the intention of the testator at so short a period after his death. As a matter of public policy, it is most important that Parliament should always support, as far as possible, the intentions of testators in educational and charitable trusts, otherwise you discourage so deeply such munificence in the future, especially if Parliament is too ready to change their purposes after they are dead. I am told that the real purpose of Mr. Rhodes was to unite the Teutonic race in one educational system. It seems a very whimsical idea in view of our present experience, but, if that was the intention, it is obvious it would be most nearly carried out by giving scholarships to the Dutch or Scandinavian peoples, the Dutch particularly, because they are the closest of all European peoples to us in race and, on the principle of carrying out the testator's intentions, they might most properly receive the scholarships. As time goes on you will find all sorts of new circumstances arising. You may desire to have educational relations with Russia, or with France, or with Italy. You may find it convenient to move the scholarships from one place to another, sometimes to give them in one place and sometimes in another. In short, you cannot foresee the future. It is, I submit, a far wiser thing to trust the discretion of the trustees and allow them to administer the trust according to their discretion, following up the wishes of the testator as nearly as may be. The only argument I have heard against this course is that it throws a great burden upon the trustees. No doubt it does. No doubt they would have a large number of applications which they would be obliged to reject. But I do not think that is really an argument to which this House ought to

  847
  give too much weight. Trustees are, in effect, public functionaries. They are performing a public duty and they must not shrink from the labour that duty entails. If it can be said, as I think it can, that in the interests of education it is necessary that they should have a wide discretion for the purpose of carrying out the testator's intentions, then they must bear the trouble that involves, and do the best they can.
  As a matter of procedure, it is possible that to proceed by way of Instruction is inconvenient. I do not desire to press that particular course if the Chairman of Ways and Means is of opinion that an Instruction is not the right way of dealing with the matter. I shall be quite satisfied if this matter can be thoroughly looked into in the Committee. The Committee, I understand, consists of the Chairman of Ways and Means and one other Member of Parliament.
  The CHAIRMAN of WAYS and MEANS (Mr. Whitley): Four or five.
  Lord H. CECIL: It is an Unopposed Bill Committee.
  The CHAIRMAN of WAYS and MEANS: Yes.
  Lord H. CECIL: I should be quite satisfied if this Amendment could be thoroughly considered in Committee, and if the views of the trustees can be heard and a reasonable decision come to upon the matter. I can quite believe that it is so small a point as not to be desirable to be dealt by Instruction, but in one way or another I earnestly suggest—I think I represent, not a very large number, but one or two influential people in the University of Oxford, in making the suggestion—that this point should be thoroughly considered in Committee, and that if in the judgment of the Committee the interests of education and the intentions of the testator are better carried out by inserting such an Amendment as I contemplate, they will make that Amendment in the Bill when it is before the Committee.
  Colonel YATE: The only point I wish to raise is that in Clause 4 of the Bill mention is made of students from all places within the British Empire, but there is no specific mention of India. I am sorry to say that an Instruction I had drafted was not drafted in time and does not appear on the Notice Paper. The Instruction I would have moved is—
  848
  "That it be an Instruction to the Committee on the Rhodes Estate Bill [Lords] that they shall amend Clause 4 of the Bill, so as to make such number of the scholarships substituted for those established pursuant to the German codicil as the Trustees may think right available for students from India."
  I entirely agree with the Noble Lord (Lord H. Cecil) as to the advisability of these scholarships not being definitely allocated for all time to any particular university.
  Sir H. CRAIK: They are.
  Colonel YATE: I am not speaking of English universities, but of British Imperial universities.
  Sir H. CRAIK: All the students come to Oxford.
  Colonel YATE: The proposal is that they should not be allocated definitely, but that the trustees should be able to change them as they might think fit. I would suggest that India should be inserted as a possible recipient of some of these scholarships from time to time when the trustees may think fit or opportunity may offer. Clause 24 in Mr. Rhodes' will lays down:
  "No student shall be qualified or disqualified for election to a scholarship on account of his race or religious opinion."
  I would ask that India should be taken into consideration with the rest of the British Empire, and that whenever it is possible for India to have a scholarship allotted to her, such should be given; and I also suggest that the word "India" should be specially inserted, so that she might have a share of the benefits of these scholarships with the rest of the British Empire. I would ask the Committee to take this into consideration at the proper time.
  Mr. MACKINDER: I have been asked to say a few words to the House as representing the views of the promoters of this Bill. The last thing that the promoters of this Bill wanted to do was to be mean towards education. In proof of that, I would like to say at the outset that beyond all the requirements of the will of Mr. Rhodes they have already established out of the residuum, which was left entirely at their disposal, no fewer than eighteen new scholarships beyond those they were required to establish, simply because they wished to benefit education. To charge Trustees who have established eighteen scholarships of £300 a year, tenable at the

  849
  University of Oxford, with meanness towards education or the University of Oxford, or with defalcation of their charge, is hardly the right way to commence this discussion. Perhaps I had better explain the general facts with regard to this trust. When Mr. Rhodes died he left a very large sum of money, most of it in more or less speculative investments, most of them in South Africa, not all Stock Exchange investments, but some investments in land. A considerable time was necessary in order to realise those investments and to convert an adequate portion of them into gilt-edged or more or less gilt-edged investments. The scholarship fund mentioned in this Bill, which is to be set up at some time under Mr. Rhodes' will, free of all duty whatsoever on the part of the trustees, but entirely at their discretion, they found could not be set up with any advantage to the public until those speculative investments had been realised. The trustees have gone a very long way towards the fulfilment of that which they felt to be their duty, but they have not yet quite completed the duty of making investments suitable for establishing a scholarship fund. Under those circumstances, they come to the House with quite a small Bill affecting a very small portion of the total trust. I take it the House will not want the question of diverting from the gift of the Kaiser of these scholarships argued at any length. It is quite obvious that neither the Kaiser on the one hand nor the University of Oxford on the other, for some considerable period after the War, will probably wish to execute this trust. We might have a very delicate situation. We might have the Kaiser, if there is a Kaiser in the future, or some representative of the German Empire, wishing to send scholars to Oxford at a much earlier date than Oxford was willing to receive; or, on the other hand, we might have the other case of Oxford being willing to receive and the Kaiser not being willing to send. It is most undesirable that we should leave to the future a question of that sort. I do not argue that matter. I assume that the House will wish to see this money usefully employed during the spell of years which must elapse before any German student can possibly be acceptable at the University of Oxford.
  9.0 P.M.
  The hon. Member (Mr. King) has put down three matters in regard to which he quarrels with this Bill. The first relates to
  850
  the question of a mere £150 a year. I want to explain how that £150 has arisen; and then I want to say, if it will please the hon. Member and others, that the trustees are perfectly willing to see that the loss does not occur. In the first place, I do not know whether the House appreciates that when we talk of twelve scholarships, we mean twelve scholarships tenable for three years each. That means that each year you only offer four scholarships. So that all that is involved here is an exchange of four scholarships a year of the value of £300 for five scholarships a year of the value of £250. Mr. Rhodes made the German scholarships of less value because travelling expenses are smaller from Germany to Oxford than from distant lands across the ocean to Oxford—from our Colonies, and from America. All that is involved, therefore, is the disposal of four or five scholarships. If you are to make four scholarships of £300 a year, you cannot make them exactly fit with the amount of money which is at your disposal from five scholarships of £250 a year. But a thirteenth scholarship will cause a certain amount of inconvenience to the trustees, and will not be educationally very efficient, because a scholarship offered every third year has by no means the educational value of a scholarship offered in a University or a province every year. You might as well advertise in a newspaper for a scholar casually, and you would get the people who happen to be available for that sort of thing at the time. But if you offer a scholarship annually and steadily, all the schools of the place consider that is one of the prizes that is open to their scholars, and the whole place has its eyes turned upon that great prize, and the effect on the whole province is exactly what Mr. Rhodes wanted to produce, namely, to turn the eyes of the outside lands upon the University of Oxford and upon this country. Therefore the thirteenth scholarship is not really of very great value; but, in order that no one shall say that this great trust is mean, the trustees authorise me to say that, if the Committee feels that it is desirable to give a thirteenth scholarship which will not fit into the rota of years, we are perfectly willing to do it, and, instead of the public losing £150 a year, the public shall gain £150 a year.
  The second point which was made by. the hon. Member was in regard to dates. He complained there was no definite date

  851
  stated in this Bill for bringing into effect the new trust. The words of the Bill are:
  "The trustees shall, as soon as practicable after the passing of this Act."
  That, at any rate, is a definite duty which is put upon them. With regard to the question of dates, I do not think perhaps that people who have not had experience in educational organisation realise the difficulties that there are in the way of fixing a precise date. In the first place, the trustees, when this Bill has been passed, have to settle to what lands these new scholarships shall be allotted. They then communicate with the Governments of those lands, and those Governments have to communicate with the universities of those lands. The universities, after considering the matter, and after hearing probably the organising secretary of the trust, who will go out to those countries to settle the matter, advertise the scholarships. The Universiy of Oxford has to send out examination papers for the qualifying examination, and the examination has to be held, and after that you have to elect, and when you have elected you have to give a reasonable time to the student elected to make his preparations and to travel to this country. This is a time of war, and all these things will be delayed, and therefore it is very doubtful whether you can bring the more distant places into the scheme within one academic year. At present, according to the routine of the trust, every scholar is elected nine months before the beginning of the next academic year, and I think, therefore, it may be possible to bring part of this scheme into action in one academic year and part in the course of two academic years. There is not the slightest wish on the part of the trustees to cause any undue delay, and surely it is sufficient, considering what responsible men the trustees are, that we should hold to the words proposed in the Bill: "The trustees shall as soon as practicable after the passing of this Act establish, etc."
  With regard to the third point made by the hon. Member, that certain moneys were going into the purse of the trustees, not being taken up by German scholars, I am authorised to say this: The trustees are under the duty, under the will, to establish a scholarship fund. That scholarship fund will support the scholarships which at present exist. It has always been their intention—it was directed by Mr. Rhodes'
  852
  will in respect of £1,000, not more—that when they established that fund there should be a considerable margin to meet contingencies over the bare money that is necessary to support these scholarships, and therefore the hon. Member is pushing at an open door; but if it will give satisfaction we are perfectly willing to undertake that when we establish the scholarship fund it shall be sufficient to maintain the scholarships which at present exist, including the scholarships to be substituted for the German scholarships under this Bill, and in addition that it shall be increased by a sum of money equal to the money which would have been paid to the German scholars from the beginning of the War until this scheme comes into action. I do not think the hon. Member can say we are mean after that. We meant to be frank. We always intended to do it, but it was not thought necessary to put some of these things down in the Bill. However, if the hon. Member wishes it, we give that undertaking.
  Mr. KING: Will you put it in the Bill?
  Mr. MACKINDER: Whether it goes into the Bill or not is, I think, a matter which the Chairman of Committees will consider. Personally I cannot help feeling that probably after this public undertaking given across the floor of the House it will be sufficient to leave the matter to the Trustees. They have shown that they are fully conscious of the responsibility of their duties. They have given a very generous undertaking, and it may be somewhat difficult to impose upon them in the exact wording of an Act of Parliament the duty which they intend to perform.
  The Noble Lord (Lord H. Cecil) has urged a change in the Bill, with which, on general principles, I have the very greatest sympathy. That we and the French, for instance, should make an exchange; that there should be an exchange between the Universities of Paris and Oxford, is an ideal which, personally, I have very much at heart, and against which I have absolutely nothing to say. But we have a practical question before us. The original' scheme of Mr. Rhodes, as contained in his will, was to establish scholarships for Anglo-Saxons—for members of this Empire and for the Americans. That is perfectly clear in the wording of his will, and in the allotment of the scholarships under his will. He fixed the particular Colonies which were to have scholarships, and only by a codicil—and I lay stress upon this

  853
  point—I believe as an after-thought, did he establish these scholarships for Germany. In establishing them he used these remarkable words:
  "The object is that an understanding between the three great Powers will render war impossible."
  The idea with which he established these German scholarships has been utterly and for ever broken. It is impossible to fulfil the idea which Mr. Rhodes had in mind, and which is placed on record in the codicil of the will establishing these German scholarships. There is no evidence that he had any general idea with regard to the whole world. His aim was simply to add to the scheme which he had created for the Anglo-Saxon world—for the British Empire and for our great cousin realm across the water. His aim was—some say after the magnetic influence of a visit one day to the Kaiser—to add to that scheme certain scholarships for Germany, with the idea, impossible now, that he would bring Germany into a league of peace with this Empire and America. The question is, What would Mr. Rhodes have done in the present situation? That is what the Trustees have had to set themselves to consider.
  What situation did we find? The Trustees have four schouarships a year to award. We found that Mr. Rhodes, with the number of scholarships that he had to give, had not been able to cover the whole of the British Empire. He had awarded scholarshops to each of the States of Australia and to each of the Colonies of South Africa which were then within the Empire, also to Quebec and Ontario, which he regarded as upper and lower Canada, and, curiously enough, to Jamaica and the diminutive possession of Bermuda. The Trustees found that they were in a very difficult position. The Canadian provinces not included in the scheme complained that they were ill-treated. They felt very jealous of the two provinces of Ontario and Quebec, and the Trustees, out of the residue which was left absolutely at their discretion by Mr. Rhodes, have, established eighteen new scholarships, to cover the provinces of Canada which were omitted from his will, namely, Prince Edward Island, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Manitoba, British Columbia and, as it was then, the North West. Since the scholarships were given the North West has been divided into two important provinces, the great and growing provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan, and great universities, universities with very digni-
  854
  fied buildings, and universities that are bound to become important in the west of Canada in the future, have been founded in Alberta and Saskatchewan. The Trustees felt that if that fact had been present to Mr. Rhodes he would undoubtedly have provided each of these great provinces with the scholarship necessary to put them on a par with the remaining provinces and States of the Empire.
  In South Africa at the present moment neither the Transvaal nor the Orange River Colony have a scholarship, because those two States were outside the Empire at the time when Mr. Rhodes made his will. We feel convinced, having the interest of South Africa deeply at heart, as is shown in every line almost of his Will, that one of the first things Mr. Rhodes would have done would have been to give scholarships, to complete his scheme, to those two Colonies which have so magnificently rallied to the Empire in its days of trial. There remains another anomally. It is a curious anomaly affecting the Crown Colonies—those great estates of the Empire which we must never forget. Mr. Rhodes, curiously, gave scholarships to Jamaica and Bermuda. I do not want to say one word against the scholarship for Bermuda. I am proud to tell the House that every Bermuda scholar is serving in the War. You cannot deprive any State of the Empire, however small, of its scholarship given to it under Mr. Rhodes's will. It would be an invidious, an impossible and an impracticable thing to do. Therefore, you can only correct these anomalies by giving fresh scholarships. It is a curious fact that Barbadoes, amongst the West Indian Colonies, has in Codrington College perhaps the most distinguished educational establishment in the whole of the West Indies. Trinidad, since the days of Mr. Rhodes, has been coming forward every day in importance, and now ranks as a rival of Jamaica. The feeling, of the trustees, therefore, is that they ought to correct the anomalies in the West Indies by giving an odd scholarship there. But they have only four scholarships to give. One goes to West Canada, two go to correct the anomalies in regard to the new Dutch Provinces in South Africa, and one to correct the anomalies in the West Indies. Thus, with the eighteen scholarships they have already given they will approximately have completed the scheme for the British Empire. They fell that in the present situation, when the Empire has come together as it never before was

  855
  brought together, we owe it to those whom Mr. Rhodes intended to benefit, and we owe it to the Empire, to see that we consider its requirements educationally before we consider any larger and more ambitious schemes beyond the Empire.
  We feel, therefore, that the House must realise how small is what we have to dispose of at the present moment—these German scholarships—and how necessary it is to deal out some sort of equity as between the different portions of the Empire. We feel, also, that the House will realise that, on the whole, the best thing is to dispose of the scholarships in the way proposed The hon. and gallant Gentleman (Colonel Yate) who has spoken on behalf of India, and who always represents the interests of India very happily in this House, has not quite realised the difficulty that would be in our way. In the first place I would like to say that the wording of Clause 4 does not in the least prevent the trustees from giving scholarships to India. It says:
  "Places within the British Empire."
  There is not the smallest reason why the trustees should not give scholarships to India, if for other reasons they think it desirable to do so, but I have shown that Mr. Rhodes did not originally contemplate that a scholarship should go to India. I have also shown that there are certain vacancies in the scheme at the present time as regards the Dominions of the Empire, and that it is desirable to fill those first. I would remind the hon. and gallant Gentleman that the trustees have a residuum to deal with, and there is nothing to prevent them considering India when they come to deal with the residuum, after they have been able to found the scholarship fund for the maintenance of the scholarships in existence or contemplated under this Bill. When the hon. and gallant Gentleman says that he thinks these scholarships might go round from one university to another, presumably to be given—tenable at Oxford always—to the University of Melbourne this year, to the University of Toronto next year, and to the University of Calcutta the following year, I think he does not grasp the conditions of educational organisation. I must repeat what I said just now, that anyone who knows educational organisation knows perfectly well that no scholarship begins to have its real effect upon education and upon the community until
  856
  it has been established for several years and awarded for several years. But there is a further danger. Mr. Rhodes had very definite ideas as to how his scholarships should be won. As to three-tenths they are awarded on the result of examination by examiners; as to five-tenths they are awarded by the votes of the fellow scholars of the proposed student in the school, because Mr. Rhodes wanted to get not merely bookworms, but young men who were likely to get on with their fellows and be useful and active in the world. As to the remaining two-tenths, they are to be awarded by the schoolmaster, who would consider whether the student is a person who seemed fit to play a part in public affairs in later life and be useful to the Empire.
  It is obvious when you take a system of awarding scholarships in that way you cannot follow a mere examination system which says that all universities can come and compete. More than that, if you put a highly complicated system of selecting scholars into operation, then you have got to establish a habit of doing the thing in the particular university in which the scholarships is awarded. Year after year the students have to know that they are to elect one of their number for that purpose. The schoolmaster has to know that he has to keep his eyes on the students to detect the qualities which Mr. Rhodes wanted. Great experience has been accumulated by the trustees and this great organisation, which they have established should not be interfered with unduly. The trustees have the greatest sympathy with the idea that some day or other they may be able to do something for India. But as things stand at the present moment they ask simply to have these German scholarships disestablished. The sooner it is done the better, because it takes a couple of years before we can get a new system into action, and what we want now is to correct the anomalies which exist in the Imperial system at the present moment. That is the only sound policy which the trustees could have proposed. As the matters which I have covered are practical matters and it is a practical question which is at issue, if anyone suggests, and it has been suggested to me, that the trustees might split up some of these scholarships and use them in some foreign countries in smaller sums—for instance, a Frenchman might come for a single year—then, if that is done, you will drive a coach and four through the whole scheme of Mr Rhodes'

  857
  Trust, because he has particularly laid down that the scholarships should be for three years, of a particular value, and awarded in a particular way.
  With regard to the Noble Lord's suggestion that the matter which he has put forward should go to the Committee, I do not want to seem unreasonable on the point. But the trustees are already bombarded from every part of the Empire and every part of the world. They have received applications, I am told, from fifty foreign places, let alone districts in the Empire. For instance, they have been asked to award a scholarship in Scandinavia because Scandinavia is specially cognate with this country; and in Argentina, and a very good case has been made out, because we are told that there is a large British colony there and that that colony is up against a system of schools which are said to number 200, which were subsidised by Germany before the War. There are applications from Italy, Japan, and Russia, and there have been many applications for scholarships made from France. All this is in connection with four scholarships a year which must be awarded in a way peculiarly adapted to British schools. I submit that it would help the trustees a great deal if in connection with these four annual scholarships the duty were not thrown upon them of considering foreign applications. There is nothing whatever in the will to prevent them from setting up foreign scholarships out of the residuum, and as that residuum is gradually made safe from the development of the estates in South Africa, probably they may be able to consider some such project. In the meantime, if the Committee does throw upon them the duty of considering foreign applications, that greatly increases the cost of the staff, and, I submit, to no real advantage. After all, if you force the trustees to consider the Allies—I forget how many we have at the present moment, but there is a considerable number—and the peoples whom we would desire to have as Allies who are also a considerable number, you would add to their duties and produce no benefit. Therefore, I ask the House to look at this with a practical mind and not throw upon the trustees unnecessary duties.
  The ATTORNEY-GENERAL (Sir F. Smith): I only rise because, in the first place, it has been suggested that there are various legal points upon which difficulties arise, arid, in the second place, as the House is aware, because the Attorney-
  858
  General is responsible for trusts in this country, and it might be thought in the circumstances that some advice was necessary as to the course to be taken in relation to this private Bill. The hon. Member who moved the rejection of the Bill raised a number of so-called legal questions in respect of which he invited me to give assistance. I hope that he will forgive me if I say that I think some legal friend of his must have been indulging in pleasantries at his expense. There is no difficulty of the kind in the law, and there is nothing done under this Bill which is not done every day in the Chancery Courts, and with which every Chancery lawyer is not familiar. The House may address itself to this question with the full knowledge that there are no legal difficulties of any kind involved.
  When we come to the question of principle involved, it is not necessary, I think, to deal with the somewhat extraordinary attack on the Bill which was made by the hon. Member who moved this rejection. The very powerful and persuasive speech of my hon. Friend who has just sat down makes it unnecessary to make any observations at all on the Bill, except this, that I hope that the trustees will be slow, if on educational grounds they have reached the conclusion that it would be wiser to place this sum of £150 a year in the residuum that has been so properly used in the past, to allow themselves to be persuaded to depart from that conclusions by considerations which they do not themselves believe in and which do not appear to possess any real weight. I think that the House is of opinion that there is only one matter which remains open for consideration. The Noble Lord the Member for Oxford University, who has a special right to speak on these matters, has suggested that at least it should be open to the Committee to consider the question whether or not the trustees should retain the discretion as to whether the allocation of these scholarships should extend to foreign countries. The only difference between the Noble Lord and my hon. Friend is that the trustees come to us and ask that the allocation of the scholarships shall be in the British Empire, and my Noble Friend would empower the trustees to retain in their hands a discretion on this point. It is quite evident that this is the only real point at issue emerged from the Debate. It is a very small point indeed, and the question is whether it should be discussed and decided here or upstairs.

  859
  On that my right hon. Friend the Chairman of Ways and Means, who speaks with so much authority on these questions, will make some observations to the House when I resume my seat. It is a very narrow point, and I do not think the House will have much difficulty in dealing with the matter.
  The CHAIRMAN of WAYS and MEANS: On the point which was last referred to by the Attorney-General, I just wish to say this, that in my view the proposal before the House of the hon. Member for Oxford University is one which the House would expect the Committee upstairs to consider at somewhat greater length than the House of Commons is able to do. I should have felt it my duty to resist the Noble Lord's Instruction if he had proposed to move it in a mandatory form—that is to say to order this Committee, without any further looking into the matter, especially in view of what we have just heard as to the practicability of his proposal—and it would have been my duty to advise the House to reject a mandatory Instruction of that kind. If the Noble Lord moved it in the form, "That it be an Instruction to the Committee that they have power, if they think fit, to amend Clause 4 of the Bill in that respect," then I and those who will be my colleagues on the Committee will, of course, approach the matter with an entirely open mind as between the Noble Lord and the hon. Member who has just spoken for the trustees on the question of the practicability of inserting some further words. I think the House might be content with that, and I only suggest the possibility of the House passing an Instruction of that kind because that might be a question where it would be open to the Committee to consider a departure of the kind proposed by the Noble Lord, in view of the original Bill and in view of the scope of the Bill to which the House is asked to give a Second Reading. For that reason the House and the trustees might be content with a limited form of the Instruction on the Paper, and it might be agreed to. I can only give the House the assurance that, if it instructs the Committee, they will properly look into the question and, I hope, arrive at a right conclusion upon it. With regard to the Instruction standing in the name of the hon. Member for North Somerset,
  860
  I am bound to resist the proposal for the reason that it is not desirable that it should be dealt with in the House, but should be entirely in the hands of the Committee. After the remarkable speech of the hon. Member for Glasgow, who has spoken for the trustees, we can see how well their duties have been carried out in the past, but he would be the very last person to suggest that there should not be any criticism of their method. At the same time, I am prepared to keep a careful and open mind on the questions raised in Debate by hon. Members who have spoken to-night.
  Mr. KING: With the leave of the House, I may be allowed, before I withdraw my Amendment, to say that I am extremely sorry that I had not heard the hon. Member for Glasgow before I made the remarks I did. I had some slight conversation with him, but the information and the explanation I have now received from him I should have been glad to have had before I rose. But I submit that we have had a very interesting and useful discussion upon this question, and if it had not been for the course I have taken I do not suppose that we should have had the advantage of it. I hope that the House will allow me to withdraw my Amendment, and to say that, so far as I am concerned, I am grateful for the discussion which I have caused.
  Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
  Question, "That the Bill be now read a second time," put, and agreed to.
  Bill read a second time, and committed.
  Mr. KING: We have already had remarks made upon the Instruction which stands in my name on the Paper, and which I do not propose to press. At the same time, may I suggest that the Chairman of Committees will consider whether it is possible to have some of the assurances which have been given considered in the form of Amendments. The standing of the trustees is so great and so high in connection with the trust that when they make a promise it is really something that we can rely upon. But, in the case of a trust which is going to last, we hope, for centuries, there should be arrangements made in the form of an Act of Parliament and not in the form of a pledge in the House. I hope, therefore, that, if possible, some assurance in connection with this matter will be embodied in the Bill.
  The CHAIRMAN of WAYS and MEANS: The hon. Member for Glasgow has already said that he would gladly leave it to the Committee to see how far, if at all, they would deal with the intentions of the trustees, and that words should afterwards be inserted in the Bill.
  Lord H. CECIL: I beg to move, the Instruction standing in my name on the Paper in the permissive form suggested by the Chairman of Ways and Means:—"That it be an Instruction to the Committee on the Rhodes Estate Bill that they have power to amend Clause 4 of the Bill, so as to make the scholarships substituted for those established, pursuant to the German codicil, available for students from such places, whether within or without the British Empire, as the trustees may from time to time at their discretion determine."
  Sir R. ADKINS: I beg leave to second the Motion.
  I must say that I have been impressed by what the hon. and learned Member opposite has said as to applications from all parts of the world and the interests of the four scholarships. The words which the Noble Lord suggests are to give the trustees a larger discretion in a trust of this kind. Some of us attach great importance to the maximum discretion being given to trustees of such great authority as these trustees are, and as their successors will no doubt be, and think it would be of advantage in the administration of an educational trust. I am sure the Chairman of Ways and Means and his colleagues will consider this point, which is held widely by persons interested in education. We do not put it beyond this, that we are grateful for the opportunity given, on the suggestion of my right hon. Friend, that this question may be considered upstairs.
  Sir H. CRAIK: This constitutes a very serious change in the general scope and object of the Bill, and a change that will give rise to considerable difficulties. No one looking at the will and its general scope has the least doubt as to Mr. Rhodes' general intentions. They were to found scholarships to attract to English universities men from all parts of the Anglo-Saxon Empire. The trustees are not able adequately to perform that duty, and they are now seeking for more opportunities of performing the work which lay at the heart of Mr.
  862
  Rhodes, and which is embodied in the general scope of his will. He did make an exception, as we all know, in regard to Germany, because he thought possibly the Anglo-Saxon notion of kith and kin might prevent war. The hon. Member for Somerset (Mr. King) has suggested that this is an early interference with the will of the testator. But interference with a will of a testator does not depend so much upon time as on the completely altered circumstances that have arisen since his death, and we are convinced that if Mr. Rhodes had been alive at this date he would not have put in his will that codicil assigning so many scholarships to Germany. That being cut out, as it must be under present conditions, we should keep as nearly as possible to the broad intention of Mr. Rhodes' will and get back to the general object of that will, which was to link together all parts of the Anglo-Saxon Empire by bringing them together at a university. It is all very well to say we are to go all over the world. If they are to do so, the pressure upon them becomes the greater, and they must exercise a discretion which it is difficult to exercise without drawing an invidious distinction. There will be heartburnings if we so extend the scope. The trustees do not ask us to extend it, and they are the best judges of the limitations of their powers and responsibilities. But I do not wish to oppose this compromise being accepted. I hope the Committee will look upon it with some care, and I really rather doubt whether, in the circumstances, it is not a dangerous Instruction to give the Committee, overriding as it does so completely the particular meaning and intention of the testator as expressed in his will.
  Sir P. MAGNUS: I am sorry I am not able altogether to agree with the hon. Member who has just spoken (Sir H. Craik). I was very much in favour of the Instruction which was proposed by my Noble Friend the Member for Oxford University (Lord Hugh Cecil); but after listening to the speech of the hon. Member for Glasgow (Mr. Mackinder), I felt there were great difficulties in the way of accepting the Instruction of the Noble Lord in the words in which it was phrased. I am very grateful to the Chairman of Committees for having said that the whole matter shall be considered by him and his colleagues, and I am quite

  863
  certain they will give full consideration to the observations that have been made by the hon. Member for the University of Glasgow (Sir H. Craik). One reason why I was prepared to support the Instruction of the Noble Lord was that I was very desirous indeed that these scholarships should, if possible, serve the purpose of establishing something like an educational entente between the Allies of this country and ourselves. It seemed it was really one of the objects of Mr. Rhodes to give some scholarship to a foreign university in order that students at that foreign university might have the arvantage of continuing their studies at Oxford University. That idea may have been in his mind, and might be carried out of the residuum of the estate if in time it should be found possible to grant some of the scholarships to some of our Allies. For that reason I am very grateful to the Chairman of Committees for having undertaken to consider this important question. There are negotiations now going on between our Allies and this country for establishing an educational entente such as I have referred to; and only this evening, just before this Bill came up for discussion, one of the members of a Committee which is taking great interest in the proposed entente asked me if anything could be done, under the Bill now before this House, to further that laudable object.
  Mr. MACKINDER: The Noble Lord has, as I understand, rather changed the form of his Instruction, and has made it permissible for the Committee to insert or not insert these words or some equivalent words. I should like to say this in reply to the right hon. Gentleman opposite. I feel there is a difference between the rights of the trustees in regard to the residual money, which are very indefinite, and words put in this Bill with regard to specific scholarships, which though they may not throw the duty on the trustees yet do imply that the trustees should consider in each case how to handle the matter. There is the distinction. In the one case they have moral or general rights as residual legatees to do certain things, but in the other case, in relation to a certain dozen specific scholarships, you impose upon them that they are to do one thing or the other. There is specific mention of outside or inside the Empire, and, therefore, there is imposed on them the duty of considering both the outside and the inside. These
  864
  words will be practically empty words. The policy of the trustees I have frankly indicated to the House, and the House has approved of it as far as I can gather. It is just a question whether it will be wise to hold out what one might call a half hope, which, in the nature of things and owing to the limitation of things in regard to these particular scholarships, is not in the least likely to be fulfilled. However, the Chairman of Committees speaks on these matters with great experience, and the Noble Lord is only expressing in this particular form an ideal which I have in common with him and with the hon. Member for the University of London, and in view of the fact that this is merely a direction to the Committee to consider whether these words shall be inserted or not, I do not wish to resist, on behalf of the trustees, what has been proposed.
  The CHAIRMAN of WAYS and MEANS: The hon. Member may rest assured that the Committee will have proper regard to the practical considerations which have been put forward.
  Question put, and agreed to.
  Ordered, "That it be an Instruction to the Committee on the Bill that they have power, if they think fit, to amend Clause 4 of the Bill so as to make the scholarships substituted for those established pursuant to the German codicil available for students from such places, whether within or without the British Empire, as the trustees may from time to time in their discretion determine."

  CONSOLIDATED FUND (No. 5) BILL.
  Postponed Proceeding resumed on Question, "That the Bill be now read the third time."
  Mr. PRINGLE: When the Debate was suspended I was calling attention to a case, which has been prominently before the public in recent weeks, arising out of the oppressive and arbitrary action of the War Office. I refer to the case of Mr. Bertrand Russell. This is not the first occasion on which I have spoken on behalf both of individuals and of newspapers who, in my view, have been oppressively and tyrannically treated under the Defence of the Realm Act. On a previous occasion I happened to be not in agreement with those on whose behalf I was speaking. I am in the same position on the present occasion. On the first occasion it was my

  865
  duty to defend the "Globe" newspaper. On the present occasion I am endeavouring to put the case of a man with whose views as to the origin of the War I profoundly disagree. It is true that Mr. Russell was convicted of an offence under the Defence of the Realm Act, and that in view of that conviction he was fined. Consequently he has been punished for his offence. But the War Office is not content that he should have purged his offence. Not only the War Office, but the Foreign Office are pursuing him vindictively even after he has purged his offence. The Foreign Office has declined to allow him to go to America to deliver at Harvard University a series of lectures which he had undertaken to deliver, and the War Office has interfered with another project which he had in view, to deliver in various parts of the United Kingdom a series of lectures on political philosophy. A question was put yesterday to the Secretary of State for War, whose absence to-night I very much regret, because I should have preferred that the defence of his department should have been in the hands of the right hon. Gentleman, who, of course, takes full responsibility for what is done there. The right hon. Gentleman stated yesterday that the War Office had taken this action because the lectures which Mr. Russell intended to deliver were likely to prejudice the manning of the Army and consequently to weaken the country in the prosecution of the War. On that answer I put a supplementary question. I asked the right hon. Gentleman on what ground it could be alleged that a lecture delivered in Glasgow was going to prejudice recruiting for the Army and weaken us in the prosecution of the War, while the same lecture could be delivered in Manchester without having any of those disastrous results.
  The Secretary of State for War is usually very well able to take care of himself in regard to supplementary questions, but on this occasion he was significantly silent. His silence I thinks proves absolutely clearly that he had no personal knowledge whatever of the grounds upon which action had been taken by his department. Had he known that they were guilty of such ridiculous folly as to prohibit a man from lecturing in Glasgow and Newcastle while he was allowed to deliver precisely the same lecture in Leeds and Manchester, I am sure that he would have personally intervened, and prevented his department from being involved in such a ridiculous proceeding. The right hon. Gentleman
  866
  in last night's Debate, in describing the action of his Department in the early stages of recruiting in Ireland, said that apparently the War Office had been guilty of stupidity which almost amounted to malignity. In this case the War Office seems to have been guilty of malignity which almost amounts to stupidity. No reason can be given for the action of the Government with regard to this man, except a spirit of petty persecution. If there were any real risk of his committing an offence, there would obviously be no ground whatever for treating him differentially in different localities. I am not making an appeal to the House on his behalf on the ground of the distinguished position which he occupies. I think that any man, no matter how humble his position, would equally deserve to have his case stated in this House if he were treated in the way in which Mr. Russell is being treated. But we cannot leave out of account in this matter that Mr. Russell is a man with a high reputation not only in this country; he has a European reputation. His reputation extends to America. The invitation to Harvard University proves the extent of his reputation, and the high value that is placed on the other side of the Atlantic upon his philosophical attainments. Surely if our Government are treating in this way such a man, whose work is known practically all over the world, it is not simply a question as affecting that individual; it is not simply that the War Office is guilty of an. act of petty oppression, but it is committing an act of petty oppression which is being advertised all over the world.
  Some hon. Gentlemen think that it is practically of no account what reputation we have in America, or in any other country, in regard to this War. I do not think that that is the view entertained by His Majesty's Government. We know that the Government have a Department whose duty it is to put to neutrals the case of this country in regard to the War, a Department whose object it is to disseminate all over the world not only information, but also arguments in relation to Great Britain's part in the War. Consequently our reputation in matters of this kind is a matter of consequence to the Government, a matter regarding which it has shown the highest concern. They, indeed, sent an emissary to America, Professor Gilbert Murray, in order to maintain the reputation of the Empire in that country. He was questioned about the treatment of Mr. Russell, and, in a letter which he

  867
  recently wrote to the Press, he said that the only answer which he could give to the American correspondent was that to him it was incredible. So you send Professor Gilbert Murray as an emissary to America in order to defend your actions both in foreign politics and in home administration, and the best defence he can offer to this great neutral country, of the same blood as ourselves, is that your action here is incredible. My hon. Friend near me, who has served under the War Office, informs me that he did not know the War Office. I am inclined to agree with him. We have heard a great deal about Prussian militarism. This action seems to me to embody the spirit of Prussian militarism. We in this country believed that if we indeed ran any risk of lapsing into the methods of Prussian militarism that we would not borrow its stupidities—that we at least would be saved from them by a sense of humour which has been denied to the Germans. Apparently, however, the War Office has not only borrowed the Prussian stupidity, but it is also quite destitute of humour. This is all the more surprising in the Department which is controlled by the present Secretary of State for War. It is one further reason for leading us to believe that he himself is completely ignorant as to what has been done in his own office. In making this appeal for a change in action on the part of our Government, I am not only making the appeal on the ground that they are acting oppressively and tyrannically to this individual—I am making the appeal still more on the ground that by actions such as this, which are known, not only here but throughout the world, you are lowering the prestige and tarnishing the credit of this Empire.
  The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the WAR OFFICE (Mr. Forster): The hon. Gentleman who has just sat down has expressed his regret that the Secretary of State is not here to make, I will not say a defence of the War Office, but to lay their case before the House. I can assure him that I share that regret to the full. The House, however, will understand that my right hon. Friend is absent on business.
  Mr. PRINGLE: I quite understand. I did not mean to reproach him.
  10.0 P.M.
  Mr. FORSTER: That explains the matter, and I think the House will realise
  868
  that I am not able to do more than to place a broad outline of the War Office case before the House. They will realise that the matter does not really fall within the sphere of the War Office work with which I am specially connected. I, therefore, throw myself in a large measure upon the indulgence of the House. The speeches which have been made in reference to the treatment of Mr. Russell, while they express views which are condemnatory of the War Office, have been couched in reasonable terms. In regard to that I have no complaint whatever to make. Hon. Members have put their side of the case with restraint and conviction, but if they will allow me to say so I think there is some mistake as to the treatment which Mr. Russell has received; that this aspect of the case has not been fully realised. I want to put clearly—I shall not attempt to do more—what has been done with Mr. Russell and why it has been done. It is represented to this House that he has been persecuted in a spirit of vindictiveness and prevented from delivering a series of lectures rather out of a spirit of hostility to himself than from motives of due regard to the public safety. I gather from the speeches which have been made that hon. Members below the Gangway entertain the opinion that Mr. Russell has been prohibited from delivering a series of lectures which he had undertaken to deliver. That is not quite the case. Some time ago Mr. Russell, in the course of the propaganda into which he had entered, made speeches and used language which, I think undoubtedly were hostile to the successful prosecution of the War. It was on that account, and because we were led to believe that he was contemplating a continuance of his propaganda, that he was prevented from entering prohibited areas. He came to the War Office subsequently, and when I say that I do not mean that he came himself—as to that I cannot speak—but at any rate it was represented to us subsequent to the prohibition that he had entered into an undertaking to deliver a series of lectures, and unless the prohibition were relaxed he would be prevented from giving that series. The War Office told him quite frankly that they were prepared to relax the prohibition if he would give an undertaking not to use the opportunity of his lectures as a method of pursuing his propaganda. I do not think that that was an unreasonable request to make.
  Commander WEDGWOOD: It ought not to have been at the discretion of a permanent official.
  Mr. ANDERSON: Did the prohibition refer to the whole country or only to certain portions of the country?
  Mr. FORSTER: The prohibition referred to certain areas. It was not directed to prevent Mr. Russell delivering his lectures. It was to prevent him going into prohibited areas for any purpose whatever. The result undoubtedly was to prevent him delivering his lectures. What I gather from the speeches which have been delivered is the idea that the prohibition was dircted against Mr. Russell for the purpose of preventing his lectures. That is not so. The prohibition was for the purpose of preventing him carrying on his propaganda.
  Mr. D. MASON and Mr. ANDERSONrose—
  Mr. SPEAKER: Perhaps the best thing to do would be to allow the Financial Secretary to make his statement.
  Mr. FORSTER: I want the House to understand quite clearly the fact I have just stated. Undoubtedly my right hon. Friend, in answering the supplementary questions, did inadvertently refer to the lectures which it was proposed to give, and not to the propaganda which we had reason to fear Mr. Russell proposed to carry on.
  HON. MEMBERS: Why was he not prosecuted?
  Mr. FORSTER: And that really is the only point I want to make. We have not pursued Mr. Russell in a spirit of vindictiveness in order to prevent him from giving his lectures. We have offered to relax the prohibition in order that he may deliver his lectures if he will give us an undertaking not to use the opportunity for propaganda. I do not think that it is an unreasonable request to make, and I think that my explanation puts the action of the War Office in a very different light. I turn to the question raised by my hon. and gallant Friend opposite (Mr. Ashley). He referred to certain matters relating to the Territorial Force. Those were purely military questions, and the hon. and gallant Gentleman said himself he had not given notice of his intention to deal with them. Therefore, I can do no more than say I will call the attention of my right hon. Friend to what he
  870
  said. He referred to one other question, namely, the apparent failure of the War Office to use a convenient railway station for the carriage of goods to the depot which we have established at Olympia. He pointed out that the railway is exceedingly convenient, but that, instead of bringing into and carrying from the depot the vast quantity of goods which are in course of transit by means of that railway, the goods are unloaded from a station some miles distant and carted to the depot. And then he was kind enough to say that he supposed it never occurred to anybody that we should make an effort to use the railway which is so conveniently placed for the depot. It may surprise my hon. and gallant Friend to know that one of the first things we did was to approach the railway company and to endeavour to get them to agree to allow us to make use of the passenger station, for it is a passenger station.
  Mr. ASHLEY: There are three sidings.
  Mr. FORSTER: But it is a passenger station. The railway company told us that it was quite impossible for them to allow such a thing to be done, and I do not think we are open to the charge of negligence which my hon. and gallant Friend seems to prefer against us. I think he rather suggested that we should approach the railway company again and see whether some arrangement could not be made even at this time of day. I am inclined to agree with him. Possibly conditions are different now, and I propose to see whether or not we can now get the railway company to allow us to make use of the station.
  Mr. ASHLEY: Is it not a fact that the Government now control the railways, and that it is not a question of asking the railway companies, but of ordering them.
  Mr. FORSTER: I am not sure we control the railways to that extent.
  Commander WEDGWOOD: I intended to rise this evening to speak on several subjects, but I wish to deal, first of all, with the question of Mr. Bertrand Russell. We have had an extraordinary statement from the Financial Secretary to the War Office. I suppose there are few people in this House who agree less than I do with opinions expressed by Mr. Bertrand Russell on the War, but I still happen to be a Liberal, and he is a Liberal. I hoped that this War was going to stamp out these party differences, but I cannot con-

  871
  ceive anything more likely to resuscitate the old party difference than the persecution of a man simply because he is a Liberal, and that is what it has been. I do not know how many Liberals there are in the Foreign Office who prohibit Mr. Bertrand Russell going to America, or how many in the "War Office who prohibit him speaking in this country, but I am quite certain there are very few of them. I am quite sure, after what one heard from the hon. Member for Waterford, that the attitude of the War Office towards those parts of the country with which they differ was accurately described by the Secretary of State for War yesterday. It is carried out not only against Ireland, but against the expression of Liberal opinion here. They should remember that, while at present opinions from which they differ may be in a minority, may be unpopular, the time will come when Liberal opinions will have their say in this world again. I have always maintained that when we were in the ascendant and when Conservatives and Socialists were in the minority, the only liberal way of treating hostile opinion was to give it full voice, to allow it to express itself, and let the people judge for themselves as to whether those views are good or bad. Even in wartime, I believe, the same principles will hold good.
  Just consider what this prohibition of this man lecturing in Glasgow has done. If he had gone to Glasgow to deliver his lecture on all those academic subjects he would have got an audience of about 200 faddists and scholars and cranks of the ordinary sort. Instead of that the lecture is read before an audience of thousands, with an ex-Lord Provost in the chair. That is what always happens when a stupid Government acts in this way. I know perfectly well at the present time that there is a very small minority of people who are pacificists, but if you want them to remain a small minority, the best thing is not to persecute them. It has always been the same. You created Christianity by persecution. Apart from all that, I do wish to impress upon the Financial Secretary to the War Office that permanent officials in other Departments have learnt the degree to which they can go in interfering with the people of this country. Now the permanent officials of the War Office have not yet learnt it. They have only recently come in contact with public opinion, and with the suppression or influencing of
  872
  public opinion, and the sooner they learn the ways of the permanent officials in other Departments the better. If you had a permanent official in the Board of Education sending for a man like Mr. Bertrand Russell and telling him the sort of lectures he could give on education, there would be a protest in this House such as would seriously affect the position of the Minister for Education. But we are seriously told by the Financial Secretary that when the War Office sent for Mr. Russell and asked him to give his word of honour that he would not introduce into his lectures something which is displeasing to the War Office, he had to accept it with due humility and to agree to give his word not to say anything which would be contrary to the interest of England. I would sooner trust Mr. Bertrand Russell as to what is to the interest of England than I would a permanent official. It is particularly invidious attacking him because he is a representative of the extreme Liberal view—a Liberal view that independence of thought and independence of action should be supported even in the most trying times. Of course he defends his point of view. I have been seriously told by people that he is a dangerous Anarchist. The public have said that of me too. It is the common form of denunciation of anybody who dares to think for himself and speak out without any thought of what other people will think of him. I did not want to raise this question, but really the attitude of the War Office towards him is perfectly intolerable in a free country.
  I pass on to the speech delivered by the Noble Lord the Member for Oxford University (Lord Hugh Cecil). The Noble Lord proposed, I am afraid to a very thin House, a scheme which he had carefully thought out and had already put before the authorities for dealing with this problem of the conscientious objector. We all know what a muddle the Government have made of the conscientious objector. The Noble Lord is not present, but he stated quite clearly that in his opinion the conscientious objector had got to be looked at from two particular points of view. We must satisfy public opinion that the people at the front are not suffering while the conscientious objector escapes scot-free by merely pleading his conscience. I think public opinion is right in that matter. There must be some approximation in regard to equality of sacrifice. It would not be fair to let a man off—very often the

  873
  man least anxious to do his duty—on the plea of conscience when he had not discovered that conscience before. There must be some sign that a man who pleads conscience suffers for that conscience. There must also be some definite proof that if these men are not serving in the trenches and running the risks of trench warfare they are paying for their views, giving some proof of their consciences and suffering for them, because those things are necessary if we are to have any sort of equality of sacrifice. The Noble Lord opposite said—and I agree with him—that the problem of dealing with the conscientious objector should be kept entirely out of the Army. The Army authorities are not the proper people to study conscience, especially when you have different courts-martial and different tribunals looking at the same problem from different points of view. It has been suggested that they should be offered non-combatant service, and I think a straightforward choice ought to be put to them instead of this absurd system of courts-martial, sentencing and resentencing and all that nonsense, which is seriously upsetting public opinion in the country. You would then have the problem dealt with in the way that would satisfy the men who are making their sacrifice at the front, and it would be a fair statement of the duty of a conscientious objector.
  I will pass on to another point which is seriously agitating the country, and that is the man-power of the country. How are we to get men for the Army? We have had the matter put forward by Sir William Robertson, and we shall have it brought forward in this House before long, and we shall have to deal with the necessity for getting more men for the Army. I want the House to understand that if they are going to get more men there are two principal points of view which they must bear in mind. The first is, that you must impregnate the people of this country with the idea that in getting more men you are acting justly. At present the feeling of the country is that this impressment of men is being done unjustly. They see all these exemptions, and every man wonders why he could not be exempted. There is a general feeling of injustice in regard to the present system. I have heard that nowadays a munition worker can be trained efficiently in five weeks, and the same could be said of a great many other trades in this country in which men are said to be indispensable, and are thereby given
  874
  exemption. If you raise the age from forty to forty-five and still allow young unmarried men of twenty, twenty-five, and thirty to escape public service, and to remain in this country making munitions at considerable wages while other men—the married and the elder men from forty to forty-five—are being sent off to serve for one shilling per day, you will raise such a storm of opposition that this War will become unpopular, and we shall not be able to carry out that destruction of Prussian militarism which we all desire. Therefore you must not raise the sense of injustice amongst the people and amongst those who are earmarked for the great adventure, which means to many of them losing their lives.
  I urge the Government, if they are to get more men, that they should bear in mind that they must take all the men up to a certain age. Take the farmers' sons, and do not let them get out of it any longer. Take the munition workers. Do not let them get out of it any longer. Take all up to a certain age, say, twenty-two first of all, and then gradually raise the age, and allow natural causes to readjust the industries of the country. Do not raise the age. See that the younger men go first, and gradually extend the age. Let it be a hard and fast system with which no tribunal can interfere and which no exemptions can touch. The age limit alone: let that be the criterion as to whether a man has got to go and risk his life or not. So much for the justice point of view. I emphasise it, because I think it is a most important point of view. The other point of view is equally important. If you are going to take men from forty to forty-five, you are seriously going to interfere with our last chance of paying for this War. At present we are carrying on. The men of forty and over are continuing the industries of the country. They are continuing the export trade; they are continuing the work in the mines and all those industries which are not only essential after the War but are also essential for the prosecution of the War itself. The men between forty and forty-five are more useful for carrying on the industries of this country than the men under twenty-five, whereas the men under twenty-five are more useful in the trenches than men of from forty to forty-five. It is absolutely essential to realise that to carry on the War successfully you have got to have

  875
  men for the Army, men to make munitions, and men to make the money to pay for the War, and, if you do not keep them all going pari passu you are going to find it extremely difficult to prosecute the War successfully to the end.
  There is another way in which you can get the men required for the Army. I have never had an answer yet as to why it is impossible to enlist black men. I have had countless letters from black men from South Africa, and even from East Africa, saying that they would welcome the chance of fighting for the Empire. At the back of their minds, I know, is the thought that if they are allowed to fight side by side with British troops the colour bar will disappear; they will be considered men, and be given the self-respect which it is so difficult for a black man to get when he is looked down upon as he is at the present time. We know perfectly well that we have in the British Empire the largest number of coloured fellow-subjects of any nation in the world. I have spoken of this before, and I do not want to reiterate indefinitely the arguments used. I will deal merely with the attitude of the War Office towards this question. I stated here in the House when I spoke on this question last that it would be possible to raise 100,000 black troops by next spring. I instanced the untapped resources not only of British East Africa, but also of German East Africa, which we have now conquered, of South Africa, and of Nigeria. Anyone who knows anything about those countries knows that by far the larger proportion of the available black population is in South Africa. In Nigeria you have about 13,000,000 black people who are sufficiently of a warlike character to be drawn upon. In British East Africa there are 2,500,000, and in German East Africa about 7,000,000. When this proposition was put before the War Office, what did they do? They wired out and asked how many black troops they could raise in British East Africa alone, stating that a minimum of 50,000 was required. Of course, you cannot get 50,000 from British East Africa alone. They took no steps whatever to deal with the question of South Africa. They did not approach the Union Government, nor did they deal with the question of Nigeria. When they found they could not raise 100,000 or 50,000 men in British East Africa, without dealing with the problem of German East Africa, they
  876
  dropped the whole question and no further steps were taken. Instead of that, they keep pegging away, saying we want men; we want white men; we want Conscription in Australia; we want Conscription in Ireland; we want to force the last white worker out of this country. I say that in this war of exhaustion it is our duty to see that everybody, black and white, play their part, to slow down as far as possible the rate of white killing, and to secure our object by every means in our power; whether it means breaking down the colour bar and the prestige of the whites, whether it means treating our black fellow subjects as well as if they were equals of ourselves. I have seen them fight. I know perfectly well that the Askiris of the East African Rifles fight as well as the best Indian troops, and I think better than some of those Indian troops. I would not fear in the least fighting with a brigade which had a coloured regiment. The French are using those troops, and they have one coloured battalion in a brigade or one coloured regiment in a division, I forget which. They mix them, and they find the plan works. Our case is even stronger than that. At present we have an enormous number of troops in Mesopotamia, Egypt, India, troops which are, more or less in the position of garrison troops, and which have not got active operations. Surely the work of garrisoning Egypt, India, possibly Mesopotamia, even East Africa, might be done by those coloured troops whom we have seen fighting, and as well by them, and more cheaply, to the Empire. I do think it is the duty of the War Office, before they come to this House and demand a further sacrifice from the men of this country, and demand the raising of the age, that they should take into account the black population of this Empire which is only waiting to be asked and for which no conscription is necessary, and which would facilitate this man-power problem we are considering at present.
  When we are on man-power I wish to deal with one other subject. Everybody here knows that there are in this country a great number of men in khaki who are not fighting Every hospital has masses of able-bodied white orderlies in khaki, all over the country you have reserve battalions, a permanent staff of officers who have not been to the front, and you have men who have been wounded and come back from the front put into those battalions. And you have those officers

  877
  thrusting those men back to the front again long before they want to go. What do you think is the attitude of those men who see themselves driven back by those officers? I have heard of a case in which men were told "the English air does not agree with you "and who were sent back to the front, and who were told that by officers who have not been out and are not going out. What we want is a comb that will send officers out who are able and fit and ought to go out, but who, through some appointment at home, are still resting here and are actually sending out to the frightful Somme front men who have been out before and who have been wounded and who are only too glad to get a bit of rest in this country. What is really wanted is a small committee to go through with a comb all the units of men and officers who are stopping behind in this country and to see whether there is not there a well that can be drawn upon to increase our man-power at the front. There is not a Member of this House who could not put his finger on numbers of men in uniform, either serving as mess-men or orderlies, or in countless other capacities, who ought to be available for work at the front, whose work could perfectly well be done by wounded men who ought to have a chance to live before going back to be wounded again, and whose work might even be done by the women in this country who do clerk's work every bit as efficiently as the men in uniform themselves. I point towards these two sources. I point towards the further employment of coloured troops and towards the combing-out of that vast army of people behind the lines here at home, aye, and behind the lines in France too. I ask the War Office to make a thorough use of these two sources before they come to this House and ask for the raising of the age and before they comb out those who are engaged on necessary work of trade and transport and are earning the money with which to win the War. I hope the Financial Secretary to the War Office will bring this question firmly forward at the War Office, and not to press it as the expression of opinion of a solitary Member of Parliament, because from the letters I receive and from the people to whom I speak I know these two questions bulk very largely in the public opinion of the day, and if we are to carry the War to a successful conclusion we must have public opinion behind us in these matters and not fly in the face of it.
  The SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. Herbert Samuel): The earlier part of the speech of my hon. and gallant Friend (Commander Wedgwood) has brought me to my feet to supplement the remarks of my hon. Friend the Financial Secretary to the War Office on the case of Mr. Bertrand Russell. I know it is a matter in which many Members of this House, and many people outside, are interested. Mr. Russell is a man of very great intellectual distinction, and I myself feel it is very unfortunate that he should have come into conflict with the Government at the present time when the country is engaged in war. Although the Order made against him, which has been the subject of discussion, is an Order made by the War Office entirely on their own responsibility, the earlier stages of the matter come under the cognisance of the Home Office, and it is on that ground, perhaps, that I am entitled to speak upon it. The first event that occurred was the issue of a leaflet called "Two Years' Hard Labour," I think by the No-Conscription Fellowship or by some allied body, which was not known to be from the pen of Mr. Bertrand Russell, and the distributors of which were prosecuted in various parts of the country by the police for an offence under the Defence of the Realm Act. The gravamen of the leaflet was not that it described the sentences inflicted upon conscientious objectors and complained of them. The reason why that leaflet was prosecuted was that it ended with an appeal to others to do the same, and to resist the operation of the Military Service Act.
  The attitude the Government took up with respect to that matter when the Military Service Act came into operation was explained by me to the House on more than one occasion. We did not quarrel with the action of anyone who assisted conscientious objectors in claiming the rights that were granted them by Parliament under a Section of the Military Service Act. We did not quarrel with anyone who complained of unfair treatment being meted out to individual conscientious objectors. There were no prosecutions of any kind for any reason of that sort. But we did quarrel with, and we did prosecute, persons who were engaged in a campaign really directed at the manufacture of new conscientious objectors. While the nation as a whole was engaged in a

  879
  propaganda for the recruiting of soldiers there were certain individuals who were engaged in a campaign for the recruiting of objectors, and those two were incompatible with one another. The distributors of this leaflet were prosecuted because the leaflet fell clearly within that class of propaganda, and several of them were convicted and were penalised. Then Mr. Bertrand Russell wrote a letter to the "Times" in which he stated very frankly and honourably that he himself was the author of that leaflet. Obviously and necessarily a prosecution had to take place. Suppose it had not taken place, hon. Members below the Gangway and others would have said, quite rightly, that, while the Government were prosecuting obscure and humble individuals in different parts of the country for circulating a particular leaflet, the man who publicly avowed that he was the author of the leaflet was allowed to remain immune, and it would have been suggested that that was on account of his position and of his intellectual reputation. I am sure hon. Members below the Gangway who have taken up this case will agree that, if a prosecution lay against the distributors of the leaflet, the other prosecution had to lie also, and there was no question of the persecution of any individual on that ground.
  The next thing that occurred was that Mr. Bertrand Russell endeavoured to continue the propagation of this leaflet by reprinting a report of the proceedings before the Court, which embodied the speech of the prosecuting counsel, prosecuting counsel having, of course, read out the whole of this leaflet. It was obvious that the leaflet itself having been condemned by the Court, and the Court having held that it ought not to be circulated, the Government could not allow a pamphlet to be circulated which embodied the leaflet, even though the ostensible purpose was to report the speech of the prosecuting counsel. That was the next form of Mr. Russell's activities. He was not further prosecuted for that, but the pamphlet, wherever it was found, was seized and suppressed. I am not sure about the chronological order of these events as I had no intention whatever of speaking on the subject, and I have not referred to the papers, but not long afterwards Mr. Bertrand Russell went to Wales and addressed a considerable meeting at Cardiff, not on matters of philo-
  880
  sophy, not on matters of sociology, but on the War, and he made a speech which I read, and which could only be described as vehemently anti-British. He gave vent to sentiments which one reads reechoed in the English press from Berlin, but which I do not think I have read from persons in this country. That speech could undoubtedly have been made the subject of a prosecution. The case was carefully considered whether or not a prosecution should lie there, but other events followed, and it was because we did not wish it to appear that we were persecuting Mr. Russell after he had been prosecuted and convicted not long before, that we decided that, on the whole, it was advisable not to prosecute him for that particular speech, in addition to which we always had to take into account the fact that each prosecution gives further publicity very often to the statements which are made the object of the proceedings. Then Mr. Russell desired to go to America shortly before or after the Cardiff meeting to give a series of lectures. We had reason to believe that while no doubt he was proceeding to America in order to give the lectures, when in America he would be carrying on a similar propaganda to that in which he was engaged at Cardiff; that he would use his position and his reputation in the sphere of philosophy and in the more abstruse realms of mathematics to propagate views with regard to the War, with regard to the efforts of this country, and with regard to our objects in fighting to influence American public opinion against this country. He was asked whether he would give an undertaking, if he were given a permit to go to America to give lectures at Harvard, not to engage in anti-British propaganda—propaganda which might reasonably be regarded as hostile to or as hindering and hampering the efforts of this country in the prosecution of the War. He refused to give that undertaking.
  Commander WEDGWOOD: Was that in writing?
  Mr. SAMUEL: I do not think there was any correspondence. It was done verbally as far as I remember. Had he given that undertaking he would have been allowed to go to America, because, as an honourable man, his word would have been frankly and readily accepted. Next, we had information that he was about to proceed to the camps in

  881
  which conscientious objectors were set to work under the auspices of the Committee presided over by my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary for Home Affairs (Mr. Brace), with a view to creating agitation and disturbance there, and to upset, as we believed, the work of the Committee. It was then that the War Office intervened and made the Order prohibiting him from going into the prohibited areas, because in those areas almost all the camps are situated, and they included South Wales and other parts of the country in which his activities might be particularly mischievous. That was the propaganda which the Secretary of State for War had in mind when he said that Mr. Russell's lectures—not the series of lectures referred to to-day, but the lectures which he gave in South Wales, and which we believed he intended to give in the conscientious objectors' camps—were detrimental to the Army and to the efforts of this country in the War. That is the whole story. That is what led up to the Order and to the refusal of the permit to go to America. Mr. Russell has been told again and again that if he would give an undertaking to cease from this kind of propaganda here or in America he could at once be given the fullest liberty to deliver lectures on philosophy, sociology, or any other subject he wishes, without the smallest desire on the part of the Government to interfere with his freedom.
  Commander WEDGWOOD: Would you give such an undertaking?
  Mr. TREVELYAN: Can the right hon. Gentleman tell us what is the kind of propaganda to which objection is taken? Can he read out a few of the phrases to which objection is taken?
  Mr. SAMUEL: I cannot read out any phrases because I have not got them.
  Mr. TREVELYAN: Hear, hear!
  Mr. SAMUEL: I have not got them at hand. I remember them well, but I should he sorry to repeat them, because it would give additional publicity to them. I do not want to re-echo them. Whenever anyone speaks in this House, he speaks in the presence of the Reporters' Gallery, which is the most powerful sounding-board in the world, and I do not wish to give a wider publicity to Mr. Russell's observations. The hon. Gentleman (Commander Wedgwood) asks whether I would give such an undertaking. If I had been prose-
  882
  cuted and fined for an offence of this character; if I had narrowly escaped prosecution on another occasion, and if there was good reason to believe that I was about to continue activities of that character, I think the Government would be doing less than their duty if they did not ask me to give an undertaking of that character before letting me loose to carry on my activities in the United States.

  TRADING WITH THE ENEMY (WINDING-UP FIRMS).
  Sir H. DALZIEL: Before this Debate closes I desire to address one or two questions to the Government upon another branch associated with the conduct of the War. I refer to the question of the winding-up of enemy firms trading in this country. I want to invite the Government to tell us why—in my opinion, at all events—there has been such great delay, and I want to provide them with the opportunity to put forward any defence which they have to make. Many people have expressed surprise that up to the present not one single German firm in this country has been wound up to completion. I confess that I am not in the least surprised. I remember when the Bill was passed six or eight months ago that gave the Government power to carry out this administrative act, it was only after eighteen months that some of my Friends and myself induced the Government to take power to deal with this matter. They would not take the power themselves, and they were only forced by public opinion to act in this matter. I say, therefore, that I am not surprised that they have shown such little vigour in using those powers. I remember my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary, when we had the last Debate on this subject, saying that he was sure they would all agree that it was a very distasteful thing to have to carry out that policy, and I am sorry that our expectations daily are being fulfilled. But I regard this as a very serious matter indeed. I am referring not to firms which have a small enemy alien interest, but firms which are overwhelmingly German and which were allowed by the graciousness of the Government to continue business as usual for the first eighteen months of the War. According to the latest statement on the subject there were 275 enemy alien businesses under control and 333 cases in which winding-up orders had been issued, and

  883
  there is not a single case in which the winding-up process has been completed. The vast majority of these firms are continuing to-day. They are doing business. A very considerable portion of them are taking orders for a very long time ahead, and really to some of them the winding-up order or the control of the Board of Trade, as the case may be, is an advantage, because they can now boast, as some of them have done, that they are carrying on business in association with the Board of Trade.
  These firms, in the most case are being carried on not in British interest, but in German interest, and on balance it will be the enemy who will gain from the business which is now being carried on in certain cases. My hon. Friend will no doubt tell me that there is a full and satisfactory answer to the criticism which I am making. He will tell us that there is the question of the book debts, that these have got to be collected, and that, therefore, we cannot finish the winding-up process until the last book debt has been collected. I submit with all deference that that is no answer. There is never a company of which you can collect the last debt. That is why the law of the country, in cases in which a winding-up process is carried out, gives great power to the Courts, and authorises action which the liquidator may take in regard to the more expeditious winding-up of a particular company, and if controllers or liquidators at present were anxious to wind-up the business of any particular firm, all they have got to do is to go to the Court and state the circumstances of the case, and no reasonable request would be refused. When there are a few debts on the books it is quite possible and quite customary to sell the debts, to invite outside persons to say how much they will give for them, and in that way close the liquidation. If the Government are going to wait until the very last debt has been collected on behalf of these German firms the War will be over—and I am no optimist with regard to the cessation of the War—before these firms are to any great extent wound-up. I would ask my right hon. Friend whether any communication has been made, direct or indirect, to the controllers and liquidators of these firms to expedite their work as speedily as possible? I venture to say no communication whatever has been made. The result is that the controllers and liquidators are masters of
  884
  the situation. We want some one above them—a controller of the controllers and liquidators—who will hurry up these matters with the least possible delay. There are great and valuable officers at the Board of Trade, more valuable, perhaps, than there are in any other Department, and it is impossible for them to give the time necessary for matters of this kind day by day and hour by hour with the many other matters to which they have to give their attention. They should be dealt with in a separate and independent Department. Why is it that this long delay has taken place? Up to this moment, after two years and three months I challenge him to deny that not one German firm in this country has been officially wound up in accordance with the wishes of the House. It is quite different in Germany, where there was only one British company not wound up soon after the War. Persons have been nominated in all parts of the country as controllers, and some of them have very little knowledge of liquidation duties. I suggest that is one reason. I suggest another. Will my hon. Friend tell me whether these persons are paid by fee according to the magnitude and character of the firms they are called upon to liquidate? I assert that they are being paid by the hour. These men are working possibly months, possibly years, and they are paid so much an hour at the present time. If that is the case, I do not think that is the sort of thing which will carry on with undue rapidity the work for which they have been appointed. I can quite understand, if men are paid by the hour, that the thing is likely to run a good deal longer than would be the case if they got a bonus or premium, according to the shortness of time in which they are occupied in completing the work thrown upon them. I know that the system of payment by the hour exists in some cases, a system which is calculated to prolong the liquidations, because, human nature being what it is, there is no particular reason why it should be otherwise. You have got to revise the whole arrangement, and offer an inducement to these men to complete their work with the least possible delay. Do the Government realise how seriously people throughout the country regard this matter? We see at the present time the heads of British businesses being forced by the law of this country to join the ranks of the Army, while, on the other hand,

  885
  Germans, some of them naturalised and some unnaturalised, are allowed to carry on their business and snatch and capture the very business which these Englishmen have had to give up in order to fight for their country. I cannot understand how a Government supposed to represent the country and all parties should approach this matter in the way they have. There is far too much tenderness in almost every Department of the Government for Germans naturalised or unnaturalised. There is evidence of it in the slowness with which they come to a decision or do anything at all. In the winding-up of businesses and the internment of alien enemies it has been difficult to get the Government to move in what we believed vital matters connected with the winning of the War. We fail to understand why this should be so. There is no getting the Government to move in what we believe to be a vital matter in connection with the winning of the War. There has been too much tenderness. There has been no driving power—no proper supervision in regard to this matter. If the Government meant business as they profess to do these firms would all have been wound-up by the present time.
  There is an associated question—that of the continuance in our midst of German banks. This is, I understand, a matter not directly under the Board of Trade but more one for the Treasury. We have three German banks allowed to do business to this day in our midst after two years and three months of war. I think it is a disgrace. The banks are run by a German who is day after day in the manager's office doing business, surrounded, in one case to my knowledge, by German clerks. It was only as a result of frequent protests in this House that we forced the Government to intern the Germans employed in two banks—or rather some of the number so employed. The excuse of the Government was that these men are necessary, after two years of war, to carry on German business in a German bank, under a German manager, in the City of London ! In my opinion, that was a very weak excuse. It is said that these men have a knowledge of the business of the bank and its various ramifications which make it necessary to retain them. But the same applies to hundreds of thousands of businesses in this country the principals of which are interned at the present moment. We are a lenient people. I do not know if the House is aware there are many men interned at Islington who
  886
  are allowed once a week to see the principals of the firm with which they are associated, and the clerks who used to serve them, and to discuss with them matters of vital importance to the business. Why was that not possible with regard to the German banks. Why could not the clerks who have knowledge of the business in the City of London have been interned and, if necessary, consulted on matters of vital importance? No, it is a case of tenderness again—tenderness with regard to banks. I do not know whether the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster is going to say anything on this to-night. I hope he is not going to say that they have appointed Sir William Plender—a man of very high standing—and that he is responsible for the carrying on of the banks, and that therefore the Government have no responsibility. But the question of the clerks employed in the carrying on of these banks by Germans is really not a matter for Sir William Plender. It is the responsibility of the manager of the bank. He is a German, and he is allowed to continue in that position by the gracious permission of the Government. The right hon. Gentleman must not seek to ride away on the popularity and ability of Sir William Plender. It is the Government who are responsible. It is the German manager of the bank who is responsible for the German clerks employed, and Sir William Plender has no direct responsibility in the matter.
  11.0 P.M.
  I should like to ask a fourth question. Is it true the German clerks who have been interned are allowed full salary while British clerks fighting at the front have had their allowance reduced by 50 per cent.? I hope I shall get an answer to that question. Then, again, German banks are employing German brokers. If they have shares to sell they go to alien firms—one member of which changed his name a short time ago to an English name. The banks, in fact, are still allowed to go to the friends of German firms and carry through transactions on the Stock Exchange. We had a precedent in Germany in regard to this matter, and I say the whole story with regard to German firms and German banks has never been properly explained to this House. I say to the Government, "Get a move on at last in regard to this matter. Let the British public believe that you are sincere, because unless some action is taken, unless public opinion is

  887
  satisfied, all these things will drag on until the War is practically over, we shall have all the German clerks and managers coming back, and the business they had before will again be centred in their hands."
  The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the TREASURY (Mr. McKinnon Wood): The only subject which affects the Department that I represent is the winding up of the German banks, and in regard to that the statement is a very plain and simple one. In the early days after the outbreak of War—in August and September, 1914—the Home Office issued orders dealing with the winding up of the German banks. The broad principle upon which those orders proceeded was that no new business at all was to be undertaken by those banks. The sole business was to be the winding up of transactions that were proceeding when the War broke out. With regard to one of these banks, one of the most important, the Deutsche Bank, that process, I am told, is practically completed. With the others great progress has been made. I want to make it perfectly plain to my right hon. Friend that the licence of these banks extended only to transactions that were proceeding at the time, and the business of the Receiver who was appointed, Sir William Plender, was to collect the assets and deal with the liabilities. In the cases where payments were due from the banks to British subjects or Allies or neutrals, it was the duty of the Receiver to pay the sums over. Where the liabilities were due to enemy subjects, when they were known persons, the money went to the Public Trustee, and the surplus assets of the banks were paid over on account of the Treasury to the Bank of England. That is the whole process that is going on. Just before the outbreak of War there were 363 enemy alien subjects in these banks. That number has been reduced to nine, and it is about to be reduced to seven.
  Sir H. DALZIEL: That was the same six months ago.
  Mr. McKINNON WOOD: A certain number of persons who had special knowledge of the business, on the advice of those responsible for the winding-up of the banks—I am sure my right hon. Friend will see nothing remarkable about that fact—had to be retained, because banking business is not a thing that can be carried on without a certain amount of knowledge. As to the amount of time
  888
  occupied, I do not suppose that that will surprise anybody who is accustomed to banking business. These banks were doing business all over the world. Naturally, the collection of debts due to the banks and the winding-up of business with persons in all parts of the world takes a certain amount of time. Under circumstances like these commercial people are not in a hurry to deal with the business. I confess I do not see anything remarkable in the fact that the winding-up of these banks, with their large, extended, and complicated transactions, should have taken a couple of years. That winding-up was necessary to the interests of the British, Allies, and neutral creditors. It is not quite fair to represent it as a case of carrying on German businesses. To express it accurately it should be described as a case of winding up German business. Under that heading I hope my right hon. Friend is satisfied, for I submit to the House that he really has no very substantial ground of complaint. The only other point is that of the salaries. I cannot at present give my right hon. Friend that information, as I did not know the question was going to be raised.
  Sir H. DALZIEL: I mean the salaries of the men employed by the bank and interned as against the Britishers who have been forced to go to the front. In the one case they are paid in full, whilst the British only receive a portion of their wages.
  Mr. McKINNON WOOD: Really, I could not possibly be expected to reply to that offhand?
  Sir H. DALZIEL: I will put a question on the Paper.
  The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the BOARD of TRADE (Mr. Pretyman): In answering the rather strongly-worded accusation that the right hon. Gentleman has made against the Board of Trade for not having done the duty laid upon it by Parliament under the Trading With the Enemy Act passed at the beginning of the year, I should like, before I deal with it, to note what clearly it was that we had to do. This was perfectly clear. It was to get rid of enemy control and of the enemy element in our trade, in the trade interests of this country. We have not wasted time in doing that. It is a different matter altogether when the suggestion is made that the duty laid by Parliament upon the Board of Trade was confiscation of enemy

  889
  property. That is a policy which has not been approved by Parliament, either in this War or in any other war in which we have been engaged. Parliament, of course, may adopt that policy if it thinks fit. It has not thought fit so far, and it has not laid that duty upon the Board of Trade.
  There is another point which perhaps I also should make clear: That when the vesting of this enemy property, which has to be vested either in the controller for winding-up or in the custodian for the purpose of sale, comes to be dealt with at the end of the War, it will be dealt with as an asset belonging to this country, and as an asset which will be of value in bargaining whatever terms of peace may be decided upon. It must be subdivided into two parts. First of all, there is the actual capital belonging to the enemy subject or enemy which has been vested as such; and, secondly, any profits that have accrued whilst it has been in the hands of either the controller or the custodian. These two are kept separate. I understand that the legal position is that the question of these two assets is quite different. It will be quite open to Parliament or the Government after the War to treat these two assets on a different basis—the asset which was the actual value of the enemy's property at the time it was vested, and the asset which arises out of profits earned during the time when the property was vested. And it does not necessarily follow at all if it should be decided that the capital sum should be returned or exchanged against British property which has been in the enemy's hands, that the profits which have been earned on that capital would similarly be returned. I cannot say, nor can anybody say, what exactly would be done with them; but I want to make clear that one does not necessarily follow the other, and it would be perfectly open to this House or the Government to decide what should be done either in the one or the other case.
  I will state exactly what we have done. The right hon. Gentleman said perfectly correctly that I stated, in answer to a question yesterday, that 330 orders have been made for winding-up. Then the right hon. Gentleman waxed very eloquent on the fact that, as he stated, in no case had the winding-up been actually completed. That sounds a very serious indictment. May I suggest to him it does not really matter whether the winding-up
  890
  is actually completed, so long as we have the assets sold and wound up in that sense? Let us take the case of a company which has been dealt with under a winding-up order. The assets consist, say, of a factory and stock-in-trade, and certain other substantial assets have been disposed of and bought by British producers, but the actual final order of release, the settlement of the winding-up, is not completed because there are certain debts which have not been collected, there are certain creditors who have not been able to give satisfactory proof of what their claims are, and in some cases there are even actions pending which may have to be settled. Therefore the actual completion of the winding-up has not been decided. What happens? Suppose the War comes to an end, what is there left?' A few book debts. Is that a very important matter?
  Sir H. DALZIEL: You are incurring great expense all the time.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: No; we are not paying by time, in that it will cost more because it takes six months to clear up instead of three. We are paying on the amount of work done, which is calculated on the amount of time it actually ought to take to do the work, and I do not think that is a very bad system. It is a system which is adopted by the Courts. We pay for actual work done, and it is quite obvious that if you have a percentage scale these cases vary very much. In some cases the difficulties are extremely great and involve a great deal of work, while in others it may be comparatively simple, and to pay on a percentage scale, regardless of the amount of labour entailed on the controller or the Public Trustee, would obviously be unfair. Therefore we pay for actual work done. There is no advantage in spreading the work over.
  In answer to the question put to me, I said that in a considerable number of cases the assets had already been sold, and the hon. Member for Brentford asked me if I would get the number. I can now give the number. In 165 cases out of 330 the assets have already been sold and disposed of, and therefore all that is left is a certain number of small items which may take some time to complete, but which is quite immaterial. Therefore practical results have been obtained, assets disposed of, and to all intents and purposes the winding-up is completed. My hon. Friend asks: Why cannot we take

  891
  some drastic process and get an order of the Court to deal with these cases on a different basis to that of ordinary winding-up cases? If we did that we should come directly up against the other principle that we may run the risk of confiscating private property without any good national reason. The line I suggest is, when we have vested the property in a controller for winding-up and disposed of all the material assets, we have got rid of the enemy interest in our trade and control, and nothing can restore it. The only thing that could restore enemy control over our business would be this: If when the end of the War came a large proportion of these businesses were not woundup to the point at which the assets have been disposed of, and if it were decided that all assets in the hands of the controllers should be restored to their original owners, then enemy control would be resumed over those businesses where the assets had not been realised. For that reason we have done all we can to accelerate this, and my right hon. Friend is perfectly wrong in saying that nothing has been done to accelerate this process. A few weeks ago an urgent Circular was sent to all the controllers, asking them to accelerate the winding-up of these businesses. We are in constant communication with the controllers, and every exertion is made to complete this process as quickly as possible.
  I submit that it is much less important to get a number of actual clearing orders than to maintain the principle that we are not to confiscate private property. The Board of Trade are anxious to leave no stone unturned in order to get rid of enemy control of our trade. I repudiate any suggestion that we have been lax or slack in carrying out that principle. May I express the debt of gratitude we are under and the House is under to the Committee who have spent endless hours for which they have not been paid in investigating these innumerable cases, and who have given invaluable advice to the Board of Trade. In every case we have been guided by their advice. The suggestion of my right hon. Friend is that we have taken longer than is necessary in winding up these businesses. In this connection it may be interesting to notice these figures. The number of ordinary winding-up orders of British businesses made in the year 1912 was 151.
  Sir H. DALZIEL: There was no War in 1912.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: That is exactly my point. My right hon. Friend does not seem to appreciate my points. There is a War now and that necessitates our getting rid of the enemy control. We are doing this as rapidly as we can, and we have got rid of it absolutely in 165 cases already. But we do not want to deal on a War basis at all with the other part of the problem. I hope that we shall not take as long, but it is only fair to point out what a long process winding-up is in the normal course. Five out of the 151 cases were completed in six months, thirty-three were completed after another six months, twenty-six after eighteen months, twenty-three after two years, thirteen after two and a-half years, eleven after three years, and forty are still outstanding.
  Sir H. DALZIEL: Are these private liquidations?
  Mr. PRETYMAN: They are liquidations which began in 1912. I merely give them to illustrate the time it takes normally to complete the winding-up, We have succeeded already in the few months that we have dealt with them in winding up practically half of the 330, and, in addition, orders have been made in 70 cases vesting the enemy interest in the Public Trustee for the purpose of selling it to a British purchaser. That is under Section 4 of the Act. There, when you have once sold the property, you have got rid of the enemy interest altogether. You cannot, however, sell the property until you find a purchaser, and we had this difficulty. It is not always easy to find a purchaser at a satisfactory price, and we do not feel justified in selling at a knock-out price, nor do we feel justified in selling at a very low price to a British subject merely because before the War he was a partner with a German. We take the view—and I believe it will be accepted by the House—that these assets are not being vested for the benefit of any particular individual, but are a national asset. It frequently happens that you have a firm, three parts of the interest in which at the time the War broke out belonged to an enemy subject, and the remaining fourth part to a British subject. We vest the enemy share, 75 per cent. in the Public Trustee for the purposes of sale. We are perfectly prepared to allow the British partner, if he can afford to do so and is willing to pay the full value, to purchase, but it

  893
  would not be fair to allow him, simply because he had been in partnership with a German before the. War, to have the property at a knock-out price, and therefore get an advantage over his trade competitors. Where he cannot pay the full value of the property vested in the custodian, and where no other British purchaser can be found to give fair value for it, he is allowed to pay back to the Public Trustee the share of the profits which would accrue to the enemy subject's capital, and to enter into an arrangement of a permanent character by which he can repay the whole of the capital by instalments over a period of years. So that at the end of the War, if it was decided that the interest should revert to the enemy subject he would not be a creditor who could come down on the old British partner and break him by demanding the whole of the money, but he would come under the permanent arrangement made by the Public Trustee and would only be entitled to receive payment under the arrangement made with the British subject which the British subject would be able to carry out without his business being ruined. The object of that arrangement is that we should not give that particular Englishman an advantage because he was in partnership with a German, and on the other hand that he should not be at a disadvantage and should be treated on fair lines. Those are the principles on which we act, and I do not think my right hon. Friend will object to them. I should like to challenge the statement that he made that German interests of firms go on making profits. They do nothing of the kind.
  Sir H. DALZIEL: Some of the banks have done it.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: My right hon. Friend was not referring to the banks. From the moment these properties are vested for winding-up or for sale the assets of enemy subjects or enemies, those who have previously controlled those businesses have no say in the matter of any sort, description, or kind. The only people who then have any say are the custodians or controllers, and any British subject who had previously been associated with the business. I will not admit there has been any delay of any description that could be avoided in carrying out orders unless we had been willing to sell properties at knock-out prices and to encourage the somewhat dangerous principle of confiscating private
  894
  property in war time. If I may venture to say so, I do not think we are a country which ought to encourage that policy.
  Sir H. DALZIEL: You have to go to the Courts, and the Courts have to act in accordance with the law, and therefore compensation does not arise. It is the law of the land.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: I do not quite agree in that. We should not have to go to the Court. If we place the property under a controller, that controller does not have to go to the Court in order to sell that property at a knock-out price. They are not wound up under the orders of the Court, but under the Act. Some are under the order of the Court, and there you have to get permission of the Court. Under this Act no permission is necessary; it is sold under the Act. Under the authority of the Board of Trade, the controller could exercise his power and sell the property merely to get rid of it. In order to fulfil the right hon. Gentleman's desire for inordinate speed in completion, we could sell those properties for a great deal less than they are worth. In doing that, we should not only be getting rid of the element of enemy control, but should be actually confiscating and disbursing the private property of enemies or enemy subjects not for the benefit of the State. I am sure it is a very important matter that we should, at the end of the War, have as large assets as possible in the hands of this country to bargain with. If we disposed of property for half what it was worth instead of the full value, it means we should make a present of half the value to some individual in this country, and the assets we should hold at the end of the War would be by so much reduced.
  Sir H. DALZIEL: The Germans are going to get this money!
  Mr. PRETYMAN: The right hon. Gentleman may desire to give it to them, but I have not said so. It is not German money; it is money which is held by the Government and an asset to this country, and at the end of the War to do what it likes with. We are the last country for whom it would be wise to inaugurate a policy of mere confiscation of private property in war time, for the sole reason that we are the country who probably own a larger proportion of property in foreign lands than any other nation in the world. I do not think it would be a wise policy in our own interests. It is a totally different

  895
  matter from carrying out the policy laid down by this House of getting rid of the element of peaceful penetration which we very rightly resent and of which the House is determined to get rid. The figures I have given show that in carrying out that policy, the Board of Trade are not lax and are not tardy but are carrying out the policy to the best of their ability. I do not think that even if the right hon. Gentleman did the work himself he could have done it any more expeditiously or effectively than it is being done by those in whose hands it has been placed.

  GREECE.
  Mr. LYNCH: I propose now to raise the question of Greece, because the situation there is very grave. Although this War may continue for a very considerable time, yet it is quite possible that within the next few weeks, possibly within the next few days, important events may take place which will throw their influence over the whole course of the subsequent campaign, and afterwards may be seen to be among the decisive factors in its result. In the handling of this question many blunders have been made. The greater part of the responsibility for those blunders rests with His Majesty's Government. I regard this question as so serious that in rising now I put on, so to speak, the whole armour of democracy, and I intend to speak not only to this House but to the public at large with frankness and boldness.
  The question of Greece also involves, both directly and indirectly, that of the whole Balkan campaign. The question may be asked at this stage: Why is Greece not now ranged with the Allies, fighting cordially in the direction in which her own interests point? Greece had the example of Serbia before her eyes to give her pause. Following upon that arose the question of Roumania, which remained in suspense for many months. On a former occasion I depicted to this House the enormous efforts that were being made by Germany to bring in Roumania on that side. Happily those efforts have been frustrated. That may be claimed as a victory for the diplomacy of this country, but those who have any knowledge whatever of the inside of these matters will know that no credit for that is due to this country; if one can apportion the praise, I think it would be in a very great part due to the statesmanship of the French Prime
  896
  Minister. He has handled this whole question not only with address but with boldness.
  When Roumania entered the lists an oportunity arose, such an opportunity as had been presented in numbers to the Allies, pointing out the way to victory. That opportunity was neglected. One would have imagined that while Roumania was preparing, and after the period when it became certain that Roumania must finally enter on the side of the Allies, adequate preparations would have been made in Salonica, in full co-operation with the Roumanians and in complete co-ordination with the whole great plan of strategy of the Allies, and that the moment that Roumania entered the lists the greatest energy would have been shown in carrying out these plans so prepared, and there would have been a rapid march on both sides to the capital of the Bulgarians, that Bulgaria would have been wiped off the slate, that the connection between Constantinople and Germany would have been broken, that Turkey would have been isolated, soon to be crushed, and the whole aspect of this War would have been changed.
  I was speaking not long ago to a man of very high endowment, whom I will describe as the greatest intellect now in political affairs in Europe. We discussed this question of Roumania and the Balkan campaign, and he said: "There are times when men must bear the strokes of fate and when they must brace up every nerve stoically to meet the inevitable; but what are our feelings when we see a golden opportunity floating before our eyes, and see the chance missed by sheer futility and incompetence and the road to victory vanishing; and when we are compelled to turn from that picture to a state of affairs which makes us doubtful about the ultimate fate of our nation?" That has been the state of affairs in regard to Roumania. Such has been the Nemesis which has fallen on the supine policy which we have seen on that Front Bench.
  I will touch on the question of Greece. We have there an extraordinary spectacle, which on the one hand reminds one of a Gilbert and Sullivan opera, and on the other of a great Sophoclean tragedy. Perhaps some future historian will seize upon that picturesque incident on which to begin in a striking way his first chapter of a book entitled: "The Decline and Fall of the British Empire." We see a King who is closely allied with the Kaiser and has

  897
  the reputation of holding the Kaiser in a sort of awesome respect, and who, incidentally, happens to be closely related to nearly all the Royal Families in Europe, because they are all related. One aspect of this War, which I venture to say the future historian whom I have indicated will touch upon with feelings even of amazement at the state of mind of the civilised world, is that we behold what one may call a trade-union of Kings, a Trust of Kings on the one side and the march of civilisation on the other; and that Trust of Kings has been favoured by His Majesty's Government.
  I do not suggest any kind of intervention in the affairs of Greece, still less any degree of compulsion to force Greece to take sides. One of my own colleagues, in an entirely generous spirit, has suggested that it is a case of interfering with the rights and liberties of small nations. That is not a true picture with regard to Greece. So far as we can judge—of course, we can make allowance for the party feeling of our own newspapers—the great masses of the Grecian population have been true to their instincts, their aspirations, their desire for liberty, and their desire to march in that road, side by side with the Allies, by which they can hope to achieve a glorious future. On the other side we have the King, the état major, the principal officers of the Army, attempting to dragoon the people and to falsify the elections. Thus, rising altogether out of that myth of Constitutional Government which is too often paraded before us, and showing at the critical moment that they are true to type, and that the first instinct of their minds is self-preservation, the interests of their own class and the safety of their thrones.
  That is the condition of Greece at the present moment, and I ask why does this Government not enter energetically into the line which is quite in accordance with its own policy and which is almost essential to the safety of the cause. Would they find any obstacle on the part of France? I venture to say "No !" The French forces at Salonika at the present time are under the command of a celebrated general, whose personal acquaintance I have the honour to enjoy, and who in this War has proved himself one of the most capable of all the French leaders. I know that from the beginning, when he took charge of the Salonika forces, his ideas have always been those of a great and capable soldier, but again and again
  898
  his plans have been baffled by obstacles thrown in his path, and the baffling of his plans means diminishing the chances of the success of the Allies. Had General Sarrail at first been allowed a perfectly free hand, and had his bold and energetic measures been supported, this whole War would have been entering into the last phase and leading to the final victory. Would any hon. Member say that is the condition of affairs now? Has it not been brought home to us, the enormous importance of this Balkan campaign? The Germans themselves recognise its importance, and they are congratulating themselves publicly, by the mouthpiece of the noted exponents of their strategy, that that opportunity has been missed by the Allies.
  One of the most extraordinary and indeed humiliating circumstances in connection with this War to my mind has been this, that although there is great brain power in France—I think myself that the French are the most intellectual people in the world—and though there is great brain power in this country, latent though it may often be, hidden and kept down as it often is, yet all the great, bold plans—plans of great imaginative conception, plans of true strategy, plans implying great organising power, and plans involving energetic action—have originated on the side of the Germans. So it was with this Balkan campaign. Once more, as so often had happened, the chance has been presented to the Allies, and once more they have neglected their opportunity, and the German strategists have taken advantage of it. Only a few days ago we were told that Roumania was marching rapidly on to victory, that Austria was at her mercy, that Russian armies were pouring over the Carpathians and would soon be beating at the doors of Vienna. What is the position now? Roumania has been forced to retreat and is threatened in her vital parts. The strategy of Mackensen reminds me of a certain bold thrust of Sir John Moore in the Peninsula which made Napoleon Buonaparte exclaim, "That is the only man fit to fight against myself." Now the situation is one of real jeopardy. Even now, perhaps, it is too late to take decisive action.
  And here at this point I would ask the representative of the Foreign Office in regard to this futile handling which has characterised the Government since the beginning of the Balkan campaign, has he or have they been influenced by anything

  899
  apart from simple strategy or national considerations? Has there been intervention of the Court of England—I ask that question and I do not ask it lightly—to save the throne of one of their relatives, or why has the word gone round throughout the French ranks of the legend of ménagez le Roi—be careful of the King? In this War, the most terrible in human experience, where great ideals are held before our eyes, where millions of soldiers are going down to slaughter, where from the furthest ends of the earth men have rallied to the cry of freedom, aspiring for the advance of civilisation—is all that to be defeated by the cry of ménagez le Roi? I want the people of England, the people of Ireland, and the people of the Dominions to understand this.
  Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER (Mr. Maclean): As far as I understand, the hon. Member seems to be reflecting upon the Sovereign. That is not in order, except on a substantive Motion placed upon the Order Paper of the House. I am sure that, after the reminder I have given him, the hon. Member will abstain from any further references of the kind.
  Mr. LYNCH: Certainly I will abstain from any further references; I leave the country to judge. I will now deal with His Majesty's servants. First of all, the Foreign Minister. I do not treat of his policy with the remotest degree of personal animosity. On the contrary, we have all known and admired Lord Grey in this House, and I, myself, have had friendly feelings towards him—if, indeed, those tender filaments of affection can really survive in the chilly atmosphere in which British statesmen love to shroud themselves As far as I can approach these men, in the case of Lord Grey it has been with feelings of real friendship and appreciation. I believe that he has many excellent qualities, but, as a Yankee friend of mine put it in the vernacular, in foreign politics, "be can't play for shucks." I believe that when the history of this War and all its transactions is written with full knowledge of the facts, Lord Grey will be seen to have been one of the disastrous failures on the British side. With all his excellent qualities, he has none of those which fit a man to be a great Minister of Foreign Affairs. He knows very little about foreign affairs to begin with. He has none of the peculiar per-
  900
  sonal qualities which are essential—neither the finesse of the. French diplomatist, nor the subtlety of the Italian, nor the plastic sympathy, the sense of life of the Slav, nor the bold straight directness of the American.
  Mr. PRINGLE: Are you referring to President Wilson?
  Mr. LYNCH: No. Being interested in this question, I have been at some pains to find out how Lord Grey acquired the enormous reputation that he has. I have traced out the matter in this way; Foreign politics have never been a strong point with Liberal Governments. In the parvenu spirit in which they demean themselves they hardly dare to deal with foreign politics, they are not free of the demesne. Being in want of a Foreign Minister at one time they looked round and found Sir Edward Grey, as he then was, who had the reputation of knowing something of foreign politics—he was too much bolstered up even then—and was vaguely believed to be a Liberal. Accordingly he was chosen, and all would have been well in time of peace. Living as we did, we see it when we look back, in the stuffy atmosphere of hypocrisy and make-believe, which is the very air we breathe in politics, particularly in this House, I daresay, if things had gone on smoothly, all his virtues would have figured magnificently on a tombstone. But in such a crisis as this you want character. Where you want a great character, a great man, Lord Grey has been found lamentably wanting. All the great names of States and events that one could mention from the beginning of the War are only so many symbols of his incompetence.
  I leave him for the moment, and proceed to the Prime Minister himself. The time has come for plain talking and salutary counsel. I say a still greater failure in the whole management of this War has been the Prime Minister himself. From the very beginning, instead of standing out as a great leader of the nation he has contented himself with all those tricks of sweet-water Machiavellis, putting down the plummet here to test the way of the main stream and guiding his boat accordingly in those waters—always the trick of the opportunist politician, always the chicanery of the lawyer; never once boldly facing a menacing external situation with the determination to solve a dangerous problem, never exercising powers of prevision, forethought

  901
  and good judgment; only a policy of drift, and then coming down to this House with that extraordinarily impressive air of his and persuading us that a situation lamentably bad—bad through his faults—is the best that could possibly happen in the best of all possible worlds. I am here reminded of the lines:
  "But Clacbus was the middle-class in brief,
  With all their virtues held on life-long lease,
  Of Opportunist-politicians chief,
  And Mediocrity's great masterpiece."
  I could give a list of names of statesmen which it might seem extraordinary to mention to the British House of Commons, although in reference to a nation which claims to be the greatest nation the world has ever seen—we are entitled to look high—names of men who have stood out as particularly great men and particularly great leaders. I do not ask anything ex-extraordinary in this sense. I do not wish to rehearse the attributes of men of genius from Themistocles to Richelieu. We have a right to demand the qualities which have been exhibited in times of crisis by men who had previously laid no claim to greatness, but who, when tried in the furnace, were found to be gold; such men as homely plain Abe Lincoln, my friend Louis Botha, or Sir Henry Campbell Bannerman—men who led, men capable of taking great decisions, men equal to laying down the lines of great policies and firmly pushing them to their legitimate conclusion. Instead of the great qualities of luminosity of mind, true judgment, organising power, and energy, and real compelling force, we have the continual spectacle of experience only in the tricks of politics and wire-pulling, and all those doubtful secondary virtues, and never one sign of a great man leading a great nation to victory. [An HON. MEMBER: "Why don't you send your name in"?]
  12.0 M.
  No doubt again and again the opportunity will present itself to me to make a speech somewhat on these lines. Again and again the Government will have blundered, and again and again disasters which could have been avoided will have been presented to us. I want to point out to the House the seriousness of the whole situation. What we are here discussing now is vital to the conduct of the War. Blunders mean the lives of men; blunders mean rivers of blood; blunders mean mountain of corpses. Blunders arise when a great crisis is presented, if you fail to inspire yourselves with the princples of true statesmanship and allow your minds to be
  902
  diverted as you have by merely secondary motives, some of them of a kind which defeat the intentions and run counter to the ideals which we hold up to the nations of the world.
  Mr. GRETTON: I very much regret that the matter to which I desire to call attention should be brought on at this late hour, but I shall put the points I wish to refer to as briefly as possible. The question I raise has reference to the blockade. The whole question of the blockade has been greatly altered by the repudiation of the Declaration of London. The Order in Council issued 7th July last, however, in some degree contained a pale reflection of one or two points which originally were incorporated in the Declaration of London. The meaning of the Order is not very clear. The first paragraph lays down that it shall be a presumption that a vessel proceeding to an enemy destination is loaded with enemy goods. It clearly is a matter, after the vessel is examined, to be sent to the Prize Court for decision, for that Court is the only authority which can definitely decide any case of doubt; no declaration by Order-in-Council can effectively deal with the subject. There is the Zamorra judgment which lays down—I cannot give the exact words, but I can give an accurate purport of it—that a Prize Court is not to take its law from Orders-in-Council, and if a Court is to decide judicially, and in accordance with the Law of Nations, it cannot in doubtful cases take its directions from the Crown. I am very well aware that there are very great difficulties in bringing all these cases before the Prize Court, and for that purpose the Contraband Committee was set up. But the Contraband Committee has carried its functions too far, and matters which required decision, and ought to have been decided by a Prize Court, have in fact not reached it, but have been dealt with by a new and illegal body standing between the executive officers of the Crown and the Courts set up to decide cases of doubt.
  The only other point quoted in the Order-in-Council about which I desire to inquire, is Paragraph 4. It contains a frank recognition of Article 40 of the Declaration of London that a vessel is liable to confiscation if she carries 50 per cent. of contraband. I contend that this proportion is much too high. This is an easier rule to administer than the old rule that you must prove that the captain of the ship knew that the vessel

  903
  was carrying contraband that under modern conditions is even more difficult to prove than of old, but 50 per cent. is arbitrary, and is in any case too high. This matter requires further examination and revision. I want to refer also to another matter of great importance that has been several times raised here, and which certainly needs clearing up. I hope the Noble Lord will be able to say something definite in the matter. How far does the Government at present consider that the proceedings are governed by the Declaration of Paris? It is quite clear that the First Article of the Declaration of Paris has, from the outbreak of the War, been consistently broken to our detriment. It has never ben agreed to universally by neutral nations or it has been broken by our enemies. I regard the Declaration by the Government as irregular, and it is very doubtful whether it has any effect. For practical purposes it is true that this part of the Declaration is not being carried out by enemy countries, and the whole Declaration of Paris for which the First Article was the consideration offered to this country, is a serious detriment to the proper carrying out of the blockade. The Second Article is a great hindrance to the blockade. It lays down that the neutral flag covers merchandise with the exception of contraband of war. That is all new doctrine; it is not part of the Law of Nations. It was only assented to because at that time the Government of this country considered it advantageous that the world at large and to this country considered that privateering should be abolished. Now that privateering or its equivalent is indulged in by the enemy I contend that it is no longer binding on this country that we should work under this Second Article.
  I will not refer to one or two other matters which I intended to raise. In regard to the blockade generally I am not going into details. I will only say this: There is no doubt there has been an improvement in the measures for carrying out the blockade. I am not one of those who expect, under modern conditions, that any blockade should be, in all respects, perfect. But what we are aiming at is to make it as perfect as possible, and with as little leakage as the circumstances will allow. The Government have taken one step which has been of great assistance. They are appointing more competent Con-
  904
  sular agents and getting better staff supervision at the ports of departure whence goods are sent by neutral countries trading with the enemy, and in; this way they are getting better information of what is going on. But a great deal more needs to be done. It is the unfortunate fact that the Foreign Office by tradition for many years has been divorced from the Consular Service. Trade questions, trade problems and matters of that kind have been despised by the Diplomatic Service, and it has been considered something unworthy of the dignity of a Diplomatic official, or one trained in the higher diplomacy, to soil his hands with the sordid subject of trade and finance. But trade and finance are at the root of this War, and now is the time to make a great change that is necessary to reinforce the Consular Service, and obtain the greatest efficiency of the blockade. The Consular Service ought to be an integral part of the Diplomatic Service.
  There is another matter, that of the dealings with the Overseas Trusts. While, no doubt, we get fair play, it must be remembered that the gentlemen controlling these trusts are, after all, not British subjects, that their first duty is to the neutral Power whose subjects they are, and that these gentlemen, of course, very rightly, interpret cases of doubt, or cases which are not clearly interpretable in favour of this country, in favour of their own fellow-subjects. You must expect them to do so, and therefore care is necessary by experts on the spot to see that we do get, at any rate, the swing of the pendulum and fair play in the determination of these agreements. I think the Government often get misled. For instance, in calculating the imports into a certain foreign country—I think it was Denmark—someone on behalf of the Government took the tonnage of the ships entering the port. What does "tonnage" mean? Is it gross tonnage, net tonnage, foreign tonnage, or British tonnage? How is the cargo to be calculated? All these matters are very misleading, and require close investigation.
  I want to refer to the Memorandum issued by the Allied Governments dealing with the question of submarines. It is a most extraordinary document. It was, apparently, taken from nowhere. It bore the signature of nobody, so far as we know, but was published as a Memorandum CD. 8,349, and this kind of leaflet, with a few pious opinions of a very loose and indefinite kind, was sent broadcast to neutral

  905
  Powers. It is clear on the face of it that it was drawn up in French and very loosely and badly translated into English. [An HON. MEMBER: "Read it out."] It would take too long. The document was sent broadcast. That is not the way to deal with the new question of submarines. It is a very difficult question requiring great consideration. Submarines are new instruments of war, and in many respects do not conform to the old rules of war. They can only be brought into line with the principles of the Laws of Nations by careful consideration of the application of those principles to the new conditions
  In the first place there is the question of blockade. I maintain that a submarine cannot be a commerce destroyer or a blockade vessel at a long distance from her base and at the same time conform to the Law of Nations, because it is essential, according to the Law of Nations, that no ship shall be destroyed on the sea except in case of a most urgent necessity. The submarine sets out with the intention of destroying vessels because she cannot take captured vessels into port at such long distances from her base. Submarines are sent for raiding commerce, and there are very few cases of captured vessels being taken into port by submarines, and in no case has that been done by Germany at more than a very few miles from the Belgian ports. The submarine cannot put a prize crew on board and navigate the vessel into port, nor can she take the necessary measures to ensure the safety of the passengers and crew. If a submarine decides to violate the law of nations and sinks a vessel, I claim that the Government should act and issue to neutral nations their decision on this point. Norway has thought the matter out and has decided upon her line of action which she has announced to the world, and the decision of Norway contrasts most favourably with the feeble and fumbling document which the Government has agreed to. I do not wish to go further into the question of submarines. A submarine is of a different type to any other vessel employed in war, and she is properly differentiated by one fact, that it is important that this vessel should be able, at times, to come to the surface to obtain air and the rest which are vital to her crew, and is thus exposed to attack and capture. The fact that she has to come to the surface differentiates a submarine from every other vessel and this makes the use of neutral waters of more importance to
  906
  such a vessel than to any other ship, for they are to her a port of rest and refreshment. I hope the Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs will be able to give me satisfaction on some of these points. I think the right hon. Gentleman will agree that I have not made these remarks in any unfriendly spirit to the Foreign Office.
  Mr. OUTHWAITE: I wish to raise a matter which arose out of the reply which the Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs made relating to a question which I put to him. It is relevant to the issue which has been raised by the hon. Member for West Clare (Mr. Lynch). The hon. Member has asked why is Greece not fighting on the side of the Allies? The question I want to put is whether it is the desire of all the Allies to have Greece fighting on our side? In the "Morning Post" last week there appeared a long communique from Athens in which it was stated that, in reply to a question by the Greek Government, the Minister at Athens, on behalf of Monsieur Briand, stated that Italy was strongly opposed to Greece's intervention or our side. It was stated that if Greece would declare war on Bulgaria the Allies would accept this proposition and would promise to aid Greece to carry on the War and interest themselves at the proper time on behalf of Greek interests. I want to know whether it is true that Italy has opposed the intervention of Greece on the side of the Allies. The right hon. Gentleman replied that such a question was not in the public interest. Surely the public here have a right to call attention to a statement made by the French Prime Minister. But the matter goes much further than the opposition of Italy to the intervention of Greece. I desire to know whether the opposition which I believe Russia set up to the intervention of Greece still exists? I have read the report of a debate which took place in the Greek Chamber about 4th November last year. In the course of the controversy between Monsieur Gournaris, who had just then succeeded Monsieur Venizelos, these statements were made. Monsieur Gournaris asked Monsieur Venizelos, who had stated that he had sent out a communication to three of the Allies asking whether they desired the participation of Greece in the Dardanelles attack, if he had seen the replies of the various Cabinets Venizelos said: "I gave in my resignation on the Saturday and I do not think the replies had then arrived." From those replies I presume that Russia did not desire at that

  907
  time the participation of Greece because she might set up a counter claim for Constantinople. The succeeding Prime Minister, in an interview which appeared in the "Daily Chronicle," definitely makes the statement expressly forbidding, in the event of their success, the Greek Government establishing their flag within fifty miles of the ancient Byzantine capital. The question I wish to ask is whether this opposition on the part of our Allies to the intervention of Greece has been withdrawn. Has any offer been made to Greece that territorial compensation will be made to her similar to that which has been made to other small States and countries?
  I think this is a matter of very serious import. I think that very many people are perturbed at what has happened, in view of the fact that we are ostensibly fighting on behalf of small nationalities. If Greece in the past has failed to come in, and has been prevented owing to opposition from Russia, because that country is desirous of having control of Constantinople and the Dardanelles, and if at a subsequent period Greece offered to come in, but opposition was set up by Italy, also for territorial reasons, then I think we must agree that Greece has not altogether had justice in this matter. Our diplomacy has entirely failed, perhaps. For those reasons I should like to have some statement on this matter from the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. I am not asking for secrets, as these are statements which have been published in public journals.
  Lord R. CECIL: I do not want to detain the House at this hour for more than a few minutes. The hon. Member who has just sat down (Mr. Outhwaite) has repeated at somewhat greater length a question which I felt it my duty to tell him on an earlier occasion I could not answer with due regard to public interest. I am afraid I can only give him that reply on the present occasion. Obviously—quite obviously, I should think—it would be impossible for any minister at this stage and under these conditions, to enter into a discussion on what we have said or are going to say or what others of our Allies have said or are going to say to Greece in reference to the present crisis in European affairs. In regard to the speech of the hon. Member for Clare (Mr. Lynch), to which I paid great attention. I am sorry to say that I do not in the
  908
  least understand what it was that he really wanted to accuse the Government of. There was a great deal of vague denunciation of Balkan strategy, and in one passage he appeared to hint at some obscure had disreputable influence as having been brought to bear upon the Councils of the Government and of the Allies. As far as the strategy in the Balkans is concerned, it has been exclusively and entirely dictated by military considerations and military advice. I believe I am right in saying the only people who have had anything to say in deciding such movement of the troops as there has been are those who in war time must decide those things, namely, the military advisers of the Government. As to any suggestion that any person whether strictly a member of the Government or not, has used any influence to deflect the policy of this country from considerations of sound strategy, I can only say that such a suggestion is absolutely baseless, and is an insinuation to Parliament quite unworthy of this House, and one which ought not to have been made. That is really all I have to say upon the subject spoken of by the hon. Member for Clare.
  There was a speech by the hon. Member opposite (Mr. Gretton) on a totally different matter. He asked a number of questions about the blockade. I am sure he will pardon me if I deal with the questions he asked rather briefly. As I understood him, he put two questions with respect to what was the exact position in reference to the Declaration of London, particularly why we had kept alive, or sought to keep alive, the provision which renders ships, a portion of whose cargo is contraband, liable to confiscation. As he knows quite well, no such provision used to exist in the law of this country, and it is not even certain, even now—I say so quite frankly—that such provision would be enforced by the Prize Courts. We believe it is a reasonable deduction from law and from the conditions of modern war. We believe it is a reasonable thing to say that if a captain has on board his ship more than 50 per cent. of contraband he must be assumed to have known that he had such a large contraband cargo as that, and we have laid that down in principle—a principle which we believe to be sanctioned by a very large number of States, and to be in itself reasonable, and one which, if necessary, we shall seek to maintain in the Prize Courts. It is not in any way a diminution; if it is anything at all it is an extension, and it is

  909
  only on that ground it has been retained in. the Order in Council. With regard to the position of the Contraband Committee, on that there is a little misapprehension. In an ordinary blockade the only thing you have to decide is whether a ship is going to a blockaded port. Under the present blockade, as my hon. Friend knows, there are a lot of other considerations. You have to decide whether the ultimate destination of the cargo is not a neutral port but an enemy destination. That is a matter which it is very difficult to be sure about. The papers of the ship will probably give no information with regard to it. You must investigate it by consideration of other circumstances. You must have somebody to say whether there is a primâ facie case for submitting it to a Prize Court. The only function of the Contraband Committee is to decide whether there is sufficient ground for taking the cargo or any portion of it before the Prize Court. Somebody must do that. I think such a Committee as has been constituted with all the apparatus and information which has been gradually accumulated for its use is the most useful instrument for that purpose. I do not think there really is any ground whatever for thinking the Committee has exceeded its jurisdiction. I say, speaking after some considerable experience of its working, that I think the country owes it a deep debt of gratitude for the admirable way in which it is performing its function.
  I pass rapidly to the Declaration of Paris. My hon. Friend will know the Declaration of Paris is a binding international instrument—recognised to be binding on this Government. The Government has said so. We do not admit—I won't go into the arguments—that anything we have done has been an infringement of its provisions, and we do not believe that properly construed they hinder the carrying on of the Blockade in a proper direction. I pass to the Consular Service merely to say that I heartily agree with my hon. Friend that a closer connection between the Consular Service and the Diplomatic Service is in itself a very desirable thing. I think, however, he exaggerates the view that diplomats do not care about trade. That may have been true once. I do not think it is in the least true now, but whether true or not I quite agree the two services ought to be as closely connected as possible and as far as we are able to give.
  910
  any attention to anything except the War, that matter is occupying the attention of His Majesty's Government. We are doing our best to think out what alteration in the Consular Service ought to be made in order to secure what we all desire to bring about. I will only say one other word and that is as to submarines. I did not quite understand what my hon. Friend's criticism of the Memorandum issued by the Allied Governments is. Is his complaint that it is a Memorandum issued not by this Government but by the Allied Governments? It is stated on the title of the doucument itself that it is not intended to be a full discussion of the whole submarine question. It points to particular events which had already occurred in the course of the War, and to the dangers in case of submarines frequenting neutral ports and other matters of that kind. It deals with only those particular points. I quite agree that some day or another it will be necessary to consider the whole status of submarines, what they ought to or ought not to be allowed to do as a matter of international law. That is not the purpose or intention of this Memorandum. It is merely drawing the attention of neutrals to certain dangers and to certain risks which they themselves will run if they permit submarines to make use of their ports in the same way and with the same liberties and privileges that other ships of war are entitled to. It is for that purpose, and for that purpose only, this Memorandum is issued. I do not think any just criticism can be made upon the utility of His Majesty's Government in issuing such a document. I am grateful to my hon. Friend for the care and restraint with which he dealt with the subject. I think he will agree that recent events have shown this action was not unnecessary and that the Memorandum was issued not a moment too soon. I do not think that there is anything else which I can say usefully on the occasion of this Debate. I merely conclude by saying I am grateful to my hon. Friend for the tone in which he dealt with this subject.
  Major HUNT: I quite agree with the hon. Member for Clare that Lord Grey is the worst Foreign Minister we have ever had in war time. We are told in the country generally that he has been considerably under the influence of Lord Haldane, and in the country Lord Haldane is generally looked upon as a pro-German, though I do not think

  911
  he can be under the influence of anybody who is German. He was the person chiefly responsible for the Declaration of London which is now, according to the Noble Lord himself, admitted to have been an enormous mistake. Surely there is no doubt about that. Although all the dangers were pretty well brought forward, the Government tried very hard to get it passed into law. If it had been, it would have been a very serious thing for us in this country. That is one thing. Then, in my opinion, and I am quite sure in the opinion of a great number of other people, he and the Prime Minister between them so crippled the Navy that it was the cause of the loss of many, many thousands of good lives. If they had allowed the Navy to do its work as permitted by International law, and as the Americans used theirs in the Civil War, in all human probability this War would have been over before now. I believe those Gentlemen sitting there on the Front Bench now know it perfectly well. They tell us that we could not use our sea power as we were entitled to according to International law, because if we did we should have had all the other nations against us. What humbug! Are we really to be told that if we had used our just rights properly we should have had war made on us when neutral countries will stand Germany drowning their women and children in neutral ships. Are we going to be told that? That is one of the things this Government, and the Unionists, too, will have to answer for to the people when the next General Election comes, and it will serve the Unionist leaders perfectly right if they share the condemnation; at all events, that is my opinion. I also quite agree with the hon. Member for Clare that the Roumanian position is a very dangerous one, and that, as usual, we are in great danger of being too late. We failed to save Belgium and Serbia, and I believe that people all over the country are very much afraid that we are going to be too late to save Roumania. Hon. Gentlemen do not seem to like what I am saying, but I am sure that there is a great deal of anxiety about the Roumanian question. Think what is going to happen if the Germans overrun Roumania! It would have a terrible effect on our prestige, and it would give to Germany very large quantities of foodstuff, and of oil—two things that she is most in need of. It would be a terrible blow to the Entente Powers. I do not want to say anything out of order, but
  912
  I would like to know why is it we are not actively helping Roumania at the present time? Is it because we are afraid to back up Venezelos and the majority of the Greek people against the Greek King, who is nothing but a humble satellite of the German Emperor, and who is dead against us? I want to know what is to prevent us from going to the help of Roumania and ignoring altogether the Greek King. If we fail to save Roumania there is this danger—Germany will make an enormous effort to get some sort of peace terms as a result of overrunning that country. That, at all events, is how I understand it. I think His Majesty's Government ought to make every possible effort to go in some way to the assistance of Roumania before it is too late.
  I only want to say two or three words about the blockade. I am sorry the Noble Lord is not here, because I should like to remind him that when he first became Blockade Minister he told me, because I suggested it was quite time the Government took the gloves off, that I was inconceivably offensive. The curious part of it is that ever since then he has been trying to get the Government to take the gloves off, and I am bound to say he has had a certain amount of success. Let me also say that I am quite sure he is doing his best, though I am afraid by no means altogether successfully. In the House the other day I asked him a question in which I showed from the American statistics how countries neighbouring on Germany were receiving from America from three to six times the quantity of goods that they got in 1914, and that, of course, the inference must be that a great deal of those goods went to Germany and helped her to keep the War going. I had got a supplementary prepared for him but he disarmed me by saying he would see any Member who honestly wished to talk about the blockade. As I thought that would include me, I did not like at the time to ask a supplementary question. I have not had the pleasure of seeing him yet. I am afraid that the blockade cannot be called a success at the present time. There is an enormous leakage going on. I have got, unfortunately, a flying son living in Holland, interned there, and I know from absolute evidence that at all events some little time ago both the Germans and the Dutchmen in Holland were always laughing at the absurdity of what was called the British blockade, and there were many

  913
  cases of poor people getting very, very rich all of a sudden, undoubtedly through the money they made by smuggling goods over in to Germany. All the facts go to prove that an enormous amount of stuff has gone from Holland and neutral countries into Germany, which we might have stopped and which has undoubtedly prolonged the War to a great extent and caused the loss of many, many thousands of our best lives. That is the fault of the Government because they funked to stick out for our just rights at sea; and I hope that now they are beginning to realise the seriousness of the situation and the power of Germany and the difficulty of ending the War with a. satisfactory peace, there will be in the future a really strict blockade; and I am sure that if there is we ought to finish the War at all events next year.
  Question, "That the Bill be now read the third time," put, and agreed to.
  Bill accordingly read the third time, and passed.
  The remaining Orders were read, and postponed.
  And, it being after Half-past Eleven of the clock upon Thursday evening, Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER adjourned the House without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.
  Adjourned accordingly at Twelve minutes before One o'clock a.m., till Tuesday next, 24th October, pursuant to the Resolution of the House of this day.