Commons Sitting of 2 April 1917

Preamble
The House met at a Quarter before Three of the clock, Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair.

PRIVATE BUSINESS.
Gas Light and Coke Company Bill,
London Corn Exchange Company Bill,
As amended, considered; to be read He third time.

NEW WRIT.
For the Borough of Belfast (South Belfast Division), in the room of James Chambers, Esquire, K.C., His Majesty's Solicitor-General for Ireland.—[Lord Edmund Talbot.]
QUEEN ANNE'S BOUNTY.
Copy presented of Annual Report and Accounts of the Governors of Queen Anne's Bounty for the year 1916 [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.

SHOPS ACT, 1912.
Copies presented of Orders made by the Council of the undermentioned local authority, and confirmed by the Secretary of State for the Home Department:
Urban districts of Margam and Glyncorrwg
[by Act]; to lie upon the Table.
Copy presented of Order made by the Council of the undermentioned local authority, and confirmed, with Amendment, by the Secretary of State for the Home Department:—
Borough of Aberavon
[by Act] to lie upon the Table.

ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS.
  WAR.

    PAPER RESTRICTION ORDER (POSTERS).
    Major NEWMANasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he is aware of the restriction of the size of posters
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    to 600 square inches, and that printers, advertisers, and billposters regard a poster of this size as useless on street hoardings or open positions generally; whether he is aware that a full page of a leading newspaper containing 450 square inches can be and is, without restriction, solely utilised daily for the advertisement of a type of ladies' waterproof coat, female underwear, or similar business advertisements; whether the Paper Restriction Committee have recognised the hardships imposed on printers by their recent Orders relative to the printing of advertisements and catalogues; and will he, bearing in mind the importance of the advertising industry to both printers and newspaper proprietors as well as of economy in the use of the paper available, endeavour to bring together the Committee and representatives both of the printing and newspaper industries in order that a solution fair to both sides may be arrived at?
    The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the BOARD OF TRADE (Mr. Roberts): The Board of Trade, who are responsible for the Paper Restriction Order, have had before them a deputation fully representative of the various interests affected by the Order, and are now giving careful consideration to the views put forward by that deputation as to its effects.

    FISH FREIGHTS (PASSENGER TRAINS).
    Mr. EUGENE WASONasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he has now heard from the Railway Executive Committee as to whether they intend to insist on the prepayment of fish by passenger train; and what action he proposes to take in this matter?
    Mr. ROBERTS: After very careful consideration of this matter in consultation with the Railway Executive Committee, the Board of Trade have come to the conclusion that in present circumstances it is desirable that the liability should be on the sender to pay the charges on the carriage of goods sent by passenger train, as this will reduce considerably the clerical work of the railway companies. I understand, however, that there may be special difficulties with the fish traffic at some of the Scottish ports if this requirement is applied generally, and in the circumstances it is not proposed to alter the existing practice at Scottish ports as regards fish.
    Mr. WASON: So far as Scotland is concerned it will be entirely exempted from the new Regulation?
    Mr. ROBERTS: That is so.
    Mr. WING: Will this apply to fishing ports like Grimsby and Shields, where very great difficulty would be caused by the new Regulation?

    RAILWAY FARES.
    Colonel BURNasked the President of the Board of Trade if he will favourably consider the suspension of the 50 per cent. increase in train fares during the months of July, August, and September, as this increase is particularly hard on the middle and working classes, many of whom may thereby be prevented from taking a holiday at the seaside?
    Mr. ROBERTS: I can only refer the hon and gallant Gentleman to the announcement made by the Board of Trade in Friday's newspapers that in view of the heavy and urgent demands made upon the railways in connection with the War there is no prospect that the concession desired can be given.
    Mr. CHANCELLOR: Is the 50 per cent. increase in fares also charged in Ireland?

    FURLOUGH PAY (INDIAN OFFICERS).
    Commander WEDGWOODasked the Secretary of State for India whether until the War unemployed Indian Army officers residing in England were allowed to draw full furlough pay whether they were given work by the Home Government or not whether a new Regulation has recently been made by which these officers so employed by the Home Government have to refund to the Indian Government part of their furlough pay; and whether he has sanctioned this particular way of relieving the Indian Exchequer at the expense of the British taxpayer?
    The SECRETARY of STATE for INDIA (Mr. Chamberlain): I am not aware that before the present War the question of employing Indian Army officers of this particular class under the Home Government has ever arisen. The circumstances in which the Regulation regarding the amount of unemployed Indian pay to be received by this class of officer when em-
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    ployed by the War Office were explained by me in my answer to the question of my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Melton on the 29th November last.

    INDIAN PUBLIC SERVICES.
    Sir JOHN JARDINEasked whether opportunity will be given to the House to discuss the Report of the Commission on the Indian Public Services before orders are passed thereupon; and whether the opportunity will be before or after the discussion of the Indian Budget?
    Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: I do not propose to put down any Motion on the subject, but I shall be glad to discuss the suggestion with my hon. Friend if he so desires.

    FINLND (RUSSIAN PROCLAMATION).
    Mr. JOHN O'CONNORasked the Secretary for State for Foreign Affairs whether the new Government of Russia has published a manifesto completely restoring the Constitution of Finland and annuling the edicts issued during the last eighteen years contrary to Finnish law?
    The SECRETARY of STATE for FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Mr. Balfour): Yes, Sir. The Russian Government published on 20th March a proclamation repealing the principal enactments by which the freedom of Finland had been curtailed, and instructing the Senate of Finland to submit proposals to amend other enactments passed of late years against Finnish laws. The proclamation also grants complete political amnesty, and, besides promising to submit to the Diet of Finland suggestions for a new form of administration and, if necessary, a new Constitution, confirms the rights of the Finns under their present Constitution.
    I understand that the people of Finland regard the proclamation as fulfilling all their wishes, and that the Finnish Diet will meet on 4th April. I know how highly the House will appreciate the action of the Russian Government in this matter.
    Mr. O'CONNOR: Has the right hon. Gentleman any particular information regarding a somewhat similar proclamation in respect of Polish liberty?
    Mr. BALFOUR: I should rather like to have notice of that question.
    Mr. GINNELL: Will the British Govern-men follow, with regard to Ireland, the example of the Russian Government?

    GREECE.
    Mr. LYNCHasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether the fall of the Russian despotism will have any effect in modifying the policy of the Allies towards Greece; whether he is aware that King Constantine is in constant communication with the Kaiser; and whether, in view of the new political situation, a more energetic programme will be adopted in the Balkans?
    Mr. BALFOUR: The answer to the first and second parts of the question is in the negative, and I am unable for obvious reasons to make any statement in regard to the last part.
    Mr. LYNCH: Is it not a fact that the condition of Greece represents on a small scale the condition in Russia before the fall of the Czar, and that by your policy you are supporting those parties in Greece who are favourable to the German Emperor?
    Mr. BALFOUR: Historical parallels are treacherous and dangerous grounds which I could not venture to traverse by way of question and answer in this House.
    Mr. LYNCH: Is there not something more dangerous and treacherous—that is, a weak and cowardly foreign policy?
    Mr. OUTHWAITE: With regard to the present King Constantine is there not—
    Mr. SPEAKER: There are 195 questions on the Paper, and there are many hon. Members who wish to ask questions.
    Mr. LYNCHasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether his attention has been directed to a recent interview given by M. Venizelos to the Agence Havas, in which the Greek statesman said that the Allies, in promising him support, made the express stipulation that his movement must not be anti-dynastic, and that the imposition of such a condition deprived his movement of much of its effective value, even in regard to aiding the cause of the Allies; and whether, in view of the change of regime in Russia, the Allies will still maintain the policy indicated?
    Mr. BALFOUR: I have seen the interview referred to, but cannot accept the hon. Member's account of it as accurate or complete. With regard to the last part of the question, I have nothing to add to previous declarations of the policy by His Majesty's Government.
    Mr. LYNCH: Is not this interview in complete accord with the statements in the Italian Chamber by Signor Boselli, the Prime Minister of Italy, that the movement of M. Venizelos must not be anti-dynastic, otherwise it would not receive the favour of the Allies?
    Mr. BALFOUR: I have heard of the statement of the Italian Prime Minister, but if the hon. Gentleman wishes an answer he must give me notice of the question.
    Mr. LYNCH: Will the right hon. Gentleman refer—
    Mr. SPEAKER: I have called the next question.
    Mr. KINGasked the Prime Minister whether he will now give the House full information upon the deliberations and decisions of the Rome Conference and upon the position in Greece?
    The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER (Mr. Bonar Law): I am not in a position to make any statement.
    Mr. LYNCH: Should not we have the light on these important questions? Why should the House of Commons not be informed on a question connected with a policy which has been adopted?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: This is one of the questions which in time of war it is necessary to keep secret.
    Mr. PEMBERTON BILLING: Shall we have an opportunity of discussing this in Secret Session?

  MILITARY SERVICE.

    LAND CULTIVATION.
    Mr. G. LAMBERTasked the President of the Board of Agriculture whether a resolution has been received from county war committees that no more men, even general service men, should be taken from the land for the next two months; and whether it is proposed to act in the spirit of these resolutions?
    The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the BOARD of AGRICULTURE (Sir Richard Winfrey): The Board have received the resolution. My right hon. Friend has been assured by the Under-Secretary of State for War that the War Office is doing everything possible to leave as many men as can be left for agriculture.
    Mr. LAMBERT: Will no more men be taken from the land for the next two months?
    Sir R. WINFREY: That is a question for the War Office.

    PLOUGHMEN (SCOTLAND).
    Mr. CECIL HARMSWORTHasked the Secretary for Scotland if his attention has been directed to a recent statement of the Director-General of National Service to the effect that there is no farmer in Scotland to-day who stands in need of a ploughman; and if he will say what special arrangements have been made in Scotland with the military authorities that have resulted in the retention on the land in Scotland of the requisite number of ploughmen?
    The SECRETARY for SCOTLAND (Mr. Munro): The reply to the first part of my hon. Friend's question is in the affirmative. The Director-General informs me that every farmer in Scotland who has applied to his Department for a ploughman has been offered one; and it is believed that the present requirements of Scottish farmers have been fully met by the officers of the National Service Department. This situation results partly from my arrangement with the Army Council to the effect that in taking men for military service the supply of labour necessary for food production shall be safeguarded so far as practicable, and partly from the arrangements made by the National Service Department in co-operation with my Department for the supply of additional ploughmen, including men from the Home Defence Forces, to meet the farmers' requirements. I may add that the National Service Department has, during the present spring, distributed over 2,000 agricultural workers among the farms in Scotland, and it has promises at the present time of a further number of about 250 employés skilled in agriculture who are to be lent by local authorities in Scotland later in the season.

    MEN CALLED UP (Loss OF PENSIONS).
    Mr. JOYNSON-HICKSasked the Home Secretary whether be is aware that
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    R. Purser, aged thirty-eight, with three children, carrying on a hairdresser's business in St. George's Road, S.E., is shortly being called up for service; whether the nearest hairdressers who will compete for his business are an Italian at 36, St. George's Road, a Belgian at 8, St. George's Road, a German at 91. London Road, an Italian at 3, Earl Street, a a German-Swiss at 49, Newington Butts, and a German widow, with a Russian Pole as manager, at 138a, Newington Causeway; whether five of these are of Army age; and what steps the Government is taking to render impossible the continuance of such injustice to English tradesmen?
    The SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Sir George Cave): It is the fact that Mr. R. Purser, who is a hairdresser, has been called up for military service. As regards the second and third parts of the question, the hon. Member's information is inaccurate. The persons whom he describes as a German, a German-Swiss, a German widow, and a Russian Pole, are respectively a Russian, the British-born wife of an Austrian, the British-born widow of a naturalised British subject, and a Dutchman. Of the men mentioned in the question three only and not five are of military age, and of these three, one, a Russian, has attested; the other two are an Italian and a Dutchman. I cannot compel these persons to abandon their businesses; but I am confident that the patriotic citizens of Walworth will see to it that Mr. Purser's business shall not suffer because he is serving his country.

  FOOD SUPPLIES.

    SCOTCH CALVES (SALE).
    Mr. W. THORNEasked the President of the Board of Agriculture whether he can explain the circumstances under which the Swift Beef Company of Chicago have been able to offer hundreds of young Scotch calves for sale at their premises in the Annexe, Smithfield Market, during the last two weeks; and what steps he proposes to take to prevent alien companies controlling British produce in this manner?
    The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the MINISTRY of FOOD CONTROL (Captain Bathurst): The calves in question appear to have been offered by the

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    Swift Beef Company on commission from Scottish dealers. This firm is only one of many stall-holders in Smithfield Market between whom it is not proposed to make any discrimination.

    POTATOES.
    Major McMICKINGasked the President of the Board of Agriculture whether he can now say if the minimum guarantee of £6 per ton for potatoes grown in 3917 will apply to earlies and second earlies; and whether, seeing that this class of potato is perishable, is unsuitable for keeping, and must be marketed day by day as raised, the farmer will, in the event of the price on rail falling below the guaranteed minimum, be entitled to claim the difference?
    Sir R. WINFREY: The details of the guarantee have not yet been settled, but the matter to which the hon. Member refers will not be overlooked.
    Sir HENRY DALZIELasked the Secretary for Scotland whether he is aware that, notwithstanding the county of Fife has been depleted of stocks of potatoes for seed purposes, no town in Fife is receiving any benefit from the supply that is being distributed in the large towns; and what action he proposes to take to remedy this state of affairs?
    Mr. MUNRO: Owing to the limited amount of potatoes at my disposal I regret that it is not possible for me to so arrange that a share shall be given to every burgh and populous district throughout Scotland. I have been obliged to confine the distribution to certain specified areas. It is hoped that the towns in which my right hon. Friend is interested may, in common with other towns, derive indirect benefit from the fact that the larger towns are receiving supplies from the special source referred to.

    RABBITS.
    Mr. CATHCART WASONasked the Secretary for Scotland (1) in what respects the Regulations for the killing of rabbits have altered the existing law; if tenants have for many years had the unrestricted right of killing ground game on arable lands; and (2) if tenants of arable land have had the unrestricted right for many years of killing rabbits on arable land; if he can state what were the representations made to him by a deputation who waited on him with reference to the subject; and what action he has taken?
    Mr. MUNRO: I propose to reply to this question and the following question together. With respect to the rights of tenants to kill ground game, I would refer my hon. Friend to the terms of the Ground Game Acts. Representations have been made to me by the deputation to which he refers and from other quarters to the effect that further powers of killing down rabbits are required under existing conditions, and a Defence of the Realm Regulation was accordingly passed on the 30th March enabling the necessary action to be taken. An Order will be made at once, of which I will send my hon. Friend a copy.
    Colonel LOCKWOOD: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that in a week's time rabbits will be unfit for human food?
    Mr. MUNRO: That will be borne in mind.

    VOLUNTARY RATIONING.
    Colonel LOCKWOODasked the Prime Minister whether, in view of the numerous directions given by Lord Devonport, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Food, and the hon. Member for Hornsey as to what the public should eat, drink, and avoid, some definite statement by a single authority could be issued on the subject?
    Captain BATHURST: I have been asked to reply. I am not aware that there has been any discrepancy between the directions given by the Food Controller and their interpretation by the hon. Member for Hornsey and myself. The Food Controller is the sole authority for giving directions, which are always as definite as possible. I endeavour faithfully to reflect the Food Controller's views in this House.
    Colonel LOCKWOOD: May I ask if the hon. Gentleman's rr cathedra statements are to be taken as the last word, and what articles he recommends the public to save most?
    Captain BATHURST: That is a large question, but at any rate, when I speak on food questions in this House I do so with the authority of the Food Controller. If the hon. Gentleman wants to press me on the latter part of the question, it might-involve considerable discussion.
    Mr. W. THORNE: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that the Food Controller has absolutely lost the confidence of the people of this country with this shilly-shally business?

    ESHER COMMON.
    Mr. W. THORNEasked the First Commissioner of Works what amount of money has been paid for the trees commandeered from Esher Common; and if he can state who received the money, if any was paid for the trees?
    The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the WAR OFFICE (Mr. Forster): Timber on Esher Common has been requisitioned under the Defence of the Realm Regulations, and the question of compensation is at present before the Defence of the Realm Losses Royal Commission. No payment has yet been made.

  MUNITIONS.

    EMPLOYMENT OF EX-SOLDIERS.
    Mr. WATTasked the Minister of Munitions whether his Department has in its employment in the West of Scotland many inspectors of munitions who cannot accurately be described as skilled men seeing that many of them had been employed before engagement by the Department in trades other than the metal trade; whether several of these men have been declared by the War Office fit for general service but are being kept back by his Department; and whether, in view of the fact that so many ex-soldiers are capable of doing this inspection work, he will review his decision?
    The MINISTER of MUNITIONS (Dr. Addison): There are a certain number of inspectors (called "examiners") who were engaged for inspection work during the War, who have now become skilled in the work of the department, though not "skilled" in the sense that they were mechanics in the metal trades. A considerable number of examiners have already been released for military service on replacement by men without military obligations or by women, and it is hoped in due course to release practically all who have been declared fit for general service. Any application from suitable ex-soldiers for employment in this way will be willingly considered.

    COLONIAL WORKERS (BADGES).
    Mr. TYSON WILSONasked the Minister of Munitions whether he proposes to give the volunteer munition workers who have come to this country from the Colonies a medal or badge as a recognition of their services and loyalty?
    Dr. ADDISON: The question of the issue of a medal to munition workers as a mark of recognition of their services to the country is still under consideration. When a decision is arrived at my hon. Friend may rest assurred that the claims of the voluntary workers who have come from the Colonies to assist in the common cause will not be overlooked.

    HOUSING ACCOMMODATION.
    Mr. ROWNTREEasked the Minister of Munitions what steps are being taken to secure that in those cases in which permanent dwellings are erected for the housing of munition workers good town-planning standards are adhered to, more especially in regard to the giving of ample frontages to secure air and light and the provision of garden space around the dwellings, so that the members of the families of munition workers may be enabled to cultivate food for their own consumption?
    Dr. ADDISON: It is impossible within the limits of an answer to a question to give the particulars for which my hon. Friend asks, but I can assure him that due regard is paid, in connection with the Ministry's permanent housing schemes, to the considerations he raises, so far as they are consistent with the necessity for economy and for rapid construction.
    Mr E. HARVEY: Are these town-planning schemes submitted to the Local Government Board?
    Dr. ADDISON: They are recommended to the Local Government Board in the first place, and they are inspected.

    FACTORIES (MESS-ROOM ACCOMMODATION).
    Colonel Lord HENRY CAVENDISH-BENTINCKasked the Minister of Munitions whether he is aware of the delay in issuing permits to build the necessary mess-room and cloak-room accommodation in factories; and whether, seeing that these delays tend not only to reduce out put, but are injurious to the health and comfort of the workers, he proposes to take any action in the matter?
    Dr. ADDISON: I am not aware that any unreasonable delay has occurred in issuing the permits referred to by the Noble Lord. In deciding whether such permission can be given important questions affecting finance, building labour and material have to be considered. Subject to their consideration, the matter is

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    expedited as much as possible. If any specific complaint is brought to my notice, I will have inquiries made.
    Lord H. CAVENDISH-BENTINCK: Is there not sometimes a delay of five or six months before an answer can be extracted from the Ministry?
    Dr. ADDISON: No, Sir. I should be glad if the Noble Lord can supply me with an instance?
    Lord H. CAVENDISH-BENTINCK: I shall be glad to do so.

    T.N.T. FACTORIES.
    Lord H. CAVENDISH-BENTINCK: asked the Minister of Munitions whether his attention has been called to the fact that in some Government T. N. T. factories there are many breaches in the regulations designed to safeguard the health of the workers; is he aware that the exhaust ventilation provided is imperfect and inadequate; that the mess-room, cloak-room, and washing accommodation is also inadequate; and that the distinction between the clean and dirty side of factories has been abandoned, so that the garments of those engaged on poisonous and non-poisonous processes mingle together; and will he say what action he proposes to take to improve the conditions?
    Dr. ADDISON: A set of rules for observance in T.N.T. factories has recently been issued by the Ministry. These embody the practice which has proved most successful in T.N.T. factories, and it is my intention to ensure that the rules as published are complied with in all T.N.T. factories. I shall be glad if the Noble Lord will supply me with the names of the factories to which he refers.
    Lord H. CAVENDISH-BENTINCKasked the Minister of Munitions whether ho is aware that the system of alternation of work is necessary in all T.N.T. factories if grave injury to health and risk of death is to be avoided; and will he say why no such system has been arranged for in a Government T.N.T. factory in the North-Western district, employing over 2,000 men, where the great majority work continuously, and in how many T.N.T. factories is the system of alternation of work not yet arranged?
    Dr. ADDISON: Alternation of work has been practised wherever possible. In the case of the factory referred to there have
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    up to the present moment been insuperable difficulties in the way of introducing this system since there is no work available to substitute for the filling of shells. The general question, however, and the particular position of the factory referred to are being constantly watched. Recent returns from this factory are not disquieting. I should add that scientific opinion as to the value of alternation of work is not absolutely decided. It is still a question whether it is not better to trust to the principle of eliminating the sick at an early stage and to remove preventable causes rather than to attempt to avoid disease by the process of alternation of work.
    Lord H. CAVENDISH-BENTINCK: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the sickness percentage runs from 5 to 10 per cent., and that at this factory the rate is as high as 10 per cent., whereas in other shell factories it is only about 2 per cent?
    Dr. ADDISON: I do not think that is the case. I know that the rate at this factory is high, but we are doing our best to deal with it. We cannot provide alternative employment, because we have no other employment to offer.
    Lord H. CAVENDISH-BENTINCK: Is there not a factory three miles away where they could be employed?
    Dr. ADDISON: We cannot, where they are working fortnightly shifts, send the workers from one factory to another.
    Lord H. CAVENDISH-BENTINCK: You have alternative employment in other factories?
    Dr. ADDISON: In this particular case it is not possible to offer other work, because we have no other work to offer.

    RAILWAY TRUCKS (SHORTAGE).
    Mr. W. THORNEasked the Minister of Munitions if he is aware that at the Wartnaby and district pits there is a shortage of trucks for conveying ironstone from the pits to the furnaces; that in consequence the workmen only worked three and three-quarter days during last week"; and if he will endeavour to arrange for an adequate supply of railway trucks in order that the output can be maintained?
    Dr. ADDISON: I am aware that time has been lost at pits in this district as in others owing to shortage of wagons, but

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    I cannot trace the particular instance to which my hon. Friend refers. The matter has been taken up with the Railway Executive Committee, and active steps are being taken to increase the number and to improve the use of railway wagons.

    FEEDING CAKE.
    Mr. G. LAMBERTasked the Minister of Munitions whether, as the cost of feeding-cake is seriously hampering milk production, steps will be taken to reduce the price to stockbreeders and cowkeepers?
    Dr. ADDISON: I regret to say that the position with regard to tonnage makes it impossible to reduce the price of feeding-cake at present.

    ACID SHORTAGE.
    Mr. G. LAMBERTasked the Minister of Munitions whether he is aware that farmers in Devon are unable to obtain super-phosphate, dissolved bone compound, and potato and mangold manure, owing to the makers being short of acid; and whether measures will be taken to ensure a supply of those fertilisers which are vital for food production?
    Dr. ADDISON: I am aware that, in order to provide sufficient acid for the manufacture of explosives, it has been necessary to curtail the supplies of acid normally used for making super-phosphate. In view, however, of the urgent needs of agriculture, steps have recently been taken by the Ministry of Munitions to release for the production of fertilisers an increased, indeed the largest possible, quantity of acid, consistent with the essential requirements of munitions. Every effort will be made by the Ministry of Munitions to maintain the largest possible production of fertilisers. The control of their distribution amongst fanners in the various localities is, however, in the hands of the Board of Agriculture.
    Mr. FLAVIN: As there is a great shortage of artificial manures in Ireland, will the decision apply to that country in order to increase the production of food?
    Dr. ADDISON: The Department is not responsible for distribution.
    Mr. FLAVIN: We have railway facilities. What we complain of is the shortage of the acid for making artificial manures.
    Dr. ADDISON: We produce the acid, but its distribution is not our business.
    Mr. FLAVIN: I am not asking about distribution. We want the acid.

    WOOLWICH ARSENAL.
    Mr. CROOKSasked the Minister of Munitions whether he is aware that discontent exists in the Arsenal owing to the fact that foremen and principal fore men who have no claim as regards permanency are paid at a lower rate than their subordinates; and whether he will make inquiries into the matter with a view to providing that the rate of men in charge of other men shall approximate more to the rate of their subordinates?
    Dr. ADDISON: A deputation of temporary foremen and assistant foremen was received by the Department on 2nd March, when this question was raised. The matter is now under discussion between the Treasury and the Ministry, and a decision will be given shortly.

    WOMEN WORKERS.
    Mr. ANDERSONasked the Minister of Munitions whether he is aware that at the Edinburgh local munitions tribunal recently it was reported that a girl of eighteen years of age, in the employment of the North British Rubber Company, was receiving 12s. for a fifty-four-hour week with, in addition, a war bonus of 2s. 9d., which is forfeited if a morning is lost; that the firm in question informed the Court that these wages were in accordance with an agreement made with the Ministry of Munitions; and what steps he proposes to take in the matter?
    Dr. ADDISON: The report has been brought to ray notice, and I have caused inquiry to be made and the result of it I will communicate to my hon. Friend.
    Lord H. CAVENDISH-BENTINCK: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that there are 80,000 women for whom the Ministry have done nothing with regard to wages?
    Dr. ADDISON: I am quite sure that statement is entirely inaccurate.
    Lord H. CAVENDISH-BENTINCK: How many are there then?
    Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Member should give notice of that question.

    CENTRAL CONTROL BOARD (LIQUOR TRAFFIC).
    Mr. GULLANDasked the Minister of Munitions, as representing the Liquor Control Board, whether, in view of the promise made that no spirits should be sold in Gracie's Banking Tavern, at Annan, he will undertake that this existing restriction shall not be overturned without the consent of the Annan local advisory committee?
    Dr. ADDISON: The facts are that on the 3rd August last the local advisory committee recommended that for the present no spirits should be sold in Gracie's Banking Tavern, and that the Board have acted since the opening of the tavern on this recommendation. The matter is now again under consideration by the local committee, and the Board will give full weight to any recommendation which they may make.
    Mr. GULLAND: Will the right hon. Gentleman guarantee that this will not be done without the consent of the local committee?
    Dr. ADDISON: No; I could not give that guarantee. We shall pay the greatest possible attention to their recommendation, of course.
    Mr. GULLAND: Was not this tavern agreed to by the local committee on the distinct understanding that spirits would not be sold there?
    Dr. ADDISON: All those understandings will be taken into account.
    Mr. GULLAND: Will they be adhered to?
    Mr. PRINGLE: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that no attention is given to those understandings?
    Dr. ADDISON: I will be glad if the hon. Gentleman gives me a case where no attention has been paid to an understanding.
    Mr. PRINGLE: Plenty of them.

    FACTORY EXPLOSIONS (COMPENSATION).
    Mr. BILLINGasked the Prime Minister whether it is proposed to pay compensation to the relatives or dependants of any munition worker who may be killed by explosion in a munitions factory which can be attributed to the acts of the enemy?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: So far as concerns munition workers in the employment of the Government, compensation would be paid, in the circumstances referred to in the question, as under the Workmen's Compensation Act, 1906. With regard to munition workers not in the employment of the Government who may be killed or injured by hostile aircraft, or by measures taken to combat them, whilst upon the premises of the factory in which they are employed, a pledge has already been given publicly that, if the injured worker or his dependants on proceeding against the employer under the Act of 1906 fail to recover compensation, His Majesty's Government will pay compensation on the scale of the Act. The same procedure would be followed in the case of death or injury resulting from an explosion caused by an act of the enemy other than that specifically covered by the pledge to which I have referred.

    SCOTTISH BOARD OF AGRICULTURE.
    Mr. WATTasked the Secretary for Scotland whether he is aware that an alteration was made during his predecessor's time in the manner of dealing with the work of the Scottish Board of Agriculture with the effect that all the work of that Board has to be sent, in a way not in vogue previously to that alteration, to the Scottish Office for his consideration and approval; if he is aware that this change is working detrimentally to the interests of the fanning community by the delays thus occurring; and will he see that the system is altered so that the Board are given some power of initiation and decision?
    Mr. MUNRO: My hon. and learned Friend is under a misapprehension in supposing that the Board's powers have been at all affected by any recent action. Accordingly, the latter parts of his question do not arise.

    NATURALISATION.
    Mr. RONALD McNEILLasked the Prime Minister whether a Bill has passed through the French Chamber and Senate authorising the Government to cancel the naturalisation papers of persons who

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    before French naturalisation were subjects of enemy Powers; and whether it is proposed to introduce similar legislation in this country?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: I understand that the Bill which my hon. Friend probably has in mind has not yet passed into law. As regards the second part of the question, I would refer him to the reply I gave to the hon. and learned Member for York on the 5th March.

    EDUCATION (IRELAND).
    Mr ARTHUR SAMUELSasked the Prime Minister if, having regard to the importance of the question of primary and secondary education in Ireland and the necessity of improving the status of the schools and the emoluments and position of the teachers, a day will be given for the discussion of the subject on the Irish Estimates?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: An opportunity will doubtless arise for the discussion of the subject on the Irish Estimates.
    Mr. SAMUELS: Will more than one day-be given to the Estimates?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: I hope one day will be sufficient.

    IMPERIAL CONFERENCE.
    Mr. LYNCHasked the Prime Minister whether, in view of the fact that Australia is not at present represented at the Imperial Conference, he will bear in mind the fact that opinion in Australia is almost unanimously opposed to Imperial Federation, and that the adoption by the Government of any attitude tending to force the Dominions to accept such a form of federation under the existing conditions would be dangerous; and whether such proposals will for the present be withdrawn from the ambit of discussion of the Conference?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: There is no possibility of this or I think of any British Government adopting any attitude tending to force the Dominions to accept any form of federation.
    Mr. LYNCH: In place of Imperial Federation would the Conference take into consideration my own plan for a ring of republics?
    Mr. ROWNTREEasked the Prime Minister whether the Imperial Cabinet, in its executive capacity, is responsible to the Parliament of the United Kingdom or to the Parliaments of the Dominions, or whether the Government does not propose to accept the doctrine of Parliamentary responsibility?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: I cannot usefully add anything to the reply which I gave to the hon. Member on 28th March and to a supplementary question by the hon. Member for Burnley arising out of my reply.
    Mr. MARTINasked the Prime Minister if he will state the kind of closer relations between all parts of the Empire referred to in the Gracious Speech from the Throne?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: I cannot give the definition asked for, but in my opinion a great advance towards these closer relations has already been made in the meetings of the Imperial War Cabinet.
    Mr. MARTINasked the Prime Minister whether the representatives of the Dominions and of the Indian Empire are now considering with His Majesty's Ministers in secret the question of the closer relations referred to in the Gracious Speech from the Throne; and whether the people of the Dominions will be bound by what is done by their representatives in this Conference?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: The subject has not yet been discussed at the Imperial Conference. The answer to the last part of the question is in the negative.
    Mr. MARTINasked the Prime Minister how much longer the representatives of Canada at the Imperial Conference will be kept away from home, where they are much needed at the present time in connection with the prosecution of the War and other important business?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: This does not seem to me a proper question to be addressed to a member of the British Government, on whose invitation the Prime Minister of Canada is now in London in order to attend the Imperial War Cabinet.
    Mr. MARTIN: Is the right hon. Gentleman not aware that the Premier and other members of the Canadian Government are not here because the Canadian people want them to be, but because they were asked to come?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: I am not aware of that fact. I think there is plenty of scope for criticism of their own Government by Members of this House, and that they might leave the Governments of the Dominions to themselves.

    INTOXICATING DRINKS MANUFACTURE.
    Mr. A. WILLIAMSasked the Prime Minister whether, in view of the imminent lack of cereals in this country, he proposes to allow the continued waste of foodstuffs in the manufacture of intoxicating drinks?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: I can add nothing to previous answers on this subject except to point out that no barley is now being used for malting, but that the beer is being brewed from existing stocks of malt.
    Mr. WILLIAMS: Is the right hon. Gentleman not aware that malted barley is perfectly good food, especially for animals, and, if necessary, for human beings also?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: This question has been put to me in many forms recently. I can add nothing to the answers I have given. I may remind the hon. Gentleman that the restriction is only now coming into force.
    Mr. WILLIAMS: In the event of this country falling short of food, who is going to be hanged for it?

    PRISONERS OF WAR.
    Mr. LOUGHasked the Prime Minister whether, seeing that under the system adopted for appointing an informal Joint Committee of Inquiry into the sending of parcels to prisoners in Germany no expense for secretarial or other assistance incurred by the Committee can be discharged from public funds, he will consider the desirability of giving the House an opportunity of moving the appointment of additional members of the Committee or considering the suitability of those members selected to form it and its constitution?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: I do not think it would be advisable to interfere with the working of the Committee referred to. It
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    is essential in the interest of the prisoners that it should get to work and report as soon as possible. In connection with this subject, I would refer my right hon. Friend to my answer to my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Southampton on Thursday last.
    Mr LOUGH:. Can the right hon. Gentlemen say, in reference to expense, how the Committee can get to work without any provision being made?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: As I have already stated, if we find there is any difficulty in its doing the work, we shall reconsider it, but I do not anticipate any such thing.
    Mr. JOYNSON-HICKSasked the hon. Member for Sheffield (Central Division) whether some 2,000 British soldiers are interned in reprisal camps in Poland and Courland; whether the American authorities or anyone else have been allowed permission to inspect these camps; whether the men are allowed to write home or to receive parcels; and whether the Government is taking any steps, by way of reprisal or otherwise, as the French have done, to insist on an evacuation of these camps?
    Mr. JAMES HOPE (Lord of the Treasury): Some 2,000 British prisoners of war are interned in various camps in Courland; none, it is believed, in Poland. One of the Courland camps was inspected by a representative of the American Embassy in Berlin, who reported favourably upon it. There is no special restriction on the correspondence of prisoners in these camps, and parcels are received by them. The Dutch Legation at Berlin have been asked to send a representative to visit all these camps if possible. I am informed that the French authorities, so far as is known, have taken no reprisals in consequence of French prisoners of War being sent to the Courland camps, and it is thougfit that for our Government to embark on such a policy would be against the interest of our own prisoners.
    Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: As a matter of fact, are not these camps much worse than the camps in Germany?
    Mr. HOPE: I cannot say that.
    Mr. JOYNSON-HICKSasked the hon. Member for Sheffield (Central Division) whether the Government has now completed its information in regard to the statements by the International Red Cross

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    Society that large numbers of prisoners have been transferred by the Germans to the Army zones; and whether he can now make a statement as to the action the Government intend to take?
    Mr. HOPE: There seems little doubt that British prisoners of war are now employed in occupied territories behind the Western front by the Germans, but no sufficient evidence has as yet been received as to their being set to work in proximity to the firing line. The whole question is being closely watched.
    Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: Will the hon. Gentleman be able to make a statement on this very important question before the House adjourns on Wednesday?
    Mr. HOPE: I do not think so, unless further information comes to hand in the meantime.
    Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: Will the hon. Gentleman undertake during the Adjournment of the House to get all possible information, so as to be able to make a statement when the House meets?
    Mr. HOPE: It is hardly for me to make a statement on a matter which, obviously, is a Cabinet question.
    Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: Will the hon. Gentleman communicate with the Red Cross at Geneva, who are responsible for the statement, and get the evidence upon which they make this statement?
    Mr. HOPE: All that is being done.

    OUTPUT OF BEER (RESTRICTION).
    Sir FRANCIS LOWEasked the Prime Minister (1) why the Government have adopted the course of placing further large restrictions on the output of beer by an Order of the Food Controller; whether he will give an early opportunity for discussion of the matter; (2) whether the Government, in framing and enforcing further restrictions on the output of beer, will take into their consideration the fact that beer is recognised by medical authorities as a food as well as a drink, and that the moderate use of it has proved to be most beneficial to soldiers, sailors, munition workers, and other manual labourers; and (3) whether, with a view to avoiding political controversy and extravagant expenditure in war-
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    time, he will consider the possibility of taking measures to suppress the persistent agitations for State purchase or prohibition of the liquor trade, upon which so much money, paper, ink, and labour are now being expended?
    Captain BATHURST: I have been asked to reply, and will deal with this and the two following questions together. In placing restrictions upon the output of beer by an Order of the Food Controller, the Government have followed the same procedure as in the case of several other trades, especially those using sugar. The food value of beer is not disputed, but that of the barley grits and sugar employed in its manufacture is substantially greater. Restrictions upon the output of beer are based upon the necessity of rendering such foods available for direct human consumption. It is not desirable to attempt to suppress the public expression of divergent opinions upon so important a problem. If there is a general desire on the part of the House to discuss these restrictions, I will bring this before my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House, with a view to the granting of the time for discussion. I may, however, remind the hon. Member that quite recently there was a lengthy Debate upon this subject.
    Sir F. LOWE: Is my hon. Friend aware, with regard to the third question, that there is a great feeling of irritation amongst members of the trade, against whom this agitation has been directed, that the War should be exploited in this way, especially as they are far too patriotic themselves to take retaliatory measures?
    Sir S. COLLINS: Is the hon. Gentleman not aware that the greatest scientists and doctors of the day say that beer is not a food?
    Mr. SPEAKER: We have no time to digest that matter now.

    COMMERCIAL COMMITTEE (HOUSE OF COMMONS).
    Mr. LOUGHasked the Prime Minister whether there is any organisation in connection with the House of Commons called a Commercial Committee; and, if so, how has it been formed, and whether a Mr. Louis Sinclair, formerly a Member of this House, acted as secretary

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    of the organisation; and whether he thinks that it would be desirable that no such Committee should be formed without communicating with all Members, in order to ascertain those who may desire to join it and in some way regulating its constitution and proceedings so as to prevent abuses?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: The Commercial Committee is one of the oldest and largest unofficial Committees of Members of the House, and is representative of all parties of the House. Any Member of Parliament can be a member of it, and is always welcome to attend its meetings. The late honorary secretary (Mr. L. Sinclair) has resigned owing to litigations, and is at present defending an action in the Law Courts.

    RACE MEETINGS (BETTING).
    Mr. CATHCART WASONasked the Prime Minister if he is aware that numbers of bookmakers and the betting profession might be much better employed either in the Army or on the land; and if he will during the War take steps to prohibit betting either on racecourses or elsewhere?
    Sir G. CAVE: My right hon. Friend has asked me to reply to this question. I agree that all members of the betting profession who are fit for work would be better employed in the Army or on the land. AS to the last part of the question, racing is now much restricted, and I do not see my way to introduce legislation at the present moment on the subject of betting.
    Mr. PRINGLE: Does the right hon. Gentleman regard betting as a profession?
    Sir G. CAVE: Certainly. I took the expression in the question.
    Mr. W. THORNE: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that at a race meeting one day last week there were 1,500 motor cars and taxis attended?
    Sir G. CAVE: I do not know.
    Mr. THORNE: I do.

    LORD EMMOTT.
    Mr. HAZLETONasked the Prime Minister whether he is aware that in the Official List of the Government the name of Lord Emmott appears as Director
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    of the War Trade Department; whether he is aware that Lord Emmott has described himself as a kind of superior Civil servant for the nonce; and will he say what is Lord Emmott's exact position, under what Act of Parliament has he been appointed, and does he receive any salary?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: The answers to the first and second parts of the question are in the affirmative. Lord Emmott is the Director of the War Trade Department, but is not a Minister. He was appointed in January, 1915, to this post when he was also serving as a Cabinet Minister, and upon the subsequent reconstructions of the Ministry he has, at the request of the Prime Minister, continued to hold it. The appointment was made by the Prime Minister—not under any Act of Parliament—and Lord Emmott does not receive any salary.

    FRANCHISE AND ELECTORAL REFORM.
    Sir G. YOUNGERasked the Prime Minister whether his attention has been called to the personal opinion of the Colonial Secretary, as expressed by him in this House, that a similiar policy to that taken with regard to the electoral position should be extended to the consideration of the constitution and powers of the Second Chamber; and whether the Government is prepared to accept that view and to act upon it?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: The Government recognise the urgency of this subject and are sympathetically considering the suggestion in my hon. Friend's question.
    Sir G. YOUNGERasked the Prime Minister whether he will see that the Fran chise Bill to be formulated on the basis of Mr. Speaker's Conference Report is presented in such a form that the House will have the fullest freedom to deal with the position of the conscientious objector?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: The Bill must of necessity be in a form to permit the discussion of such subjects if the House desires it.
    Mr. OUTHWAITE: Shall we also be able to discuss the question of the dispatch of men over military age who have not taken part in the War?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: I am informed that the nature of the Bill will make it possible for the House to discuss these subjects.

    SECRET SESSION.
    Mr. BILLINGasked the Prime Minister whether he will consider the advisability of the House going into Secret Session at the earliest possible opportunity?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: The Government will consider this proposal after the House reassembles.
    Mr. BILLING: Will the right hon. Gentleman state whether we shall be able to discuss all questions in a Secret Session, or shall we be limited to any particular questions?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: I rather think that in a Secret Session anyone called upon by the Speaker can discuss pretty much what the Speaker allows him.
    Sir F. LOWE: I would like to ask the right hon. Gentleman whether it is generally considered that the last Secret Session in this House was a success or otherwise?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: I cannot answer that question.

    PARIS ECONOMIC CONFERENCE.
    Mr. MACMASTERasked the Prime Minister if he will say whether the, Resolutions of the Paris Conference and the Report of Lord Balfour of Burleigh's Committee thereon were considered by the War Cabinet, and whether they have been referred to the Imperial War Cabinet now sitting; whether these Resolutions and the said Report have been referred to the Conference sitting at the Colonial Office under the presidency of the Secretary of State for the Colonies for their consideration; and, if the said Resolutions and the said Report have not been referred as aforesaid, will His Majesty's Government take prompt steps to see that they are so referred for consideration forthwith?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: The subject is already on the Agenda of the Imperial War Cabinet.

    EASTER BANK HOLIDAY.
    Mr. CROOKSasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether it is proposed to close the banks on Easter Saturday; and whether, if no representations to this effect have been made to him by the banks on behalf of their staffs, he will approach the
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    banks himself in the interests of those employed in banks, who have been hard worked for a long time and have been deprived of several of their statutory holidays?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: As I have already stated, Saturday, 7th April, will be a Bank Holiday, though not a general holiday.

    CINEMA COMMISSION.
    Sir HENRY CRAIKasked the Home Secretary whether the body of persons which has assumed the title of the Cinema Commission has any official recognition or is able to use any official authority; and whether official inquiry into the moral and physical effects of these shows is being delayed on account of the proceedings of this body?
    Sir G. CAVE: The body referred to has no official recognition or authority, and its proceedings do not interfere with any official inquiry. The matter is being dealt with by the local licensing authorities under their existing powers?
    Sir H. CRAIK: Is my right hon. Friend aware that this Commission is largely organised by persons interested in the trade, and does he not think that a more formal official inquiry on behalf of the nation generally would be very useful in connection with it?
    Sir G. CAVE: I have very little knowledge as to the composition of the Commission. I have no authority whatever.
    Sir H. CRAIK: I asked the right hon. Gentleman whether this is really a trade organisation. Could he not establish a Commission under the authority of his own Department to make an inquiry into a matter which is of very great interest for the nation?
    Sir G. CAVE: I do not think the moment has come for that, but I will take note of my hon. Friend's observations.
    Sir H CRAIK: Is it not the case that a great deal of harm is being done?
    Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Member had better put a question down.
    Sir H. CRAIK: Rut I have asked it?
    Mr. SPEAKER: An important question as to whether or not a Commission should be appointed ought to be put down.

    WORKERS (WELFARE).
    Lord H. CAVENDISH-BENTINCK: asked the Home Secretary whether he has yet put in force in any factory the provisions in Clause 7 of the Police (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act authorising the Home Office to secure special provisions for the welfare of the workers?
    Sir. G. CAVE: No Order has yet been made under the Section referred to, but the inspectors of the Department have been making careful inquiries in the several industries as to the provision made for the welfare of the workers. In very many cases they have found the employers ready to adopt their suggestions without resort being had to the compulsory powers given by the Section. The question of making general orders is under consideration, and a decision will be taken as soon as possible.

    ALIEN FRIENDS AND ENEMIES.
    Colonel GREENEasked the Home Secretary whether he can state the number of uninterned aliens, Allied, neutral, or enemy, between the ages of eighteen and forty-one, now residing in the United Kingdom; and whether he proposes to take any immediate action, with a view to making these men subject to military service either in this country or their own, so as to remove the feeling of injustice which has been aroused amongst our own people by the existing state of affairs?
    Sir G. CAVE: I cannot give the hon. and gallant Member the number of aliens between the ages mentioned, but I would refer him as regards alien enemies to the reply which I gave to his question on the 14th March and to the statement I made in the Debate on the 14th February, and, as regards alien friends, to the statement by the Leader of the House on the 27th February. I would add that Allies and neutrals residing here cannot properly be classified with enemies as "uninterned aliens," and that military service in this country or their own is not a choice that can be offered to enemies or neutrals.

    ENEMY ALIENS.
    Mr. JOYNSON-HICKSasked the Home Secretary how many Germans are now, and were six months ago, employed by Lawrance, Jacob, and Company, of 80,
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    Golden Lane, George Rice, Limited, of 65, Queen Street, and 0. W. Martin and Son, Limited, of 68, Upper Thames Street and 61, Grange Road, Bermondsey; why they are not interned; and whether it is in the interest of the country to continue businesses which employ alien enemies?
    Sir G. CAVE: The firms named were six months ago and are now employing respectively nine, ten, and twenty-one enemy aliens at their works, which are not, however, in the City of London. The aliens are all above military age, and no question of interning them has arisen. As regards the last paragraph of the question, I can only say that in my view it is in the national interest that so far as possible every man in the country, of whatever nationality, should be employed on work of national importance, and I am taking steps to see that uninterned enemy aliens shall be so employed.
    Mr. BILLING: Does not the right hon. Gentleman consider that the time has arrived when all enemy aliens should be interned?
    Sir G. CAVE: No, Sir; I think that would be quite impossible. Many of them are infirm, very much above the military age, and unable to do any harm whatever to this country. But I say that all of them who are fit for work should do work of national importance.
    Mr. BILLING: Will the right hon. Gentleman remove the notices in the railway carriages, which might be now waste paper, advising people not to speak for fear of giving enemy aliens information?

    UNINTERNED ALIENS.
    Mr. JOYNSON-HICKSasked the Home Secretary whether A. Fischer, of 10, Selborne Road, Southgate, an uninterned alien, is doing printing work for the British Government; and why is he not interned?
    Sir G. CAVE: The man to whom I think the hon. Member refers is Emil Paul Fischer, of Selborne Road, Southgate, a lithographic artist. He is a German, aged fifty-two, who has been thirty years in this country, and has a British-born wife. He was exempted from internment on the recommendation of the Advisory Committee, and no reason for cancelling his exemption has been brought to my notice.

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    I am informed that he is not doing printing work of any description for the British Government.
    Mr. JOYNSON-HICKSasked the Home Secretary whether Joseph Tabbush, of 49, Princess Street, Manchester, is an unnaturalised Turk; whether he, S. P. Leibman, now known as S. P. Lee, a naturalised German previous to the War, agent for the Upper Rhine Insurance Company, and Martin Hirschberg, 27, Oxford Street, Manchester, naturalised shortly before the War and agent for the Baden Marine Insurance Company, of Mannheim, are all three trading as marine insurance agents, even doing business with the Government, obtaining information of the sailings and arrivals of steamers; and whether he will consider the desirability of not allowing persons of enemy association to continue in business of this character having regard to the action of the Germans on the high seas?
    Sir G. CAVE: The facts with regard to the nationality and occupation of these three persons appears to be as stated by the hon. Member, except that Lee or Leibman, who has resided in Manchester for thirty-six years and was naturalised twenty years ago, is of Austrian and not of German origin. The latter part of the question deals with matters which are for the Board of Trade rather than for my Department, and I will consult with my right hon. Friend about them.

    PENSION SUB-COMMITTEES (CLERKS).
    Mr. DUFFYasked the hon. Member for Worcestershire (ewdley Division) whether he is aware that the clerks of pension sub-committees in county Galway have not received the fees due to them in respect to additional allowances to old age pensioners for the quarter ending December, 1916; what is the cause; and will the matter have his attention?
    Mr. STANLEY BALDWIN (Lord of the Treasury): I am informed that a cheque in payment of the amount due has already been forwarded to the clerk of the committee. The payment was authorised as soon as the accounts, which were not forwarded by the clerk until a somewhat late date, had been checked.

    MERCANTILE MARINE (ADMIRALTY'S SECRET INSTRUCTIONS).
    Mr. HOLTasked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether, in pursuance of the rule that the Admiralty's secret instructions are not given to persons whose parents were not British subjects at the time of their birth, Captain George William Goldman was compelled to give up the command of the steamship "Huntsman," belonging to Messrs. T. and J. Harrison, of Liverpool; whether he is aware that Captain Goldman was born in Liverpool in 1861; that his father was a Russian Pole naturalised in 1870, and his mother by birth an English woman, the daughter of an officer in the British Army; that Captain Goldman was educated in Liverpool, and went to sea in 1873 in a ship belonging to Messrs. T. and J. Brockle-bank, with whom he served until he joined Messrs. T. and J. Harrison's service in 1882, in which he has been for thirty five years; whether there is any charge against Captain Goldman; and, if not, whether, seeing that a change of captain did not prevent the "Huntsman" from being immediately sunk by the enemy, he will reconsider a rule which imposes hardship upon many of His Majesty's loyal subjects?
    Sir WALTER RUNCIMANasked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether, in pursuance of the rule that the secret instructions will only be given to those masters of ships who were British subjects at the time of their birth, Captain Charles E. Topp has been forced to give up the command of the steamship "Calliope"; whether he is aware that Captain Topp's father was a Dane, who entered the British mercantile marine at fourteen years of age, in which he rose to the position of master, becoming a British subject in 1898, and that Captain Topp's mother was an English woman, born at Blyth, in Northumberland, where Captain Topp also was born in 1874; whether Captain Topp served his apprenticeship in a Liverpool sailing vessel and has since been in the British mercantile marine, serving as master for the last fourteen years with Messrs. Gladstone and Company, of Middlesbrough; whether there is any ground of complaint against Captain Topp's conduct; and, if not, whether, having regard to the scarcity of

    913
    qualified officers for the mercantile marine, he will enable Captain Topp to resume the practice of his profession?
    The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the ADMIRALTY (Dr. Macnamara): There is no wish to dispute the statements as to Captain Goldman or Captain Topp, beyond saying that the evidence as to whether Captain Goldman's father was born in Prussia or comes of Russian Polish stock is not very definite. Captain Goldman and Captain Topp are not eligible for employment in command, because their fathers were not British subjects when they were born. Applications for reconsideration of this rule in their cases are at the present moment engaging attention.
    Mr. HOLT: Do I understand my right hon. Friend that if Captain Goldman's father was a Russian Pole he would treat him as Captain Rippenhausen was treated?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: I nave already said that he is not eligible under the rule, but I also went on to say that applications for reconsideration of these cases are at the present time engaging attention, although I give no assurance as to the result.
    Mr. PRINGLE: Will the Admiralty consider applications on the part of captains in the position of these persons, who have a special case to make to the Admiralty?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: Yes, Sir. Though I give no assurance as to the result, I see no reason why these captains should not send applications in.

    HOSPITAL SHIP "ASTURIAS."
    Mr. LOUGHasked the First Lord of the Admiralty why the report of the sinking of the hospital ship "Asturias," which took place on the 20th or 21st instant, was not published until the 28th instant; and whether the Government have decided on any policy of reprisals against Germany?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: The publication was delayed until it could be established whether this hospital ship was sunk by mine or torpedo, and the naval opinion that she was torpedoed confirmed by the official statement which was circulated by wireless from Berlin. My right hon. Friend has no statement to make about reprisals.

    ROYAL NAVAL HOSPITAL ATTENDANTS (WAR BONUS).
    Mr. W. THORNEasked whether the war bonus of 5s. given to the men working in the various dockyards and arsenals will apply to the Royal Naval Hospital attendants at Great Yarmouth?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: It is not intended that this bonus should apply to the establishment referred to by my hon. Friend.
    Mr. W. THORNE: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that these men are regarded as inferior persons, and will he not reconsider the position?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: My hon. Friend knows that in the first instance the war bonus was given to the engineering trades outside the Royal yards. We thought we ought to apply it to the Royal yards, but we confined it to men in the dockyards.
    Mr. THORNE: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that the men in question are not nearly so well off as the men who work in the dockyards?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: I know through the solicitations of my hon. Friend they have received consideration recently.

    SHIPPING LOSSES.
    Mr. G. LAMBERTasked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether, in the table of losses caused by hostile submarines issued by the Admiralty, the number of arrivals and sailings include British, allied, and neutral tonnage, while the losses apply only to British tonnage?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: Yes, Sir. The weekly return states that fact.
    Mr. SNOWDENasked the First Lord of the Admiralty what proportion, respectively, of the loss of 281 ships, with a total tonnage of 505,000, during February was British, Allied, and neutral?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: The figures quoted in the hon. Member's question have not been furnished by the Admiralty, but it is approximately correct to say that of the ships lost in February, one-half were British and one-half Allied and neutral.

  AIR SERVICES.

    NAVAL OFFICERS' INVENTIONS.
    Mr. BILLINGasked the First Lord of the Admiralty the names of the officers of the Royal Naval Air Service who had designed the aeroplane or seaplane which had been successfully employed against the enemy?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: Wing-Commander Porte, R.N.

    EXPERIMENTAL WORK.
    Mr. BILLINGasked the First Lord of the Admiralty, in view of the new Order of the Ministry of Munitions made under the Defence of the Realm Act prohibiting firms from proceeding with any experimental work unless they have the direct sanction of the Ministry of Munitions, if he will state what is the position in these circumstances of the firm which is now doing experimental work for the Royal Naval Air Service?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: The supply of all aeroplanes and seaplanes and experimental work in connection therewith, are under the direct control of the Air Board and the Ministry of Munitions.
    Mr. BILLING: Are airships of the Royal Naval Air Service also under that control?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: I will consider it if the hon. Gentleman will put a question down.

    ATTACKS ON ZEEBRUGGE.
    Mr. BILLINGasked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether his attention has been drawn to the results obtained by the Royal Naval Air Service on the enemy submarine bases at Zeebrugge?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: Yes, Sir.
    Mr. BILLING: Are they satisfied that these reports show the maximum amount of damage and the maximum number of raids which have been carried out?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: I am not going to answer that.
    Mr. BILLING: The information for which I am asking the right hon. Gentleman is what we have done in the past? Surely that may be given.
    Mr. SPEAKER: Is there any use asking if they are satisfied? Nobody in this world is ever satisfied.

    ROYAL NAVAL AIR SERVICE (COMMANDS).
    Mr. BILLINGasked who is in supreme command of the Royal Naval Air Service squadron stationed at Dunkirk?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: I am not prepared to give particulars of the various Commands.
    Mr. BILLING: May I ask whether the officer who is responsible for initiating raids is stationed at the Admiralty, or where the squadrons are operated?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: That is the sort of information I am not disposed to give.
    Mr. BILLING: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman to see that the officer stationed at Dunkirk has a freer hand?

    OFFICERS' CASUALTY LIST.
    Mr. CHURCHILL: I wish to ask the Under-Secretary of State for War whether his attention has been drawn to the fact that the casualty list appearing in this morning's papers contained the names of sixty-three officers killed or missing, and of this total for the whole of the Army no fewer than thirty-one are aviators of the Royal Flying Corps; and whether any explanation can be given of this remarkable disproportion?
    The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for WAR (Mr. Macpherson): I received notice of this question only a few minutes ago, and I will have inquiries made. I think that the probable explanation of the apparent disproportion is that it is a casualty return covering several days of what we know to be severe and intense fighting by the Royal Flying Corps?
    Mr. CHURCHILL: Can my hon. Friend say whether, as a matter of fact, there has been an increase in the number of casualties among the Royal Flying Corps during the last month?
    Mr. MACPHERSON: I must have notice of that question.
    Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: Even if these figures represent a few days, will they not be far in excess of the percentages which the hon. Gentleman gave us last week?
    Mr. MACPHERSON: All I can say is that the fighting has been extremely intense during the last few days, and that the number of our Flying Corps officers employed has been greater than before.
    Sir HENRY DALZIEL: Can the hon. Gentleman say whether the proportion of casualties at home within the last fortnight has been greater than it has ever been before?
    Mr. BILLING: Is it not a fact that our casualties are nearly double those suffered by the enemy in the air?
    Mr. MACPHERSON: I cannot admit that.
    Mr. BILLING: Will the hon. Gentleman make a clear statement as to what are our casualties?

    ROYAL NAVAL RESERVE.
    Mr. CATHCART WASONasked the Secretary to the Admiralty if it has been brought to his knowledge that Mr. Robert Williamson. Royal Naval Reserve, after going through the battle of Jutland, obtained leave for nine days from the 17th to 26th January, and that he arrived home-on 20th January in a dying condition; that an official telegram was sent to the commander of H.M.S. "Malaya" on 22nd January that he was seriously ill and an official certificate posted to the commander on the same day that Williamson was suffering from acute phthisis, and that despite the facts that were brought before the notice of the commander, a warrant was issued to arrest the dying man as a deserter; and, if inquiry shows negligence was shown by some official or other, will he take suitable steps to redeem the dead man's character from the aspersions that have been placed on it?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: My hon. Friend is under a misapprehension, doubtless owing to the fact that two men of the same name are concerned. No warrant was issued to arrest the Robert Williamson, who was suffering and ultimately died from phthisis. The warrant in question was issued in respect of another Robert Williamson who did not return from leave.
    Mr. C. WASON: Will the right hon. Gentleman make that perfectly clear to the man's relatives?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: I am informed that there was no warrant for the arrest of the
    918
    man who died. I will take care that the relatives understand this if there has been any misunderstanding.

    COTTON GOODS (EXPORT).
    Sir WILLIAM BYLESasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Shipping Controller whether the export of cotton piece-goods from the United Kingdom to India and Burmah can be accelerated; is he aware that there are 20,000 packages now awaiting shipment for Bombay alone representing a sterling value of £800,000;' and whether, in view of the importance to national interests of this trade, the inadequate shipping facilities will be extended?
    The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the SHIPPING CONTROLLER (Sir Leo Chiozza Money): I am aware of the facts referred to by my hon. Friend, and I am glad to be able to inform him that steps have already been taken to deal with the congestion referred to. I am sorry to have to add, however, with regard to the last part of his question, that in view of the serious character of the tonnage position, it is impossible to make any promise that other difficulties of the same sort will not arise in the near future.

  NATIONAL SERVICE.

    PRESENT EMPLOYMENT.
    Mr HANSONasked the right hon. Member for Barnard Castle, as representing the Ministry of National Service, whether he is aware of the impression that exists in the minds of employers that they are not permitted to retain on their staff or to engage the services of any man between the ages of eighteen and sixty-one who has volunteered for National Service; and whether, owing to the difficulty now experienced by many men in obtaining work on this ground, he will consider the desirability of taking such further steps as may be necessary to remove this impression?
    The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the MINISTRY of NATIONAL SERVICE (Mr. Stephen Walsh): My right hon. Friend has asked me to reply. The Director-General has not been made aware that the misunderstanding referred to in the question exists in the

    919
    minds of employers. A volunteer who has enrolled for National Service should remain in his present employment until he is called upon to take up other work of greater national importance, and before he is transferred his employer has the right of appeal. A few cases have been reported to the Director-General -where an employer has discharged a man who has volunteered for National Service, and steps have been taken in each case to make it clear that employers taking such steps were acting contrary to the wishes and intentions of the Director-General. An official statement will be issued to remove the impression? described in the question.

    APPOINTMENTS AND SALARIES.
    Mr. GILBERTasked how many District or Sub-Commissioners have been appointed by the Director of National Service; and what salaries are paid to the holders of these positions?
    Mr. S. WALSH: My right hon. Friend has asked me to reply. There are in all twenty Commissioners, ten Deputy-Commissioners, and 267 Sub-Commissioners for National Service in Great Britain. Of these officials, eight are temporarily loaned to the National Service Department from other Government Departments—principally the Home Office. Of the remainder—234—being the Deputy and Sub-Commissioners for the General Trades Section—are all volunteers. The Agricultural Commissioners and Sub-Commissioners have been selected with great care for their knowledge of agricultural conditions. Their duties are much more extensive than those of the Trades Section, and involve functions connected with the ascertainment of demand and allocation of supply, which in the towns are performed by the Employment Exchanges. They are mostly of the land agent class. Their salaries are as follows:

    12 Commissioners at £500 per annum.

    2 Deputy Commissioners at £300 per annum.

    38 Sub-Commissioners at £250 per annum.

    2 Sub-Commissioners at £200 per annum.

    1 Sub-Commissioners at £150 per annum.

    Mr. PRINGLE: Can the hon. Gentleman say whether a Member of this House holds the appointment of either a Commissioner or Sub-Commissioner and whether he does so on salary?
    Mr. WALSH: I cannot answer except what I have stated to the House, and if further information and of a different type than that already given is required, a question had better be put down.

  MILITARY OPERATIONS IN PALESTINE.
    BATTLE OF GAZA.

      BRITISH LOSSES—OFFICIAL REPORT.
      Sir ARCHIBALD WILLIAMSONasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether, in view of conflicting reports concerning the battle on the frontier of Palestine, near to Gaza, he can now give to the House fuller information than he was able to give last week regarding the results of the operations and the number of British casualties?
      Mr. BONAR LAW: Further report has (been received from the Commander-in-Chief, Egypt, describing the action south of Gaza on the 26th and 27th March. The report is dated 1st April.
      The primary object of the operation was to seize the Wadi Guzzee, so as to cover the advance of our railway. The Wadi was occupied without a fight, under cover of advanced troops pushed forward in the direction of Gaza. It appeared to Lieut.-General Sir Charles Dobell, who was in command, that the enemy might retire without fighting, and, in order to force them to stand, he decided to attempt to capture Gaza by a coup de main.
      On the morning of the 26th a dense fog delayed operations, and it was not possible to attack the Gaza position until the later afternoon, when the enemy first line trenches were captured, and more than 700 prisoners were taken. The German Commander, Von Kress, meanwhile moved up three coloumns towards Gaza to support his troops there. These columns were admirably delayed by our mounted troops and armoured cars, and heavy losses were inflicted upon the enemy, at slight cost to ourselves. The Commander and staff of the 53rd Division were captured during this fighting.
      The time during which the operation could be carried out was limited by the supply of water available for the troops, the Infantry being dependent upon what they could carry with them. Owing to the delay caused by the morning fog, the

      921
      supply of water with the troops proved insufficient to allow the attack to be continued, and our troops took up a defensive position from a point just south of Gaza towards the Wadi Guzzee. This position was attacked on the 27th by the Turks, who were everywhere repulsed, with heavy losses, our Camel Corps completely defeating the Turkish Cavalry Division. On the 28th our Infantry were withdrawn to the Wadi Guzzee, our Cavalry remaining in contact with the enemy's main position, the enemy showing no desire to resume the offensive. Our troops remain in occupation of the Wadi Guzzee.
      The enemy's total casualties are estimated by the General Officer Commanding in Chief to be 8,000, and, as already reported, we captured 950 prisoners and two Austrian howitzers. Our total killed amounted to less than 400. Some small parties of our men, numbering less than 200 in all, who are believed to have fought their way into Gaza and been cut off, are missing.
      Finally, Sir Archibald Murray reports:
      "The operation was most successful, and owing to the fog and waterless nature of the country round Gaza just fell short of a complete disaster to the enemy. Our troops are in the highest possible spirits, and I am delighted with their enterprise, endurance, skill and leading. None of our troops were at any time harassed or hard pressed."
      In the account of the operations given by the enemy, it is stated that over 3,000 British dead were found on the field, and from the report which I have just read it will be seen how much reliance is to be placed on their accounts.
      I may add that the communication which I gave to the House last week was the only-report received until that which I have just read. No doubt the difficulty of communicating in such a position is very great.

      National Insurance (Advisory Committee).
      Mr. W. THORNEasked the Comptroller of the Household, as representing the National Health Insurance Commissioners, seeing that his Department wrote a letter informing the panel doctors that no alteration would be made in the constitution of the Advisory Committee at the present time, whether he will explain why, in spite of this promise, the Advisory Committee is to be reconstituted in such a manner as to give but one place out of thirty to the medical profession?
      Sir EDWIN CORNWALL (Comptroller of the Household): A letter was written in May, 1916, stating that it was not then proposed to alter the constitution of the Advisory Committee. It has, however,. now been decided to reconstitute the Committee and reduce its numbers from 168 to about 30. I am prepared to add one or two more doctors to the Committee, or, alternatively, to appoint a small separate medical Advisory Committee, and I am at present in consultation with representatives of the medical profession on the subject.

      NEW MEMBER SWORN.
      John Arthur Ransome Marriott, Esquire, for the Borough of Oxford.
ORDERS OF THE DAY.

  BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
  Mr. SPEAKER: The two questions which the hon. Member for North-West Meath (Mr. Ginnell) has handed in at my Chair are not urgent, and I have handed them in at the Table to be answered on Wednesday.
  Ordered, "That the Proceedings on the Military Service (Review of Exceptions) Bill, if under discussion at Eleven of the. clock this night, be not interrupted under the Standing Order (Sittings of the House.)"—[Mr. Bonar Lau.]

  MILITARY SERVICE (REVIEW OF EXCEPTIONS) BILL.
  Considered in Committee.—[Progress 30th March.]
  [Mr. MACLEAN in the Chair.]

  MILITARY SERVICE (REVIEW OF EXCEPTIONS) BILL.

    CLAUSE 1.—(Power to Call Up Certain Excepted Men for Examination.)
    (1) The Army Council may, in accordance with and subject to the provisions of this Act, at any time, by written notice require any man who is for the time being- excepted from the operation of the Military Service Acts, 1916, as being—

    (a)a member of the Territorial Force who is, in the opinion of the Army Council, not suited for foreign service; and

    (b) a man (in this Act referred to as a disabled man). who has left or been discharged from the naval or military service of the Crown in consequence of disablement or ill-health (including an officer who has ceased to hold a commission in consequence of disablement or ill-health); and

    (c) a man who has been previously rejected on any ground, either after offering himself for enlistment or after becoming subject to the Military Service Acts, 1916,

    to present himself for examination in such manner and within such time, not being less than seven days, as may be specified in the notice.
    (2) Any man to whom a notice is so sent shall, as from the date of the notice,
    978
    be deemed to come within the operation of Section one of the Military Service Act, 1016 (Session 2), and not to be excepted therefrom as being unsuited for foreign service, or as being a disabled man, or as having been previously rejected, as the case may be; and the Military Service Acts, 1916, shall apply accordingly.
    (3) If a man fails to comply with a notice under this Section, he shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding five pounds or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three months.
    (4) Where a disabled man has had at least three months' service with the Colours or where his disablement has been caused or aggravated by naval or military service, no notice shall be given to him under this Section till after the expiration of a year from the time when he left or was discharged from the Service.
    (5) Where a man has been required to present himself for examination in pursuance of this Section and is not accepted for service, no further notice shall be given to him under this Section until after the expiration of six months from the date of the previous notice.
    (6) A notice calling up a man under this Section may be served by post at the last known address of the person on whom it is to be served.
    Mr. KING Mr. KING: I beg to move, in Subsection (3), to leave out the word "five," and to insert instead thereof the word "two."
    I have two Amendments on the Paper-designed to mitigate the severity of this Bill. I need not spend very much time upon them, because it is quite obvious what what their intention is, and I believe there is a general sympathy for them which I hope will extend as far as the Under-Secretary for War. If this Bill ever becomes an Act and is put into force there cannot be any doubt that there will be a great number of men who, owing to their peculiar position and having migrated to different places, will be under a misconception as to whether they have been summoned, and they may find themselves regarded as absentees and hauled before the Court. In view of the certainty that there must be a great number of such cases if the Act is put into force in every possible case, or in anything like 50 per cent. or 60 per cent of the cases

    979
    where men might be called upon for reexamination, I wish to reduce the severity of the punishment. I propose to make the maximum penalty £2 instead of £5, and where imprisonment is ordered instead of a fine—cases which I hope will be very rare indeed—I think one month would be quite sufficient punishment instead of three months.
    The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for WAR (Mr. Macpherson): I am afraid that I cannot accept this Amendment.
    4.0 p.m.
    Mr. HOGGE: Why cannot the hon. Gentleman accept a simple Amendment of this kind? My hon. Friend, by his second Amendment, proposes to re duce the terms of imprisonment from three months to one month, and every Member knows that there are men in prison who would be much more serviceable if employed in some other occupation. Take, for example, the case of the conscientious objector, who has been discussed in this House, if you like, ad nauseam. There are conscientious objectors who at this moment are serving long periods of imprisonment when they might be doing equally good work on the land. The hon. Gentleman (Mr. Macpherson) was once a candidate for Wigtownshire, and the other day the hon. Member for Somerset put questions to him with regard to some of his old electors who had previously voted for him in that constituency. These men, accustomed to dairy-farming or other forms of farm work, are now languishing in prison, because on conscientious grounds they refused to comply with certain Regulations of the State. When we are discussing the question of man-power it does seem ridiculous to lock up in prison men who might be working on the land—
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN (Mr. Maclean): I have not been able up to the present to see the relevancy of the hon. Member's remarks.
    Mr. HOGGE: I understood that my hon. Friend's speech covered both the fine of £5 and the term of imprisonment of three months, but if you rule that it only covered the fine of £5 I will stop my speech now and repeat it on the question of the term of imprisonment. I understood that we were getting rid of both Amendments at the same time. I do not suppose my hon. Friend would persist in reducing the period of imprisonment if
    980
    the fine were not reduced, and I therefore thought that it was saving time to take the two together. If you agree, I will continue my speech, but if you do not agree I will reserve it for repetition on the question of the three months' imprisonment. Silence giving consent, I wish to add that it seems to me a common-sense proposal that offenders under this Act, while obviously entitled to punishment, should not be given a punishment that is really detrimental to the nation. Instead of being sent to prison for three months, they should be put to some kind of man-power labour that would be useful to the State. That seems to me a reasonable proposition, and, although the object of my hon. Friend (Mr. Macpherson) may be somewhat different from my own, I hope that ho will see the utility of reducing those sentences. At any rate, he ought to be able to give some reason why he cannot accept the Amendment. We are continually having a Minister saying that he cannot accept an Amendment, but that is no use for the House of Commons. He really ought to give some tangible reasons to convince the minority that they ought to agree with his view. What object does the hon. Gentleman hope to achieve by locking up in prison all the men who offend against this Act? Does he think that they would be more use in prison picking oakum than digging the soil?
    Mr. BILLING: Does this mean that a man who is proved to be medically fit for active service, if he. fails to come up at the time he is called, will be locked up as a defaulter, and that it will be three months before he is allowed to go to do the service for which the Leader of the House told us the other day there was such pressing need? Is the hon. Gentleman aware that quite recently—indeed, within the last-week—there have been many cases where able-bodied men have been given three months' hard labour as defaulters, and ordered to pay a subsequent fine of £5 out of their pay when they join up? I would ask the hon. Gentleman whether he does not think it advisable to increase the fine, if he likes, in the interests of the country, but at any rate to abolish the term of imprisonment? If nothing else can be done, the man should at least be put into a special training squadron so that the three months might be spent in making him ready for the fighting line, instead of coming out of prison useless for any military purpose.
    Mr. MACPHERSON: I think my hon. Friend is under a misapprehension. The fine of £5 and the period of three months are both maximum penalties. It is open to the Civil Court when the recruit comes up before them to decide on the facts whether they should give the maximum or the very lowest penalty. I do not think it is unreasonable, at a time of great national emergency, when you have a clear Act of Parliament, and when men are required, that those men should be asked to obey the law.
    Sir J. D. REES: The contention of the hon. Member for East Edinburgh (Mr. Hogge) would involve the abolition of imprisonment altogether. He argued that a man might be put to better use at this time than being sent to gaol, but that is true at any time. He also said that the Under-Secretary should not merely refuse to accept the Amendment, but should give satisfying and lucid reasons against it. Unless my hon. Friend appoints the Under-Secretary himself, I do not think that he will ever be able to get anyone to give him reasons which will satisfy him, and for the hon. Gentleman to attempt to do so would merely be to consume time without convincing the hon. Gentleman.
    Mr. SNOWDEN: My hon. Friend the Member for Somerset (Mr. King) justified the Amendment on two grounds, one of which was that the penalty proposed was severe. I would like to have an explanation why the Government are much more moderate in the punishment that they desire to inflict in this particular case than operates at present in regard to men who are badged, or who have certificates of exemption, because under an Army Order issued some time ago any man who has a certificate of exemption can be called up for medical examination, and if he fails he is liable to penalties under the Defence of the Realm Act, namely, six months imprisonment or a fine of one hundred pounds, or six months imprisonment and a fine of one hundred pounds. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for East Edinburgh that at a time like this it is important that the resources of the country should be utilised in the most economical manner, and it is absurd to put men in prison and employ them uselessly at an expense to the State when they might be doing very useful and necessary work.
    Mr. PRINGLE: The fact that the-Clause as it stands has only elicited the support of the hon. Member for East Nottingham (Sir J. D. Rees) is the most damning thing against it. It is well known that when the hon. Member supports anything it must be intrinsically bad. Consequently, I hope that the Under-Secretary will modify his position and accept the very reasonable proposition put forward by the hon. Member for Somerset (Mr. King). It seems to me to be a very strange policy on the part of the Government to create as numerous offences as they can with a view of putting as many men into prison as possible when they require men for military purposes. If your maximum fine is low, the possibility is-that the offender will pay the fine and not go to prison. If, on the other hand, you have a heavy fine you encourage magistrates to inflict that fine, and the offender in many cases rather than pay the fine will go to prison, and the State will fee-deprived of his services during his period of incarceration. The hon. Member for East Nottingham naturally regards it as a matter of great importance to get as large a number of men in prison as possible, but I hope the Government will not be led away by him.
    Sir J. D. REES: Would it not fee possible, as a matter of prison discipline, to turn these people to some useful purpose while undergoing imprisonment?
    Mr. MARTIN: The hon. Gentleman has promised on Report to amend this Clause by exempting soldiers who have lost a limb. Might I ask him if the would go further and exempt from fine or imprisonment anyone who can show that he never really received the notice at all, even though it may have been sent to him by registered post?
    Mr. WING: Do I understand, this being both a maximum fine and a maximum term of imprisonment, that if the explanation is in any way satisfactory there will really be no necessity for the magistrate to inflict any punishment at all?
    Mr. MACPHERSONindicated assent.
    Sir J. JARDINE: Hon. Gentlemen are doubtless aware that such influence as I have has always been exerted to prevent the increase of statutory offences, and especially to prevent the punishment being greater than the crime or offence

    983
    demands, but in this case I can hardly say that even the maximum fine and the maximum term of imprisonment are very high. You must have some means of making people come forward for military service if they refuse to do so. The magistrates both in England and Scotland are not in the habit of inflicting maximum penalties, except perhaps in the capital of the county which I have the honour to represent and where extremely severe fines have been imposed and collected.

    Division No. 21.]

    AYES.

    [4.15 p.m.

    Adkins, Sir W. Ryland D.

    Gibbs, Col. George Abraham

    Parker, James (Halifax)

    Agg-Gardner, Sir Jamas Tynte

    Greenwood, Sir G. G. (Peterborough)

    Partington, Oswald

    Archdale, Lieut. E. M.

    Greenwood, Sir Hamar (Sunderland)

    Pearce, Sir Robert (Staffs, Lek)

    Archer-Shee, Lieut.-Col. Martin

    Greig, Colonel James William

    Pearce, Sir William (Limehouse)

    Ashley, Wilfrid W.

    Gulland, Rt. Hon. John William

    Peto, Basil Edward

    Astor, Hon. Waldorf

    Hamersley, Alfred St. George

    Philipps, Maj.-Gen. Ivor (Southampton)

    Baker, Joseph Allen (Finsbury, E.)

    Hanson, Charles Augustin

    Philipps, Sir Owen (Chester)

    Baldwin, Stanley

    Harmsworth, R. L. (Caithness-shire)

    Pratt, J. W.

    Banbury, Rt. Hon. Sir F. G.

    Harris, Henry Percy (Paddington, S.)

    Hobhouse, Rt. Hon. Sir Charles E. H.

    Baring, Sir Godfrey (Barnstaple)

    Haslam, Lewis

    Rawson, Colonel R. H.

    Barnett, Captain R. W.

    Henry, Sir Charles

    Rea, Walter Russell (Scarborough)

    Barran, Sir John N. (Hawick Burghs)

    Herbert, General Sir Ivor (Mon., S.)

    Rees, G. C. (Carnarvon, Arfon)

    Barran, Rowland Hurst (Leeds, N.)

    Hewins, William Albert Samuel

    Rees, Sir J. D. (Nottingham, E.)

    Bathurst, Capt. C. (Wilts, Wilton)

    Hickman, Colonel Thomas E.

    Reid, Rt. Hon. Sir George H.

    Beck, Arthur Cecil

    Hills, John Waller

    Roberts, George H. (Norwich)

    Bellairs, Commander C. W.

    Hodge, Rt. Hon. John

    Roberts, Sir J. H. (Denbighs)

    Benn, Arthur Shirley (Plymouth)

    Holmes, Daniel Turner

    Robinson, Sidney

    Bentinck, Lord H. Cavendish-

    Hope, James Fitzalan (Sheffield)

    Salter, Arthur Clavell

    Blair, Reginald

    Howard, Hon. Geoffrey

    Samuels, Arthur W.

    Blake, Sir Francis Douglas

    Illingworth, Rt. Hon. Albert H.

    Samuel, Rt. Hon. Sir Harry (Norwood)

    Bliss, Joseph

    Jackson, Sir John (Devonport)

    Samuel, Rt. Hon. H. L. (Cleveland)

    Boscawen, Sir Arthur S. T. Griffith-

    Jacobsen, Thomas Owen

    Scott, Leslie (Liverpool, Exchange)

    Bowerman, Rt. Hon. C. W.

    Jardine, Sir J. (Roxburgh)

    Seely, Lt.-Col. Sir C. H. (Mansfield)

    Brace, Rt Hon. William

    Jones, J. Towyn (Carmarthen, East)

    Shaw, Hon. A.

    Bridgeman, William Clive

    Joynson-Hicks. William

    Smith, Rt. Hon. Sir F. E. (Walton)

    Broughton, Urban Hanlon

    Kellaway, Frederick George

    Smith, Sir Swire (Keighley, Yorks)

    Brunner, John F. L.

    Lambert, Rt. Hon. G. (Devon, S. Melton)

    Stanley, Major Hen. G. F. (Preston)

    Bull, Sir William James

    Larmor, Sir J.

    Stirling, Lieut.-Col. Archibald

    Burdett-Coutts, William

    Law, Rt. Hon A. Bonar (Bootle)

    Strauss, Edward A. (Southwark, West)

    Burn, Colonel C. R.

    Lewis, Rt. Hon. John Herbert

    Swann, Rt. Hon. Sir Charles E.

    Butcher, J. G.

    Lloyd, George Butler (Shrewsbury)

    Thomas-Stanford, Charles

    Carew, Charles R. S. (Tiverton)

    Locker-Lampson, G. (Salisbury)

    Thorne, William (West Ham)

    Cator, John

    Lockwood, Rt. Hon. Lieut. Colonel A. R.

    Tickler, T. G.

    Cautley, H. S.

    Lonsdale, Sir John Brownlee

    Walsh, Stephen (Lanes., Ince)

    Cave, Rt. Hon. Sir George

    Lowe, Sir F. W. (Birm. Edgbaston)

    Wardle, George J.

    Chaloner, Colonel R. G. W.

    Macmaster, Donald

    Wason, Rt. Hon. E. (Clackmannan)

    Churchill, Rt. Hon. Winston S.

    McMicking, Major Gilbert

    Wason, John Cathcart (Orkney)

    Clay, Captain H. H. Spender

    Macnamara, Rt. Hon. Dr. T. J.

    White, J. Dundas (Glasgow, Tradeston)

    Coats, Sir Stuart A. (Wimbledon)

    McNeill, Ronald (Kent, St. Augustine's)

    Whiteley, Herbert James

    Collins, Sir Stephen (Lambeth)

    Macpherson, James Ian

    Williams, Aneurin (Durham, N. W.)

    Cornwall, Sir Edwin A.

    Maden, Sir John Henry

    Williamson, Sir Archibald

    Cowan, W. H.

    Magnus, Sir Philip

    Wilson, Captain Leslie O. (Reading)

    Craig, Ernest (Cheshire, Crewe)

    Marriott, John Arthur Ransome

    Wilson-Fox, Henry

    Craig, Col. James (Down, E.)

    Mason, James F. (Windsor)

    Winfrey, Sir Richard

    Cralk, Sir Henry

    Meux, Hon. Sir Hedworth

    Wing, Thomas Edward

    Croft, Lieut.-Col. Henry Page

    Middlemore, John Throgmorton

    Wolmer, Viscount

    Currie, George W.

    Mond, Rt. Hon. Sir Alfred

    Wood, Rt. Hon. T. McKinnon (Glasgow)

    Davies, Timothy (Lincs., Louth)

    Money, Sir L. G. Chiozza

    Yate, Colonel C. E.

    Denniss, E. R. B.

    Morison, Thomas B. (Inverness)

    Yeo, Alfred William

    Dougherty, Rt. Hon. Sir J. B.

    Morton, Alpheus Cleophas

    Young, William (Perth, East)

    Faber, George D. (Clapham)

    Munro, Rt. Hon. Robert

    Younger, Sir George

    Fell, Arthur

    Murray, Major Hon. Arthur C.

    Yoxall, Sir James Henry

    Fisher, Rt. Hon. H. A. L. (Hallam)

    Newman, John R. P.

    Fisher, Rt. Hon. W. Hayes

    Nield, Herbert

    TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—

    Forster, Henry William

    O'Grady, James

    Lord Edmund Talbot and Mr.

    Foster, Philip Staveley

    Ormsby-Gore, Hon. William

    Primrose.

    Galbraith, Samuel

    Palmer, Godfrey Mark

    NOES.

    Anderson, W. C.

    Chancellor, H. G.

    Goldstone, Frank

    Burns, Rt. Hon. John

    Doris, William

    Harvey, T. E. (Leeds, West)

    Byles, Sir William Pollard

    Glanville, H. J.

    Holt, Richard Durning

    Generally speaking, after my experience of the benches of magistrates both in England and Scotland, I am willing to trust them in these matters. They will find out what the punishment should be, and in this respect the magistrates are often superior to those Courts presided over by professional men.
    Question put, "That the word 'five' stand part of the Clause."
    The Committee divided: Ayes, 166; Noes, 26.

    Lamb, Sir Ernest Henry

    Molteno, Percy Alport

    Smith, H. B. Lees (Northampton)

    Lambert, Richard (Wilts, Cricklade)

    O'Brien, Patrick (Kilkenny)

    Snowden, Philip

    Lough, Rt. Hon. Thomas

    O'Connor, John (Kildare, N.)

    Trevelyan, Charles Philips

    Lynch, A. A.

    Outhwaite, R. L.

    Macdonald, J. Ramsay (Leicester)

    Ponsonby, Arthur A. W. H.

    TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—Mr.

    Martin, Joseph

    Pringle, William M. R.

    King and Mr. Hogge.

    Mason, David M. (Coventry)

    Richardson, Thomas (Whitehaven)

    Mr. NIELD: I bog to move, at the and of Sub-section (3), to add the words "If upon such examination a man previously rejected shall be classified for service, whether or not he shall be a voluntarily attested man or subject to the Military Service Acts, 1916, he shall be entitled to present an appeal to a tribunal mentioned in such Acts."
    It will be within the recollection of those hon. Members who were Members at the time the Military Service Acts were passed that if we had one pledge more distinct than another it was that given by the Prime Minister at the date of the introduction of the Bill and confirmed in the most solemn manner by the Colonial Secretary, then the President of the Local Government Board, that there should be no distinction whatever between an attested man and a man brought in under the Military Service Acts. There is one other point to which I would draw the attention of the Committee, namely, the appeals made during what was known as the Derby campaign, which culminated about the 12th December, 1915. It was put forward with the authority of the Secretary of State for War, through Lord Derby, that men who attested at that time should enjoy all the privileges that might be conceded thereafter to men who were brought in under any scheme of Conscription. What was the result? Abnormal numbers of men, relying upon that promise, enrolled themselves and attested during the weeks preceding 15th December, but notably during the last week. Many of those men were accepted without any medical examination at all. I say that emphatically. A very large number were examined because the doctors were working into the early hours of the morning. Such examinations necessarily Would be more or less superficial in cases where there were concealed diseases which a more careful examination would afterwards disclose. There have been cases where men have been examined no less than six times. I received a letter as late as Saturday in which a man stated that he had been called up for military service after being twelve times rejected by doctors.
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    Experience has shown us that these attested men have never been able to get what was promised—that is to say, they have never been able to raise before a tribunal the question of their health. Many of them have been obviously unfit; they have produced certificates from private practitioners and from Harley Street and Wimpole Street specialists, but the objection has been raised by the military representative that the tribunal had no right to ntertain an appeal on health grounds because the man had attested, and therefore had precluded himself from raising the question. Many persons are most anxious to see the Military Service Acts worked as fully as they can be justly and fairly. There are few persons in this House who have done more than I have to aid recruiting. The manner in which that pledge was given admits of no other course, now that we are called upon to pass another Statute, than to deal with the question of medical examination. It is because I feel so strongly that these men are entitled to an equal position with those who have been conscripted that I move this Amendment, so that a man who has hitherto been rejected by the medical officer, and who may come up for reexamination under this Bill, shall be assured of that appeal to the tribunal, where he can put forward his plea of health, and may then be sent to a medical board with proper certificates, or to a special board in case of need. I would earnestly ask the Committee and the-Under-Secretary of State for War to remember that pledge of the late Prime Minister and the present Secretary of State for the Colonies. Do not let it be said that here is another case where there is a broken pledge, when the opportunity presents itself for making the thing square for this large class of men who have acted loyally, relying upon what they have been told. If it were not for the fact that for over twelve months I have personally been in almost daily attendance at these tribunals, I would not venture to raise the question. It is a point of substance. Unless the Government concede it, it will go out to the whole country that the Government are not treating these men fairly and that they are prepared, in

    987
    putting this Bill on the Statute Book, to ignore the just claims of these men to equitable treatment.
    Mr. MACPHERSON: The Committee knows very well the deep interest which the hon. and learned Gentleman has taken in this branch of the subject of recruiting. I can answer his contention very shortly. Under this Bill, referring as it does to men who have been rejected, the old distinction of attested and non-attested men no longer exists, and the attested man has got exactly the same rights under the Military Service Acts so far as the tribunals are concerned as any other man. I think that meets the hon. and learned Gentleman's point. I can assure him that the old distinction no longer exists between attested and unattested men.
    Mr. NIELD: I am very glad to hear that announcement, but I wish it could have the authority of the Statute. Only the other day the War Office took a case to the Courts, where it was declared that a man who had attested became a military man from the moment of attestation and his rights were determined by military practice.
    Mr. MACPHERSON: That, of course, we had every right to do because that was under the old existing law. But in the case of men who have been rejected, and who no longer are in a sense attested or unattested, but are in a class by themselves, that law would not apply.
    Mr. DEWNISS: I am glad to hear that assurance, because otherwise we must divide the Committee. Going all over the country recently, speaking on National Service, I find the objection which is raised to National Service is that they want no more voluntaryism, after the way in which the Derby recruits have been treated. That has become such a serious question that unless we are assured—and of course we must accept the assurance of the hon Gentleman—that there will be no distinction between them and the conscripts we should be compelled to divide the Committee.
    Sir G. BARING: I am sure the Committee has heard with great pleasure what the hon. Gentleman has said, and I hope he will take steps at the earliest possible moment to circularise military service and local tribunals as to the assurance he
    988
    has given. Only this morning I was taking the chair at an Appeal Tribunal in Hampshire, and that very objection was taken by the military representative as to the position of an attested as against an unattested man. If the hon. Gentleman could only appear at all these tribunals we should have none of these difficulties, but the words of the military representatives are continually at variance with what the hon. Gentleman says.
    Mr. G. THORNE: I should like to support the appeal of my hon. Friend. We were all delighted to hear what the hon. Gentleman (Mr. Macpherson) said, and of course we accept his assurance, but I should like to be quite sure that the tribunals will accept the assurance, and if it is not put in the Bill, I trust he will respond to the appeal made to him that a communication shall be made to all the tribunals that they shall act upon it, and that we may be sure that there is no distinction whatever between a voluntary man and a man who has been conscripted. If that assurance can be given it will materially help matters in the future in the country.
    Sir F. BANBURY: I should like to endorse the statement that the military representatives at the tribunals do not always understand what the directions of the War Office are. I found, only the day before yesterday, a case in point where the military representative had requested the tribunal to re-examine the whole of the men employed in agriculture. That was disputed by the tribunal, but eventually the military representative made such a point of it that the tribunal divided, and the majority was in favour of the reexamination of the men. I do not believe for a moment that that was the wish of the War Office. It is quite impossible to carry on agriculture if the farmers and men have to spend hours in getting up cases and trying to convince tribunals and military representatives, who do not quite know what the War Office desires, that they are to be exempted. It is almost as bad as taking them. If the men are wanted, let them be taken. If they are not wanted, let them remain on the land and do the work. I have written a letter to the hon. Gentleman, and I hope he will see that this does not occur again, and that in this particular case he will put the matter right.
    Mr. EDMUND HARVEY: I suggest that my hon. Friend should finally settle

    989
    any misunderstanding by undertaking to put some declaratory words in on the Report stage which will make this quite clear in the Act of Parliament itself. No one doubts the good faith of my hon. Friend or his advisers but we know that misunderstandings exist, and unless the thing is put into the Act of Parliament there is a possibility that in practice the intentions of the War Office will not always be carried out. If he can see his way to give an assurance that some declaratory words, merely explaining the law as he wishes it to be carried out, shall be put in on the Report stage that will entirely satisfy the whole Committee.
    Brigadier-General HICKMAN: It is not quite clear to me from what the hon. Gentleman said just now whether both attested and conscripted men have a right to appeal, or whether neither have?
    Mr. MACPHERSON: They both have.
    Mr. A. WILLIAMS: I sincerely hope my hon. Friend will consent to put this Clause into the Bill. I can say from experience in my own Constituency that the fact that attested men under Lord Derby's scheme have been put at a serious disadvantage as compared with conscripts is standing very much in the way of the voluntary scheme for National Service. If we had only my hon. Friend to deal with we should accept his word and not want it in black and white, but when a man has to go before tribunals and be dealt with by military representatives it is most important that the thing should be put into the Act and that we should try to get rid of this feeling in the country that men had better keep clear of a voluntary scheme, because they will in the long run be put at a disadvantage as compared with those who stand back and wait for compulsion.
    Mr. ROWLANDS: I should like to join with the rest of the hon. Members who have spoken in pressing on my hon. Friend the need of putting this into the Bill itself. We at once accept his own statement, and we know that so far as he is concerned the whole matter will be carried out, but one cannot help remembering the mass of correspondence one has had on this point of the attitude which has been adopted by some of the military representatives. If this undertaking of my hon. Friend is embodied in the Act itself the members of tribunals will be
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    able to quote it, if the military representative goes outside what the War Office desires him to do. I most earnestly urge my hon. Friend to consent to put it in on the Report stage.
    Mr. HUGH EDWARDS: I hope my hon. Friend, in response to the appeals which have been made to him, will consent, at any rate, to send out a special circular to the various tribunals. [Interruption.] These military representatives do not read Parliamentary Reports, but they do read special circulars. [HON. MEMBERS: "No!"] I think they do. That is my experience. It would be all the better if we could embody it in the Bill, but if my hon. Friend is not prepared to do that, surely he can make some slight concession in the form of a special circular.
    Mr. BILLING: I think most of the injustice which goes on with military tribunals is relative to the fact that the military representatives do not really know what their duties or their limitations are. They are all very anxious to get men, and they think they are justified in going a great deal further than the law as it leaves this House permits them. If ninety-nine out of a hundred of these representatives only read what they held in their hand, their case would be a great deal better. They do not read these things, and if it happens that no one on the tribunal has read it, and a man is not represented by counsel, or by some person who is used to handling papers, he perhaps gets unjustly called in. I suggest to the hon. Gentleman that he should call all the military representatives of tribunals to a mass meeting in London, one week-end if he likes, and address them on these and other points. He can give them their instructions as this House wishes them carried out through the Government as distinct from the instructions they have got from the military themselves. I do not think it is an impossible suggestion. They can be brought here to a mass meeting, and they might be addressed and told distinctly, because it is a matter of very great importance, and no military representative can say after that that he did not know what his powers were.
    Mr. NIELD: Let the Committee thoroughly understand that the War Office accepts the position that, although a man has attested, when he is rejected medically

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    that cancels the attestation, and leaves him a free man. In other words, he passes under the Military Service Act as a voluntary conscript, if you like to put it that way. It is a contradiction in terms, but he is a voluntary conscript. Upon the assurance that a memorandum of instruction shall be forthwith issued, not only to military representatives but also to tribunals, pointing out the view of the War Office that all men who have been rejected have a right of appeal on grounds of health, I beg leave to withdraw. [HON. MEMBERS: "NO, no!"]
    Mr. KING: I hope the hon. and learned Gentleman will not accuse me of discourtesy, but I have risen repeatedly during the discussion, and I wish particularly to meet the point that he has raised. Neither the public nor the tribunals, from the position of opinion and practice into which they have got, will be content with anything less than this assurance being put into the Act of Parliament. That is our position, and in view of the experience I wonder that the hon. and learned Gentleman does not take that view. He judges other tribunals much too much by himself. Where he is chairman I have no doubt it is a competent tribunal. Where he is chairman I have no doubt they observe the rules of law. But what are the tribunals? They are a collection of men, without any legal experience, set up to administer an Act with the object of getting as many men as possible into the Army. Their advisers are not legal men. The military representatives are not legal men. In many cases they have no experience whatever of judicial proceedings of any kind, and my hon. Friend's assurance, in view of the practice which has been going on for twelve months, will not do. We must have this in the Act, and I hope the hon. and learned Gentleman will not mind if we refuse to let him withdraw. I refuse to let him withdraw, because I do not think he is taking a right and wise course.
    Mr. NIELD: I accept the good faith of the Government.
    Mr. KING: On that I hoped I should not have to say anything, because the good faith of the Government is really not believed in by its warmest supporters. The exception proves the rule. When you come to a legal luminary who is far
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    above the passions and feelings of other people. [Laughter.] I was reading a paper only on Saturday distinguished for its most whole-hearted support of this Government and all its doings—the "Daily Chronicle." In speaking of the War Office it says, "Do not let us have anything more in the way of pledges from the War Office. Their exhibitions in this area have been nothing less than disastrous." We really must have this in the Bill. I do not believe there will be any difficulty in allowing it to be put in.
    Mr. PRINGLE: I take the same view as my hon. Friend opposite and I am much surprised that the hon. and learned Member for Ealing (Mr. Nield) should so readily have accepted the assurances of the Government. The whole difficulty to which his Amendment draws attention is due to the complete failure of the Government to observe its own undertakings. We had undertakings given by the present Secretary of State for War at the time that his scheme was being carried through, and we had equally solemn undertakings from the head of the late Government and the present Leader of the House, but every one of those assurances has been deliberately flouted by the Government. We are now told that the attestation is to be cancelled if a man can produce his rejection form. Is that a legal position? We must remember that the War Office have taken the trouble to obtain a legal decision in the Court of Appeal on this matter. They have arrested several men who were attested under the Derby scheme and who had been rejected on the grounds of health. These men were taken before different magistrates. In some cases the magistrate convicted, in others he set the man free. In one of the cases in which the magistrate did not convict the War Office took an appeal to the Divisional Court in order to have the law settled. The result of that appeal was that the Divisional Court held that a man who attested under the Derby scheme was still a soldier, even though he had been rejected on grounds of health subsequent to his attestation. The point I wish to put is this—can a simple statement from the War Office alter a decision of the Divisional Court in this matter? Obviously it cannot. We must have an expressed statement in the Statute to get over the decision of the Divisional Court. If the War Office had not pressed the matter to the Divisional

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    Court and got a binding legal decision, we might have been content with their assurance, but we have now the law made by judges, and, obviously, when you have a legal decision the only thing that can overcome that legal decision is an expressed Statutory provision. It is on that ground that I think my hon. and learned Friend is mistaken in agreeing to withdraw his Amendment. I hold that the only way in which this matter can be set right is to reverse the decision of the Divisional Court by an expressed enactment in this Bill.
    Sir J. SIMON: May I ask the Under-Secretary for War if he will consider this point. Can he tell us what possible harm is done by putting these words in the Bill? If there be any harm about it I would be anxious to reconsider my present feeling, but as I understand it the hon. Gentleman concedes the point, that that which this Amendment is desiring to put on record should be the position and, so far as he is concerned, is intended to be the position. If he told us that in the view of the War Office there was some difficulty in the way of adopting that position, it would be quite another matter because he speaks, as we all know, with great authority, and we all have had experience and gratefully bear testimony to the consideration and care which he always shows in answering questions. Therefore, we do not quarrel with him. The real question is that under the Military Service Act, things are a complicated tangle and there can be no doubt that the position of the attested man as contrasted with the position of his fellow has at different times been a little difficult for a layman to follow. I do not claim any authority to speak on the matter. I find it very confusing to understand. What harm is done, what injustice is done, what wrong is done to anybody or to any form of public service if these words, admitted to be right words, are put into the Bill? If they are put into the Bill, as I submit they ought to be, then the War Office will have secured that which they tell us they desire to secure, namely, that the class of person here referred to shall get his rights, whatever his rights may be. If this was an attempt to multiply difficulties or an attempt by a side-wind to overthrow the general object of this Bill it would be another matter, but it is not. I would ask my hon. Friend if he would consult
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    his advisers. I know very well from past experience how difficult it is at a moment's notice to give way when perhaps your advisers under the Gallery think you should not. The hon. Gentlemen now representing the War Office might consult their advisers on the point as to what harm is done to any kind of public interest if we put these words in the Bill.
    Mr. MACPHERSON: My right hon. and learned Friend has put a very definite question to me. He asks me what harm is done by inserting these words in the Bill? I can be quite frank with him. I do not think any harm would be done except that the Act, as I hope it will become soon, will be much more complicated-[HON. MEMBERS: "NO, No!"] I am assured, on the very best authority, that the attested man, whose case is the one with which the Committee is at present more immediately concerned, has got the same rights as an unattested man under the Bill as it stands. The moment an attested man who has been rejected on grounds of health—and this meets the point of my hon. and learned Friend (Mr. Pringle)—gets his notice to come up for re-examination, ipso facto any handicap which was placed upon him by the fact that he was an attested man befores goes by the board.
    Mr. PRINGLE: Is it necessary for him to receive a notice under this Bill? He may receive a notice apart from this Bill.
    Mr. MACPHERSON: Under this Bill, if he is a man rejected upon medical grounds, and he receives a notice calling him up for re-examination, any handicap caused by the fact that he was an attested man in the past, will go by the board. That is the position as it has been explained to me by those best able to tell me what the position is. In view of that fact, and in view of the assurance I have given to the hon. and learned Member for Ealing, that we will apprise the tribunals and the military representatives on the point which I have elaborated, I hope the Committee will now come to a decision with dividing.
    Sir d. SIMON: I understand what the hon. Gentleman says about his information, but I do not follow him on one point. He began by saying the insertion of these words would do no harm, but that it would make the working of the Bill much more complicated. Would he tell us how?
    Mr. MACPHERSON: What I said was that it would make the Bill more complicated. I did not say it would make the working of the Bill more complicated.
    Mr. ANDERSON: I think we ought to ask the Under-Secretary to put this undertaking into the Bill. I do not see in the least what harm can be done, and the argument that it is going to make the Bill more complicated does not appeal to me very much in view of the experience we have had. It is not merely a question of the good faith of the Government, though a good deal might be said as to that, because we have had a considerable amount of experience of the Government, probably in quite good faith, giving undertakings which afterwards were not carried out. Apart from that, I think this Amendment raises an important matter. We know from the past working of the Act that time and again local tribunals and the like have refused to be guided by mere directions or mere words given in this House. They say so. Any number of chairmen have said, "We have no time to read what is said in the House of Commons. We must be guided by the Act before us." Not one tribunal, but many tribunals have said, "If we are going to read all the different instructions that come down to us, we shall be doing nothing else but reading instructions." That has been said over and over again, and we come to this, that in the last resort you can hold a tribunal responsible for violating an Act of Parliament, but you cannot hold them responsible for getting round the various instructions that are sent to them from day to day. If the War Office does mean business, and that this understanding is going to be carried out, I think it ought to be carried out as part of an Act of Parliament, and I strongly urge the representative of the War Office to take that course.
    Sir H. DALZIEL: I support the Government in this Bill, but I confess I am not a very hearty supporter. I hope for the progress of the Bill the Government will make as many concessions as possible, so long as they do not interfere with the real framework of the Bill. I could understand the Under-Secretary objecting to the Amendment if it is going to lose him 10,000 or 20,000 men, but this Amendment is not of that character. The Committee is agreed as to the purpose which the Government have in view in regard to the Amendment, but my hon.
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    Friend says that the insertion of these words will make the Bill more complicated. With great respect I submit that that is a matter for the House of Commons and not for any eminent military gentlemen who may sit at the War Office. It is a House of Commons matter, and I would plead with my hon. Friend, first of all for the sake of the progress of his Bill, and seeing that there are many important matters yet to be raised, that he should say, "We are agreed upon the purpose of this Amendment. I think it is not necessary, but I will see if I cannot bring in an Amendment on the Report stage to meet the view of the Committee." I deny absolutely that you cannot frame an Amendment to meet the wishes of the Committee which would not make the Bill more complicated. It is perfectly easy to do it, and I advise my hon. Friend in the interests of the measure to give effect to the opinions which have been expressed.
    Sir G. BARING: I hope my hon. Friend is going to yield to the very persuasive words which have just been addressed to him by one of his heartiest Friends in this House. We had an experience last Friday of a long siege, which ended, I am glad to say, in my hon. Friend's complete surrender. This is not a procedure which is likely to shorten the deliberations of the Committee. He will see the almost unanimous opinion of the Committee that these words should be definitely inserted in the Bill. I endorse everything the hon. Member for Sheffield (Mr. Anderson) said as to the natural desire of tribunals to see the explanations of the War Office in an Act of Parliament. There has been such an enormous mass of instructions and recommendations and exhortations issued that it is most difficult for an ordinary layman to follow the instructions, and the trained lawyer would find it difficult to follow thorn. If you have these words in the Act of Parliament it will simplify the proceedings of the tribunals enormously, and will not in any way complicate the working of the Act. The Under-Secretary says that it will complicate the Act itself. He has not explained how it is going to complicate the Act, and I do not think he knows.
    5.0 P.M.
    Sir F. BANBURY: I am in a difficult position. I should like to support the Government, and if they had given any reason against the Amendment I would have done so, but as I understand it, what

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    they are going to do is to send out a circular embodying the Amendment. That, they say, will be less complicated than putting the words in the Act of Parliament. It seems to me that it will be much more expensive, and it will cause much more printing. It will be sent, I presume, to the military representatives and to the tribunals. It will have to be read and understood by the military representatives and the tribunals. Possibly the military representative may lose it; possibly the tribunal may lose it. At any rate, the cost will be a great deal more, and it will not have the same effect as the actual words in the Act of Parliament. If the words are put into the Act of Parliament there will be no trouble about sending circulars out, and the military representatives and the tribunals will have to read the Act of Parliament. It surely would be a relief to the War Office, which is very much occupied at the present time, if the words were put in the Act, as it would leave them more leisure to attend to other duties. Unless some better reason is given, I am afraid I shall have to vote against the Government.
    Mr. BUTCHER: I think we are all glad to see the Solicitor-General in his place. Really it is a rather peculiar position Everyone is agreed as to what we want, and the only difference between us is that apparently the majority of the Committee wish to see this provision put into the Bill, while the representatives of the War Office prefer to embody it in the circular to be sent round. Speaking for myself, I should have thought it would have been better to put. the provision into the Bill, unless, indeed, there is some legal objection which is not open to the general public, but which, however, makes it more advisable to put it in a circular.
    Mr. MACPHERSON: It is not a question of embodying this special Amendment in the circular to the tribunals and military representatives, but a general circular is to be sent out, the object of which will be to show what the rights of the men are under this Act.
    Mr. BUTCHER: That is not a very substantial reason. If I understand it aright, it comes to this: Even if no provision is put into the Bill, the true interpretation of the Bill, when it becomes an Act, will be exactly the same as if these words were put into the Bill. But to the lay
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    mind apparently it is difficult to understand that the effect would be the same. There are many laymen who are under the strong impression that, unless these words are put into the Bill, the real intentions of the Bill may be obscured, and it may be necessary to get a legal interpretation. If that is the real position, then I think the Solicitor General, or the Attoreny-General, who I am glad to see is also pre-sent, should tell us whether there is any real reason against putting this into the Bill. I hope it will be put in, if it will have the effect of making clear to the lay mind what may be already clear to the mind of the trained lawyer. It would be much better to put it into the Bill unless there is some special reason against it.
    The ATTORNEY-GENERAL (Sir Frederick Smith): My hon. and learned Friend has just spoken of the difficulties of the lay mind. But he at least has no excuse for suffering from those difficulties. If he will consider the terms of the Bill he will, I think, observe that by Section 1, Sub-section (2), that
    "Any man to whom a notice is so sent shall as from the date of the notice be deemed to come within the operation of Section 1 of the Military Service Act, 1916.—"
    I leave out the intervening words—
    "And the Military Service Act, 1916, shall apply accordingly."
    The lay mind may be aware quite as well as my hon. and learned Friend of the fact that under the Military Service Act there is an unrestricted and general right of appeal covering the facts suggested by this particular Amendment, and the only result of carrying this Amendment would be to afford ground for thinking there is some ambiguity on the point, and that there is some derogation from the general right of appeal which is not contested. It would be a derogation wholly superfluous and quite indefensible from a right which this House wishes to preserve.
    Mr. BUTCHER: I am quite satisfied with what my right hon. and learned Friend has stated. I think he is right.
    Sir J. SIMON: This is really not a question to be determined by some niceties of legal construction. It is practically a question which is raised at this time by a-great number of people who volunteered in the early stages of the War and have been

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    rejected on medical grounds. They want to know what their position is if this Bill is made to apply to them, and if they are called up for re-examination? I recognise what the Attorney-General has said, that one does not want to use words in the Bill calculated to cast doubt on the right of appeal, but no one knows better than my right hon. and learned Friend how that is constantly secured in Amendments made in Committee. It is done by using words which show there is no derogation of the right. It is done, for example, by introducing at the beginning of the Amendment the words, "It is hereby declared that." In order to make this Amendment perfectly plain we could, in a very few moments, secure that end by adding these words, and it will then be clear that if persons who previously voluntarily attested and have been rejected on medical grounds do come under this Act, they will have the same rights as are given to others. The question is whether or not it is desired to make it plain on the face of this Bill to the hundreds and thousands of people who, at the beginning of the War, offered voluntarily to serve the country and were then rejected on medical grounds, that they will be treated just as well as Conscripts are to be treated. I should have thought that a circular to the tribunals and military representatives would hardly have been an effective means of making this clear.
    Mr. MACPHERSON: We were pressed to circularise the tribunals.
    Sir J. SIMON: Will my hon. Friend consider whether it is not possible to put into the Bill, even in slightly modified terms, a provision which will show on the face of the measure that these voluntary men are going to get as considerate treatment as other men coming under the Bill? If that is done, the Army will not lose a single soldier, and the only result will be that you would make it quite certain that no man, however ignorant he may be, shall lose his right in regard to appeal.
    Sir F. SMITH: My right hon. and learned Friend (Sir J. Simon) has put his views in artistic phrases, but I would like to submit what is the plain issue, and to get rid of all ambiguity on the point. Here we have a proposal to issue a circular. Does that tend to show that there may be some ambiguity in the terms of the Bill? After listening to the argument
    1000
    of the hon. and learned Member for York (Mr. Butcher) and of the right hon. and learned Gentleman, I replied on the legal point which had been made, and my hon. and learned Friend the Member for York admitted that he was convinced by my argument. But the right hon. and learned Gentleman does not assent to the view I put forward. He seemed to suggest that technically I was right, but he went on to state that men who are affected, when they read the Act of Parliament, will, if the Amendment be adopted, know exactly where they stand. I gravely doubt whether these men have the slightest intention of ever reading the Act of Parliament. If the tribunals are in doubt, they will be in a position, I am sure, to get competent legal advice. I think no one will be able to say there is the slightest ambiguity in the Bill as it stands—
    Mr. BILLING: I should like to say, on behalf of the majority of the people of this country, that if in your Acts of Parliament you will call a spade a spade, instead of using high falutin talk you will get your work done better and the Act more justly administered.
    Sir F. SMITH: I do not know much about the claim of the hon. Member to speak on behalf of the majority of the people. I think everyone in the House is agreed as to what is desired, and nobody will dispute that the language we have used in the Act carries out that which is-desired and which is the object of the whole House. But I will undertake to consider between the Committee stage and Report stage, if there is one vestige of doubt on the point, if it can be made more clear in the terms of this Bill, and I hope, in view of that assurance, we shall be-allowed to proceed to the next Amendment.
    Mr. HOGGE: With regard to the right hon. and learned Gentleman's assurance, he says he will consider between now and the Report stage if any additional words may be necessary. Does he remember that as soon as we have finished the Committee stage to-day we are going on with the Report stage?
    Sir F. SMITH: Yes.
    Mr. HOGGE: Does he also realise that the average Member of this House is labouring under a very great disadvantage in so far that already four or five Amendments accepted in Committee are to be

    1001
    proposed by the Government on the Report stage. I think the right hon. and learned Gentleman, without stretching a point, can admit it is a very unfortunate position that we should be asked to consider manuscript Amendments read over by Ministers and also from the Table dealing with points which, as stated last Friday by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Dundee (Mr. Churchill), involve the lives of 1,000,000 men together with their wives and families. I think we are entitled to protest at this stage of our proceedings against going on to the Report stage to-day, and in the second place there is no Cabinet Minister—
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: The hon. Member should address himself to the Amendment.
    Mr. HOGGE: If that is out of order I can continue in order easily. We ought not, as a House of Commons, to be expected to deal with the matter in this way. I have got four Amendments by the Under-Secretary for the War Office put into my hands, and just now on this question of disabled men the Attorney-General is about to propose a fifth. We are going on for several hours yet on the Committee stage. I submit, respectfully, that this is not business. It is not fair of the Attorney-General, and it is equally unfair of the Under-Secretary of State for War, to deal with this question in this way. Obviously the House of Commons is quite decided as to what ought to go into the Bill. The Attorney-General and the Under-Secretary say that it makes no difference if it goes into the Bill because it is carrying out the wishes of the majority. Why not, therefore, accept those words'? If my hon. and right hon. Friends are unanimous that they want to get on with the Committee stage of the Bill, and the whole House of Commons is agreed that they would prefer those words in, then why haggle about the matter, and why suggest that on Report we should consider words which might be more fitting? We want to make progress and we cannot make it by heaping up five Amendments before we have Clause 2 of the Bill and while there are many other Clauses to be considered.
    Mr. CHURCHILL: I gather from the concluding words of my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General that the Government intend, unless there is some serious reason to the contrary, to meet the general wish of the Committee
    1002
    on this matter. I welcome very much that assurance, and, so far as I am concerned, I am confident that when the Report stage is reached we shall find that the Government will be ready to meet the general views which have been expressed unless they have some altogether new argument to put against it.
    Mr. OUTHWAITE: We see suggestions in the papers that some of us in criticising this Bill and proposing Amendments are obstructing. But I would suggest that it is not we, but the methods adopted by the representatives of the Government which are responsible. On Friday we had an Amendment relating to agriculture which had the support virtually of the whole House—
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: The hon. Member is not in order.
    Mr. MACPHERSON: May I say that it is the intention of the Government to meet the wishes of the Committee as far as possible; but in reference to the statement made by the hon. Member for East Edinburgh that we are accepting four Amendments, might I say that these Amendments are being put down at the express wish of the Committee?
    Sir J. SIMON: Might I point out to my right hon. Friend the Attorney-General that in Sub-section (2) of Clause 1 of the Bill there is a provision that a man to whom notice is sent shall, as from the date of the notice, be deemed to come within the operation of Section 1 of the Military Service Act, 1916 (Session 2)1 That is not the Military Service Act which gives the right of appeal. It is the earlier Military Service Act which gives the right of appeal, and I would suggest to my right hon. Friend whether he sees any objection to amending the words "and the Military Service Acts, 1916, shall apply accordingly" by inserting after the words "Acts" on the Report stage the words "including the rights of appeal given thereunder?"
    Sir F. SMITH: Though, artistically, to accept these words is a deep blow to any lawyer, yet to avoid any discussion I shall be glad to accept them.
    Mr. PRINGLE: I have been endeavouring to put a point to which I have received no answer. It is a matter which deserves some attention. We know that by legal decision the Government are entitled to call up these attested men apart

    1003
    altogether from this Bill. If they are called up apart from this Bill these men have no rights of appeal. I would like the Government to make clear that whether these men are called up apart from this Bill or under this Bill, they shall have the rights of appeal.
    Mr. SNOWDEN: I desire to enforce the point which has been made by the hon. Member. As I construe the argument of the learned Attorney-General it is this, that the sending of a notice under this Act to an attested man who had been rejected on medical grounds would remove that man's attestation and hold him under the provisions of the Military Service Acts. It seemed to me that the speech delivered by the Under-Secretary for War confused the discharged attested man and the rejected attested man. The rejected attested man is still a soldier. The point was very definitely settled by a decision of the High Court two or three weeks ago. It is a most important point, and we are entitled to have it made a little clearer. What I want to know is whether in the case of attested men who have not been discharged, who have simply been rejected, and who therefore under that High Court decision are in the Army Reserve now, will the sending of notice under this Bill revoke their attestation and make them into conscript soldiers? That is a point which I want to make clear beyond all possibility of doubt.
    Sir F. SMITH: I do not recall the case in the High Court which has been mentioned, but the position from the point of view of this Bill, as I understand it, is that the moment men come within the purview of this Bill, attested and unattested men are in the same position. Therefore every attested man. when once the scope of the Bill is extended to his case, is entitled to every and all the rights of the Bill.
    Mr. SNOWDEN: My point is this: He is an attested man. He has no rights at all. Under the Military Service Acts he was given the right of appeal, but that was restricted under Regulations issued by the Local Government Board. He could not appeal, for example, on the ground of conscientious objection or on medical grounds. What I want to know is this: Will that man cease to be in the Army Reserve the moment he gets his, notice under this Act calling him up for further re-examination? At the present
    1004
    time he is in the Army Reserve, and I could quite understand the argument of the learned Attorney-General that if he comes under this Bill he will be entitled to all the rights that are given to those who are conscripted under the Military Service Acts. But what I want to know is whether his attestation will be revoked—whether he is to be in the Army Reserve? Of course, so long as he is in the Army Reserve he can have no rights of appeal under the Military Service Acts.
    Mr. PRINGLE: I think that this is a sufficiently important matter to deserve a reply from the Attorney-General or the Solicitor-General. This Amendment deals with the position of the attested men. We have the authority of a legal decision, stating that an attested man rejected on medical grounds is in the Army, and consequently we have the right to consider the effect on his position of a Bill if it is to put him into the Army while he is in the Army already, and the fact that the Attorney-General tells the Committee that he does not know anything about the case to which reference has been made leads us to inquire further as to whether the Government has been properly advised in framing this Clause. The case is public property. It was reported more than a fortnight ago in the "Times," being apparently regarded as of sufficient public interest to require a report in that paper. That decision was taken on the question whether a magistrate was right in refusing to convict a man who was an attested man under the Derby scheme, and had been rejected on medical grounds. The Crown put forward the case that the rejection on medical grounds did not take him out of the Reserve, and that attestation made him a soldier until he was discharged. That contention was upheld by the Court. Consequently until the men who are attested are discharged it is difficult to see how the Sub-section of the Bill will operate in their case. How can a man who is already a soldier in the eye of the law be made a soldier again by Sub-section (2)?
    Mr. SNOWDEN: They do not understand the point at all.
    Mr. PRINGLE: The point is roughly this: Apart from this Bill altogether, these men can receive notices, and have been receiving notices for months past. They have been re-examined and put into the Army without any appeal. Apart from this Bill altogether, it will be pos-

    1005
    sible in these cases to go on sending notices, and to get these men into the Army without any appeal. What I want from the Government is an understanding between now and the Report stage that they will make it clear that a man attested under the Derby scheme will only receive notice under this Bill, and that any right to call up a man for examination apart from this Bill will cease. I am quite sure that my right hon. Friend if he had had his attention called to the point specifically would have dealt with it already.
    Sir F. SMITH: I am distinctly grateful to the hon. Gentleman for making such allowances for me. I listened very carefully to my hon. Friend on the various points which he has communicated to the Committee. As I understand the specific Amendment which we are discussing is that which stands in the name of my hon. and learned Friend (Mr. Nield). I think that the Government has fairly met every point in regard to any grievance which has been raised, and I dealt with those

    Division No. 22.]

    AYES.

    [5.33 P.m.

    Bethell, Sir J. H.

    Hudson, Walter

    Ponsonby, Arthur A. W. H.

    Bliss, Joseph

    John, Edward Thomas

    Radford, Sir George Heynes

    Burns, Rt. Hon. John

    Kilbride, Denis

    Richardson, Thomas (Whitehaven)

    Byles, Sir William Pollard

    King, Joseph

    Roch, Walter F. (Pembroke)

    Collins, Sir Stephen (Lambeth)

    Lamb, Sir Ernest Henry

    Rowlands, James

    Cory, Sir Clifford John (St. Ives)

    Lambert, Richard (Wilts., Cricklade)

    Simon, Rt. Hon. Sir John Allsebrook

    Davies, Timothy (Lincs., Louth)

    Lynch Arthur Alfred

    Smith, H. B. L. (Northampton)

    Dickinson, Rt. Hon. Henry Edward

    Macdonald, J. Ramsay (Leicester)

    Snowden, Philip

    Doris, William

    McMicking, Major Gilbert

    Thorne, G. R. (Wolverhampton)

    Edwards, John Hugh (Glamorgan, Mid)

    MacVeagh, Jeremiah

    Toulmin, Sir George

    Flavin, M. J.

    Maden, Sir John Henry

    Trevelyan, Charles Philips

    Galbraith, Samuel

    Martin, Joseph

    Wedgwood, Commander Josiah C.

    Gilbert, J. D.

    Mason, David M. (Coventry)

    White, J. Dundas (Glasgow, Tradeston)

    Glanville, Haroid James

    Molteno, Percy Alport

    Whittaker, Rt. Hon. Sir Thomas P.

    Goldstone, Frank

    Morison, Hector (Hackney, S.)

    Wiles, Rt. Hon. Thomas

    Harris, Percy A. (Leicester, S.)

    Nolan, Joseph

    Williams, Aneurin (Durham, N.W.)

    Harvey, T. E. (Leeds, West)

    O'Brien, Patrick (Kilkenny)

    Yeo, Alfred William

    Haslam, Lewis

    O'Connor. John (Kildare, N.)

    Henderson, J. M. (Aberdeen, W.)

    Outhwaite, R. L.

    TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—

    Hogge, James Myles

    Pearce, Sir Robert (Staffs, Leek)

    Mr. Anderson and Mr. Pringle

    NOES.

    Acland, Rt. Hon. Francis yke

    Bridgeman, William Clive

    Craig, Ernest (Crewe)

    Agg-Gardner, Sir James Tynte

    Broughton, Urban Hanlon

    Craig, Col. James (Down, E.)

    Archdale, Lieut. E. M.

    Brunner, J. F. L.

    Craik, Sir Henry

    Archer-Shee, Lieut.-Col. Martin

    Bryce, J. Annan

    Currie, George W.

    Ashley, W. W.

    Burdett-Coutts, W.

    Denman, Hon. Richard Douglas

    Astor, Hon. Waldorf

    Burn, Colonel C. R.

    Denniss, E. R. B.

    Baker, Joseph Allen (Finsbury, E.)

    Butcher, J. G.

    Dougherty, Rt. Hon. Sir James B.

    Baldwin, Stanley

    Carew, Charles R. S. (Tiverton)

    Duke, Rt. Hon. Henry Edward

    Banbury, Rt. Hon. Sir Frederick G.

    Carnegie, Lieut. Col. Douglas G.

    Duncan, C. (Barrow-in-Furness)

    Baring, Sir Godfrey (Barnstaple)

    Cator, John

    Edwards, Clement (Glamorgan, E.)

    Barnett, Captain R. W.

    Cautley, Henry Strother

    Faber, George Denison (Clapham)

    Barran, Rowland Hurst (Leeds, N.)

    Cave, Rt. Hon. Sir George

    Fell, Arthur

    Bathurst, Capt. Charles (Wilts, Wilton)

    Cawley, Rt. Hon. Sir Frederick

    Fisher, Rt. Hon. W. Hayes

    Beauchamp, Sir Edward

    Cecil, Evelyn (Aston Manor)

    Forster, Henry William

    Beck, Arthur Cecil

    Chaloner, Colonel R. G. W.

    Foster, Philip Staveley

    Bellairs, Commander C. W.

    Churchill, Rt. Hon. Winston S.

    Gardner, Ernest

    Blake, Sir Francis Douglas

    Collins, Sir W. (Derby)

    Gibbs, Col. George Abraham

    Bescawen, Sir Arthur S. T. Griffith-

    Compton-Rickett, Rt. Hon. Sir J.

    Greenwood, Sir Hamar (Sunderland)

    Bowerman, Rt. Hon. C. W.

    Cornwall, Sir Edwin A.

    Greig, Colonel J. W.

    Boyton, James

    Cory, James H. (Cardiff)

    Gretton, John

    Brace, Rt. Hon. William

    Cowan, W. H.

    Griffith, Rt. Hon. Ellis Jones

    points in my argument, but as to the point raised by the hon. and learned Gentleman (Mr. Pringle) it is a new one.
    Mr. HOGGE: What I wanted to point out, when I rose before, was that the Attorney-General was not present when my hon. and learned Friend (Mr. Pringle) raised his point earlier in the Debate, and before the right hon. Gentleman entered the House, and he did not hear what was said. I do not blame the right hon. Gentleman for that, because he has other business to attend to; but it is only fair to my right hon. and learned Friend to say that he raised the point this afternoon, and it is one which has not been dealt with by anybody on the Front Bench. I should Be very glad if the Attorney-General has any specific knowledge on the point which would enable him to clear it up.
    Question put, "That those words be there inserted."
    The Committee divided: Ayes, 57; Noes, 159.

    Guest, Hon. Frederick E. (Dorset, E.)

    Lockwood, Rt. Hon. Lt.-Col. A. R.

    Rutherford, Sir J. (Lanes, Darwen)

    Haddock, George Bahr

    Lonsdale, Sir John Brown lee

    Salter, Arthur Clavell

    Hanson, Charles Augustin

    Lowe, Sir F. W. (Birm., Edgbaston)

    Samuels, Arthur W.

    Hardy, Rt. Hon. Laurence

    MacCaw, William J. MacGeagh

    Samuel, Rt. Hon. Sir Harry (Norwood)

    Harmsworth, Cecil (Luton, Beds)

    Macnamara, Rt. Hon. Dr. T. J.

    Scott, Leslie (Liverpool, Exchange)

    Harmsworth, R. L. (Calthness-shire)

    McNeill, Ronald (Kent, St. Augustine's)

    Seely, Lt.-Col, Sir C. H. (Mansfield)

    Henry, Sir Charles

    Macpherson, James Ian

    Smith, Rt. Hon. Sir F. E. (Walton)

    Herbert, General Sir Ivor (Mon., S.)

    Magnus, Sir Philip

    Smith, Sir Swire (Keighley, Yorks)

    Herbert, Hon. A. (Somerset, S.)

    Mason, James F. (Windsor)

    Stanley, Major Hon. G. F. (Preston)

    Hewart, Sir Gordon

    Meux, Hon. Sir Hedworth

    Stirling, Lieut.-Col. Archibald

    Hewins, William

    Middlemore, John Throgmorton

    Strauss, Edward A. (Southwark, West)

    Hickman, Colonel Thomas E.

    Money, Sir L. G. Chiozza

    Terrell, George (Wilts, N. W.)

    Hills, John Waller

    Morgan, George Hay

    Thomas-Stanford, Charles

    Hobhouse, Rt. Hon. Sir Charles E. H.

    Morison, Thomas B. (Inverness)

    Thome, William (West Ham)

    Hodge, Rt. Hon. John

    Morton, Alpheus Cleophas

    Tickier, T. G.

    Hohler, G. F.

    Newman, John R. P.

    Wardle, George J.

    Holmes, Daniel Turner

    Ormsby-Gore, Hon. William

    Wason, Rt. Hon. E. (Clackmannan)

    Hope, James Fitzalan (Sheffield)

    Paget, Almeric Hugh

    Wheler, Major Granville C. H.

    Howard, Hon. Geoffrey

    Palmer, Godrey Mark

    Whiteiey, Herbert J.

    Hunt, Major Rowland

    Parker, James (Halifax)

    Wilson, Lt.-Cl. Sir M. (Beth'I Green, S. W.)

    Illingworth, Rt. Hon. Albert H.

    Partington, Oswald

    Wilson-Fox, Henry

    Jacobsen, Thomas Owen

    Pearce, Sir William (Limehouse)

    Winfrey, Sir Richard

    Jardine, Ernest (Somerset, East)

    Philipps, Maj.-Gen. Ivor (Southampton)

    Wing, Thomas Edward

    Jones, J. Towyn (Carmarthen, East)

    Philipps, Sir Owen (Chester)

    Wolmer, Viscount

    Jones, William S. Glyn- (Stepney)

    Pratt, J. W.

    Wood, John (Stalybridge)

    Kellaway, Frederick George

    Pryce-Jones, Colonel E.

    Yate, Colonel C. E.

    Kinloch-Cooke, Sir Clement

    Rawson, Colonel Richard H.

    Young, William (Perthshire, East)

    Lambert, Rt. Hon. G. (Devon, S. Molton)

    Rees, Sir J. D. (Nottingham, E.)

    Younger, Sir George

    Larmor, Sir J.

    Reid, Rt. Hon. Sir George H.

    Yoxall, Sir James Henry

    Law, Rt. Hon. A. Bonar (Bootle)

    Roberts, George H. (Norwich)

    Levy, Sir Maurice

    Robertson, Rt. Hon. John M.

    TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—

    Lloyd, George Butler (Shrewsbury)

    Robinson, Sidney

    Lord Edmund Talbot and Mr.

    Locker-Lampson, G. (Salisbury)

    Rothschild, Lionel de

    Primrose.

    Sir F. SMITH: In regard to the words suggested by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Walthamstow (Sir J. Simon), I undertake that they shall be proposed by the Government on the Report stage.
    Sir C. HOBHOUSE: I beg to move, at the end of Sub-section (3), to insert the words "unless owing to the loss of a limb, he is permanently disabled for any military service."
    I move this Amendment for the purpose of making a disabled soldier, who has been discharged safe from being called up to the Court, only to be immediately released, and sent back to the place whence he came. It is quite clear that there are several kinds of disablement which might prevent a man from being called up under this Bill, but being aware that the Government have a further Amendment which they intend to propose on the Report stage I do not feel it necessary to present my arguments in support of my proposal, and all I will do at the present moment is to formally move my Amendment as it stands on the Paper for the purpose of obtaining from my hon. Friend opposite a statement as to the amended words he proposes to submit at a later stage of the Bill.
    Mr. MACPHERSON: I am glad that the right hon. Gentleman is prepared to withdraw this Amendment. I have given
    1008
    an assurance that on the Report stage I will introduce an Amendment covering the case of the soldier who is disabled by battle wounds. I can assure my right hon. Friend that the case of the man who has lost a limb will be covered by that Amendment.
    Mr. HOGGE: If my right hon. Friend had persisted in the Amendment as it stands I would have objected because there are many other physical functions which are more to a man's detriment even than the loss of a limb. For instance, there is the case of men rendered speechless by shell shock and men who are deaf. I have read the Amendment which the right hon. Gentleman proposes to move in Report and which deals mostly with wounds received in battle or in an engagement with the enemy and injuries from poisonous gases. There is another class of case which ought to be considered very specifically. I refer to the neurasthenic cases. Every Member knows of young officers and men who have come home suffering from some functional disease due to the shock and strain of this awful War. Those are the worst kind of cases, and it is most difficult for a doctor to say whether a man of that kind has recovered or not, and, even if he has, to say whether he will stand the shock for another week or month. I want to enter my caveat at this stage and to ask the hon. Gentleman between now and Report to take very special care that

    1009
    the neurasthenic and functional disease-cases will be specifically looked to on -account of the danger to the man himself and the danger to the fit men with whom he may be associated on his return to the firing line.
    Mr. PRINGLE: I am surprised that the Government accept this Amendment in this form in view of the statement of the Attorney-General that if you expressly mention one case you abrogate the rights of others. We mentioned the loss of a limb and in other cases it may be held that the man is not entitled to any discretionary treatment. I think the Government should, between now and Report, bear in mind the words of the Attorney-General and not prejudice other cases quite as much deserving of sympathy as the loss of a limb. A blind man is far more deserving of sympathy, and yet may be liable to a penalty under this provision. This will lead to the absurd position of giving relief to the people who least require it.
    Mr. MACPHERSON: I think my hon. Friend must be under a misapprehension, because I have not accepted this Amendment at all.
    Mr. PRINGLE: That is quite true, but he has told us he is going to accept an Amendment on Report which is the same Amendment in slightly altered form.
    Mr. MACPHERSON: No. I have not accepted this Amendment. I will propose an Amendment on Report applying to officers and men who have been discharged on account of wounds received in battle.
    Mr. PRINGLE: I think that makes the position even worse. His Amendment is one, as I understand, which is exclusively for the benefit of men discharged from the Service. The Amendment before us includes men whether they are discharged from the Service or not, who may be disabled on account of the loss of a limb. The Sub-section with which we are dealing is a general provision imposing a penalty upon any man of whatever class who fails to respond to notice for reexamination. I would suggest to the right hon. Baronet the Member for Bristol that he should not withdraw his Amendment, because the Government Amendment will leave the people who are permanently disabled liable to penalty unless they have been discharged from the Army. I hope in the light of that my right hon.
    1010
    Friend will reconsider the position. It is surely absurd that men who are totally and obviously incapable, such as blind men and deaf and dumb men, should be liable to a penalty for failure in this respect. I think in every such case there should be an express exemption that men in such circumstances should under no conditions be liable to a penalty.
    Mr. MARTIN: I desire to move an Amendment to the proposed Amendment.
    The CHAIRMAN: The hon. Member is no doubt referring to a Paper which he has handed to me, but that deals with quite a different subject which will arise on the next Amendment on the paper.
    Mr. MARTIN: It is the same subject. I want to add other persons to the exempted classes. This Sub-section provides for penalties, and the right hon. Gentleman proposes to exempt from those penalties certain people. I desire to go further, and to exempt another class, and to provide that they shall not be penalised if they are able to show that they did not receive the notice.
    The CHAIRMAN: That is a separate subject, and will be dealt with on the next Amendment, which will be called after this is disposed of.
    6.0 P.M.
    Sir WILLIAM COLLINS: The Under-Secretary told us that he proposed to move an Amendment at a later stage, covering a larger ground than that proposed by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Bristol (Sir C. Hobhouse). I venture to think that there are many other categories of exemptions that ought to be free from penalty, who by reason of discharge from the Army, not merely because of the loss of a limb but through other disabilities, should not be put to all the trouble of being called up again for examination. A case discharged from the Army as the result of a battle wound represents a certain class of case which ought not again to be brought up. I have another kind of case in mind, and it is that of a man who attested under the Derby scheme. He is a man in well-to-do circumstances, was passed for general service, and subsequently found that he was unable to see at night; he was afflicted with night blindness. He was repeatedly before medical officers, who failed to discover the nature of the defect. The man was accused of malingering, and was held up to obloquy as a slacker or a drinker, and the blindness

    1011
    at night was attributed to one or other of those causes. The man was examined repeatedly by a medical board and produced certificates from well-known occulists to the effect that he was so suffering. Those certificates were disregarded. The man in the last resort appealed to me. I found him to be suffering from a well-known degeneration of the back of the eye, of which the characteristic symptom is night blindness. I wrote direct to Sir Alfred Keogh myself, and told him it was a rather flagrant case, and he replied thanking me, and in two days he informed me that the man had been discharged from the Army. A case of that kind, I venture to think, ought not again to be called up for examination. Indeed, I have had a letter from this gentleman during the last day or two, saying that he sees in the papers that all discharged men are to be re-examined, and going on:
    "I have little doubt, from my past experience of Army medical boards, that I shall be passed fit for general service again. Will you let me know what course I ought to adopt? As you know, I am perfectly willing to do what I can. The fact that I enlisted before I was called and did not appeal proves that, but rather than go through a second experience like I did before, I would deliberately take my own life and put an end to my troubles once for all. The jeers, the threats. and the cruelty are more than I can bear again."
    Many unkind things have sometimes been said in regard to medical examinations, many of them unjust and unfair criticisms, but I fully admit that there have been unfortunate mistakes in the past, and I hope the assurance of the Leader of the House that some improvements will be made in medical boards in the future will be carried out, that opportunity will be given to resort to specialists and experts, and that the certificates produced by the individual's own doctor will not be disregarded, as they were in this case. I hope the hon. Member when he brings forward his Amendment on the Report stage will make it somewhat wider than he intimated, and certainly wider than the Amendment of the right hon. Gentleman now before the House, in order to meet some of these rather serious cases, which are causing a very painful feeling throughout the country.
    Sir C. HOBHOUSE: Under the circumstances, I will ask leave to withdraw my Amendment, but I wish to guard myself against saying that I accept in its entirety the Amendment which my hon. Friend
    1012
    (Mr. Macpherson) is going to put on the Paper. With regard to what fell from the hon. Member for East Edinburgh (Mr. Hogge), I would like to say to him that any limitation which appears in the words of my Amendment is the result of consulting an expert, and it may therefore be necessary to look very carefully at the Amendment of the Under-Secretary when it appears on the Paper.
    Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
    Mr. KING: I beg to move, at the end of Sub-section 3, to insert the words"but a man shall not be liable to a penalty under this provision if he shows that he did not receive the notice."
    Mr. MACPHERSON: I accept that. Amendment agreed to.
    The CHAIRMAN: I have a manuscript Amendment in my hand given in by the hon. Member for York (Mr. Butcher), but I think that it deals with a point which we have been discussing for the last hour and a half.
    Mr. BUTCHER: My hon. Friend the Member for Mansfield (Colonel Sir Charles Seely) and I had intended to support an Amendment dealing with this question of exempting men who had been wounded or otherwise rendered incapable in war but as I understand the Under-Secretary will move an Amendment in large terms on Report, I do not now desire to move, while reserving to ourselves the right to criticise the Government Amendment if it is not wide enough.
    The CHAIRMAN: With regard to the next Amendment in the name of the hon. Member for Blackburn (Mr. Snowden), to insert the words "Where a man has been discharged from the Army or Navy as unfit," it seems to me that that Amendment, if carried, would make Sub-section (4) quite contradictory to Sub-section (1), and it is not possible to accept an Amendment which contradicts a decision at which the Committee has already arrived.
    Mr. SNOWDEN: On a point of Order, Sir. I admit that the phraseology is rather complicated, but the purpose of it is this: You will see that Sub-section (4) exempts from its operation men who have been discharged from the Army with less than three months' service. The point of my Amendment is to give to every man discharged from the Army, no matter how short his length of service may have been,

    1013
    the benefit of this provision, and I do not think that that contradicts anything that has gone before.
    The CHAIRMAN: The hon. Member will, perhaps, recollect that on Friday we amended Sub-section (I) by providing that nobody should receive a notice after discharge, except after an interval of at least six months, and, therefore, if we put in the present Amendment, it would contradict that Amendment.
    Mr. SNOWDEN: I think I have not made my point clear, because will not this Sub-section, as it stands now, be a contradiction of the Clause as amended? At the present time, as the Clause stands, a disabled man must have at least three months' service to be entitled to exemption for twelve months against being called up, and the point of my Amendment is to extend that exemption to men who have been discharged as disabled after, say, a week's or month's service.
    The CHAIRMAN: I am afraid it would leave the Bill in a hopelessly contradictory form.
    Mr. HOGGE: In regard to the pensions of those men, this deals with disabled men who have been discharged from the Army diseased, caused or aggravated by naval or military service. The natural result of that kind of discharge is that those men are in receipt of a pension which cannot be revised except on terms of six months.
    The CHAIRMAN: That does not seem to me like a point of Order.
    Mr. HOGGE: I was trying to suggest a reason why the Amendment of my hon. Friend should be allowed, because of the complexity of the provision into which we should fall if the Bill as it stands is allowed to remain. If, however, it is not in order, I will prepare an Amendment for the Report stage.
    The CHAIRMAN: I do not think it can be taken here.
    Mr. KING: I beg to move, in Subsection (4), to leave out the words "three months'," and to insert instead thereof the words "one month's."
    In this Sub-section the point is that where a man has had at least three months in the Army or Navy, or where his disablement has been caused or aggravated by his service, no notice is to be given to I him till after a year from the time when
    1014
    he left the Army or Navy. I endeavour to give a man who has been in the Army only a month the benefit of this Subsection. There are to my knowledge-several cases of men who have been brought into the Army for the shortest possible time. I know the case of a hopeless epileptic who was taken by his father for medical examination. Apparently the doctor refused to believe what was told him, and after two days he had to join up. He had a very bad fit that night, was in hospital the next day, and within three weeks he was discharged from the Army. I say that that man ought to have the benefit of a year's free play as much as if he had stayed in the Army for three-months in hospital instead of for only three weeks. I cannot see why the-Government cannot give way on this point, because it would mitigate, in very severe and obvious cases of necessity, the very-great and admitted hardship of this Bill.
    Mr. MACPHERSON: I accept.
    Amendment agreed to.
    The CHAIRMAN: With regard to the-next three Amendments on the Notice Paper, to insert the words "or has been discharged since the 31st December, 1916," that subject was dealt with on Friday by an Amendment of the hon. Baronet the Member for Loughborough (Sir M. Levy). We inserted a proviso at the end of Subsection (1) which, I think, covers all those points, as follows:
    "Provided that no man shall be required to submit himself for re-examination within six months of his previous; and last rejection or discharge."
    Mr. MACPHERSON: With regard to that point, Sir, my promise then to my Hon. Friend the Member for Lough-borough was that on the Report stage I would move an Amendment myself, embodying what I felt was the general wish of the House.
    Sir M. LEVY: I think this is a mistake, because I particularly put the point, "Do you accept the Amendment as it stands now?" The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Bristol (Sir C. Hobhouse) asked if it would be brought up again on Report, and I rose and said, "Will you accept my Amendment definitely, here and now?" My Amendment was then, I think, accepted.
    The CHAIRMAN: I do not think it is necessary to discuss this further, because

    1015
    here is the Bill, and in my own handwriting those words are there inserted. That deals with the next three Amendments. Then as regards the following two, to leave out from the word "him" to the end of Sub-section (5), that, I think, is equivalent to a negative of Sub-section (1). It would destroy Sub-section (1).
    Sir E. LAMB: I should like to put a question in view of my Amendments. I do not quite understand from the Under-Secretary whether he is going to accept the actual words which were taken on Friday during the Committee stage from the Member for Loughborough? They are not mentioned on the present White Paper. If the hon. Gentleman is going to vary them then this Amendment of mine will be in order.
    The CHAIRMAN: Yes, but not at this stage. If the Government propose to vary the words already inserted objection can be taken at the time. As the Clause stands, and so far as the Committee stage is concerned, the hon. Member has gained his point. The Amendment, however, to which I was referring would only contradict what we have already done.
    Sir E. LAMB: I submit that it goes much further than that. I do not want to press the matter unduly, but if the Government are going to stick to the Amendment of Friday this goes much further.
    The CHAIRMAN: I would point out that this Amendment would destroy Subsection (1) altogether. That is the reason I cannot accept it here.
    Mr. PRINGLE: I beg to move, at end of Sub-section (5), to insert the words,
    "Provided that a man who is not accepted on the ground that he is suffering from a permanent disability shall receive a final discharge."
    I think it is extremely important that men who are obviously permanently disabled from military service should be released from this harrowing process. All of us know from our own personal experience large numbers of cases of men who never by any possibility can become fit for military service being called up not once, or twice, but three or four times for re-examination. In this Bill we are giving a power to the Government, or to the Army Council, to call up these men again after six months. It seems to me
    1016
    that when a medical board sees that a man is suffering from permanent disability which will render him always incapable of military service that that board should give him a final discharge, and so free him from the anxiety and uncertainty as to his being called up in the future. As a matter of fact we understood that that was at the present time the policy of the Army Council. We know that when the last Military Service Act was passed provision was made that men as to whose condition there was any doubt should be called up before 1st September, and many of these men were called up. They received what is known as the "pink form." On that pink form it was expressly stated, "If you are found to be suffering from permanent disability you will receive a final discharge." Why should not the Government put into this Clause an expression similar to what they put into that pink form so as to relieve these men of anxiety? It is also a useless process to re-examine them. It is a waste of time—of their time, and of the time of the doctors. It causes unnecessary trouble, and a great deal of expenditure and waste. Why should not the Government clearly say that such a provision is necessary and accept the Amendment which I now propose? Why should they not say that men obviously and permanently unfitted on their next medical reexamination shall receive a final discharge?
    Sir RYLAND ADKINS: I hope the Government will give not only a sympathetic attention to this, but that really in this, or an alternative form of words, they will embody this view. There are no doubt a number of cases in which the medical men may have doubt as to whether or not the injury is a permanent disqualification. Very well, in those cases this would not apply. But there are all kinds of cases, like total blindness, organic heart disease, different kinds of maiming, malformation, etc., as to which there can be no reasonable doubt whatever. In cases of this sort I submit it is in the public interest that the men who are positively and permanently disabled should be set free to do service for the State in other ways without any anxiety or any uncertainty that they will be taken away from it for another examination which would only have the same result. I have resisted all temptations up till now to vote against the Government. I do, however, urge upon the Government to accept this Amend-

    1017
    ment. I am sure it will very much facilitate the carrying out of the Act by the tribunals.
    Sir S. COLLINS: I hope the Government will see their way to insert this Amendment. If the hon. Gentleman is going to accept it I shall say no more.
    The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the WAR OFFICE (Mr. Forster): There seems to be only one feeling in the House, and that is, where a man is permanently and totally disabled he ought not to be called upon to go up for re-examination. I am afraid I cannot accept the words of my hon. Friend. To put in "permanently disabled" would, I think, open the door too widely.
    Mr. PRINGLE: Let them interpret it.
    Mr. FORSTER: If my hon. Friend will accept the substance of his Amendment and make it men who are "permanently and totally disabled." we will accept it. These are the cases, I think, that my hon. Friend has in mind.
    Mr. PRINGLE: Yes, permanently and totally disabled!
    Mr. FORSTER: We might accept the Amendment in that form.
    Mr. HOGGE: On behalf of my hon. Friend and myself, whose names are down to this Amendment, I think we can accept what the hon. Gentleman the Financial Secretary offers. [HON. MEMBERS: "Agreed!"] I want to remind my hon. Friend of the fact that Brigadier-General Geddes, who presides over the recruiting destinies of the nation at the present time, is a Scotsman.
    An HON. MEMBER: That is no objection to him!
    Mr. HOGGE: On 1st January he made a resolution which I hold in my hand. It reads as follows:
    "There is no intention of calling up again for military service or for medical re-examination a man who, on offering himself for attestation was rejected as unfit, and who, after 25th May was again re-examined by a medical board and rejected."
    That was given on 1st January, 1917, so it is very fresh. In fact, it is one of the freshest pledges that we have in our possession. Apart altogether from that it also answers the challenge which my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary gave to me the other day, I think on Thursday, when he defied me to produce a single pledge which this Government has broken or
    1018
    proposed to break. I hand this one to him with my compliments. I hope he will be able to deal with it. It has come from an old university friend both of himself and of myself who presides over and directs the recruiting of this country. At the same time. I am very glad my hon. Friend has put in these words, and we shall accept them.
    Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
    Further Amendment made: At the end of Sub-section (5), add the words "provided that a man who is not accepted on the ground of permanent and total disability for service shall receive a final discharge."—[Mr. Pringle.]
    Mr. KING: I understand that several Amendments which I have on the Paper will be accepted by the Government.
    Further Amendments made: In Sub-section (6), after the word "man"["notice calling up a man"], insert the words "to-present himself for examination."
    After the word "by"["served by post"], insert the word "registered."—[Mr. king.]
    Clause, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.

    CLAUSE 2.—(Restoration to Military Rank.)
    Where a disabled man is accepted for service in pursuance of a notice under this Act, he shall, if when he left the Service he was an officer, or if when he was discharged from the Service he was a warrant officer or non - commissioned officer, be restored to the military rank which he held before he so left the Service or was discharged, unless the Army Council otherwise direct.
    Sir MAURICE LEVY: I beg to move to leave out the words "unless the Army Council otherwise direct."
    Clause 2 in its present form is certainly a Clause which is intended to be very satisfactory to the majority of men who are likely to be called up. I cannot admit, however, that with these particular words it is very satisfactory, for they deprive the Clause of its real value to those officers who have been wounded and discharged. To these men it will be a great cause of worry and anxiety to know that they may be called up again for medical re-examination. That worry and anxiety will be intensified by the fact that possibly when they are again called to the Colours they may not take the rank they held

    1019
    when they were discharged. I cannot believe that anyone desires that except in a very few instances. I realise that the Army Council may say that they must have certain powers to decide whether a man shall go back to exactly the rank he previously occupied. It is quite right that when a man has been in any way unsatisfactory in his position in the Army that he should not have the right to go back. On the other hand, I think other words might be found which would maintain some right of supervision and revision by the Army Council. After all, it is impossible for the Army Council in cases of this description to enter into details of what are the merits of any officer They must naturally be engrossed with matters of far greater importance. Therefore the matter must be delegated probably to the commanding officer of the regiment. He also is possibly engrossed in matters still more important. Therefore I take it that a man should have a prescriptive right to rejoin the rank he left unless some good reason can be shown why he should not do so.
    I would like to impress on my hon. Friend that the number of cases in which the Army Council would desire to exercise their right would naturally be small. It was stated on Friday that the total number likely to be called up for re-examination would be something like 500,000, and it is estimated that probably 20 per cent. of those called up for examination would have to rejoin, or, if they had not been in the Army before, had been rejected on medical grounds, would have to join up. If you take 10 per cent. as those who have been discharged from the Army, that would make it 50,000, and, taking the number of officers out of that figure, I think you would find the number of men for whom the Army Council would like to exercise some prerogative is particularly small. The Bill at the present time, I think, is much disliked in the country, and, therefore, I think it would be wise on the part of my hon. Friend, if he cannot see his way clear to accept the Amendment as I have worded it, to put in some words himself, or on Report accept words which I have drafted as an alternative to this Amendment. The words I suggest to him would be, at the end to add, "Provided that no man shall be required to rejoin the Service at a military rank lower than that which he held when he left the Ser-
    1020
    vice or was discharged, unless his case has been adjudicated upon by a tribunal upon which not less than half the members shall be civilians." I hope, however, my hon. Friend will accept my Amendment on the Paper.
    Mr. MACPHERSON: I regret that I cannot accept this Amendment. As my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer pointed out in his speech introducing this Bill, the Army Council think it most necessary in the interests, not only of the officers themselves but of the men whom these officers might be called upon to lead, that it should have what is called a dispensing power. He gave at the same time an assurance that the Army Council would exercise that dispensing power with the very greatest care. It is a well-known fact that at the beginning of the War a great many young men got commissions who did not deserve them, and after some testing, particularly after testing in France, it was found by their superior officers that they were not good enough for the position which, by good fortune, they were allowed to occupy, and the view of the superior authorities in France was that it was a danger to me men under them that they should be allowed to remain in their commands. I think in cases of that sort it is in the best interests of the Army that this dispensing power should be given to the Army Council. You may rely upon it that in any case where a man has been asked to resign his commission, and the Army Council think that he is fit to go back to that commission in his old rank, they will allow him to go back: but, as I have said already—and I do not think I can put it more clearly—it really is in the interests of the men that the Army Council should have power to allow a man to go back to his own rank or not.
    Mr. KING: I quite understand, and I am sure the Committee will quite understand, what the hon. Member means by saying that it is in the interests of the. men that certain officers or non-commissioned officers should. on returning to the Army, not go back to the rank in which they failed in leadership and in the duties required of an officer, and that it would be unfair to men under them to put them back. The real way of dealing with such cases is not to have them back in the Army at all, and for this reason: Such cases must be, I believe, comparatively few—probably very few indeed. On the

    1021
    other hand, there must be a very considerable number of cases of men who have left the Army through some sort of friction, or through some lack of touch and confidence between them and their commanding officers. I know personally one or two such cases; they were probably quite frequent before the War. I have known several cases in the course of my life. Just this sort of men, who might be very good officers, are in danger of being degraded, and, instead of having confidence in themselves and returning to the Army in the positions in which they were, and therefore getting the confidence of their men, they will go back in inferior positions. And what is the position of a man who, having once been an officer, is sent back with the stigma upon him that he is not worthy of the position he had before? It is an intolerable position, and it is not good for the discipline of the Army, I am sure. The real solution of this question is to accept the Amendment, and, if there are cases in which you have any doubt about sending a man—either a commissioned officer or a noncommissioned officer—back to the same rank he was in before, do not take him back into the Army at all. I do not believe you would lose 400 to 500 men, whereas by the other course you would destroy a lot of confidence. I have bad quite a number of letters. I took up this point before, when we had a previous Military Service Bill under discussion. I spoke upon it then, and had an Amendment, and several officers wrote to me expressing sympathy. On this occasion I have had letters from two gentlemen in the Army who have had experience which leads them to see that it is much better that the Army Council should give up their dispensing power. I have great confidence in thinking that 'on reconsideration the representatives of the War Office, who, after all, are sensible men, and men who want to make the best they can of a very difficult and distasteful Bill, will do something.
    Mr. CHURCHILL: Would my hon. friend the Under-Secretary tell us about how many officers there are who have been invalided out of the Army since the beginning of the War, and who will be reexamined under this process, and what percentage of that number he expects will become liable under this Bill to military service? I do not myself believe that the total number is a very large one, and I
    1022
    believe that the percentage of those who will be found eligible will be a small one. Therefore, the number of officers with whom we are dealing appears to be very small, and I should think that a far smaller proportion of those who would be fit for service would be unfit to receive their commission. So that really we have three successive stages of reduction. The original number is not a large one. The number who will be fit to serve is a still much smaller one. The number fit to serve, but not fit for a commission, is smaller still. I do not know how the figures run. Perhaps the Under-Secretary will be able to give us some information on that point, but I should have questioned whether, when you had got down to the third stage—that of a man fit to serve and not fit to get his commission back—the numbers exceeded a few score at the outset, and whether they were large enough to make it necessary for you to subject anyone to what is a great and exceptional hardship. It seems to me that, unless the numbers are substantial—and I think they must be wholly insignificant—it is not worth while persisting in this.
    Brigadier-General HICKMAN: I hope my hon. Friend will stick to his point and not give this away, because I do think the Secretary of State and the Army Council, or perhaps rather the Military Secretary and the War Office, should have a discretion in a case like this. As a matter of fact, this sort of thing is happening every day at the present time. Officers, to my certain knowledge, have been in France: and have been either wounded or invalided and have come back home. After recovery they are then brought back again to work at the depots, where these particular officers, having been in command of battalions at the front, are now acting as majors and captains. I cannot see any difference. If you are going to differentiate in regard to the men who are to be brought back by this Bill, you are going to put at a disadvantage those officers I have described, who, after becoming well, have gone back to service at the depots. I hope, therefore, my hon. Friend will stick to the point.
    Mr. OUTHWAITE: This is in almost all respects a Bill which, it is generally recognised, is likely to inflict a very great hardship, but I think in this particular the hardship is more obvious than in any other case. I was rather impressed by

    1023
    what the hon. Gentleman opposite said. He said you could not take back some of these officers because they would endanger the lives of soldiers under their command. From that we must infer that previously they were endangering the lives of their men. Surely that was the time when they should have been called upon to resign their commission, but it seems that it is only when the officer has been wounded in action, perhaps, that you are ready to discover he is not fit to lead men. Surely there is a way out of that difficulty. If there are cases of such men who are not fit to lead in the field, surely it is possible to allow this small number to retain their commissions and put them to other work that will not lead to the endangering of the lives of men. I do think the hon. Gentleman might find some way to meet the difficulty which he has in his mind, and at the same time not inflict a very grave hardship.
    Mr. MACPHERSON: In reply to what has been said may I point out that many of these officers have been asked to resign and others have been asked to relinquish their commission on the ground of ill-health. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Dundee (Mr. Churchill) knows very well that last categorising of resignation in the Army is not really permissible, and it has been reduced in order to enable us to be relieved of an officer who for example lost his nerve at the beginning of an attack.
    Mr. CHURCHILL: What is the formula which the hon. Member refers to as "relinquishing his commission through ill-health?"
    Mr. MACPHERSON: That has been introduced since the beginning of this War, and it is meant to soften hard cases. A young officer may find himself suddenly in a very difficult position, and while he may be most anxious to prove himself as courageous as possible, his nerves may give way at the last moment, and in such a case, instead of being called upon to resign and being treated seemingly as a coward. he is called upon to relinquish his position on the ground of ill-health. I regret that I cannot give the number of officers asked for by my right hon. Friend, but these cases are fairly numerous, and I do not think his method of deduction by means of those three stages compels me to alter the opinion I have stated, namely, that it would be in the best interests of
    1024
    the Army, be the number large or small, to leave a dispensing power in the hands of the Army Council. The hon. and gallant Gentleman (Brigadier - General Hickman) who spoke last brought forward a strong case for the existing officers. It is a hard thing for an officer who has very likely been one and a half years in France, and has borne the brunt of many bard engagements, to find a man whom he-has supplanted eighteen months before, and who has been home doing nothing, should come forward and have the same rank. I can imagine a very large amount of disappointment amongst the officers who have been undergoing these hardships when this man is suddenly called back after enjoying himself at home. I think the House would be ill-advised to accept the Amendment which has just been moved by my hon. Friend behind me, and I hope, if a Division is to be taken, we shall divide now.
    Mr. CHURCHILL: I think the Under-Secretary for War is altogether misinformed as to the meaning of the phrase "relinquishing a commission through ill-health." I think it is extremely important, in justice to a considerable number of officers who have left the Army under the most gallant and meritorious circumstances, that the definition which he has. given on the spur of the moment should not go forward in the way the hon. Member has described, because the exact contrary is the case. When an officer has left the Army, having been discharged from hospital, hopelessly incapacitated by his wounds, the phrase has been "relinquishing his commission through ill-health." Great exception has been taken to that extremely ambiguous phrase in public, and I understood that the War Office were going to make some alteration in the use of that phrase in order to show that there was not the slightest question of an officer relinquishing his commission, but of being forced to give it up by his state of health. If it was to go forward that officers are really being allowed to resign in order to escape a court-martial for an attack of nerves in face of the enemy it would be most injurious, and I hope the Under-Secretary will take an opportunity of correcting that view.
    I am aware that the number of officers invalided out is a considerable one amongst the officer class who hold commisssions, but the number of officers who have been invalided out as unfit to serve

    1025
    is a small proportion, and it is a very rare thing that an officer is invalided out who is likely to be fit for service again. Still more rare is the case of a man who has been invalided out and who is not fit to receive a commission, and I do not believe you will find a dozen such cases. I am all for the War Office having a dispensing power not to give a man a commission if they do not think he is fit for it, but is it worth while persisting in recalling officers bond fide invalided out of the Service, and forcing them to serve as privates. That is a great hardship to which, I believe, they will hardly ever agree, and I think the Government could safeguard themselves without losing their position under the Bill or reducing the number of men they require. What I say about officers also applies to the warrant officers. I agree if you bring an officer back you should bring him back in a junior position if necessary, and he should not step over the heads of others. If, for example, you bring a lieutenant back, he should go in at the bottom of the list, having been invalided out, but it does seem a very serious hardship to inflict upon a man who has committed no fault, who through ill-health has broken down, and he is not fit for a commission, that having once held a commission he should be recalled and forced to serve as a private soldier.
    Mr. MACPHERSON: I should like to make clear exactly what I did mean by the phrase "relinquishing his commission on the ground of ill-health." I was dealing with a specific case raised by the hon. Member for Hanley (Mr. Outhwaite). The term of resignation in the "Gazette" was as I stated, but in the vast majority of cases where the "Gazette" notice appears in that form, the notice is a true statement of the facts and it means that the officer has resigned on account of ill-health. When an officer has been gazetted out on account of ill-health, there should be no doubt that the facts are as stated, and I hope I have made that point clear. I hope we shall now proceed to a Division.
    General IVOR PHILIPPS: I am glad the Under-Secretary has made that explanation. After what he has said here, I think it will be necessary for him to be very careful in considering the way in which "Gazettes" are issued, so that there will be no danger of anything of this sort happening, in order that there will be nothing reflecting on ony of our gallant
    1026
    soldiers. I hope the hon. Gentleman will look into that matter, because it will spread the utmost dismay in many homes in this country in the case of men who have given most gallant service to their country. I think some such words as the hon. Baronet proposes to leave out are necessary, because the Army Council are not likely to look up in the Debates the assurance which the hon. Gentleman has given, and something ought to be done to prevent a General Order being issued under which these men will all go back to the ranks. I think it is our duty to put in some such words. Of course, the Army Council must be the deciding authority, but we ought to limit the words so that they cannot pass a general Order saying that Clause 2 of this Bill will not operate, because that is what these words mean. There is no question about it. If this Bill becomes an Act of Parliament the Army Council can issue a general order and say Clause 2 of this Bill passed by the House of Commons has no effect. I would ask the Under-Secretary if he cannot insert the words "unless the Army Council in special and individual cases otherwise direct." Otherwise we are passing an Act of Parliament giving the Army Council power to do what I have described.
    Mr. MACPHERSON: I will accept that suggestion, and on the Report stage I will see if we can agree to some form of appropriate words.
    Sir GEORGE REID: I think the Under-Secretary has just made a concession which is open to very grave suspicion. I should be very sorry by inserting any words in an Act of Parliament to limit the discretion of the Army Council in regard to these officers, for we might compel them to give a commission to a man who has been found by experience to be quite unfit for it.
    General PHILIPPS: I said "unless the Army Council otherwise direct."
    Sir G. REID: I was not referring to what the hon. and gallant Gentleman said, but to other remarks made in this discussion, and I am extremely anxious that we should not limit the power of the Army Council to deal with these commissions.
    Mr. CARADOC REES: The governing word in this Clause is "disabled." In

    1027
    another part of the Bill there is a definition of a disabled man which provides that,
    "A man (in this Act referred to as a disabled man) is a man who has relinquished his commission in consequence of disablement or ill-health."
    It is clear that the word "disabled" in this Clause will bring in all men who have been severely wounded as well as men who have retired on the ground of ill-health. This Amendment is to limit the proposal to ill-health and leave out the case of the men who have retired. I think the word "disabled" covers both cases.
    7.0 P.M.
    Sir G. TOULMIN: I should like to have it made clear whether the concession which has been made by the Under-Secretary includes the sergeants and other noncommissioned officers. We have been talking almost entirely about officers, but I do not think the hardship which would be inflicted upon non-commissioned officers is any less than what would be inflicted upon officers. The probability is that the smaller the allowances which they would receive as privates than they would receive in the higher ranks would be much more important to their families. I suppose these Amendments will some time appear on the Paper. [HON. MEMBERS: "NO!"] Are we, then, to receive these concessions without knowing what they are? That is rather unsatisfactory. I hope we shall not be expected to rush them through in a minute, but that we shall have as much opportunity as possible of considering them.
    Mr. FORSTER: We are all agreed that this dispensing power of the Army Council is not to be generally applied, and I think the suggested words, "unless in any individual case the Army Council otherwise direct," would meet the point.
    Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
    Further Amendment made: "After the word "unless," insert the words "in any individual case."—[Mr. Forster.]
    Clause, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.
    Clause 3 ("Short Title") ordered to stand part of the Bill.
    The CHAIRMAN: I think the new Clause ("Right to Appeal to Tribunals"), standing in the name of the hon. Member
    1028
    for Somerset (Mr. King), has been covered by what we have already done. With regard to the new Clause ("Saving""), standing in the name of the hon. Member for Wolverhampton (Mr. G. Thorne), there was some discussion yesterday, when an Amendment was moved by the hon. Member for Sheffield, but I am not quite sure whether it covered the same point.

    NEW CLAUSE.—(Saving.)
    This Act shall not apply to any man who at the date of its passing had attained the age of forty-one years.—[Mr. G. Thorne.]
    Clause brought up, and read the first time.
    Mr. G. THORNE: I beg to move, "That the Clause be read a second time."
    I move this Clause, because it seems to me vitally important to secure certainty under the Bill. It was practically stated that those who had attained the age of forty-one did not come under this Bill, and I want to make that absolutely clear. That is the object of my Clause. If that view is accepted by the Government, I do not want to say a word further, but I should like these words in, so that there is absolute certainty.
    Sir J. SIMON: Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will be kind enough to tell me whether I follow it rightly through the Act of Parliament. My hon Friend is moving a new Clause to express in plain terms what I think is the general intention, that there shall be some age limit to which this new Act will apply. He proposes that it shall not apply to any man who at the date of its passing had attained the age of forty-one years. If I understand it rightly, the Bill. as it is now drawn, would apply to everybody who cannot say that he is forty-one within thirty days of the notice given him under the Bill. If the Committee will follow me, it will work out in this way: The Military Service Act, 1916 (Session 2), brought in additional persons. It brought in everybody who had not attained the age of forty-one years before the appointed date. I look down, and I see that "the appointed date, as respects men who come within the operation of this Section on the passing of this Act," was the thirtieth day after the date of the passing of this Act—that would be a date in June, 1916. It went on to say that "the appointed date, as respects men who come within the operation of this Section after the passing

    1029
    of this Act," will be the thirtieth day after they come within the operation of this Section. At the time that was passed it was primarily intended to deal with the youngest, with men who were not eighteen but who would be eighteen later on. It seems to me, read strictly, that the Government is right when it says that it is those persons who do not reach forty-one within thirty days from the date of the notice under the present Bill who will be caught by the Act. If that is the case, it is a very complicated calculation, and it means reading the Section with minute care. Secondly, I do not know that anyone is anxious to encourage a lowering of the military age for these people as compared with others. A man was exposed to the first Military Service Act. It was then necessary that he should be forty-one by the date mentioned in that Act. The second Military Service Act caught everybody who became forty-one within thirty days of the passing of the Act—that is to say, by June, 1916. Now you are catching people who are forty-one within thirty days of the notice you now propose to give them. You are getting less. If that analysis is right, this is not bringing in people of greater age, but it is really bringing in people of a lower age, and the new Clause proposed by my hon. Friend would really give you a few more men. I would, therefore, suggest to the Government that there is a practical advantage in accepting that Clause. It puts quite plainly what the limit is, and, although it is quite true that you would catch people over an extra month, I do not know, if one accepts the principle of the Military Service Act, that there can be any objection. I only interposed because I want to know if I rightly read the Act of Parliament through. It is a very difficult thing for any ordinary citizen to work it out with certainty. and it is very desirable that we should have stated in plain terms what the position is.
    Mr. MACPHERSON: It is quite true, as my right hon. and learned Friend has said, that as the Bill stands we get fewer men than we might otherwise get if we accepted the Amendment. The law, I think, is. quite clear as to the age under this Bill. Under the Bill a man is brought under the Military Service Acts as from the date of the notice. calling him up for medical re-examination. The appointed date therefore is thirty days from the date of the notice. If the man attained forty-one years of age before the
    1030
    appointed date—that is, thirty days after the date of the notice sent to him—he is not liable for compulsory military service. I think that is a clear statement of the case, and when we thought of leaving the Bill as it stands and without my hon. Friend's proposed new Clause we had in view the fact that we were dealing with men who had been rejected on account of illness, and we thought if a man were nearing the age of forty-one that he was as good as useless to us. However, if we pre pressed—
    Mr. G. THORNE: I only want to secure certainty, and, as I understand it, is now perfectly clear, I beg leave to withdraw the Clause.
    Motion and Clause, by leave, withdrawn.

    NEW CLAUSE.—(Duration.)
    The Clause shall come to an end and cease to have effect as from the first day of May, nineteen hundred and eighteen.—[Sir C. Hobhouse.]
    Clause brought up, and read the first time.
    Sir C. HOBHOUSE: I beg to move, "That the Clause be read a second time."
    I move this Clause which stands in the name of the hon. Member for Somerset (Mr. King) for the purpose of asking a question. Under Clause 1, Sub-section (1), the Army Council may at any time by written notice require any man who is for the time being excepted from the operations of the Military Service Acts, 1916, to present himself for examination, and so forth. I wish to ask whether the duration of this Bill will automatically come to an end at the same time as the other Military Service Acts, or whether under the words I have read out it will continue in force after the Military Service Acts come to an end and after the War has come to an end? I cannot confess to any knowledge of the law, nor can I offer any opinion as to the legal effect of words inserted in an Act of Parliament of this sort, but I should like to know the real effect of those words, and whether, as a matter of fact, the Bill does automatically come to an end, or, if it does not, whether my hon Friend will insert some words which will bring it to an end at the termination of the War?
    Mr. MACPHERSON: I think this Clause is quite unnecessary. This Bill and the

    1031
    Military Service Acts are purely war measures. Nobody can say when the end of the War will be. The exact date, I understand, must be fixed by Act of Parliament, but as I understand it, this Bill will end at the same time as the Military Service Acts to which it refers.
    Sir C. HOBHOUSE: Do I understand that my hon. Friend has consulted his legal advisers on the point? It seems to me to be a matter of interpretation, and I should like to be certain. though I do not press it.
    Mr. MACPHERSON: I think it is right.
    Mr. KING: This Bill must be read along with the other Military Service Acts. The last words of Clause 3 are, "This Act shall be read together and may be cited together with the Military Service Acts, 1916."The three Acts when they are passed into law will be one Act for all purposes. It is quite impossible to give the one we are now passing without the other two. If you turn to the first Military Service Act, you will see words in the first Section saying that it is for the period of the War. It is legislation from the outset for the period of the War and nothing else. I do not think that the Clause which the right hon. Gentleman has moved is really necessary, but it does give us an opportunity of raising the question as to what the period of the War is. The more I look on the future the more difficult I can see it will be to say when you come to the conclusion of active hostilities and when the period of the War will have ended. There must, of course, be an Act of Parliament to decide that. If the military decision is not of a decisive and overwhelming character it may be found necessary to keep the Armies in being. Negotiations may be very prolonged before there is an actual signing of the Treaty of Peace, and it is quite possible that the War may be prolonged and that the actual fighting may go on for a year or two. Perhaps this question is not quite in order, but it is a question which is present to the minds of a good many men as to how long they will actually be kept in the Army under these Acts. It is a question that ought to be faced, and not left to be decided later on in a happy-go-lucky way. I hope that we shall soon see an end of hostilities near, in order that we may be able to consider all the questions which
    1032
    will come up under this comprehensive phrase, "the period of the War," in good and ample time.
    Question put, and negatived.
    Bill reported.
    As Amended, considered.
    Mr. HOGGE: On a point of Order. Can we proceed to the Report stage of a Bill of this importance on the same day on which we have completed the Committee stage without some special authority being obtained from the House or some special Resolution being passed? I understand that not only are the Government going to proceed with the Report stage, but that they also propose to take the. Third Reading to-day. I could give reasons against that course, but I do not propose to give them at this moment. I only want to know exactly where we stand in this matter. Can we object to the Report stage being taken now? I think we can by the Rules of the House, so far as I know them, but I should like to have your ruling. Sir, on the subject.
    Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER (Mr. Whitley): The position is this: There is nothing in the Rules at all to prevent the House from proceeding with the Report stage, if it so desires. It frequently has been done in special circumstances. Therefore, when the Government calls "Now" to a Report stage, the House proceeds unless it otherwise desires.
    Mr. HOGGE: In that case, I beg to move, "That this House do now adjourn."
    Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER: I think the proper course would be, if the House is unwilling to proceed. after the first Amendment has been moved, to move that the further consideration be now adjourned.
    Mr. HOGGE: I will do that.
    Sir C. HOBHOUSE: On the point of Order. Strictly speaking, I understand the position to be that anyone can object to the Report stage being taken on the same day as the Committee stage. I would ask you, Sir, is it not necessary for the House to decide upon such a point?
    Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER: The right hon. Gentleman is not quite correct. The objection of a Member does not stop the House from going on with the Report stage. Of course, it is a matter that is in the hands of the House, and the Chair, if

    1033
    objection is taken, would allow the House to consider on a Motion for the Adjournment of further consideration whether it was prepared to proceed or not.

    CLAUSE 1.—(Power to Call up Certain Excepted Men for Examination.)
    (1) The Army Council may, in accordance with and subject to the provisions of this Act, at any time, by written notice require any man who is for the time being excepted from the operation of the Military Service Acts, 1916, as being—

    (a) a member of the Territorial Force who is, in the opinion of the Army Council, not suited for foreign service; and

    (b) a man (in this Act referred to as a disabled man) who has left or been discharged from the naval or military service of the Crown in consequence of disablement or ill-health (including an officer who has ceased to hold a commission in consequence of disablement or ill-health); and

    (c) a man who has been previously rejected on any ground, either after offering himself for enlistment or after becoming subject to the Military Service Acts, 1916,

    to present himself for examination in such manner and within such time, not being less than fourteen days, as may be specified in the notice:
    Provided that no man shall be required to submit himself for re-examination within six months of his previous and last rejection or discharge.
    (2) Any man to whom a notice is so sent shall, as from the date of the notice, be deemed to come within the operation of section one of the Military Service Act, 1916 (Session 2), and not to be excepted therefrom as being unsuited for foreign service, or as being a disabled man, or as having been previously rejected, as the case may be; and the Military Service Acts, 1916, shall apply accordingly.
    (3) If a man fails to comply with a notice under this section, he shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding five pounds or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three months; but a man shall not be liable to a penalty under this provision if he shows that he did not receive a notice.
    (4) Where a disabled man has had at least one month's service with the colours
    1034
    or where his disablement has been caused or aggravated by naval or military service, no notice shall be given to him under this section till after the expiration of a year from the time when he left or was discharged from the service.
    (5) Where a man has been required to present himself for examination in pursuance of this section and is not accepted for service, no further notice shall be given to him under this section until after the expiration of six months from the date of the previous notice:
    Provided that a man who is not accepted on the ground that he is permanently and totally disabled for service shall receive a discharge.
    (6) A notice calling up a man to present himself for examination under this section may be served by registered post at the last known address of the person on whom it is to be served.
    Mr. PETO: I beg to move, in Subsection (1), after the word "man" ["by written notice require any man"], to insert the words "who is not now employed in agriculture and."
    On Friday, when the Bill was considered in Committee, we had a considerable Debate on the question of the exclusion of agriculture from the scope of the Bill, and the Under-Secretary of State for War finally agreed that he would put words into the Bill on the Report stage which would have the effect, at least, of leaving agriculture out of the scope of the Bill, at any* rate, in respect of those men who were registered as agricultural labourers—that is to say, men who were employed in the industry of agriculture at the time of the registration, which was in the middle of 1915. I find that my hon. Friends who took part in that Debate were not satisfied that this would really meet the case, because a very large number of these men who had been rejected upon medical examination had been taken on in agriculture since that date, and they were taken on by farmers, as labour became scarcer and scarcer, with the full confidence that whatever other labour they might not be able to obtain, at least they might depend upon these men who had been rejected on medical grounds and discharged from the Army. Therefore, when I saw the proposed Amendment put down by the hon. Gentleman I was not satisfied with it, because he proceeds by

    1035
    leaving the whole of agriculture within the scope of this Bill and then putting in a provisio as follows:
    "Provided that the powers under this provision shall not extend to any man who is for the time being engaged in agriculture, and whose work is certified by the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries to be work of national importance, and who was engaged on such work on the thirty-first day of March, nineteen hundred and seventeen."
    That is a system of doing two things—putting all these men within the provisions of the Bill, and then, so to speak, badging them. That is not what we understood at all to be the arrangement made in Committee. It does two other things: It says in effect to the agricultural labourer, "You are liable to receive this notice for re-examination under the Bill unless you can prove two things: first, that you are an agricultural labourer." That was a matter which the House will remember on Committee stage the Under-Secretary said was so difficult to define that he could not define it himself, and that was one of his reasons for objecting to my Amendment. He now leaves the agricultural labourer to prove that. He has to prove another thing. He is to have a certificate. He is to be certified by the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries to be engaged in that particular part of agriculture which the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries regards as of national importance. Our contention, broadly, is that the whole of agriculture at the present time is work of the first national importance. We have had an assurance of the Leader of the House that that is his view, and the view upon which the Government are proceeding. If that is so, I maintain that the proper place in which to put this exemption is in the body of the Clause, and that the proper words are those which I am moving, namely, that this Bill, in effect, shall only apply to people other than those who are now employed in agriculture. There was great force in the contention of the hon. Baronet the Member for Ayr Burghs (Sir G. Younger) on Friday last. Undoubtedly the operation of local tribunals, from the very nature of the fact that they are local, has not been uniform in its action. Therefore, if—I only say if—the War Office say it is too big a measure to do what I understood they were going to do, namely, ex-
    1036
    clude agriculture altogether, I should be quite willing to agree to the proviso which I have suggested being put in at the same point as the proviso suggested by the Under-Secretary for War. For the moment I content myself with moving this Amendment at this point, so that we should have a perfectly clear understanding, something that the farmers and agricultural labourers all over the country can understand, because it is in the Bill, namely, that agriculture is left out of those provisions under which men who-have hitherto been exempt or who are rejected go through the mill again and have to come up for medical re-examination. When we get that, then we can consider whether there is any ground for giving the President of the Board of Agriculture power to say that there are certain districts in the country or certain sections of the trade which are not so essential as others to which, in his opinion, in the general interests of the country and particularly of food production the provisions of the Bill can be made to apply. We cannot deal with the broad question and we cannot deal with the other questions to which I have referred unless we first get these words inserted in the Bill.
    Captain Sir OWEN PHILIPPS: I beg to second the Amendment.
    Sir J. SIMON: On a point of Order. I did not quite understand, Sir, at what stage you indicated that the question might be raised whether, in the circumstances, it was right to go on with the Report stage.
    Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER: As soon as I have put the Amendment and there is a Question before the House.
    Question proposed, "That the words, who is not now employed in agriculture and, be there inserted in the Bill."
    Mr. HOGGE: I beg to move, "That the Debate be now adjourned."
    I think the House is entitled to give more consideration to this very important Bill than is afforded it by the time placed at its disposal by the Government. I do. not want to raise any point of Order, although I have been looking at the Manual of Procedure, and I think I could quote certain Clauses from it which would make it technically impossible for the Government to go on. But I do not take refuge in these official and technical rules, because I think there is a strong case on

    1037
    the facts. I do not want to delay consideration of the measure if the feeling of the House is against my Amendment. I think we are entitled to complain of the date in the Session at which this Bill has been brought in. It was only brought before the House on Wednesday last, and its Committee stage was continued on Friday, a day on which we do not usually sit. We sat on Friday till past six o'clock in a thin House, and to-day we have gone on with the Committee stage until half-past seven. We are now asked to go on to the Report stage, and you, Sir, are put in the unfortunate position, in which you are frequently put and from which you always emerge with conspicuous ability, of picking up the Amendments which are showered upon you in manuscript on the Report stage. I think the House is entitled, when a Bill has been amended to the extent that this has been, to see the effect of the Amendments in a reprinted Bill. I can quite conceive that for some very special reason, such as time, the Government might claim that because they had not time they could not reprint the Bill, but there can be no such hurry in this case. There is no reason why the House should rise on Wednesday, unless that Members do not want to be here on Thursday. We can have the Education Estimates to-morrow, as suggested by the Government, and we could have the Report stage and Third Reading of this Bill on Wednesday, and we could adjourn on Thursday, and we could all of us—except those who are Scotsmen and do not want it—have a Good Friday holiday. As far as we Scotsmen are concerned, Good Friday is nothing to us except a name, and while other hon. Members want to observe that we do not care a rap about it. But that is by the way. On the question of time it is possible to reprint this Bill and enable us to get our Amendments down on the Report stage for Wednesday. I hope my right hon. Friend (Mr. Churchill) will back us on this point, because he backed us well on Friday on a similar point. I think his point was excellent on Friday and he made it with great power, namely, that this House ought not to worry about an extra half-hour or hour if a question of vital importance was involved to many of our fellow citizens.
    This involves a million medically rejected or discharged men. If you take their wives and families, it represents a portion of the community which is not less
    1038
    than some five million people. If other hon. Members have been subject, as I have been this week-end, to correspondence on this Bill they will have some faint idea of the interest that it has aroused in the minds of most people. I spoke on this Bill on Thursday and between Friday morning and Saturday night I had no fewer than 513 separate letters from all parts of the Kingdom from men who have been already medically rejected, who were putting up specific cases, many of them quite good cases, which they besought me to try and meet by Amendment when the Bill was in Committee. Hon. Members have really not had time to consider the suggestions which have come to them from the men who are affected and we are not entitled to rush a Bill of this importance through the House of Commons without giving a fair opportunity to these men to submit their views. What would this House of Commons have said supposing that, instead of this being a Bill affecting a million medically rejected men it had affected a hundred or two hundred corporations in this country? If it had affected the great corporations of Manchester, Liverpool, Edinburgh and Glasgow, every one of us would have been exhorted to stop the Bill's wild career and secure some interval between the various stages. But those medically rejected men are voiceless in this House except in so far as most of us have said that we detest and abhor the Bill. Even my hon. Friend (Mr. Macpherson) says he hates and loathes it, although he has to support it. We are doing ourselves an injustice, as Members of this House and as representatives of these men, if we proceed immediately to the Report stage without the Bill being reprinted with the Government Amendments, and an opportunity afforded to all of us of putting down whatever Amendments may appeal to us when we have seen the Bill on the Report stage. Therefore, I suggest that the Government can get over the difficulty quite easily by taking the Education Estimate to-morrow and the Report stage and Third Reading of the Bill on Wednesday, thus enabling a day to intervene, which is, after all, a short interval, and take the Adjournment on Thursday. There may be important questions which ought to be discussed on Thursday. Many of us raise questions on the Adjournment. I am raising one myself. Perhaps that is natural. I put that in because it is destroying my own chance of raising a question in which I am in-

    1039
    forested. Every one of us ought to be prepared to give up any general questions in which we are interested on the Adjournment Motion in order that a million of our fellow countrymen may be able to say that they receive fair treatment from the House of Commons. I do not think that is putting it too high. I put myself under the leadership of my right hon. Friend (Mr. Churchill). On Friday he gave us a lead—he was the pioneer—and I hope he will get right in the van this afternoon of those who believe it is not fair to these men to rush this measure, and that he, like us, is willing to come back here on Thursday and give up a day of his holiday, if it is going to be of any service to a class of men who, after all, have been very much harried by all the Bills which have been passed with regard to military service.
    Mr. PRINGLE: I beg to second the Motion.
    There is one substantial ground on which I think I shall have the support of every one in the House. As this Bill left Committee there was a complete understanding as to the people who are affected by it. We had a long discussion on one Amendment as to whether voluntarily attested men would have the right of appeal granted under the Military Service Act. When that question was put to the Treasury we had, in the first place, a very doubtful answer from the Under-Secretary, and subsequently we had a reply from the Attorney-General, in which he admitted that he had not heard of the decision on this question in the Divisional Court. In face of a situation like that it is absurd to ask the House to go on with the consideration of the Bill when the Government itself cannot give a clear statement as to the people who are affected by it. It is true that the right hon. Gentleman intimated at the end of that discussion that he was going to propose an Amendment dealing with those people, but it is extremely doubtful whether any such Amendment can be made in the Bill at all. In these circumstances, when such an important matter is left undecided, I think the House is bound to insist on seeing the terms of the Amendment which relates to these voluntarily attested men. The trouble of these voluntarily attested men is not a new one. There has been difficulty in carrying out the pledge given them that they would not
    1040
    be treated on the same footing as Conscripts under the Military Service Acts. Indeed, one of the difficulties in regard to this pledge has to some extent brought on this Bill. They were to be treated in the same way as Conscripts, yet the Conscripts could not be called up for reexamination, while attested men were being so called and have been continuously called up. It would be very interesting to know whether, if they are called up after this Bill, they will be entitled to the appeal provided under the Act. At present the Government cannot tell us whether they will be entitled under the Bill as it stands. They cannot tell us whether any amendment of the Bill will so entitle them. In view of that statement of the Government's mind, if we are entitled to credit them with a mind, I believe we have an absolute case in insisting on an Adjournment of this Debate. This is an extremely important matter. I do not believe the late Government could have introduced this Bill. It is the most obnoxious Bill which this Parliament has ever attempted to pass. Had it been introduced by the late Government it would not have reached its Second Reading.
    Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER: The hon. Member is going beyond the limits of a Motion for the Adjournment of the Debate.
    Mr. PRINGLE: I do not propose to pursue that line of argument, but we are entitled to protest against a Bill of this kind being rushed. I believe if this had pursued the ordinary course in going through this House, and if the stages had been separated by a decent interval, as provided by our Standing Order, there would have been such a storm of indignation throughout the country that the Government, strong as it is, would have had to abandon it.
    Mr. RUNCIMAN: The Motion, I understand, is based on the ground that during the discussion Amendments have of necessity been made in the Bill. Something like six or seven, I understand, have been made in the course of to-day's discussion, and the form that the Bill will take when it is to be amended on the Report stage cannot be seen unless Members have followed the Debate very closely and have taken the trouble to amend their copies as they went along, and even then I doubt very much whether there are many Members who have an accurate record of what

    1041
    has taken place. In addition to that there have been two or three Amendments promised on the Report stage, and, finally, one of the Amendments at least, which the hon. Gentleman was courteous enough to circulate to the House for our convenience, has already been or will be changed when it is moved. Under these circumstances it is clear that the House will find great difficulty at this stage to follow the exact form that the Bill will take. An ordinary Motion of this kind might be supported purely on these technical grounds, but I think that no one in the House would consider that it was an abuse of our procedure to ask that there should be an adjournment. A Bill of this nature which affects such a large number of men vitally—certainly it is a matter of life and death to a large number of them—and when the feeeling is so strong outside, as it is in all quarters of the House, should be moulded with great care, when it not only affects the lives of those whom it will legislate for, but has a very important bearing on some of our most important industries. Therefore, I would submit to the Chancellor of the Exchequer it would be more convenient and would lead to a much more satisfactory measure in the long run if he would agree that the Report stage should not be continued this afternoon. I know that this would involve a rearrangement of our business before separating for the Easter Recess, but I would suggest that it would be better to do that than that this Bill should take an unsatisfactory form, particularly in respect of some of the Amendments which have been under discussion, on which I believe there are doubts, even as between the lawyers. Very grave doubts have been expressed by them. If we do not take the Report stage to-day, I suggest that we might resume the discussion to-morrow in order that the House of Lords might get the Bill tomorrow night and so give them a chance of discussing it on Wednesday. I understand there is great interest taken in this Bill in another place. This would only involve an abandonment of the business which had been announced for to-morrow, but I feel certain the general feeling of the House is more in favour of a postponement of the Education Estimates and of dealing with this most important matter.
    The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER (Mr. Bonar Law): I am sure the House will understand that I am in
    1042
    rather a difficulty in gauging the position, as it has not been possible for me to be present during the discussion. As I understand it, the Amendments about which there has been doubt have nearly all been accepted from hon Members by the Government. I quite understand that at ordinary times the course we have been asking the House to take is one which would be impossible to recommend, much less to insist upon, and I wish the House clearly to understand that the Government realises as fully as do private Members on both sides how vital this Bill is to the men who are affected by it. We realise that this is not the kind of Bill, as I said in introducing it, which we would have introduced at all had it not been for the military situation. for that reason i am not in the least going to be influenced by any feeling that the pressure of the House is driving the Government to go back on the course it has announced. My only desire is to have this Bill discussed in such a way as to be sure that all the mitigating Clauses which are possible are inserted in it. That is as much our desire as it is the desire of the House. As my right hon. Friend has pointed out, that means a rearrangement of the business which we had intended to take. My right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Education has been waiting for a long time to get his Estimates. I promised him once before that he would get them, but I had to break that promise through the force of circumstances. I am anxious not to take the same course again, but I quite admit that the question of whether or not we have the Education Estimates now or on the first Estimate day on which we meet is not an important one, though I would ask the House to remember, in view of the decision we came to last week, what a volume of business lies before us when the Session resumes. Really, we must act with all the dispatch which is possible. [HON. MEMBERS: "Shorten the Adjournment!"] Admitting that, I think that is not a consideration which should influence us in coming to our decision now. My right hon. Friend suggested a course which we had already thought of and which has a good deal to recommend it, and that is that the Education Estimates should be dropped now, that we should take the Report stage of this Bill to-morrow, and that on Wednesday we should move the Adjournment of the House, adopting the precedent taken previously to make the Adjournment

    1043
    take effect from the following day. I would like to point out that I have already discussed this with the Leader in another place, and that the Members of the House of Lords are as keenly interested in the subject as we are here They wish to have a full opportunity of discussing it. I am ready to make this proposal to my right hon. Friend, and I think it is a fair one, and I hope it will commend itself to the House—that the House should give us the Report stage and Third Reading of this Bill before to-morrow dinner-time, so as to enable us to get the Bill printed and circulated to the Members in another place by the following morning. If the House will give that understanding—I do not ask for a pledge, because the House of Commons always adheres to an honourable understanding—and will agree to that arrangement, I will adopt the proposal of my right hon. Friend, and we will have the Report stage of this Bill to-morrow.
    Mr. RUNCIMAN: I am greatly obliged to my right hon. Friend. Can he tell us what business he proposes to take tonight?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: The first Bill we shall take will be the Courts (Emergency Powers) Bill, Committee, and I hope it may be possible to take some stages of the two following small Bills.
    Mr. RUNCIMAN: Would it be possible for the Government to circulate their own Amendments with the Papers to-morrow morning; If we could have them in final form circulated with the Papers to-morrow it would greatly facilitate the work of the House on the Report stage.
    Mr. BONAR LAW: There is no doubt that that would be a great advantage to the House. It is rather late, and there may be difficulty in getting them printed, but I think that it is a difficulty which with energy, can be overcome, and I will try to meet my right hon. Friend.
    Mr. PRINGLE: Does the right hon. Gentleman propose to take more than the Second Reading of the Munitions of War Bill to-night?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: I am not familiar with that Bill, but I understand that it raises no question of controversy. When we come to it, we can judge whether it is possible to go on.
    Question put, and agreed to.
    Debate to be resumed To-morrow.

  COURTS (EMERGENCY POWERS) BILL.
  Considered in Committee.
  [Mr. WHITLEY in the Chair.]

  COURTS (EMERGENCY POWERS) BILL.

    CLAUSE 1.—(Powers of Court to Suspend or-Annul Certain Contracts.)
    (1) Where upon an application by any party to a contract for the construction of any building or work entered into before the fourth day of August, nineteen hundred and fourteen, the Court is satisfied that, owing to the prevention or restriction of, or the delay in, the supply or delivery of materials, or to the diversion or insufficiency of labour, occasioned by the present War, the contract cannot be enforced according to its terms without serious hardship, the Court may, after considering all the circumstances of the case and the position of all the parties to the contract and any offer which may have been made by any party for a variation of the contract, suspend or annul the contract on such conditions (if any) as the Court may think fit.
    (2) This Section shall be construed as one with the Courts (Emergency Powers) Act, 1914.
    Mr. NIELD: I beg to move, in Subsection (1), to leave out the words "for the construction of any building or work."
    I move this Amendment in order that contracts which have been entered into and which are of equal importance with matters concerning the construction of buildings may receive an equal amount of attention. It is notorious that in the greater world of commerce contracts have been made for the forward delivery of goods, contracts which involve very large sums of money and for which the prices have been fixed on the basis of pre-war conditions. If the Committee were fuller there are many Members who would appreciate at once the point I am trying to make. I will take. for instance, forward contracts for nitrates and forward contracts for sugar, commodities which have a definite market value and many of which are the subject, I am afraid, of a good deal of speculation in time of peace. These contracts have been based on rates for freight which prevailed before the War. Now the rate of freight has gone up enormously, but by reason of the condition of the contracts being for an inclusive price, those prices are now out of

    1045
    all keeping with the cost of material plus the cost of bringing it over to this country. What is the effect of it? The seller has had to deliver upon the terms of his pre-war prices, and he has had to pay these enormous freights, while the buyer has got the advantage of the freight and can sell on this side, if his cargo survives the voyage, at a price which includes the enormously enhanced freight. Therefore, the buyer puts into his pocket very large sums of money. He has been subject to no risk, because if his goods do not arrive he gets his insurance. There, again, the vendor has had included in his price the cost of the premium which has been very largely inflated by reason of the risk, so that on every aspect of the case the seller is. prejudiced, and the buyer receives on advantage of an inordinate kind, so much so that it is positively unjust and inequitable that he should be allowed to put it into his pocket.
    8.0 P.M.
    I think the Solicitor-General could be satisfied upon inquiry among the large city commercial communities, notably the London Chamber of Commerce, that in cases of compulsory arbitration arising out of these contracts the Court has had very considerable difficulty in making awards under these forward contracts. I think two of His Majesty's judges sitting, as we call it, at first instance, have pronounced in favour of a reduced sum. The Court of Appeal, I understand, reversed this judgment and held the buyer entitled to participate in the profits which the circumstances in war had brought into his pocket. My object in proposing these words in the Bill is to make the scope of the Bill apply to all kinds of contracts of whatever nature, provided that the judge to whom the matter is referred has power to make such an amendment of the contract as will be just and equitable. It is not putting the buyer in the position of vendor, and it is not suggested that the contract must of necessity be completed upon pre-war terms. What it is proposed to do is to give the Court the right to determine equitably between the various parties to the contract, having regard to the altered conditions produced by the state of war over which neither one party nor the other has had any control. There is one point I should like to mention in relation to these awards. I am told that the awards which have been made in accordance with the provisions of that Act of Parliament have been received with in-
    1046
    credulity in America, where they should be enforced, and that very considerable friction has arisen in consequence. American opinion has been very strongly, aroused as to the inequitableness of enforcing contracts on terms which would give the buyer all the advantage without suffering any risk of loss. There are large electrical and other industries which are involved in the same way. I do not propose to go into them in detail, but I should like the Solicitor-General to remember that there are other matters to be borne in mind. There are deliveries of finished materials which are required for buildings, although they do not come under strictly building contracts, and if the Clause is left as it is it would not cover that class of case. There are orders necessarily very large indeed for electrical fittings in connection with buildings in course of erection when the War broke out. There are in fact a whole lot of trades which would not come within the purview of this Clause at present in the Bill, within the purview of the words "constructional or building work," but which would be hit just as heavily because they are based on pre-war labour prices and pre-war costs of materials. The whole thing I admit is full of difficulty. But you must in justice provide for other trades. There is a good deal more that might be said on the point, but I am quite sure that the Solicitor-General understands the full range of the observations I have already made, and will realise the very serious danger that threatens the whole British commerce unless some relief is given under these contracts.
    Mr. PRINGLE: It seems to me that the hon. Gentleman has put a very strong case for this Amendment, and I hope that the learned Solicitor-General will be willing to meet it either by accepting the Amendment, or by suggesting an. alternative course whereby the arguments put before the Committee may be substantially met.
    The SOLICITOR-GENERAL (Sir Gordon Hewart): I cannot help thinking that my hon. and learned Friend (Mr. Nield) has not entirely appreciated the scope of the Bill. So far as contracts are concerned, the Bill proposes to deal with them in two ways. There are builders' contracts as to which a special kind of relief is to be-given, and there are contracts of whatever nature the performance of which is interfered with by the requirements and regulations of a Government Department. No

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    doubt some of the contracts in the category to which my hon. and learned Friend has referred will fall within Clause 2, and, in proper cases, relief will be granted under the operation of that Clause. But the proposal which my hon. and learned Friend now submits is of the most comprehensive and far-reaching character. He said, in effect, that Clause 1 ought to be made to apply to all contracts of whatsoever character, and, if I followed him aright, he is seriously suggesting that wherever a man has entered into a contract of whatsoever kind before the War, and after the War finds out that through something attributable to the War it is difficult for him to carry out that contract, he may go to a judge of the High Court, or, I suppose, a County Court judge, and invite him to deal with the matter on terms which he thinks equitable. I can only say that if any such enactment as that were to be made it would be difficult indeed for judges of the High Court or of the County Court to find time for the performance of the duties which would fall upon them.
    The origin of this measure seems to be not entirely understood. It is a measure which did not come into existence in the time of the present Government. It was drafted in the time of the late Government, and it was drafted for the purpose of dealing with three or four definite and specific grievances. One of those grievances was the grievance of the builder who, before the War, had entered into certain contracts, and, after the War, found that, by reason of causes definitely, clearly, and undoubtedly attributable to the War, those contracts could not be performed in the allotted time. That made a strong case, and it was a case to which the Government were not only willing, but anxious to apply a suitable remedy. If we are to go further than that, if we are to apply this procedure to contracts of every kind whatsoever, if by Act of Parliament this House should call upon the judges to take cognisance of any contract of whatever kind made before the War, as to which the person who has made it finds the performance difficult by reason of the War, the effect would be most serious. No doubt the points raised by this Amendment are of a restricted character, but there are consequential Amendments which will follow on this proposal if it be adopted, and the effect would be that there would be no restriction whatever
    1048
    upon the kind of contract for which relief I would be sought. It might, indeed, be the case that a person who had entered into a contract of marriage might go to the Court and seek relief from it, because, in consequence of circumstances arising from the War, and of difficulties created by the War, he was unable to carry out his promise. I submit that the proper and sensible course is to keep this Clause restricted to the particular class of contract to which it now refers, a class of contract in which a strong case has been made out, and we ought not to destroy its effect by seeking to extend it to every kind of contract whatsoever.
    Mr. BOYTON: I am not sure that the learned Solicitor-General has made the position quite clear. My attention has been called to a new Clause which he has put down and which is of a very wide character. I should have thought that that would have covered breach of promise of marriage cases.
    Sir G. HEWART: Perhaps I may be allowed to interrupt my hon. Friend, and to explain that the new Clause, as it appears on the Paper, unfortunately omits two very important words. It is intended solely to deal with agreements and covenants in leases.
    Mr. BOYTON: I am obliged to the learned Solicitor-General for his explanation. When I found for the first time this morning he had a long and elaborate new Clause down I was a little astonished. I hardly knew where we were. If, as has been suggested, it is intended by the Amendment to exempt every contract under the sun, whereas the intention of the Government is to confine this matter to building contracts and building constructional contracts—
    Sir G. HEWART: So far as the first Clause is concerned.
    Mr. BOYTON: If that is the clear purpose and meaning of the Clause, I do not think we can su essfully resist the hon. and learned Gentleman's contention.
    Mr. NIELD: With regard to the hon. and learned Gentleman's suggestions with reference to breaches of promise of marriage, I do not see how they could be affected by the War. Persons, it is true, may have their fortunes reduced by the War, but I cannot suppose that the marriage contract is entered into purely from the point of view of the fortune possessed

    1049
    by either party. Surely other considerations come in. I would like to remind the hon. and learned Gentleman that the German Federal Council, on 16th December last, passed a resolution authorising the German Chancellor to cancel contracts made with anyone in the Allied Entente countries, and I suppose that would include something short of cancellation, and would allow of the submission of terms which would be acceptable. But I notice that the House is nearly empty, many hon. Members have gone to dinner, and it is hopeless to suppose, even if I pressed this Amendment to a Division, that I could hope to carry it. I have never wasted the time of the House, and I am not going to begin doing so now. I therefore, ask leave to withdraw my Amendment.
    Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
    Mr. PRINGLE: I beg to move, in Subsection (1), after the word "or" ["construction of any building or"], to insert the words "the execution of."
    The object of this Amendment is to apply the relief to other contracts besides constructional and building contracts. A number of people are very interested in the position of shipbuilding contracts. These were suspended under the Defence of the Realm Act (No. 2) to enable the Admiralty to use all our shipbuilding resources for the purposes of the Navy. Subsequently the Government came to hold the view that commercial shipbuilding was to a large extent as important as the increase of our various ships of war, and at that time arrangements were made by the Board of Trade with a number of shipbuilders whose contracts had previously been held up and received protection under the Defence of the Realm Act, and the contracts were renewed on various terms which were agreed upon between the builders and the shipowners. Now a new system is being adopted, and many of these revised arrangements are being broken through in order to allow the building of standardised ships of which we have heard so much recently. Those whose agreements have been broken into in this way are naturally anxious to understand what the position is. They recognise that they were protected under the Defence of the Realm Act (No. 2). They wish to know whether the revised arrangements into which they have entered and which are now broken are to continue to be binding on them. They are doubtful if
    1050
    they receive protection under either Clauses 1 or 2, and in order to ascertain what their position is I move this Amendment.
    Sir G. HEWART: The object of this. Amendment is really identical with the object of the Amendment which has been disposed of already. If the words proposed are inserted, it is quite clear that the effect of Clause 1 will not be limited to buildings or building construction, but will be extended so as to apply to any contract under which work of any kind whatsoever has to be executed. In those circumstances, I do not think that I need repeat the objections which I urged against the acceptance of the Amendment of the hon. and learned Member for Ealing. But I gather from what has just been said that the object of this Amendment is also, if not chiefly, to ascertain what is the position of certain shipbuilders under certain shipbuilding agreements. Glad as I always am to respond to appeals, especially to appeals of my hon. and learned Friend, I should have great hesitation in advising as to the position of the shipbuilders to whom he refers unless I had the agreements in question before me. I do not think, with great respect, that this is a matter which can be said to arise upon this Clause. The hon. and learned Member is not proposing to limit his extension of this Clause to the case of shipbuilders, much less to the case of the particular shipbuilders to whom he now refers, and I must respectfully decline the task of advising as to the position of that particular group of shipbuilders in the absence of suitable material on which I could form an opinion.
    Mr. PRINGLE: I think it very important that we should have some opinion from the Government. The Government and the hon. and learned Gentleman are quite aware of the existence of these contracts. He knows that revised arrangements were entered into, and that through the action of the Government these revised arrangements are now broken. Under this Bill relief is provided for one class of people who are affected in a similar way. I am entitled, therefore, to ask the Committee to insert an Amendment which would protect another class who are affected similarly by the action of the Government. I had hoped, therefore, that as these contracts were well known to the Government and my hon. and learned Friend was their legal adviser in the

    1051
    matter, he would have been able to state whether protection was given, if not under Clause 1, at least under Clause 2. But if the hon. and learned Gentleman is not able to give an opinion, I am afraid that it will be necessary to divide, not so much to. divide in Committee, but to take a Division on the Report stage. The matter is far too important to be disposed of in this cavalier way, when the House is so thin as it is at present. We are dealing here with extremely important interests. The very fact that this Bill has been introduced proves the extreme importance of the matter, and if it is important to give protection in relation to building contracts, it is equally important to give protection for other contracts of a similar kind in which the contractors have been affected in the same way. I had hoped that in the circumstances some opinion or concession could have been announced by the Government, but the fact that we can get so little satisfaction almost suggests reporting Progress so that a better opportunity of full discussion of this important matter should be given.
    Mr. NIELD: In reply to the Solicitor-General, may I point out that there is a great deal of difference between my proposal just now and this proposal, because, while I agree that I cast my net very wide indeed, so as to include, as I intended it should include, all these other contracts, this narrows it very considerably? It does seem to me that there is a large quantity of work other than building work which might very well be included in this Clause for which the demand for relief is equally strong as it is in respect of these building contracts. If the argument is that the judges would not have time to do the work, then my reply is that it is perfectly easy to set up tribunals of a sufficiently impartial character, whether commercial tribunals or whatever they may be, to investigate cases of this kind and to refer them to the judge for disposal. That would very considerably narrow down the duty of the judges. We ought not to allow hardships which arise to continue merely on the plea that it would impose on the judges more than their share of work to get through.
    Amendment negatived.
    Sir G. HEWART: I beg to move, in Sub-section (1) after the word "work"
    1052
    ["building or work entered"], to insert the words "or for the supply of any material for any building or work."
    I move this Amendment, in the absence of the hon. Member for West Newington (Mr. Gilbert), because it seems to me, on consideration of this proposal, that the effect of it will commend itself to members of the Committee. The Clause as it stands gives relief to the building contractor under a contract for the construction of any building or work; but it would be said that the sub-contractor who had undertaken to supply the material was not included in this measure. It seems to us that where the head contractor may obtain relief of this kind, he should not also be in a position to hold his subcontractor bound. Therefore, for that reason, among other reasons, I hope the Committee will be disposed to accept this Amendment that I move, and which Stands in the name of the hon. Member for Newington.
    Amendment agreed to.
    Mr. PETO: I beg to move, in Sub-section (1), to leave out the words "fourth day of August, nineteen hundred and fourteen"["before the fourth day of August, nineteen hundred and fourteen, the Court"], and to insert instead thereof the words "seventeenth day of July, nineteen hundred and sixteen."
    My hon. and learned Friend the Solicitor-General, in giving a general description of the original Bill just now, referred to it as if it had originated from the time of the late Government. As a matter of fact, it was in July of last year that the special hardships which are inherent to building contracts for buildings and other works were brought to the attention of the present Home Secretary. At that time what the building trade concentrated their minds upon was merely the fact that in the course of the prolongation of the War circumstances of various kinds had arisen which rendered it very difficult, in some cases almost impossible, to carry out their contracts. so they sought relief. Shortly after that the Munitions Department issued a prohibition against all building work exceeding a sum of £500, and practically put a stop to the carrying on of these building contracts. That applied, of course, not to contracts entered into before the commencement of the War, on the 4th August. 1914, but any contract at all. What the building trade maintains is that they have

    1053
    sought relief from the execution of contracts on account of the circumstances arising out of the War. On the date 4th August, 1914, so far as the building trade was concerned, they thought nothing would happen, and everybody was encouraged to go on with their business as usual. The builders entered into fresh contracts, if they liked, and everybody was encouraged to do so because it was encouraging the employment of labour. That policy dropped through and passed away. I think the proper date to put in is not the date of the commencement of the War, the 4th August, 1914, but the date when those building contracts were interfered with, necessarily, of course, by the action of the Government, and the most appropriate day for this measure is the date when the Government prohibited the execution of building work of any magnitude at all. That was on the 17th July, 1916.
    The Bill as drafted would not meet very many of the hardest cases. I will give the Committee one of the hardest cases, and only one, that of a contract entered into by Liverpool contractors on the 22nd February, 1915, under which there are penalties for non-completion—which is the ordinary form of contract—and in which there is a force majeure clause. Notwithstanding this, their clients, a cold storage company, claimed from them £2,000 in penalties in respect of works many months overdue. The firm go on to point out, in their communication, that it was perfectly impossible for them to execute this contract up to time, because it included very heavy steel work, amounting to over £3,000, and about the time they were expecting to get the steel and the work would have been done the Government practically commandeered all the steel of the country, and it was only after the expiration of six months that they got any of the steel. Consequently, on this transaction, entered into on the 22nd February, 1915, they have claims now pending against them which will be enforced under the Bill as drafted in a Court of law for no less than £2,000, penalties for delay in circumstances over which they had no control at all. I do not wish to detain the Committee a moment more than is absolutely necessary, but I do ask the Solicitor-General to deal with this Amendment as he dealt with the last one. The intention of the Bill is to give relief to this particular trade, and, incidentally, to stop the terrible cost of litigation such as has already taken place in some instances,
    1054
    particularly that by the Metropolitan Water Board. I want this Clause to cover all the contracts to which it ought to be applied. I am advised that there are very few contracts existing now which were entered into before 4th August, 1914. There are a great many contracts which were entered into in the months following that—in the early days of the War—which ought to be included in this Bill. For these reasons I move the Amendment.
    Mr. BOYTON: I desire to support the Amendment proposed by the hon. Member for Devizes. It is interesting to note that this is a legacy to the Solicitor-General from his predecessor. I had no idea that it was on the shelves of the Home Office, and thought that it was occasioned by the fact that the Ministry of Munitions set up a building permit committee, and said that after the 17th day of July, 1916, no building work beyond £500 was to be undertaken without special permit The result of that Order created some consternation in the building trade throughout the length and breadth of the land, and various deputations attended on the Minister of Munitions, and, as the result of those deputations and the difficulty in which he found himself, the Minister of Munitions set up a small Advisory Committee, as is very customary at the present time. I speak with some knowledge of the matter, because I was a member of that Committee, and a Sub-Committee made a recommendation to the Minister of Munitions to this effect, that they felt that considerable hardship was inevitably inflicted on the building trade by the demands necessary to meet the Government requirements for both material and labour, and the Committee recommended that cases of this kind should be dealt with by legislation or otherwise, suspending the operation of contracts arising out of contractual relations, either wholly or partly, so long as the Order is in force. We went on to point out the very serious hardship which occurred by the suspension of building operations, and builders were involved in considerable loss by the withholding of retention money and by the detention of the whole of their plant and also by the wastage of and damage to material. The recommendation I have read is a very strong one and when I saw the Bill I thought it was the outcome of that recommendation, but it is satisfactory to know that the hardship that had already been inflicted prior to July, 1916, had been observed by the Solicitor-General

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    of that date and that the then Government proposed to bring in some legislation. No doubt the deputations and the setting up of the Sub-Advisory Committee had the effect of continuing the good intentions of the hon. and learned Gentleman's predecessor. I hope that, as a result of what has been said by the hon. Member for Devizes and the strength of the extract from the Report, that the Solicitor-General will grant this concession. It would be only fair seeing that difficulties occurred from the commencement of the War, and emphasised by the fact that since July last no building of any importance can be undertaken, and bearing in mind the contractual relations of the various builders and contractors.
    Sir F. BANBURY: I think Clause 2 is designed to meet the objection raised by the hon. Gentleman (Mr. Boyton). He pointed out, truly and correctly, that considerable hardship arises where a builder has entered into a contract and is prevented from carrying out that contract by Regulations made by the Government, but that is met by Clause 2, which I think the hon. Member cannot have read.
    Mr. BOYTON: I did.
    Sir F. BANBURY: I think that is mended by Clause 2.
    Mr. BOYTONdissented.
    Sir F. BANBURY: I understand from the Solicitor-General that is so. In the Amendment my hon. Friend goes very much further. The Amendment says that where after the War a man has entered into a contract with his eyes open—I quite agree before the War is a different matter—and where the Government have not by any legislation interfered with his carrying out of that contract it is to be voided because, apparently, it is not to the pecuniary advantage or is to the pecuniary loss of the person who entered into it. I sincerely trust that the Government will not accept the Amendment, because that would be an end to every contract. The argument that because a man has made a bad contract it should be voided is quite an impossible one.
    Sir S. COLLINS: I hope the Solicitor-General will accept the Amendment. I suppose builders almost as much as any other class in the country have suffered very much indeed during the War. A few have been fortunate in munitions and Government work, but the great mass of
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    the builders have been almost at a standstill. Their plant and offices are lying idle, and many of them have had to shut up. I hope consideration will be given to this worthy and deserving class who have done so much to beautify London and our other large towns throughout the Empire. It is very little to ask, and I hope the concession will be granted.
    Mr. NIELD: I think the right hon. Baronet the Member for the City (Sir F. Banbury) did not do himself justice, because his observations were really not justified by the proposal. It is not every contract or even every building contract—
    Sir F. BANBURY: It only applies to building.
    Mr. NIELD: The statement made was that it applied to every contract.
    Sir F. BANBURY: No.
    Mr. NIELD: It is only to those contracts where the judge holds it would be inequitable to enforce the terms. The trouble which has arisen and which makes the Amendment so necessary has arisen wholly and solely by reason of the attitude assumed by the late Government and the late Prime Minister in his speech at Newcastle distinctly inviting the trading community to go on as they were going or, in other words, using a paraphrase of the familiar expression "Business as usual." The result of that was that men entered into contracts in the full belief that the normal condition of things would prevail. I cannot imagine that gigantic contracts were entered into. I have in mind a case where the gravest hardship arose in connection with a Metropolitan Water Board contract. It was for the erection of their offices at Riverhead and which would have been completed long ago, but for the interposition of restrictions upon building material. The unfortunate contractor there could neither go forward nor back and was called upon to make good the contract against the weather. He has had to spend considerable sums of money, and he cannot get a farthing of that by reason of the law as it at present stands. It is in a hard case that the judge would have power to give relief. It is not as if we were asking for a general tearing up of contracts. We base the case for this Amendment on the ground that the Government urged the community to go on as if nothing had happened, and, in fact, practically to go into ordinary contracts. The Ministry of Munitions actively interfered and

    1057
    peremptorily forbid the delivery of goods, except upon providing certificates which they themselves controlled, and I think justice can only be adequately met by putting in a date to cover that.
    Mr. G. THORNE: I desire to endorse what has been said in support of the Amendment. It is not as if this Clause proposed to destroy contracts. It is only to give power to the Court, and the Amendment will simply enlarge that power. It seems to me that that enlargement is vitally necessary in the interests of the persons concerned. The provision is that the Court may, after considering the whole circumstances of the case and the position of the parties to the contract take action. This Amendment gives the Court the chance of showing fairness to those men who have been very hard hit.
    Sir C. CORY: The discussion that has taken place assumes that this only applies to building. Has it not a much wider meaning than building only, and does it not apply to all contracts? The Clause says,
    "Where, upon an application by any party to a contract for the construction of any building or work entered into—
    I take it that a contract for "any work" would include all contracts, and not be confined to building contracts merely, and I think we shall be entering on to very dangerous ground if we include in the Bill all contracts entered into during the War by men with their eyes open.
    Mr. PETO: I should like the Solicitor-General to answer one point raised by the right hon. Member for the City of London (Sir F. Banbury). He said the cases I have mentioned of contracts entered into since 4th August, 1914, were met by Clause 2.
    Sir F. BANBURY: I did not say that, but I said that where the Government have come in and stopped people carrying out their contracts by saying "You must not do more than a certain amount without the sanction of the Government," that is met by Clause 2.
    Mr. PETO: I do not think that is so. It extends the scope of Clause 1 of the Defence of the Realm (Amendment) (No. 2) Act, 1915, which says that
    "necessity is a good defence to any action or proceedings taken against that person in respect of the non-fulfilment of the contract so far as it is due to that interference."
    1058
    That presupposes that there is an action brought against the builder in this case to make him complete his contract, and that he has then a defence which he can set up, but that is a very small part of the hardship we want to remove. There are all sorts of other circumstances than an action brought for specific performance of contract. There are hardships arising out of matters such as retention money, protection of buildings, and all such matters as that. All those things, if we have Clause 1 extended in the manner in which I propose, will be dealt with under that Clause, and the Court will be given power to take these things into consideration and to give the relief which is justified in each case.
    Sir G. HEWART: There are two questions which appear to be raised. One, which it may be convenient to deal with first, was raised by the hon. Baronet the Member for West Cornwall (Sir C. Cory), who referred to the words in the second line of Clause 1:"The construction of any building or work." If I followed his observations, what he was contending was that the words "or work" are sufficiently wide to make the contracts referred to include contracts of any kind whatsoever. With great respect, I do not think that that is the true construction of the Clause. I think the words "or work" must of necessity be read in close association with the word which has gone before, and the words "the construction of any building or work" mean the construction of any building, or work which is ejusdem generis with the construction of any building, and therefore I do not think he need seriously apprehend the kind of mischief which he mentions. With regard to the other question, which is the main question raised in the course of the discussion, I think it is a little important that the Committee should see clearly what it is that is proposed by the Amendment, and what it is that is proposed by the Clause as it now stands. The question for the Government in Clause 1 of this Bill was the question of giving relief in proper cases to persons who had entered into contracts of a particular kind. Those persons were builders, and I am sure that we all agree with what fell from my hon. Friend the Member for Kennington (Sir S. Collins) that the builders are a worthy and deserving class. But within what limits and subject to what conditions is relief to be given to that worthy and deserving class?

    1059
    A line must obviously be drawn some where, and the policy which is observed in Clause 1 of the Bill is to draw the line at the outbreak of the War, so that a clear contrast is pointed between the man who before the War entered into a building contract and finds after the War, by reason of circumstances arising out of the War, that he cannot without great hard ship perform his contract in the stipulated time, and, on the other hand, the man who after the war entered into a contract and experienced it may be a similar kind of hardship. Now let us see what is the consequence which would follow if the Amendment which has been supported by so many members of the Committee were to be adopted. The date which it is proposed to substitute by the Amendment for the date of the commencement of the War is the 17th July, 1916, and, as I understand, that date is chosen because at that time, in consequence of an Order made by the Minister of Munitions, under the provisions of Regulation S.E, I think, of the Defence of the Realm Act Regulations, it was positively prohibited to a builder that he should without licence proceed with the construction of at any rate a certain kind of building. Why, Sir, if that date were to be substituted, the effect would be this—and I am not sure that it is not the real intention of the Mover of the Amendment that this should be the effect—that for a whole period of two years from the 4th day of August, 1914, up to the 17th day of July, 1916, a building contractor should have had the opportunity of entering into a building contract with notice of the War, and notice which was a notice of one kind in the autumn of 1914, of another kind in the spring of 1915, and of another kind at each successive period as the two years went on; and having entered into that contract with his eyes open, or I should hope partly open, and having stood to gain whatever benefit he might hope to gain from that contract, may now turn round and say, "Notwithstanding that I entered into this contract, it may be two years after the War had begun, nevertheless, because the difficulties I have experienced are due to the War, I claim the right to go to the Court."
    Sir S. COLLINS: And the thing has got worse as time went on.
    Sir G. HEWART: I am told that the thing has got worse as time goes on.
    1060
    May I suggest to my hon. Friend opposite that it may have been among the calculations or speculations of the builder that prices would get better? I submit, however, with all earnestness, that if once we depart from the clear and obvious line of demarcation which is suggested by the date of the outbreak of War, we venture upon a sea which has no shore. An alternative date, 16th July, 1916, is suggested. I rather gather I am right in my conjecture that that date was selected because it was upon that date that the actual prohibition was made against building.
    Mr. PETO: The Restriction of Building Order.
    Sir G. HEWART: I am obliged to my hon. Friend—
    Sir S. COLLINS: May I remind the learned Solicitor-General that by order of the Government builders are not able to carry out their contracts? Everything is at a standstill. Their plant is rusting, and everything is going to ruin.
    Sir G. HEWART: Be it so. Therefore the argument comes to this: that the period during which a building contractor entered into a contract which, nevertheless, he may now come to the Court to suspend or to annul, must be the whole period from the beginning of the War up to the time when building was actually prohibited! These are the true dimensions of the extension which are suggested by this Amendment. I submit that it is impracticable, and that the line which has been chosen, and chosen after careful deliberation for this Clause—that is to say, the line which is between the pre-war contract and the post-war contract- is the true line of division. I trust the Committee will see the reasonableness of that course, and the difficulties and dangers which would arise from the proposed alternative and later date.
    Mr. NIELD: The Solicitor-General has not quite answered my point. That refers to the date of the Government's prohibition of building. The action was only in obedience to what was said in the highest possible quarter from one who might be supposed to kno how things stood. That Newcastle speech will require a lot of explaining if we are to accept the suggestion that these ntracts were entered into with open ey should like to raise one question b I sit down. The Solicitor-General hat the operation of Section 2 in this is limited also in

    1061
    point of date to contracts entered into previous to the commencement of the War. Does that apply in general to any contracts the performance of which have been interfered with by Government Order?
    Sir G. HEWART: My hon. Friend behind me has really asked me two questions, and I will say a word upon each of them. In regard to his first point the invitations that were offered to the public, I have a recollection of some of them—I am not sure that I remember the particular invitation to which he refers—that business should be carried on as usual, notwithstanding the War. I cannot help thinking that it is a very strong proposition to put forward, that the true date should follow the invitations of that time, and that all contracts made after such invitations should have something like an indemnity. One thing, however, is certain, that if the true inference is to relieve whatever followed that invitation and acceptance the thing cannot possibly be limited to builders. Under Clause 1 of this Bill a similar relief must be given to every person who can say that in consequence of the invitation to proceed with business as usual he, or she, after the War, entered into a contract of some kind, whatever kind, which has now become—shall I say—inconvenient ! In regard to the second point, I am not sure that it arises upon this Clause. The Second Clause refers to interference with contracts. There contracts are not limited to builders. It is interference to contracts of any kind "by Regulation, requirement, or restriction by a Government Department." I should have thought that the question there was not what was the date on which the contract was made, but was the contract, whenever made, in fact interfered with by requirement, Regulation, or restriction of a Government Department?
    9.0 P.M.
    Mr. BOYTON: I am very sorry I am not -endowed with the ability, legal knowledge, and subtlety of the learned Gentleman in charge of this Bill. I can only look at the measure from a business point of view. You are going to give protection to people who before the War entered into business contracts at the prices then prevailing, at low rates of wages—lower than has since prevailed—and low cost of material. You are going to extend to them the privilege of getting out of contracts. You did not shut down the builder at the time the War broke out.
    1062
    You did not say to the builder on 15th August: "You shall not build." You wait until 17th July, 1916, before you finally shut him down. In these nineteen months work has gone on. It was not wrong. It was not a crime on the part of the builder to undertake contracts. Builders went on building so far as they could. They had difficulties to meet in respect of the scarcity of labour, and the growing cost and shortness of material. In framing their contracts I do not suppose they thought for a moment of the difficulty and trouble into which they were letting themselves. When they had got their buildings up to one or two stories—and if you go round London you will see this spectacle—they were told they must not go any further. These buildings may be lying for the next two years, during which time their retention money is at stake; their bills of exchange are falling due to their material merchants. Their capital has been sunk, their mortgage interest is running on, and you are not going to give them any redress or assistance. For the life of me, as a business man—I have not the legal mind, and I am glad I have not!—but from the business point of view I consider it is a crying disgrace that any Government Department should not give these men relief.
    Sir S. COLLINS: May I invite the learned Solicitor-General to try to be practical—to put away his legal mind a little and deal in common-sense. The hon. and learned Gentleman spoke just now of giving indemnities. I know a large and powerful trade in this country. I am not going to enlarge upon it, but simply to say that those in it destroy far more than they build up. They are going to take care to have an indemnity. I trust the hon. and learned Gentleman will consider our case sympathetically, and do something to relieve the builders. Their buildings, as my hon. Friend opposite has said, have been standing. They will have a great deal to do. A great deal of the work will have to be gone over again. Much of it will have deteriorated, and have to be pulled down, and replaced. I do ask that the hon. and learned Gentleman will give this extension; will just put himself in the place of the builder, and forget, for the moment, that he is a lawyer.
    Question put, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Clause."

    The Committee divided: Ayes, 115; Noes, 16.

    Division No. 23.]

    AYES.

    [9.5 p.m.

    Archdale, Lieut. E. M.

    Greenwood, Sir G. G. (Peterborough)

    Ormsby-Gore, Hon. William

    Baldwin, Stanley

    Gretton, John

    Parker, James (Halifax)

    Banbury, Rt. Hon. Sir F. G.

    Griffith, Rt. Hon. Ellis Jones

    Pollock, Ernest Murray

    Barnes, Rt. Hon. George N.

    Gulland, Rt. Hon. John William

    Pratt, J. W.

    Barnett, Captain R. W.

    Haddock, George Bahr

    Prothere, Rt. Hon. Rowland Edmund

    Bathurst, Capt. Charles (Wilts, Wilton)

    Hall, D. B. (Isle of Wight)

    Pryce-Jones, Colonel E.

    Benn, Arthur Shirley (Plymouth)

    Hamilton, C. G. C. (Ches., Altrincham)

    Rea, Walter Russell (Scarborough)

    Bentinck, Lord H. Cavendish-

    Hardy, Rt. Hon. Laurence

    Rees, G. C. (Carnarvonshire, Arf n)

    Boscawen, Sir Arthur S. T. Griffith-

    Harmsworth, Cecil (Luton, Beds)

    Roberts, George H. (Norwich)

    Brace, Rt. Hon. William

    Harmsworth, R. L. (Calthness-shire)

    Robinson, Sidney

    Bridgeman, William Clive

    Harris, Percy A. (Leicester, S.)

    Roch, Walter F. (Pembroke)

    Bryce, J. Annan

    Haslam, Lewis

    Rowlands, James

    Bull, Sir William James

    Hewart, Sir Gordon

    Rutherford, Sir J. (Darwen)

    Carnegie, Lieut.-Col. Douglas G.

    Hewins, William Albert Samuel

    Rutherford, Watson (L'pool, W. Derby)

    Cave, Rt. Hon. Sir George

    Hickman, Colonel Thomas E.

    Samuels, Arthur W.

    Cawley, Rt. Hon. Sir Frederick

    Hills, John Waller

    Samuel, Samuel (Wandsworth)

    Chaloner, Colonel R. G. W.

    Hodge, Rt. Hon. John

    Shaw, Hon. A.

    Cempton-Rickett, Rt. Hon. Sir J.

    Holt, Richard Durning

    Shortt, Edward

    Cooper, Sir Richard Ashmole

    Hope, James Fitzalan (Sheffield)

    Smith, Harold (Warrington)

    Cory, Sir Clifford John (St. Ives)

    Hughes, Spencer Leigh

    Smith, Sir Swire (Kelghley, Yorks)

    Cory, James H. (Cardiff)

    Illingworth, Rt. Hon. Albert H.

    Spicer, Rt. Hon. Sir Albert

    Courthope, George Loyd

    Jacobsen, Thomas Owen

    Strauss, Edward A. (Southwark, West)

    Craig, Ernest (Cheshire, Crewe)

    Jardine, Ernest (Somerset, East)

    Tryon, Captain George Clement

    Craig, Col. James (Down, E.)

    Jones, Edgar (Merthyr Tydvil)

    Turton, Edmund Russborough

    Craik, Sir Henry

    Jones, J. Towyn (Carmarthen, East)

    Walker, Colonel William Hall

    Currie, George W.

    Jones, William S. Glyn- (Stepney)

    Wardle, George J.

    Davies, Timothy (Lincs., Louth)

    Kenyon, Barnet

    Wason, John Cathcart (Orkney)

    Denman, Hon. Richard Douglas

    Larmor, Sir J.

    Watson, John Bertrand

    Denniss, E. R. B.

    Layland-Barrett, Sir F.

    Whiteley, Herbert J.

    Dougherty, Rt. Hon. Sir J. B.

    Levy, Sir Maurice

    Williams, Col. Sir R. (Dorset, W.)

    Duke, Rt. Hon. Henry Edward

    Lewis, Rt. Hon. John Herbert

    Wilson, Rt. Hon. J. W. (Worcs., N.)

    Duncan, C. (Barrow-in-Furness)

    Lloyd, George Butler (Shrewsbury)

    Wood, John (Stalybridge)

    Fall, Arthur

    Locker-Lampson, G. (Salisbury)

    Wood, Rt. Hon. T. McKinnon (Glasgow)

    erens, Rt. Hon. Thomas Robinson

    MacCaw, William J. MacGeagh

    Yeo, Alfred William

    Fletcher, John Samuel

    McNeill, Ronald (Kent, St. Augustine's)

    Young, William (Perth, East)

    Galbraith, Samuel

    Morison, Thomas B. (Inverness)

    Yoxall, Sir James Henry

    Gibbs, Col. George Abraham

    Munro, Rt. Hon. Robert

    Goddard, Rt. Hon. Sir Daniel Ford

    Neville, Reginald J. N.

    TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—

    Goldstone, Frank

    Nicholson, Sir Charles N. (Doncaster)

    Lord Edmund Talbot and Mr. Beck

    Colliding, Sir Edward Alfred

    NOES.

    Agg-Gardner, Sir James Tynte

    MacVeagh, Jeremiah

    Tickler, T. G.

    Boland, John Pius

    Martin, Joseph

    Toulmin, Sir George

    Collins, Sir Stephen (Lambeth)

    Nield, Herbert

    Wing, Thomas Edward

    Flavin, Michael Joseph

    Nolan, Joseph

    Jones, H. Haydn (Merioneth)

    O'Brien, Patrick (Kilkenny)

    TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—Mr

    King, Joseph

    Outhwaite, R. L.

    Peto and Mr. Boyton.

    Lambert, Richard (Wilts, Cricklade)

    Radford, Sir George Heyncs

    Mr. PETO: I beg to move, in Sub-section (1), after the word "to" ["owing to the prevention or restriction of"], to insert the words "circumstances occasioned by the present war, including."
    Mr. BOYTON: On a point of Order. I have another Amendment, which is quite different from the previous one, namely, to leave out the words "fourth day of August, nineteen hundred and fourteen," and insert "seventeenth day of July, nineteen hundred and sixteen, and on any occasion of damage to property by enemy raids."
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN (Mr. Maclean): That depends upon whether the words "fourth day of August, nineteen hundred and fourteen," remain in the Bill, and the Committee has just decided that they shall, so that that is disposed of.
    Mr. PETO: The alteration which my Amendment would make to the Bill is only a small one, but I do not like limiting the powers of the Court in advance exclusively to questions arising out of insufficiency of labour and materials. I have already been informed by builders and contractors, who naturally take a great interest in this Bill, that if it is confined strictly to delay in the supply or delivery of material or the diversion or insufficiency of labour, that will not cover all the circumstances which arise owing to the War. and which prevent the proper execution of their contracts. There are all kinds of circumstances connected with contracts which have very little or nothing to do with either labour or material. There is the class of contracts dealing with the retention of money, and protection of buildings and matters of that kind, which it is impossible to fulfil without great hardships.
    Sir G. HEWART: I must resist this Amendment, because I think the representatives of the builders in this House are asking for a little too much. The position under Clause 1 is this: The Court may suspend or annul contracts of a certain character if the contractors can show that
    "Owing to the prevention or restriction of, or the delay in, the supply or delivery of materials, or to the diversion or insufficiency of labour occasioned by the present War the contract cannot be enforced according to its terms without serious hardship."
    I gather that the difficulties fall under the head of materials, or labour, and that these constitute the main difficulties, but my hon. Friend is not satisfied with the enumeration of the grounds of relief, and he would cast the net as wide as possible, and include everything by inserting the words "circumstances occasioned by the present War," whatsoever they may be, But there must be some limit in a matter of this character, and if the builders can obtain relief where they can show that their difficulties have arisen through circumstances connected with materials or with the supply of labour, I think that is sufficient.
    Mr. PETO: Those words would not have met or prevented the action which came before the House of Lords against the Metropolitan Water Board.
    Sir G. HEWART: I have a lively recollection of that case, and unless my memory plays me false, it was decided adversely to the contractor, and that decision was affirmed by the Court of Appeal. Since then, I believe, the House of Lords has reversed the decision, and therefore my hon. Friend cannot got much assistance from that case.
    Amendment negatived.
    Sir G. HEWART: I beg to move, in Subsection (1), to leave out the word "to" ["or to diversion or insufficiency of labour."]
    I move the omission of this word for reasons which are perfectly obvious. If that word remains doubts would arise as to the meaning of subsequent words, and the omission of this word will make it clear what the operation of the subsequent words is.
    Amendment agreed to.
    Mr. NIELD: I beg to move, in Subsection (1), to leave out the word "may"["the Court may, after considering all the circumstances"], and to insert instead thereof the word "shall."
    I think it is very desirable that this Clause should be made more mandatory by the insertion of the word "shall."
    Sir G. HEWART: My hon. and learned Friend has the gift of asking us to do a very large thing as if it were something very small. The scheme of this Clause is obviously to give the Court the power, if it thinks fit, of suspending or annulling, as the case may be, but my hon. and learned Friend proposes that the Court may not only do that, but shall be required to do it in every case, and that takes away from the Court the discretion which is the very essence of this matter.
    Amendment negatived.
    Mr. PETO: I beg to move, after the word "contract" ["suspend or annul the contract on such conditions"], to insert the words "or vary or rescind any of the provisions of the contract."
    This is the last of the three Amendments to which the whole of the building trade attach great importance. The learned Solicitor-General has not given way on either of the other Amendments proposed on behalf of the builders, but I hope he will meet us in this case. The Bill provides that the Court may suspend or annul the contract. Broadly speaking, the builders do not ask for power of the Court to suspend the contracts, because in most cases the War has done that, and the builders do not want any further suspension. We should rather like some provision to enable us to go on with the contract, but to annul a contract is not the proper power to give to the Courts. Many of these cases of hardship do not necessarily involve a complete annulling of a contract. Take the individual clauses in a contract which cannot be carried out, or which are affected. There certainly ought to be a power in the Court to vary or rescind any of the provisions of the contract, as well as power to suspend or annul. I will give one case as an illustration. It is that of a contract which is one of a few that is still alive, and which is under the words we have already passed affected by this Bill. It is a contract which was entered into with the Belfast Corporation in 1913. It is for out-fall sewage works, and about one-tenth

    1067
    of the work has already been completed. The position of the unfortunate contractor is that his plant is on the job depreciating very rapidly, and he cannot get any money from the corporation, or any settlement; they simply regard the contract as suspended during the War, and they intend to call upon the contractor to finish the work after the War. All the plant is wasting away, and they can get no relief of any sort or kind. The Solicitor-General says that in order to relieve contractors he is going to give power to the Court to suspend or annul the contract. This contractor does not want his contract annulled, but he does want the Court to have power to prevent the clauses of the contract operating unfairly and with undue advantage to the wealthy corporation for whom the work was being carried out. Therefore I think the Solicitor-General should consider that point if he wants to do anything to make this a live Bill to give any relief at all, even in the limited number of cases to which he has allowed it to apply. To do this he should certainly give the Court the discretionary power of varying or rescinding individual clauses, as well as the power of annulling or suspending contracts.
    Sir G. HEWART: I am sure the members of the Committee appreciate the kind of criticism to which this Clause is being subjected. I am not in the least complaining; I only want to understand it. First of all, it is said that the Clause ought to apply to a great many contracts to, which it does not apply. Then it is said that it ought to apply to contracts of quite a different nature. And, thirdly, it is said that it ought to apply upon grounds other than the grounds which are enumerated. Now it is said that the Court ought to be able to give a different kind of relief from that which this Bill proposes. In order to see the reasonableness of this suggestion, may I be permitted to call attention to that which the Bill does enable the Court to do. It is provided in the cases to which the Clause applies that the Court may, after considering all the circumstances of the case, the position of all the parties to the contract, and any offer which may have been made by any party for a variation of the contract, suspend or annul the contract on such conditions, if any, as the Court may think fit. In other words, one of the matters contemplated by this Clause is that before the applica-
    1068
    tion to the Court there may have been a suggestion on the part of one of the parties for a variation of the contract, and what my hon. Friend proposes is that where the parties upon the question of varying the contract have failed to agree, one of them may go to the Court and may ask the Court not merely to suspend or put an end to the contract, but to make a new contract to vary or rescind any provision of the contract. What does that mean? It means that the Court is to be entitled, in such a case and after such a failure as is here suggested, to make a new contract.
    I do not for a moment attempt to put the case so high as to say that this Clause is a complete remedy for every grievance-—of course, it is not-but I do submit that it goes to the utmost limit of what may practically and reasonably be done in order to meet the grievance. If my hon. Friend will consider the words of this Clause, it will be apparent to him that a very large discretion is given to the Court. The Court may take into consideration the several matters Which are enumerated here, and it may then suspend or annul the contract on such conditions, if any, as the Court may think fit. I submit that is ample discretion, and that it would be in the last degree mischievous, find, where not mischievous, impracticable, to invite or to empower the Court to make a new contract between the parties in such circumstances. One can imagine a case in which the person who had the obligations to perform might contend, "It is not that I cannot perform the contract. It is not that I am not ready to perform the contract now. It is not that I cannot complete the contract within the time stipulated. But look at the prices. I ask you to revise the schedule of prices." The defendant in the action says, "Certainly not" My hon. Friend says that in those circumstances it is right and proper that the Court should take upon itself the irksome and very often impracticable task of saying what the prices should be.
    Mr. POLLOCK: I think the Clause does want these words, "or vary any of the provisions of the contract." The Solicitor-General has made his point quite clear. We are, first of all. giving a power to the Court which it may under certain circumstances use. It is to have a discretion. It is not to be compelled to use it, but it is to have the power, and, if in its discretion it thinks it right, it is to use it. Supposing

    1069
    an offer for a variation of the contract has been previously made and the Court thinks it a perfectly fair one and that it ought to have been accepted, is it, then, only to have the power to say it will suspend or annul the contract? It is quite true that the Clause says, "on such conditions as the Court may think fit"; but it would be rather forcing the Court to say," I will suspend or I will annul the contract, but the condition I impose is that you must really in effect accept the variation which has been put forward and which ought to be available. "If one of the things which the Court is to consider is a reasonable offer to vary a contract in a particular case, I should have thought that it would have been very useful if the Court instead of going to the full length of annulling or suspending the contract had the intermediate power between those two very important and rather powerful expedients of saying, "I will vary the contract in accordance with the reasonable offer that has been made." The Solicitor-General has pointed out that this is not a power which the Court will use or will be compelled to use unless it is right and proper, but I feel a certain difficulty in parting from this Clause without giving the Court an intermediate weapon between complete suspension or complete annulment. I think it ought to have something lighter than those two very heavy remedies, and that it ought to have the power to vary. The Court need not use the power, but it would be unfortunate if the Solicitor-General did not accept the words "or vary."
    Mr. NIELD: I desire to echo the words which have fallen from my hon. and learned Friend opposite (Mr. Pollock), and, in doing so, I should like to address myself to an observation of the Solicitor-General, which I do not think be meant. After referring to the scope of the Amendment, he reviewed other types of Amendment in such a way as to give the impression that he thought there was some intention to obstruct the progress of the Bill.
    Sir G. HEWART: No.
    Mr. NIELD: I am glad to hear my hon. and learned Friend say, "No," because this is a very important measure and at any rate should receive reasonable discussion. I would ask the Solicitor-General
    1070
    between now and the Report stage to consider the necessity for giving this extra power to the Court. Surely, as the last speaker said, the Court must consider what has taken place between the parties in their endeavour to come to a settlement, and it ought to have the power, if it thinks it reasonable, to do something other than merely annul the contract. What is more iniquitous than that a man should insist upon getting a building of greater value at the expense of the unfortunate man who has entered into a contract with him by demanding that in so far as the contract has been partly performed at enhanced prices for labour and material it shall only be paid for at the scheduled prices in the contract? In times such as these, which are so exceptional—none of us living have ever known the like or will ever know them again—there should be a generous interpretation on the part of the Court, and, in order that there may be that generous interpretation, there ought to be the widest possible power. It is a discretionary power, which will only be exercised when a good case is made out. I would ask the Solicitor-General, between now and the Report stage, to make some effort to make some effort to accept these words.
    Sir S. COLLINS: I trust that the Solicitor-General will listen to and think over what his two hon. and learned Friends have just said. I speak as an ordinary man, not as a lawyer. I hope that the hon. and learned Gentleman is not closing up his mind and heart like adamant. Surely he does not come down with this Bill and think he is going to carry it through like the laws of the Medes and Persians, without any alteration. We only make little alterations. We all admire the hon. and learned Gentleman for the very high position he holds and the clear way in which he has stated his case, and, so far, won to-day, but if he will meet us in this very little and modest request to give this wider and discretionary power, I do not think he will regret it. At any rate, if my poor efforts are unavailing, will he listen to his two hon. and learned Friends and give way on this Amendment?
    Amendment negatived.
    Clause, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.

    CLAUSE 2.—(Relief from Liability when Fulfilment of Contract Interfered with by Requirement of a Government Department.)
    Sub-section (2) of Section one of the Defence of the Realm (Amendment) (No. 2) Act, 1915, shall apply in the case of the fulfilment of a contract being interfered with by a requirement, regulation, or restriction of a Government Department, other than the Admiralty or Army Council, in like manner as it applies in the case where such interference is due to a requirement, regulation, or restriction of the Ad niralty or Army Council.
    Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Clause stand part of the Bill."
    Mr. POLLOCK: I have given notice of an Amendment to leave out this Clause. The object of the Clause as it stands in the Bill is a good one. I have no quarrel with it at all, except that the words as drawn do not go quite far enough, and I have suggested another new Clause, which appears on page 352 of the White Paper, to take its place.
    Sir G. HEWART: Perhaps I may shorten the Debate by saying at once that I am willing to accept the hon. and learned Member's suggestion, and that when the right time comes I shall be prepared to accept the somewhat more comprehensive Clause he has put down by way of substitution for it.
    Mr. POLLOCK: I beg to thank my hon. and learned Friend.
    Question put, and negatived.

    CLAUSE 3.—(Power to Accept Premiums on Leases for Twenty-one Years or Upwards.)
    (1) Sub-section (2) of Section one of the Increase of Rent and Mortgage nterest (War Restrictions) Act, 1915, shall not apply to a lease of a dwelling-house for a term of not less than twenty-one years.
    (2) Section two of the Courts (Emergency Powers) (No. 2) Act, 1916, is hereby repealed.
    Sir G. HEWART: I beg to move, in Sub-section (1), to leave out the words "not less than twenty-one years," and to insert instead thereof the words "twenty-one years or upwards."
    It will be apparent at once that this is a purely verbal alteration. The object of the Clause as a whole is to take out of the
    1072
    operation of the Increase of Rent and Mortgage Interest (War Restrictions) Act, 1915, certain leases for terms of less than twenty-one years. The fact is that as the Clause now stands there is a double negative. All that I propose is to substitute the words "twenty-one years or upwards" for the words "not less than twenty-one years."
    Mr. BOYTON: The suggestion is not quite as innocent as it appears. It will be remembered that in the original Act a mistake was made. It penalised anyone for endeavouring to obtain a fine or premium in addition to rent for classes of property to which that Act applied. To put that right, in 1916 another Bill was brought in, the Courts (Emergency Powers) (No. 2) Act, 1916. and in Section 2 of that Act the County Court was given authority to grant a lease for a term of twenty-one years or upwards, and if there was any difference of opinion, the Court. provided that both parties appeared and that it was satisfied that the terms of the tenancy were not less satisfactory to the tenants than the terms on which the dwelling-house was let, might make an order accordingly. As I understand it, both the Section in the original Act and the Section in the Act of 1916 are to be repealed. In that case we shall not have recourse to the County Court, and it will be penalising a large number of people, if they have a lease of less than twenty-one years to dispose of, in that they will not be able to go to their tenant and sell it. It not only penalises the owner but the tenant who might presumably buy, and it puts a stop to business. The Solicitor-General is going too far in suggesting that both these Sections should be eliminated. I shall be glad to have some explanation.
    Sir G. HEWART: I am sorry I did not think it necessary, in moving what appeared and still appears to me to be a mere alteration of phrase, to deal with the subject-matter of the Clause. The matter really is quite simple. "What happened under the Increase of Rent and Mortgage Interest (War Restrictions) Act, 1915, was that it was provided that a person should not
    "in consideration of the grant, renewal, or continuance of a tenancy of any dwelling-house to which this Act applies require the payment of any fine, premium, or other like sum."
    By the latter Act that is, the Courts (Emergency Powers) (No. 2) Act, 1916—it

    1073
    was provided that in the case of a lease of twenty-one years and upwards a person who wished to do that which the earlier Act forbade, might go to the Court and obtain leave to do it. The proposal of Clause 3 of this Bill as a whole is to take those longer leases of twenty-one years and upwards out of the operation of the first Act. Therefore, as they are out of the operation of the first Act, the particular relief given to them by the second Act ceases to be necessary. So far as my Amendment is concerned it does nothing except to state, I hope a little less clumsily, what was stated in the Clause as drafted. All I am proposing to do now is to take out the words "not less than twenty-one years," and to insert the words "twenty one years or upwards.," I cannot for the life of me see that there is any difference of meaning between the two expressions.
    Amendment agreed to.
    Mr. ANDERSON: I beg to move, at end of Sub-section (1), to insert the following new Sub-section,
    (2)"Where upon any application by any party to a contract the Court is satisfied that owing to any restriction or direction imposed or given by or in pursuance of any Regulation made under any enactment relating to the defence of the realm any term of the contract cannot be enforced without serious hardship, the Court may, after considering the circumstances of the case and the position of all the parties to the contract and any offer which may have been made by any party for the variation of the contract, suspend or annul the contract on such conditions (if any) as the Court may think fit."
    The object of these words is to secure the proper enforcement of legislation which we have already passed. We are asking for nothing new at all. When the Increase of Rent and Mortgage Interest (War Restrictions) Act was before the House of Commons on a previous occasion I moved an Amendment in these words, and I was definitely assured that it was quite unnecessary, and that the Bill in itself gave all the power of recovery for which I have been asking. The point is whether a tenant who has been overcharged under this Act has a right to recover illegal payments that the landlord has taken from him. The Act laid it down
    1074
    that the tenant could not be charged above what he had been paying prior to 25th November, 1915, and the Act says,
    "A person shall not require the payment of any fine, premium, or other sum in addition to the rent, and where any such payment has been made after 25th November, 1915, then the amount shall be recoverable by the tenant by whom it was paid from the landlord, and may, without prejudice to any other method of recovery, be deducted from any rent payable by him to the landlord."
    In point of fact a considerable number of cases have arisen where tenants have been overcharged by the landlord—that is to say, they have been asked to pay more than the landlord was legally entitled to call upon them to pay. It was assumed that in that case the tenant would have a right to deduct from subsequent weekly payments what he had been illegally charged, and my view is that it was the definite opinion of the Local Government Board that they should so recover. In a great many cases the tenants have actually deducted. They have said, "You were not entitled to charge this. We have paid you our full legal rent. We have paid you every penny that you are entitled to ask, and since you have charged us more we are going to deduct from our subsequent rent the excess that you have charged us." These cases have been taken into County Courts, with varying results. Sometimes the judge has appeared to take a common-sense view and also a legal view of the matter and has declared for the tenant. In other cases he has given his decision on the side of the landlord. One case in particular has come out which has, above everything else, induced us to bring this matter forward. It is the case of Sharp Brothers and Knight a Chant. It was first of all decided for the tenant in the County Court.
    Mr. BOOTH: Where?
    Mr. ANDERSON: I am not quite sure of the place, but I think the Solicitor-General will have the full particulars.
    Sir G. HEWART: I remember the case perfectly well and I remember the decision of the Divisional Court and of the Court of Appeal, but I do not remember the place at which the case arose.
    Mr. ANDERSON: The Bill has come on rather unexpectedly owing to the rearrangement of business and consequently I have not furnished myself as fully as I should otherwise have done with the particulars. But the main facts are that the County Court decided for the tenant. Then it was taken to the Divisional Court, which upheld the County Court. It was then carried to the Court of Appeal, which reversed the decision of both the lower Courts and said such deductions on the part of the tenant were illegal. That is a very extraordinary state of affairs, because that is legalising illegal rent, and it seems to me to be really legalising what, in the first instance, was a form of robbery. If that judgment were to be upheld the tenants could not recover what has been illegally taken from them, and the landlord could not in any way be punished for overriding the decision of the law that you yourselves have made. It is exceedingly difficult for working-class tenants to carry a judgment from a County Court to a Divisional Court and to the Court of Appeal. It is absurd to ask working-class people to go in for all these legal expenses in order to find out what the law is. We are asking you to so alter the wording of the Act as to make it absolutely watertight and to place it beyond the shadow of a doubt so that tenants can know exactly what their legal rights are.
    Mr. WARDLE: I desire to reinforce with all the strength of which I am capable the case which my hon. Friend has put forward. I am rather sorry the Amendment which I put down previously could not have been taken along with this, for they are really part and parcel of the same question, and it covers a very wide field. When this House passed the Restriction of Rents Act it did so for the protection of the tenant, and if this loophole is allowed to continue—for a loophole it undoubtedly is—the poorest class of the community will be the chief sufferers. The history of this class of case is written in words of very grave hardship in the case of many of the poor. The number of letters which have been received in regard to the manner in which they have been treated would, I am sure, shock the House. I have one here. Many of these cases are made all the harder because they apply either to the wives of soldiers who are serving at the front or to the widows of soldiers who have been killed in the War. Here is the case of a woman, the wife of a
    1076
    soldier, who writes to say that her rent was increased from 7s. to 7s. 6d. a week, the extra sixpence being demanded by the landlord. When she refused to pay he said, "What about the arrears," She said, "There are no arrears. You really owe me something." He turned round and made a sarcastic remark, and said what he would do after the War. It is this threat of what they will do after the War that is hanging over these poor people and giving them trouble, because this Bill comes to an end after the War. Week after week when they refuse to pay the landlord is adding the sum as arrears in the rent book, and putting over their heads the threat of what ho will do to them when the War is over. The case is a little different in regard to this Amendment, but it is only a difference in degree and not in kind. The case is that the landlord is charging more than he is entitled to charge them legally, and that has been one of the great troubles in regard to this Act. Many of the poor people knew nothing about the Act, and they have gone on paying the increased rent for some time, and then they find that they have been robbed by the landlord and try to get the money back; but they have no remedy. There is no penalty in the Bill, and no means of recovering from the landlord if the Solicitor-General will not accept this Amendment. Why should the landlords be in a different position under the law from anyone else? Penalties are provided under the Munitions Act for workmen if they break their agreement and do anything illegal; the same applies to employers. Why should there be no penalty with regard to landlords who act illegally, and why should the landords be able to threaten poor people as they are doing at the present time? I think this House ought not to stand it. These poor people ought to be put in a position under the law to recover what has been illegally taken from them by the landlord.
    10.0 P.M.
    Sir G. HEWART: I hope it is not necessary for me to say that I am entirely in sympathy with the object of this Amendment. Let us see how the law now stands. The Increase of Rent and Mortgage Interest (War Restrictions) Act, 1915, provided, among other things, that in the case of the dwelling-houses to which it applied it should be impossible for the landlord to recover rent in excess of the standard rent. Since the Act has been law, subject, of course, to the limit of

    1077
    time stated in the Act, it has been impossible for a landlord by any legal process to recover rent beyond the standard rent. The grievance to which reference is made, and the grievance that was dealt with in the case mentioned by my hon. Friend (Mr. Anderson) arose upon somewhat different matters. It is one thing for a landlord to be unable legally to recover excess rent; and it is another thing for a tenant who through error has paid an excess of rent to recover it back from the landlord. That is so for the very simple reason that where money is paid in ignorance of law as distinguished from the case where it is paid in ignorance of fact, it is not recoverable. If I follow the proposal which has been put forward by my hon. Friends, what they say is that the Act of Parliament as it stands is not complete. It is not enough, they say, to provide that the landlord shall not be able to recover an excess rent, but the poor people who live in the kind of dwelling-house to which this Act applies do not read Acts of Parliament, and perhaps they would not appreciate them if they did, therefore the remedy does not go far enough, unless it provides that the landlord must not require, and if he requires with success, shall have to repay the excess rent. With that object I am completely in sympathy. I am not making, and I am not suggesting the slightest observation upon the decision of the Court of Appeal in the case to which reference has been made. That case, as I have now ascertained, arose in Birmingham. The learned judge of the County Court in Birmingham decided the matter in favour of the tenant. His decision was upheld by the Divisional Court, but it was reversed by the Court of Appeal. It was reversed, and if I may say so, rightly reversed, by the Court of Appeal upon two grounds (1) that the Act was not retrospective, and that the limits of time were exceeded in that case, and (2) because the money had been paid not in mistake' of fact but in mistake of law and therefore was not recoverable. I cannot help thinking that the grievance to which my hon. Friend has referred is a grievance which ought to be dealt with and should foe dealt with fairly by legislation but I am not quite sure that the words which he proposes are well contrived to bring
    1078
    about the end which he desires. The Amendment which he proposes is that words shall be added as follows:
    "Nor shall any person for the consideration aforesaid require the payment of any rent in respect of any dwelling-house to which the Act applies greater than, the standard rent."
    What that Amendment does under a different form of words is precisely what is done already by Section I of the existing Act, which provides, in terms, that the increase shall be irrecoverable. I gather from the speech of my hon. Friend that his desire goes far beyond the words-of the Amendment. The point is not that the landlord shall not be able to recover—that is provided for already—tout that if he requires, and requires with success, and the tenant pays it in error and in ignorance of the law, the tenant may then recover it back, or he may get it by way of set off against subsequent demands for rent. I shall be happy in the interval which may elapse between now and the Report stage to consider whether it is not possible to find a concise form of words which will give effect to what appears to mo to be a perfectly legitimate demand.
    Mr. ANDERSON: I should like to thank the Solicitor-General for having met us in an exceedingly fair and reasonable way, and I shall expect between now and the Report stage that some words will be brought forward better than ours to carry out the intention which we seem to have in common.
    Mr. BOOTH: I am sure we are all indebted to the Solicitor-General for the promise he. has given. But I would like-to point out that this is not merely a tenant's question. I do not wish to lessen the case put forward by my hon. Friends; I would rather emphasise it. But I want it to be borne in mind that there are good landlords as well as bad landlords. The great bulk of the landlords of this country, I venture to say, did at once comply with the law, and they feel it very hard that they should be stigmatised as a class because of the action of a few bad landlords.
    Mr. YEO: I, too, thank the hon. and learned Gentleman for the promise he has given with regard to the Clause of my hon. Friend. There is one effect which this question is having to which I would like to draw attention. When people want to go into another house, one of the things they have to do is to produce their rent-book, and when a bad landlord has-entered up supposed arrears in the book

    1079
    it has the effect of preventing many of these people from being accepted as ten-ants, because landlords will not take tenants whose rent-book shows assumed arrears, although, in fact, they never existed. I think that, in considering this Clause, the Solicitor-General might also consider the possibility of preventing landlords being allowed to put these entries into the books, and thus making it difficult for tenants to remove to other houses, a difficulty which is causing a good deal of trouble and heartburning among many people. I hope he will give this point favourable consideration.
    Mr. ANDERSON: On the strength of the assurance we have had, I beg to ask leave to withdraw my Amendment.
    Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
    Clause, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.

    CLAUSE 4.—(Relief from Disqualification for Membership of House of Commons in Certain Cases.)
    None of the provisions of the House of Commons (Disqualifications) Act, 1782, or of the House of Commons (Disqualifications) Act, 1801, shall be construed so as to extend to—

    (a) a contract or agreement entered into before the twenty-first day of February, nineteen hundred and seventeen, for or relating to the supply of property to any Government Department for purposes connected with the present War; or

    (b) a contract or agreement entered into on or after the said date as to the price or compensation to be paid for any property requisitioned or taken by any Government Department for purposes connected with the present War or as to any other terms on which any property so requisitioned or taken is to be handed over or supplied.

    Mr. KING: In the absence of the hon. Member for Edinburgh (Mr. Watt), I beg to move, after the word "shall" ["Act, 1801, shall"], to insert the words "while the present War lasts."
    The hon. Member in whose name this Amendment stands takes a very great interest in this Bill, and he has been obliged to go away to address a meeting, a very proper, public-spirited, and patriotic action. On his behalf I beg to
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    move the Amendment. I am not quite sure that it is necessary, but at any rate the Motion will give the Solicitor-General an opportunity of saying whether he can meet our objections to this Clause in any way.
    Mr. BOOTH: I have frequently suggested that, in some of this emergency legislation, words should be put in to show-that it is war legislation. We want it made quite clear that these Acts of Parliament shall come to an end at the close of the War.
    Sir G. HEWART: All I have to say about this Amendment is that the words are unnecessary. If hon. Members will look at the Clause as a whole they will see it is perfectly clear that the operation of the Bill is limited to the time while the present War lasts.
    Mr. KING: I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.
    Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
    Mr. ROWLANDS: I beg to move to leave out paragraph (a).
    I wish to get an explanation from the Solicitor-General of the scope of this particular Sub-section. It seems to take a very wide and sweeping range with regard to a Member taking contracts. It opens, as far as I can judge, the door with regard to Members not belonging to a company. We know that when a Member of this House is covered by belonging to a limited company he is not responsible, as an individual, for any contract which may be made with the Government. As far as I can gather, the effect of this Clause will be to reopen entirely the old question of contracts. It will leave an individual Member perfectly free to take Government contracts. It may be that this is a very simple thing at the present time, while the War is on, but people outside this House are watching this matter, and I have been in receipt of correspondence which is not particularly flattering in some respects, because these people seem to think that, under the press of the War, we in this House intend to take advantage of the War to liberate ourselves from the responsibility for entering into contracts with the Government, under which we are at the present time. More than one of the letters I have received has drawn my attention to a recent case, well known to hon. Members, in which the late Member for Whitechapel was subjected to heavy penalties in this

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    regard, and I wish to elicit from the learned Solicitor-General information on the scope of this Sub-section.
    Sir F. BANBURY: The Solicitor-General may remember that on the Second Reading of this Bill attention was drawn to this Clause, and attention was also drawn to the fact that paragraph (a) differs from paragraph (b) The latter Clause only applies to a date subsequent to the passing of this Act, and relates to property which may be requisitioned or taken by any Government Department for purposes connected with the present War, or as to any other terms on which any property so requisitioned or taken is to be handed over or supplied, and I think the Government are right, because if it requisitions a man's property it is rather hard that it should also fine him for sitting or voting in this House. But paragraph (a) is quite different. In the first place, it is retrospective, and, in the second place, it does not apply to property requisitioned or taken, and really it whitewashes a Member for having voted contrary to the provisions of an Act of Parliament—and, if I may say so, a very good Act of Parliament—which has been in force for a number of years and for contravening which a Member of this House only two or three years ago had to pay a very considerable sum. I asked the learned Attorney-General if it was intended in any way to put an end to any action that had been already commenced, and he said that as far as he knew there was no such action. Since then I have had a letter from a solicitor informing me that such an. action was commenced in September of last year, and it was not an action which was taken in connection with any property which was requisitioned or taken, but was connected with a payment received for voluntary service. The hon. Member in question is a Conservative Member, so that I cannot be accused of any party bias in this particular matter. I will not give the name unless I am pressed, but I do say that it is not right where an action has been commenced to interfere with it. I do not know what rights are in this case, but the solicitor informs me that the hon. Member in question was warned that he was doing something illegal, and yet after that warning he continued to sit and vote in this House. In those circumstances, I do not think it right that a Clause should be put in a Bill of this sort which would render the law ineffective and prevent an action
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    from being proceeded with. I trust that the Government will consent to the omission of this paragraph.
    Mr. BILLING: I support this Amendment because I feel keenly about this. Sub-section. It seems to me as if this. Sub-section has been introduced into the Bill to cloak a number of actions which have been done in this House by private Members during this War. Before I had the privilege of being a Member of this House I was told that the Lobby of this. House was the stable for the stalking horses of limited companies. I do not want to say that since I have been here that opinion has been strengthened cither one way or another, but during the past twelve months I have repeatedly put questions to the Prime Minister endeavouring to ascertain from him whether it was legal or illegal for Members of this House to trade with the Government. This Clause, if we pass it, practically gives an indemnity for any man who has in past times entered into contracts with the Government. Practically what it amounts to is this: that an hon. Member can sit in this House and vote public money into his own pocket. I doubt whether at the present moment there is any Member who has a mandate to vote public money into anybody else's pocket, but I am perfectly confident that no Member has any mandate to vote public money into his own pocket. I do oppose any such proposal, and if the hon. Member goes to a Division on this matter I shall certainly support him in the Division Lobby. In these strenuous times, when we legislate in this House at the rate at which we do, it is a very simple thing to slip through a Bill which presumably is quite a harmless Bill, and is going to relieve possibly tenants who have landlords who are not as kind as they might be, and at the same time it may have the result of altering the whole idea of what this House has stood for for centuries. On the integrity of the Members of this House rests a very great deal more than the mere relieving of one or two Members of this House from any liabilities which they may have incurred by trading. with the Government. I would like to suggest that profiteering to a very great extent resulted in a revolution in Russia, and I would like to suggest that if we condone profiteering in this House it will be impossible for us to handle it outside this House. If hon. Members of this House vote money

    1083
    into their own pockets, and if there is any Member of this House richer when peace is signed than he was when the War broke out it is difficult to know how he can attack or endeavour to stop Members outside from doing likewise. My position here is rather difficult. I can say candidly that so far as I am concerned, I have no axe to grind at all. I ask for nothing from the Government, and I seek nothing, but I do say that if this paragraph (a) is put into the Bill it will be a message to the people of this country that not only are the Members of this House in favour of the profiteers, but they have framed a special provision of this Bill for the purpose of voting public money into their own pockets.
    Mr. D. MASON: This is a most important provision of the Bill, and the Member for the City of London (Sir F. Banbury) certainly went to the root of the matter when he showed the difference between paragraph (a) and paragraph (b)The House is practically asked to give a blank cheque indemnifying any Member who has any contractual arrangement with the Government, and in asking us to do that he is asking us to do what we ought no; to do and what there is no justification for our doing. I object to this particular paragraph because it is based on legislation by reference. We are referred to two Acts, one going back as far as 1782, and the other 1801. I have taken the trouble to go through those Acts, and, if I may say so, they are carefully drawn up and they show what the ideas were then as to the integrity of any man who might become a Member of this House. To ask us to cancel one of the very best statutory provisions passed by this House, and which reflect honour on this House, seems to me unjustifiable, and I consider that no case has been made out for it. I will just trouble the House with a reference to the Act of 1782, which provided for "furthering the freedom and independence of Parliament." The Act goes on to say:
    "Any person who shall directly or indirectly, himself, or by any person whatsoever in trust; for him, or for his use or benefit, or on his account, undertake, execute, hold or enjoy in the whole or in part, any contract, agreement or commission, made or entered into, under or from the Commissioners of His Majesty's Treasury … for or on account of the public service. or shall knowingly and willingly furnish, or provide, in pursuance of any such agreement, or contract or commission, which he or they have made or entered into a? aforesaid, any money to be remitted abroad … shall be incapable of being elected
    1084
    or of sitting or voting as a Member of the House of Commons, during the time that he shall execute, hold or enjoy such contract, or agreement or commission."
    I think that it is a very wise Act, and it is made stronger by the Act of 1801, which prevented a Member who had such a contract from sitting in this House. The provision which the Amendment seeks to leave out seems to me unwise, and I do not see any occasion for it. We may be asked, What would you do in the event of any such contract being necessary for carrying on the War, and how would we provide for that Member, in the interests of the public-service, carrying on the contract without being indemnified? That could easily be met by an Order in Council or by some special legislation in respect of any large contract. To ask us to give what amounts to unlimited power to any Member, and, in fact, to tempt any Member to engage in contracts with the Government during the War, seems to me most indefensible and most unwise. In the very nature of things during the War there must be an enormous number of contracts between the Government and private persons. That is an occasion when you ought to be extra particular and careful not to make it easy for irregular transactions to be carried out. For the honour of the HOUSE and its members we ought not to facilitate entering into such contracts. and rather we should do all we can to guard the good name and reputation of our Members. I hope that the Solicitor-General will meet the case by some other words. I support enthusiastically the hon. Member who moved the rejection of the Clause. A particular case can be met by some such means as I have suggested. I trust that the Solicitor-General will show that we are most anxious to maintain the good name of this House.
    Sir G. GREENWOOD: I cannot help thinking that the objections which are being raised to this Clause are really very much exaggerated. As the hon. Member has stated, the House of Commons Disqualification Act was passed in 1781, in the reign of George III., and at the end of Lord North's Administration, when it was failing. That was an age notoriously of very great corruption.
    Mr. BILLING: Not as bad as to-day!
    Sir G. GREENWOOD: The hon. Member knows more about the corruption of to-day than I do. Happily it has not

    1085
    been brought to my notice, and I have not seen the stalking horse which is supposed to be stabled in the Lobby.
    Mr. BILLING: You must have your eyes shut.
    Sir G. GREENWOOD: I looked at May's Constitutional History of England in regard to this and he says that at that time costly and improvident contracts were encouraged by a system of Parliamentary jobbery. Lucrative contracts for the public service were found a convenient mode of enriching political supporters. A contract for a supply of rum or beef for the Navy was as great a price for a Member as a share in a loan or lottery. Government candidates were encouraged by this system because it was well understood that if the Government candidate got a lucrative contract his constituents were to have a share in it.
    Mr. BILLING: We do not go as far as that to-day.
    Sir G. GREENWOOD: Hon. Members speak of the corruption of to-day, but I have not seen it, and I do not think anything like that state of affairs exists at the present time, or that any such danger is to be guarded against. What really seems to mo to reduce this to almost an absurdity is that by Section 3 of the Act it is provided that it shall not apply to contracts made by any corporation or company. At that time limited liability companies did not exist. Since 1855 and 1862 especially limited liability companies have sprung up in number innumerable. The effect is this, that I, as a Member of Parliament, might hold all, or nearly all, the shares in a limited liability company. I might be a director of it, and I might then be allowed with perfect impunity to tout for contracts and to enter into as many contracts as I liked with the Government. That would be allowed by this Bill. Allusion has been made to the contract entered into by Sir Stuart Samuel. I believe it is admitted that that was an entirely fair contract, and that the Government gained by it, and if only Sir Stuart Samuel's firm had been turned into a company there would have been nothing to be said against it, so far as the law was concerned. But it happened that it was a private firm, and as a Member of this House he had to pay a penalty of £500 a day. When an Indemnity Bill was introduced there was so much objection taken to it that the Bill was never passed. I
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    understand this is to apply as a war measure to cases of contracts which may have been entered into under some pressure from the Government. [An HON. MEMBER: "No!"] I have no knowledge of any of these contracts, but I understand that the Bill refers to contracts entered into in the course of business connected with the War, and which were required by the Government. The exemption is confined to those cases.
    I should, perhaps, not be in order to enter into the question of requisitions, because that is dealt with by the next Sub-clause, but I may be allowed to say this: When a man has his goods requisitioned by the Government the requisition itself is, of course, no contract, but there is a contract all the same if goods are requisitioned, whether it be hats, or hay, or boots, or anything else, because you have to enter into an agreement, so as to settle price and other things, and there may be a doubt whether it amounts even to a requisition. I believe a case of this sort has arisen where a member of a certain firm was approached by the Government, who said, "We want you to supply us with a certain number of articles"—I will not say what kind of articles—and the reply was," We cannot do it, because one of the members of our firm is a Member of the House of Commons." "Very well," says the Government, "we are going to have the goods anyhow, and we shall requisition them." It would be a monstrous injustice, in that case at any rate, if the Member were penalised. I submit that in time of war this provision in this Bill is required, and these fears about the corruption of Members of Parliament are grossly exaggerated. I have never heard them, and I resent the imputation that Members are so corrupt in this House that they are not to be trusted in such a matter as this.
    Sir J. SIMON: The speech of my hon. Friend would appear to be a speech in support of the proposal that, at any rate for the period of the War, if not for all time henceforward, Members of the House of Commons may contract with the Government without penalty. He has been telling us that we do ourselves a great injustice if we imagine we require the stringent provisions of an Act of Parliament such as was necessary in the bad times of Lord North. That is not at all the proposal which is before this Committee. The proposal before this Com-

    1087
    mittee is that if there be any contracts or agreements entered into before 21st February last that so far as those contracts go a Member of Parliament, who is a partner, shall not be liable for certain penalties. That is quite a different proposition. If the proposition here was that that because of the War we should repeal these two disqualification Acts for the benefit of ourselves and our fellows, I do not think that any Member of Parliament would be found to support or justify that proposal. I quite recognise that this is a much more limited proposal. I would none the less like to ask the Solicitor-General a question or two about it. My excuse for so doing is that I think I am the only Member in the House at the moment who served on the last Committee appointed by the House of Commons to inquire into one of these cases that of Sir Stuart Samuel. I am bound to say that it always seemed to me that Sir Stuart Samuel got fairly severe treatment for what in the circumstances was a mistake easily explained. Be that as it may, he was required to pay to the uttermost farthing. I observe, first of all, that this is not a Clause which is addressed to the relief of specified and named cases. Has there, in the history of legislation since the Statute of lv82, ever been any general relief in respect of unnamed and unidentified persons'? I am only relying for the moment upon my own memory, which is treacherous, as are all memories, but I have a clear recollection of some specific cases. There was, for example, the case of Mr. Forsyth, a well-known lawyer and editor of an extremely valuable collection of cases of constitutional law. He was a Member of the House of Commons and got himself involved in some difficulties because, I think I recollect, although a lawyer, he had some interest outside. There was the case also of a Member of the House, who was also a partner in a firm of printers who printed for the House of Commons. His case was dealt with specifically. There was the case also of that very famous Member, Mr. Home Tooke, who was not only the last clergyman that sat in the House of Commons, but he had this distinction: he only had three constituents. He was Member for Old Sarum. I think he was specifically relieved. Is there any case in which we have legislated blindfold? If there is, I
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    think we should hear it If there is not, I think we ought to know why these proposals are now introduced.
    Mr. BOOTH: There is the case of the present Attorney-General!
    Sir J. SIMON: That is another specific case. The present Attorney-General came forward and himself expressed how necessary it was that he should have relief—and we all agreed! It does seem to me to be a rather serious innovation, war time or no war time, that the House of Commons should be asked to pass a Clause of this kind without having the slightest notion to what it refers. Supposing, for the sake of example, a case was a flagrant one, I think we are entitled to know about it. Supposing, on the other hand, it was merely a technical and nominal one. I am sure in times like these the House of Commons would be glad to offer relief. I invite the Solicitor-General to tell us whether this is done out of excessive caution, whether it is a matter more or less imaginary, or whether it is an endeavour to cover up something like a scandal. I think we are entitled to some explanation, and such justification as the Government can offer.
    Sir G. HEWART: The immediate Amendment before the House is to leave out paragraph (a), but the discussion upon that part of the Clause has gone beyond the limit—I am not complaining in the least—of that paragraph, and I readily respond to the invitation of my right hon. Friend. He may dismiss from his mind at once the notion that there is any attempt here to hide—I think his phrase was—something like a scandal.
    Sir J. SIMON: I said I did not know.
    Sir G. HEWART: My right hon. Friend may put aside that notion altogether, as also the notion that somebody else mentioned that here was a case of a mystery. The fact was this: After the commencement of this War Government Departments had. and were known to have, the power to requisition goods for the purpose of the War. The knowledge that they had that power was shared by Members of this House, and by persons who are not Members of this House, and what took place was that various commodities—wool, timber, hay, leather, and so forth—were required sometimes from Members of this House. No doubt it may well be that if the Members who

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    were so required to hand over their commodities for the purposes of the War had bad present to their minds the sweeping words of the first Section of the Act 22 George III., Chapter 45—words which referred to "any Contract, Agreement, or Commission, made or entered into with, under, or from the Commissioners of His Majesty's Treasury," and so forth, "for or on account of the public service," they would have at once replied, "We cannot pay the slightest attention to this request unless you put it in the form of a requisition." In some cases, no doubt, that was not done. This Clause was not invented by this Government; we took over this Bill from our predecessors. The Government as a Government have no interest whatever in this Clause except to render what we conceive to be an elementary measure of justice What happened was that out of an excess of caution it was thought right to provide a Clause of this kind, not because anybody is of opinion—certainly no Law Officer that I know of is of opinion—that something has been done which undoubtedly brings the Member within the ambit of the Act of 1782, but it may be that that has been done which might give rise to an action for penalties—and we know how vexatious these actions can be, especially if brought by impecunious persons—which, even when they do not succeed, put the defendant to considerable anxiety and expense. Therefore this Clause is introduced ex abundanti cautela, in order to make it plain that actions cannot successfully be brought, and cannot usefully be commenced against Members who in circumstances that I have described have done that which I have mentioned.
    Mr. BILLING: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether ho has any knowledge of the case of a common informer having informed against a certain hon. Member?
    Sir G. HEWART: I am coming to that particular case upon an Amendment later on the Paper, and no doubt it may be contended that with regard to that particular case in which proceedings have already been taken, other considerations might arise. But to go back to the point which has now been raised, it is observed that there is a contrast between paragraphs (a) and (b) and the reason of that contrast is pretty plain to anyone who considers the Clause as a whole. The line is drawn at 21st February of this year, the
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    date of the introduction of this Bill, and in this paragraph the subject of the Amendment now under discussion what is provided is that a contract or agreement entered into before the day upon which this Bill was introduced is not to be subject to the provisions of the House of Commons (Disqualifications) Act, 1782. That is to remove doubts, and it is intended to cover the case where a question might arise whether the request which had been made was in the form of a requisition. But with regard to the period since the introduction of the Bill the policy of this Clause is to say that, if from this day forward anything of the kind is done, from this day forward relief shall not be extended beyond a case where all that has been done is to make an agreement as to price or compensation payable, and where there has been an undoubted requisition. That is the whole contrast between Sub-clauses (a) and (b).
    Sir F. BANBURY: Why is that?
    Sir G. HEWART: That is the very thing I have been explaining. May I say that Sub-clause (6) is limited to the removal of doubts as to whether there is a contract within the meaning of the Act of 1782 where there has been an agreement as to price or compensation following upon an undoubted requisition. Sub-clause (a), on the other hand, removes doubt in like manner where it is not so clear that there was a requisition or a requisition in proper form. What is the position as a whole? We have heard some rhetoric on this point—I do not complain of it—about voting public money into our pockets. What is really being done? We do not know of any scandal—in fact, there has been no scandal—but we know from certain Government Departments specially concerned with the provision of material for the conduct of the War that certain Members of this House have given up commodities and other things I have mentioned. There may have been a defect in the form of the request. There have sometimes been negotiations which could be called an agreement as to the price payable, but it is that kind of transaction that it is sought to meet.
    I enter upon this matter as a bequest. but I submit this is a reasonable thing to do, and there could not be a greater travesty of the facts we are dealing with than to represent this proposal as one to extend impunity to an indefinite amount

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    of corruption, and I regret that language of that kind has been employed, because it has no sort of relation whatever to any fact that is sought to be comprised within the ambit of this measure. When one comes to the definite and specific question whether this Clause shall be permitted to cover and defeat proceedings commenced before the Bill was introduced, we come to another and a different question, but, subject to that observation and that alone, I do submit that this is a Clause rightly and prudently provided to prevent what would otherwise be a vexatious public mischief. A right of requisition exists, and it is known to exist. Where there has been a formal requisition, I submit that it would be intolerable that a Member of this House should be exposed to expensive and vexatious litigation, not because he has entered into a contract, but because he consented to his commodity being used for a Government Department.
    Sir F. BANBURY: The hon. and learned Gentleman has made a very good defence, but he has carefully avoided answering the question which I asked him. He did allude to it, but, having alluded to it, he skated off in another direction. Does or does not this particular Clause give an indemnity to a Member of this House against whom an action was commenced six months ago?
    Sir G. HEWART: I am extremely sorry if I omitted to deal with that matter. I hope the right hon. Gentleman will believe that it was not through subtlety on my part, but merely through forgetfulness. I say at once, so far as that particular action is concerned, that I have had the advantage of considering it with some of my colleagues, and we do not think it would be right that this Clause should extend to defeat the action, and I propose, when we come to it, to accept the Amendment which is upon the Paper, not quite in the terms employed, but so as to give effect to what is desired by the Mover, words which will prevent this Section from having the effect of defeating that action.
    Sir G. RADFORD: I ventured to raise this question on the Second Reading of the Bill, and I had hoped that the Solicitor-General would have given us some explanation which would have saved some of use who object to this Clause from persevering in our objection.
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    I raised the question on the Second Reading not with any desire to embarrass the Government or any Members of this House, but knowing, as most of us know, that a considerable number of Members have had dealings with the Government, very honourable for the most part I have no doubt, and that they may be considered to have come within the Acts of 1782 and 1801 and may stand in need of the relief which is accorded by this Sub-section. If the Solicitor-General had given us an assurance that all those persons had been requisitioned and therefore could not reasonably be blamed for anything that occurred, I should myself have been satisfied and should not have said another word.
    Sir G. HEWART: May I say that so far as my information goes, and I have no reason to doubt its completeness, every case has followed either upon an undoubted requisition or that which was a requisition except perhaps in some point of form. In substance, as I now understand, one may say that there has been requisition in every case.
    Sir G. RADFORD: I am much obliged to my hon. and learned Friend for his explanation, but it does not seem to me to cover the ground. There are people who have been requisitioned and there are some people who have not been requisitioned, and they come within this Clause. The Solicitor-General limits what he says by adding as far as he knows, and that seems to me a fatal defect in his answer. He knows—or if he does not he ought to know—what contracts there have been. The Government know—or if they do not they ought to know—with whom they have made contracts. I cannot allow the Solicitor-General to ride off on the suggestion that so far as he knows it is all right. I hope that he will give us a little more information, and if he will give us the information that all the persons who will obtain relief under this Clause are conscripts or the victims of requisition, then I shall have the greatest sympathy with him, and do all I can to support his Clause. At present he must consider whether he should not give us a little further information. I for one would be extremely reasonable and ready to be satisfied. It is all the more necessary that some information should be given, in view of the fact that my right hon and learned Friend the late Home Secretary pointed out to

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    us that so far as he knows—and his knowledge is considerable—people have not obtained the relief from offences against this Act without their being specially named in the Act of Parliament and an indemnity given to them accordingly. I still hope to support the Solicitor-General in regard to this Clause, but I hope he will be kind enough to throw a little more light on the subject than he has done already.
    Mr. PRINGLE: The explanation which the Solicitor-General has given is not one which will enable us to pass the paragraph now under consideration. The hon. and learned Gentleman has submitted that several Members of the House were in some doubt or ignorance as to their position in regard to the Contractors Act. We all know there has been a very recent instance which has been more than once referred to in the course of the Debate. Only a few years ago—I think the year before the War—a case arose in reference to Sir Stuart Samuel, which was so very doubtful a case that it had to be investigated by a Select Committee of this House. My right hon. Friend opposite was a member of that Committee and he knows how difficult and complicated was the question which had then to be investigated. In spite of the difficulty and complexity of that case this House refused to give an indemnity. Even though it was a doubtful case they said that Sir Stuart Samuel ought to have known the law. My point is that everybody, in view of Sir Stuart Samuel's case, ought to have been on his inquiry. The old maxim about ignorance of the law excusing nobody should be applied. If we are going to apply that to the poor criminal who goes into Court before a magistrate, are we going to exempt ourselves as Members of Parliament from it. We have already exempted the head of the Bar—the Attorney-General. He was a big enough departure; but he at present is in splendid isolation. Why should we make a further indemnity for all Members of Parliament? We may excuse the Attorney-General—it is his business to know the law—but why should we excuse every Member of Parliament? The Solicitor-General has left us in a good
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    deal of doubt in this matter. As my right hon. Friend opposite (Sir J. Simon) has pointed out, this is the first case in which a general indemnity has been asked from this House. In every previous case the indemnity has been limited to the specific individual, whose case was known to the House and upon whose case the House was in a position to express an opinion. Here we do not know what the circumstances are. We are told that there is a number of doubtful cases. The Solicitor-General has told us that, first of all, there are the cases where there might have been a requisition, but where the requisition was not in proper form. Where the requisition was not—
    It being Eleven of the clock, the Chairman left the Chair to make his Report to the House.
    Committee report Progress; to sit again To-morrow.
    The remaining Orders were read, and postponed.
    Whereupon Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAXER, pursuant to the Order of the House of the 12th February, proposed the Question, "That this House do now adjourn."
    Mr. BOOTH: May I ask whether recent proceedings on this Bill and the stage to which we have got imply any change in the order of business for to-morrow or the day after?
    Lord EDMUND TALBOT (Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury): We propose to continue the progress of this Bill after the Military Service Bill to-morrow.
    Mr. BOOTH: Will there be any suspension of the Eleven o'Clock Rule?
    Lord E. TALBOT: No.
    Sir H. DALZIEL: Can we be told if we meet at twelve on Wednesday or at the ordinary time?
    Lord E. TALBOT: At the usual time on Wednesday. At twelve on Thursday.
    Question put, and agreed to.
    Adjourned accordingly at One minute after Eleven o'clock.