§ Whereupon Mr. SPEAKER, pursuant to the Order of the House of the 12th February, proposed the Question, "That this House do now adjourn."
§ Mr. HOGGEI want to raise a question, of which I gave the Under-Secretary of State for War notice at Question Time to-day, concerned with the raid over London last Saturday. There are certain facts concerned with that raid which have not yet been explained to the House, and I am quite sure my hon. Friend will welcome the opportunity of giving further information with regard to it if he can. The first point I want to raise is the question of how far the official communiqué of that raid is an accurate account of the proceedings. We were told, for example, that there were twenty German machines which visited London on that occasion. I should like my hon. Friend to explain this to the House: Were the twenty machines which the War Office say visited London bombing machines, or did they include all the other machines which accompanied those on that visit? The reason I put that is a very simple one. I am not the only Member of this House, and I am not the only member of the public, who counted a great many more machines. I myself counted twenty-six machines in one of the two flights which were over London, and I could produce substantial evidence of the fact that in that particular flight there were twenty-six machines. I want the Under-Secretary to explain whether in the number of twenty which the War Office gave they included all the protecting machines that usually accompany bombing machines on a raid of that kind. Then, secondly, I want my hon. Friend to explain how it was that it was not until yesterday, through the evidence of a coroner's inquest being published in the Press, that we were made aware of a supreme act of courage on the part of a British airman. I do not know how many British airmen went up to meet the German flight, but, at any rate, as the result of this evidence which has now been made public, we do know that one of our airmen fought one of these German flights, and that he discharged at least forty-six or fifty cartridges from his ammunition belt on the Germans before he was shot down. I think all of us recognise the supreme courage of our own airmen 2270 throughout this War, and I think all of us recognise the supreme courage of that young airman, whoever he was, who was killed in his gallant attempt to oppose that flight. I do think, if for no other reason —and I will give our reason presently—we ought to have heard from the War Office that, at any rate, we had some British airmen up who displayed the usual pluck and courage that we associate with that arm of the service. I do not think that the British public ought to be left to read the account of a coroner's inquest to learn of an act of courage of that kind. The third point I would put is this. I want to know why it was—if it can be stated, and I think it ought to be stated—that there were no British aeroplanes in any number ready to oppose that German flight. I would like to ask my hon. Friend if he can explain the absence from this country of some of the finest pilots, who ought to have been defending London; if there was any special reason why these machines were sent to the other side of the Channel; if those machines have since been brought back; and whether the objects for which they were taken there have ceased to exist, and that there remains no other reason for their being there? I want to ask him, with regard to-certain rumours which are prevalent. While none of us may place any great reliance upon rumours—they are unsettling—you cannot hide, and my hon. Friend knows that the War Office cannot hide, certain arrangements which obtain in London, and it is a well-known and-demonstrable fact that at one of the aerodromes in London a certain number of British machines did try to rise and attack the German flight, and that they were unable to pursue the object on which they set out because of certain defects in the machines. Somebody, this afternoon, suggested that they had been tampered with. I am not suggesting that, because I can quite conceive an inability to start machines without their having been tampered with; but my hon. Friend, in his reply, said that the War Office did not propose to make any kind of inquiry, and that reply rather disturbed one's mind.
§ The UNDER-SECRETARY Of STATE for WAR (Mr. Macpherson)I did not say so.
§ Mr. HOGGEThe hon. Gentleman says he did not say so. Then he will be able to make it quite plain, in his reply, that 2271 he did not mean what I thought. I rather gathered, from his reply, that he was not prepared to make that kind of inquiry. I suggest that the Government, as well as the House of Commons, wishes to take the whole British public with them as far as they can in this War. There is a certain amount of panic and unrest amongst the people, particularly in the City of London, at the present time, and when it is reported in the papers that the War Office is not taking the precautions that they should do, and are attempting to evade direct questions that are put, and are seeking refuge too frequently in the reply that it is not in the public interest, I do not think that they are doing themselves a service.
I therefore should be glad if to-night, in the short time that remains to us, he can deal with these points. Firstly, as to the real number of aeroplanes that came across; secondly, as to the practice of the War Office in notifying the casualties among our own airmen, and whether this, which was revealed to us by a coroner's inquest was the only casualty among them, or whether it is true, as has been asserted in other quarters, that other British airmen were brought down. Thirdly, whether he can assure the House that the air squadrons which were taken from this country for a very special purpose—which I need not disclose, but which everybody knows—have now been returned. Whether, in the fourth place, my hon. Friend does intend, on his own initiative, to satisfy himself that in the London area, in our aerodromes and in our gun stations, war conditions obtain all the time. Whether, at these stations and aerodromes, men are actually present all the time, ready to take the air or to fire a gun at a moment's notice; whether he will personally satisfy himself that that is so, and will assure the House that he can allay a perfectly reasonable suspicion in the minds of the people that all is not as well as it might be.
§ Mr. MACPHERSONI should like to deal, if I may with the last point of my hon. Friend the Member for East Edinburgh. He said that at Question time I made a definite statement that no inquiry was made into some accident or incidents which had occurred at a certain aerodrome. If my memory serves me right I never made any such assertion, what I did say was, it was not the practice in accidents 2272 of this sort for inquiry to be made. I do not know what my hon. Friend has in his mind about this certain accident at a certain aerodrome, but all I can say is this, that if he can produce any specific case of any accident affecting the Air Service which ought to be inquired into, and in which no inquiry was made, then I will do my level best to see that such inquiry is made.
§ Mr. MACPHERSONCertainly; but what I object to, and, I think the House will agree, is that all sorts of insinuations should be made, not by direct questions to the Minister in charge or Minister responsible, but that the case should be made by insinuations in supplementaries, when obviously the Minister, if he is wise, ought not to reply, and I think the House will agree that any insinuations against the Air Department or any Department, should not be made by means of supplementary Questions. My hon. Friend knows perfectly well that insinuations were made to-day in a supplementary question.
§ Mr. MACPHERSONIt does not matter by whom it was made. My hon. Friend, if he did not make it, was cognisant of it, because he makes it now without any facts, and without making the necessary inquiries I am unable to answer.
§ Mr. HOGGEWhat I said was that the suggestion was made this afternoon, and that I expressly dissociated myself with it and did not allege it in my speech. I have information which I am prepared to hand to my hon. Friend and tell him the exact source from which it came; that at a certain aerodrome certain air machines had gone up and had to come down again because of engine trouble, and all I ask is that he, as Under-Secretary, should satisfy himself that everything is as right as it should be.
§ Mr. MACPHERSONI think my hon. Friend is now adopting a much more reasonable attitude. My impression was that he repeated the assertion which was made at question time this afternoon. If he asks me to make inquiries into the truth of the story which is being circulated, much to the detriment of not only of this individual aerodrome, but to the whole of the Air Service, it is a different story, and I 2273 am prepared to do it. With regard to the third point, I am taking his points not in the order in which he first made them but in the order in which they were last made.
With regard to the third point, the hon. Member asks me whether it is a fact that during the recent air raid there was an absence of some of the defence squadrons in this country for a particular purpose at the front. I think I may say that is true. As my hon. Friend knows very well, at any given moment certain squadrons may go to the front from this country, and this is a question of policy which I have elaborated at very great length on more than one occasion. Whether any squadron may have gone for any specific purpose may be true, but if my hon. Friend makes the suggestion that a certain squadron was taken away from the defence of London for that purpose, I think he is going too far. At certain times squadrons may be taken away from the defence of this country to take part in an offensive capacity at the front. With regard to the second question, he asks me whether the War Office were accurate in stating the list of casualties which actually took place.
§ Mr. HOGGEI was quite willing to accept what my hon. Friend said the other day on his word that the casualties included this airman. What I am putting is this—what reason was there for a, change in the practice, and leaving the public to find out through a coroner's inquest that one of our gallant airmen met his death in this raid?
§ Mr. MACPHERSONThe War Office does not intend to be inaccurate when it announces to the world the number of casualties which have taken place either in London or any other place over which the air raiders went. I assert that the casualties given were accurate and did include not only the gallant airmen who lost their lives, the gallant naval airmen, and Civil servants, but also the general public. My hon. Friend seems to be making a large point of a very small fact. I am sure the House will be ready to join in an expression of regret to the relatives of this very gallant airman for whoso death an inquest was held. An inquest is the inevitable consequence of any death by the law of England. When anybody is found dead, whether he be a Civil servant, a Naval airman, or a member of the Royal Flying 2274 Corps, it is necessary by law that an inquest should be held. An inquest in this land is held immediately, for definite purposes, upon the body of any man does not follow that if the public become apprised of the death of some single individual by the adventitious aid of the law of England that that precludes a grateful country from acknowledging in proper form its appreciation of the gallant manner in which an airman met his death. The first point was whether I could state the number of air raiders that passed over this country. I cannot add anything to the statement which was made by my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary or the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The information which I have does not in any way disagree with the information which my right hon. Friends gave to the House. I do not know upon what evidence or information my hon. Friend relies.
§ Mr. MACPHERSONI do not know how he differentiates between a British and a German aeroplane at a height of 10,000 feet.
§ Mr. MACPHERSONIt is impossible for anybody who is not skilled in that particular branch to distinguish even with glasses whether an aeroplane 10,000 feet high is an English or a German aeroplane.
§ Mr. SPEAKERThis is a very interesting conversation, but I think that it would be much better to allow the hon. Gentleman to make his reply.
§ Mr. MACPHERSONI did not make any calculation. I am content to rely upon the calculations made by very distinguished experts in this branch of the Service, and the information which has already been given twice by my right hon. Friend is the only information which I can give to the House, at the present moment. The aerial defence of London is at this moment engaging the serious attention of the War Cabinet, and I am happy to say that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister and General Smuts are both personally looking into the position. I think that this will reassure all my hon. Friends in this House.
Mr. TYSON WILSONPersonally, I deprecate the introduction into our discussions of anything which will in any way lead our enemies to suppose that there is any division of opinion with regard to what should be done in connection with the air raids. The Under-Secretary seems to think that if an expert says that an aeroplane is five thousand or ten thousand or fifteen thousand feet high, it must be right and must not be questioned in any shape or form. I have information from a man who took an active part in the air raid, and I would rather take the experience of practical men than the opinion of experts who did not seethe aeroplane at all. I have been informed in letters and inter views that at least in two instances men who were prepared to attack the German aeroplanes, and who, in fact, ascended with that object, have been degraded because they did so without the consent of their commanding officers. If commanding officers do not realise the seriousness of the position, and that men who recognise that one of the best means of meeting the attacks of German aeroplanes is to put them out of action ought not to be degraded because they take action—
§ Mr. MACPHERSONI should like to ask my hon. Friend to tell me most specifically when this has been done, because I cannot allow a statement of that sort to be made in public without further particulars.
Mr. WILSONThat is one of the ways of the War Office in getting out of very difficult questions. I have information in connection with the air raids, and also in connection with other matters controlled by the military authorities which, if the newspapers were open, could be made public.
§ Mr. MACPHERSONWill my hon. Friend give me the information as to the War Office degrading Royal Flying Corps officers because they have done what they thought was their duty?
Mr. WILSONMy information is that the pilot of an aeroplane ascended, and did attack a German aeroplane, and, be- 2276 cause he did this without the consent of his commanding officer, he has been degraded.
§ Mr. MACPHERSONWill my hon. Friend give me the particulars of that case?
Mr. WILSONI will get written information. I have had this verbally from the person concerned. But there is something more. I am only giving this for what it is worth. I am told that because a man had not passed his medical examination as an air mechanic or pilot, he also has been censured or degraded for taking a certain part in attempting to bring down a German aeroplane. It is very easy for the hon. Gentleman to say, "Give me positive information." I am telling him what I have been told. It may be true or it may not, but during the last two years the hon. Gentleman and his predecessors have had information with regard to the interference of superior officers in connection with the action of an inferior officer. If the hon. Gentleman will give me access to the pigeonholes of the War Office I shall be able to enlighten him. If he will not accept my word, let him refer to the pigeon-holes at the War Office and he will find what I have said to be absolutely correct. I object to any Member of the Government attempting to minimise the importance of certain information which is conveyed to them and saying, "Unless you can prove this on oath in a Court of law, we will not accept your information." That is absolutely wrong. Subordinate officers in the Air Service are extremely afraid that if they come forward and tell what they can tell, they will be punished by a court-martial or by the War Office. It is most unfair to these men, who are doing their utmost to protect the country.
§ It being Half-past Eleven of the clock MR. SPEAKER adjourned the House, without Question put, pursuant to the Order of the House of the 12th February, till Tomorrow, pursuant to the Resolution of the House this day.
§ Adjourned at Half after Eleven o'clock.