HC Deb 17 June 1918 vol 107 cc130-40

The said Orders shall apply to the original consignees of such beans, peas, and pulse as aforesaid, notwithstanding that at the date of the making of the Order affecting any beans, peas, or pulse, such consignees thereof had parted with the property therein, and accordingly any contract under which the property in any such beans, peas, or pulse passed from the original consignees or from any persons deriving title under them to any other person, whether made before or after the respective dates of the said Orders, shall be deemed to be and always to have been void and of no effect, and any documents of title relating to the said beans, peas, and pulse as aforesaid shall be delivered to the Food Controller, and any money paid under any such contract shall be repaid as if it had been paid for a consideration which had wholly failed.

Mr. LOUGH

I beg to move, at the beginning of the Clause, to insert the words, "Where the bills of lading or other documents have been disposed of to persons not regularly engaged in such businesses,"

This Amendment is intended to embody the promise on the strength of which the Second Reading of the Bill was obtained by my right hon. Friend. I do not wish to recall unpleasant circumstances to the mind of the right hon. Gentleman when he is pressing this Bill, under great difficulties, but he will remember that the Bill got an extraordinary reception, that on the Second Reading every speaker almost spoke against it and referred to its provisions as dangerous, and that it was only after the right hon. Gentleman had taken the unusual course of making a second or third speech that he was enabled to get the Second Reading. In his later speech he made a definite promise to the Committee, and it is the essense of that promise which I have tried to embody in this Amendment. Let me recall the promise to the right hon. Gentleman's mind, and ask him why he has no Amendment of his own on the Paper in order to carry it out, instead of leaving it to an outside Member? These were his words: Therefore I ask that a Second Reading should be given to this Bill and I am quite prepared between now and the Committee stage to go fully into the matter and consider what may be required to safeguard properly the rights and businesses of those who have claims on the lines which have been indicated by various speakers. The various speakers to whom the right hon. Gentleman there referred had simply dealt with the cases of ordinary business men dealing in these articles whose contracts were to be raked up for eighteen months. It was their case which my right hon. Friend undertook to go into. Then he made this further promise: I make no claim to understand the technical points that are raised by the decisions of the Courts. My right hon. Friend will forgive me for saying that he ought to understand these matters, because they are merely fair, honest dealings between man and man, and when he brings in a Bill which is to be retrospective in its character and which will press very hardly on people who are honestly carrying out their business, he ought to understand these points. He went on: As I understand the matter the whole question at issue is this, whether certain men at a time when there was severe food shortage had a right to engage in transactions which meant selling the same article six or seven times over. Again, I ask my right hon. Friend to forgive me for pointing out that a man does not sell an article six or seven times over, he only sells it once. He spoke of it as a very reprehensible practice—I say it is an impossible practice. Finally the right hon. Gentleman said: I hope that a Second Reading may be unanimously accorded to the Bill, but I say in asking for that Second Reading we have no wish to cast any reflection whatever or to impose any losses upon those who, in the ordinary course, were engaged in legitimate trade at the time."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 6th May, 1918, col. 1930, Vol. 105. These are the pledges which were given, and which it is the object of the Amendment on the Paper to carry out. We had a definite undertaking that something should be done in this direction, but the right hon. Gentleman has not put any Amendment whatever on the Paper. Therefore, I propose that these words shall be inserted at the beginning of the Clause. I do not claim that they are good words, and if my right hon. Friend who has the help of the draftsmen, does not like the words, which are an attempt to secure that men legitimately engaged in the trade shall not have losses imposed upon them or be unfairly treated—if, I say, the right hon. Gentleman does not like my words, let him adopt some other form of words. All we ask is that he should fulfil the promise on which he obtained a Second Reading of the Bill, and shall thus deprive the measure of that aspect of unfair dealing which it now appears to possess.

The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the MINISTRY of FOOD (Mr. Clynes)

I will deal with the Amendment before approaching the other points raised in the speech of the right hon. Gentleman. I am quite unable to accept the Amendment not only because I cannot agree with it, but also because I am quite opposed to its object. On the Second Reading of this Bill we discussed that object fully, and I then pointed out that it was the aim of the Bill to check profiteering. The object was in fact, when there was a serious shortage of certain cereals, to prevent illegitimate trading by means of which great profits were made on the transactions. I explained also to the House that the Ministry was not in the slightest degree opposed to the just claims or proper trade actions of the regular trader who has been accustomed ordinarily to engage in the business of buying and selling peas and beans. There is in regard to this Amendment, however, rather serious difficulty, as in my view it would, if it were embodied in this Bill, raise for us serious legal complications, and involve the Ministry in a succession of disputes in the Court. It would restrict the purpose of the Bill, and that is the main reason for our resistance to it. It would also give a guarantee to at least one class of dealer in the business of buying and selling peas and beans on the occasion in question, that he was entitled to the whole of whatever war-time profits might have accrued from his transactions had he at that time been left alone. Therefore, if the Amendment were carried, in addition to involving the Ministry in very costly and possibly lengthy legal proceedings, it would as a certainty guarantee the whole of these profits to one particular kind of trader. For these reasons I am strongly of the opinion that this Amendment could not be fairly pressed upon us, and certainly I should have to resist it.

As the right hon. Gentleman has pointed out, however, I did give an assurance in the course of the discussion when the Bill was before the House for Second Beading, and I want to follow that up by offering my right hon. Friend and those who have acted with him in this matter not only a further general assurance, but a statement in set terms which I trust will go the full length of meeting his desires in this matter. There are very serious objections to any attempt to embody this assurance in the terms of the Act itself, and indeed I am not so sure that certain of the men who may come forward to make their claims could have their claims met as reasonably by any Amendment of this kind as they may feel assured of having them met by the offer which I am going to make. I would point out to my right hon. Friend that I never made a promise to embody an Amendment, and therefore it cannot now be alleged that I am not keeping faith within the terms of the statement which has been already read from the OFFICIAL REPORT. I will not say it is trifling with the matter to allege that a man cannot do business in one of these articles more than once, but what I have said, what I have meant, and what everybody understands, is that on the occasion in question peas and beans were sold several times over.

Mr. LOUGH

Not by the same man.

Mr. CLYNES

It is quite immaterial to say whether the action was actually the act of the same man or not. The answer to my right hon. Friend is that in some cases quantities of these peas and beans were sold ten times over before they reached the consumer, and before they were put on the market. I hope that is a transaction which in war-time no man in this House will think of defending. Each sale added considerably to the cost the consumer would have to pay for every pound of the peas and beans he purchased for the family table. We are anxious to meet the just claims of the legitimate trader, and those who ordinarily and properly in normal times are engaged in this business of buying and selling peas and beans. Therefore, to meet this view—and I can assure my right hon. Friend, if it be required, that this is a perfectly genuine endeavour on our part to fulfil the promise that was given and to meet the claims of the legitimate traders—what I now have to say is this. As soon as the Bill has become an Act of Parliament the Food Controller will investigate transactions which are affected by this Act. Persons interested in these transactions may lay their claims before the Food Controller. These claims will be considered, and will be dealt with by the Food Controller on the basis that an allowance is to be made to a legitimate trader in the articles concerned, the allowance to be limited to a proper profit to such person on the normal turnover in these articles. No allowance will be made to a person who was not a legitimate trader. A legitimate trader we deem to be a person who in the ordinary way of his trade dealt regularly in these articles. The extent of the legitimate trader's normal dealings in the articles will define the area over which the allowance is to be made to him. In determining a proper outfit regard will be had not to the profit which would have been earned if the transactions had been allowed to stand, but to the usual pre-war rate of profit in that class of transaction and to the other relevant circumstances of the case.

I may be asked as to the particular form through which or by which the Food Ministry would determine claims submitted to them. This is a trade question, a trade and business issue, and what the Food Ministry has in mind is to leave to some reputable and competent trade arbitrator a decision of the claims as they are presented. The purpose, then, of the Ministry is, to a great extent, that of my right hon. Friend, and, in view of the complications, dangers, and difficulties which would arise from the insertion in the Bill of such words as he has proposed in his Amendment, I trust he may see his way not to press it, but to accept the explicit assurance I have given.

Mr. LOUGH

The Committee will observe from the condition of these benches that I could not carry my Amendment if I had the disposition to do so, but I will just point out that the course the Ministry are taking—because the Ministry is taking over this—is the normal course in this House. It is proposed to pass the Bill in a stronger form than I quite approve of on an assurance that the matter will be equitably dealt with outside within the provisions of the Bill. I suppose I can get nothing better from my right hon. Friend who has now thought it over and listened to the representations which have been made, and I understand that each transaction is to be left to an arbitrator. There were some words in the beginning of what my right hon. Friend said which suggested that the matter would be decided by the Food Controller. I do not think that is fair, and I am glad to see he shakes his head. The matter will be decided by an arbitrator appointed from the trade. I think that is very important, and although the procedure is novel those who think I am sacrificing their interests will have to remember the difficulty I am in. I have to take the best I can get, and therefore I thank my right hon. Friend for the concession he has made in that matter, and beg to ask leave to withdraw my Amendment.

Mr. CLYNES

There is only one point. My right hon. Friend said that an arbitrator was to be appointed by the trade. What I said was that the person to be appointed was to be a reputable and competent person, and known as a trade arbitrator. I said that he would be appointed by the Food Minister.

Mr. LOUGH

Every matter is to be left to him?

Mr. CLYNES

Certainly!

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Mr. LOUGH

I beg to move to leave out the words "notwithstanding that at" ["notwithstanding that at the date of the making of the Order"], and to insert instead thereof the words "if after."

My right hon. Friend (Sir F. Banbury) asked me to move this Amendment, and notwithstanding what has been said, seeing he is not present, I think I ought to do so. It discusses quite a different point to the one we have been dealing with, and really deprives the Bill of its retrospective character. This is a very strong feature of the Bill, and one against which the greatest repugnance was expressed by speakers on the Second Reading. I should like to hear what my right hon. Friend has-to say on this point, and I move the Amendment in order to give the opportunity of an answer.

Mr. BOOTH

On a point of Order, Mr. Chairman. Is not this Amendment rather one which negatives the Bill? There can be no Bill if this Amendment be carried.

The CHAIRMAN

The hon. Member is quite right. That is my own opinion of this Amendment—that it is equivalent to negativing the Bill, and therefore cannot be accepted.

Mr. LOUGH

I beg to move, after the word "aforesaid" ["beans, peas, and pulse as aforesaid"], to insert the words, in all cases where the transaction was not completed previous to the first day of May, nineteen hundred and seventeen. This Amendment is somewhat to the same effect as the last. But I am in great difficulty in the matter, though perhaps, a little more successful in my Amendments than even such an old Parliamentary hand as my right hon. Friend the Member for the City. This Amendment is to put some limit of time into the Clause. If my right hon. Friend wants to take a limit, I suggest it is a fair and just one, as it has been drawn up by myself. If it is not accepted, I trust the Minister will himself mention some limit of time. As the Bill is drawn, we might go back ten years or to any time in dealing with any of the persons concerned with the sale of these articles.

Mr. CLYNES

The essence of this Bill is its retrospective character. If there is to be any limit it should be a limit not of time, but of kind. The object of the Bill is to cover all the transactions which are aimed at, and therefore it would be quite unfair to one section of traders merely because a man stood on one side of a particular date that he should be treated in a certain manner, and another trader standing on the other side of that date should, so to speak, go scot-free. The whole point of the Amendment was argued at length during the Second Reading Debate, and I can only repeat that it is impossible for us to recede from the position of seeking to make the Bill completely retrospective in this matter.

Amendment negatived.

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Clause stand part of the Bill."

Mr. DENNISS

I am very much obliged to my right hon. Friend the Parliamentary representative of the Food Controller for the very fair way he has met the trade. We—that is to say those whom in the ordinary way of business it concerns—welcome this Bill. The man who imports food at a time of scarcity is a public benefactor. The speculator whose business it is for his own purposes to take money from the pockets of an impoverished people is just the opposite sort of person. The object of this Bill is to deprive such men of the opportunity for extortion, and to take from them, in certain cases, profit they never ought to have earned, or be allowed to keep. Ordinary traders will, so far as they may suffer, be compensated and allowed to have a proper profit. The object of the Bill will be achieved, if I may be allowed to say so, in the best possible way. Furthermore, a man who is skilled in the trade of which peas and beans form a part and who has all his life been engaged in it, and has been accustomed to act as arbitrator, will be appointed by the Food Controller to decide each of the cases coming up, with proper instructions, I suppose. That is the right step. The right hon. Gentleman has decided that no profiteering is to take place, and that only the bonâ fide merchant is to benefit in these transactions. There could be no better tribunal than the suggested arbitrator. If a Court of law had to decide it would not do so well. Those engaged in the trade will be known, or should he known, to such an arbitrator, and no judge or jury will be able to judge better than such a man. The right hon. Gentleman has taken a very wise, proper, and satisfactory course, and personally I am very much obliged to him for doing it, seeing that I Have taken some rather prominent part, and a great deal of trouble, in this matter.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 2 [Short Title] and Schedules 1 and 2, ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Bill reported, without Amendment.

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read the third time."

Mr. LOUGH

May I ask my right hon. Friend not to press the Third Beading? There is no one here who is particularly interested in the Bill. Beans and peas, or pulse, are things of which I know nothing. I have never dealt in them. The right hon. Gentleman in charge of the Bill, I think with my hon. Friend opposite, has met the ease very fairly, but I do not think he ought to press the Third Reading to-night with nobody here. I myself do not intend to take any further part in the proceedings, but I think for the reputation of the House, having got the Committee and Report stage, he might leave time for fear any further representations may be considered necessary.

Mr. CLYNES

There are two reasons why I think we might fairly ask the House to give the Bill the Third Reading. The one is that the sooner the Bill assumes its complete stage the sooner the persons concerned, who are now in a condition of suspense in which they have lived for some time, will be relieved, and the sooner you will be able to get to work to determine the merits of the cases, and assess the proportion of compensation to which they may be entitled. That is one very forcible reason; and the other is that I claim fairly to have met all the points expressed in the Committee stage and on Second Reading of the Bill. What the right hon. Gentleman opposite says as to there not being many Members in the House denotes the absence of any very serious contention on the points at issue. I have endeavoured to meet all the points, and I think I have met them; and, evidently having secured the general approval of the House, I do not consider it unreasonable to ask that the Bill should be read the third time.

Question put, and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read the third time, and passed.

The remaining Orders were read, and postponed.

Whereupon Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER, pursuant to the Order of the House of the 13th February, proposed the Question, "That this House do now adjourn."

Mr. BOOTH

I think we should have some means of finding the Report of Mr. Justice Atkin's Committee referred to in the Emergency Legislation Resolution on the Order Paper. There is nothing known of it in the Vote Office or the Library, and even some members of the Government I have spoken to think it is two or three years old, and some think it was in the "Times" two or three weeks ago. I am not suggesting that the members of the Government now on the Front Bench know. We not only ought to have the

Report, but we ought to have it in our hands one clear day before we take the Resolution.

Mr. PARKER (Lord of the Treasury)

I do not know anything about this particular Report, I will convey the hon. Member's request to the Chief Whip and endeavour to obtain it.

Question put, and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at twenty-two minutes before Nine o'clock.