Commons Sitting of 24 June 1918

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

PRIVATE BUSINESS.
Harrod's Stores Bill [Lords],
Read the third time, and passed, without Amendment.
Aldershot Gas, Water, and District Lighting Bill [Lords],
London United Tramways Bill,
Pontypridd and Rhondda Joint Water Board Bill [Lords],
Railway Passengers Assurance Bill [Lords],
As amended, considered; to be read the third time.
British Gas Light Company (Norwich) Bill [Lords],
Read a second time, and committed.

CIVIL STAFF EMPLOYED BY GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENTS.
Return presented relative thereto [ordered 19th June; Mr. Beck]; to lie upon the Table, and to be printed. [No. 76.]
PRODUCTION AND DISTRIBUTION OF MILK.
Copy presented of Report of Committee on Production and Distribution of Milk to the Food Controller [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.
MINISTRY OF FOOD.
Copies presented of Sugar (Domestic Preserving) Order, 1918; and Sugar (Rationing) Order, 1918, General Licence; made by the Food Controller under the Defence of the Realm Regulations [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.
POST OFFICE SAVINGS BANK.
Accounts presented of all Deposits received and paid during the year ended 31st December, 1917, together with a Statement showing the aggregate amount of the Liabilities of the Government to Depositors in the Post Office Savings Banks on the 31st December, 1917, and the nature and amount of the Securities held by the Commissioners for the Reduction of the National Debt to meet those Liabilities at that date [by Act]; to lie upon the Table, and to be printed. [No. 77.]
SHOPS ACT, 1912.
Copy presented of Order made by the Council of the undermentioned local authority, and confirmed by the Secretary of State for the Home Department: Borough of Folkestone [by Act]; to lie upon the Table.
RAILWAY SERVANTS (HOURS OF LABOUR).
Copy presented of Report by the Board of Trade of their Proceedings under the Railway Regulation Act, 1893, during the year ended 27th July, 1917 [toy Act]; to lie upon the Table.

WAR PENSIONS, ETC., STATUTORY COMMITTEE, ACCOUNTS, 1916–17.
Copy ordered "of Accounts of the War Pensions, Etc., Statutory Committee, 1916–17, together with the Report of the Comptroller and Auditor-General thereon."—[Mr. Baldwin.]
Copy presented accordingly; to lie upon the Table, and to be printed. [No. 78.]

ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS.
  WAR.

    ZINC CONCENTRATES (SMELTING).
    Mr. HOLTasked the President of the Board of Trade whether any agreement or contract has been made between the Government and the Zinc Corporation in

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    relation to the smelting of zinc concentrates in this country; and, if so, what are the terms of such agreement or contract?
    The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of TRADE (Sir A. Stanley): No, Sir.

    OIL PRODUCTION (GREAT BRITAIN).
    General CROFTasked the President of the Board of Trade if all steps are being taken by His Majesty's Government to develop the production of oil from coal and shale deposits in this country; and whether he can report what progress has been made in developing this national industry?
    The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the MINISTRY of MUNITIONS (Mr. Kellaway): The Ministry of Munitions is taking every possible step to increase the production of oil from coal and shale deposits in the country and of creosote. The work is hampered by the shortage of labour, but very considerable progress has been made. I am advised that at present it is not desirable in the national interest to quote figures, but I am considering the possibility of giving further information of the progress which has been made in developing the production of oil from home sources.
    Mr. BILLING: Would the hon. Gentleman say to whom anyone is to report in the event of any findings in this country?
    Mr. KELLAWAY: The information should be sent to me.

    GAS BILLS.
    Mr. ROWLANDSasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he can state what action he proposes to take in connection with the Report of the Committee on the Gas Bills?
    Mr. GILBERTasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he can now state what action he proposes to take on the Report of the Select Committee on Gas Undertakings (Statutory Prices); and if it is intended that the Government shall bring in a Bill to carry out the recommendations of this Committee?
    Sir A. STANLEY: I propose to introduce a Bill as soon as possible to give effect to the recommendations of the Select Committee, and to include in the Bill provisions of a like nature with respect to tramway, electricity, and water undertakings.

    RAILWAY SEASON TICKETS.
    Mr. MACMASTERasked the President of the Board of Trade upon what principle the rates for passenger season tickets on the railways were determined previously to the issue of the recent Order; whether the rate was fixed by the railway company with reference to the mileage travelled; if so, whether there was any and, if any, what differentiation in that connection and the amounts thereof; what was the fixed rate per mile, or otherwise, for season tickets for a distance of 12 miles from the starting point; at what stage of mileage beyond that point and for what distance did any differentiation come into operation; and, if there was a differential rate, did it come into operation at fixed mileage stations or at ordinary railway station points along the line?
    Sir A. STANLEY: I am afraid that it is not possible to give categorical replies to the points raised in this question. As the hon. and learned Gentleman is no doubt aware, there were, generally speaking, no statutory requirements in regard to the issue of season tickets or the terms on which they were issued. In fixing season-ticket rates the railway companies had regard generally to the mileage travelled, but local and other conditions were also considered.

    INDIA.

      ARMY (ACTING RANK OF MAJOR).
      Colonel YATEasked the Secretary of State for India for what reason the grant of the acting rank of major with pay of that rank to officers commanding all Indian regimental depots, sanctioned in Indian Army Order No. 677, of 1917, is held to have effect only from the 26th of November, 1917, instead of from the date of taking charge; and whether he will suggest to the Government of India the advisability of issuing this Order with retrospective effect?
      The SECRETARY of STATE for INDIA (Mr. Montagu): The grant of the acting rank in question was not sanctioned in I.A.O. No. 677, but in a later Order of the Government of India of the 26th November, 1917, which had no retrospective effect. I will ask the Government of India whether they see any reason for reconsidering the matter.

      EXCESS PROFITS TAX.
      Sir HENRY CRAIKasked the Secretary of State for India whether the question of an Excess Profits Tax in India has been considered; and whether it is proposed to extend that tax to businesses in that country, where very large war profits have been realised?
      Mr. MONTAGU: In March last year the Finance Minister discussed the question in paragraph 61 of his speech introducing the Financial Statement for 1917–18, and gave his reasons for preferring at that time to secure a portion of excess profits by means of a Super-tax, which was then imposed for the first time.
      Sir H. CRAIK: Since the declaration of the Finance Minister, has the Government of India had the matter again under consideration, seeing that there is a very strong feeling in India that these enormous profits ought to come under the same Income Tax as here?
      Mr. MONTAGU: The hon. Gentleman will realise that our Excess Profits Tax is based on our incomes. The Income Tax law of India presents, I will not say insuperable, but very great difficulties for the imposition of a similar tax.

      INCOME TAX (OFFICERS).
      Colonel YATEasked the Secretary of State for India whether officers of the Indian Army are exempt from the payment of Income Tax on War Loan subscribed to by them because they are regarded as not ordinarily resident in the United Kingdom, but if an officer is taken prisoner then the payment of Income Tax is insisted upon as they are said to cease not to be ordinarily resident in the United Kingdom; and, if so, will be put a stop to this treatment of prisoners while in captivity?
      Mr. MONTAGU: As I informed my hon. and gallant Friend on 19th June, questions concerning Income Tax should be addressed to the Treasury.
      Colonel YATE: Is it not the duty of the Secretary of State for India to safeguard the interests of their officers in His Majesty's Forces?
      Mr. MONTAGU: I certainly can and will make representations to the Treasury in the interests of Indian soldiers, but the enforcement and the interpretation of the Income Tax laws is not in my hands at all, but those of the Treasury.
      Colonel YATE: Is it just that a man taken prisoner at Kut-el-Amara should be charged extra Income Tax?

      CIVIL SERVICE (PAY).
      Colonel YATEasked the Secretary of State for India whether members of the Indian Civil Service whose services have been placed at the disposal of the War Office receive the same rates of pay whether serving in East Africa, Mesopotamia, Palestine, Egypt, Italy, France, or the Mediterranean, or whether there is any differentiation; and, if there is a differentiation, whether there is any reason why the same rule should not equally apply to all?
      The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the WAR OFFICE (Mr. Forster): Indian Civil servants giving military service under the War Office are, as a general rule, in receipt of Indian Civil furlough pay, plus the standard military emoluments of a British officer in the area in which they serve. If the hon. and gallant Member has in mind any particular case in which the treatment appears to him to be anomalous, I shall be happy to inquire into it.
      Colonel YATE: Will the right hon. Gentleman inquire whether officers serving on the East of the Suez Canal get a different rate of pay from those serving on the West of the Suez Canal?
      Mr. FORSTER: I will make inquiries.

    RUSSIA.

      RELATIONS WITH GREAT BRITAIN.
      Mr. DAVID MASONasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether the existing Russian Government is now formally recognised by His Majesty's Government; who is our representative there; whether there is a British mission now in Russia and of whom is it

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      composed; and whether, in view of our financial interests and the possibilities of future trade and commerce with that country, His Majesty's Government will appoint a financial representative to help Russia in the reorganisation of her finances?
      Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND (Department of Overseas Trade): The answer to the first part of the question is in the negative. There is no accredited British representative in Russia, but British interests, both political and economic, are in charge of various missions there. In the event of any invitation being received from Russia for the assistance of His Majesty's Government in the reorganisation of her finances, I should be glad to consider the appointment of a special financial representative for this purpose.
      Mr. BILLING: Is there any accredited representative of the Russian Government in this country?
      Mr. SPEAKER: That does not arise out of this question.

      UNRATIFIED TREATIES.
      Mr. KINGasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he is aware that the Russian Convention of 16th July, 1917, signed provisionally by M. Terestchenko on behalf of the Russian Government, has not been ratified by the Government of Russia as required by Russian law; whether any treaty or convention is operative without the required ratification; and whether he can give any instance within ten years of unratified treaties being regarded as operative?
      The MINISTER of BLOCKADE (Lord R. Cecil): The signature of M. Terestchenko was not provisional. Treaties may, and often do, become operative without ratification. A case in point is our military agreement with France.
      Mr. KING: Is the Noble Lord aware that he has not answered the first part of the question? He has evaded it.
      Lord R. CECIL: I have not evaded it. I said the very answer that the signature of M. Terestchenko was not provisional.
      Mr. KING: Is not the point of the question whether by Russian law it must not be ratified?
      Lord R. CECIL: We have not anything to do with Russian law. We only have to do with international law.

    MILITARY SERVICE.

      RUSSIAN SUBJECTS (LABOUR BATTALIONS).
      Mr. HOGGEasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether the Government has received a protest from the Russian Soviet against the conscription of Russian subjects in this country; what reply has been made to it; and whether he can state if any Russian subjects are now being called up for any purpose whatever?
      Lord R. CECIL: The protest is being considered. Russian subjects are being called up to serve in labour battalions.
      Mr. KING: Can any date be fixed when our reply will be given? It has been under consideration for a fortnight, I think.
      Lord R. CECIL: No, Sir.
      Colonel WEDGWOOD: Are the Russian subjects permitted to join Jewish regiments, if they are of that faith, instead of labour battalions?
      Lord R. CECIL: Will the hon. and gallant Gentleman be kind enough to give me notice of that question?
      Mr. KINGasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he is aware that Russian Poles were subjects of the ex-Czar of Russia qua King of Poland; whether he will lay upon the Table of this House a copy of the decree issued by the Russian Provisional Government on the 29th March, 1917, proclaiming the independence of Poland as a whole, including that part then in enemy occupation; and whether the military convention with Russia of 16th July, 1917, extends to Polish subjects, formerly Russian subjects, whom the Russian authorities which entered into the convention had declared to be independent of Russia?
      Lord R. CECIL: The first part of the question is a matter of history on which the hon. Member is in as good a position to form an opinion as I am. The answer to the second part of the question is in the negative. The convention does extend to Poles.

      CIVIL SERVANTS ON ACTIVE SERVICE
      Colonel Lord HENRY CAVENDISH-BENTINCKasked the President of the Local Government Board whether he or his predecessors have given an assurance that the prospects and interests of members of the permanent staff of his Department on active service shall not be prejudiced by any action taken by him during the period of the War; and whether, notwithstanding such assurance, he has made permanent, or intends to make permanent, during the War the appointment of any female clerks temporarily employed in his Department?
      The PRESIDENT of the LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. Hayes Fisher): I have offered a permanent appointment to a lady who has been employed for a year past in the branch of my Department which deals with maternity and child welfare. I certainly have no intention of taking any steps which would prejudice the prospects or interests of the men who have joined the forces, and the appointment of this lady cannot be regarded as doing so. The question of the continued employment of women clerks in the Civil Service after the War is a general one which I assume the Treasury will deal with as a whole.

      2ND DEVONS.
      Major Sir BERTRAM FALLEasked the Under-Secretary of State for War if he can give any news of Private H. P. Innes, No. 290949, D Company, 13th Platoon, 1st Section, 2nd Devons, of whom no news has been received for a considerable period, and as to whom the information obtainable from No. 2 Infantry Records, Exeter, 17th June, 1918, is that he was discharged to base depot 15th April, 1918?
      Mr. MACPHERSON: I regret that I have no later information regarding Private Innes.
      Sir B. FALL: Is my right hon. Friend making inquiry?
      Mr. MACPHERSON: I have made inquiry, but could get no further information. I will pursue my inquiry.

      COAL PORTERS.
      Mr. SMALLWOODasked the President of the Board of Trade if he is aware that the committee of the National Amalgamation of Coal Porters has tendered
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      notice to terminate all agreements between the Society of Coal Merchants and the union on 28th June next, giving as the reason that the work of the coal trade cannot be carried on owing to the call now being made upon the man-power of the coal trade, and that they recognise that their duty to the community can best be served by taking this step than by allowing things to drift into chaos; and if he will say what steps he proposes to take having regard to this statement?
      Sir A. STANLEY: The Controller of Coal Mines has arranged to receive a deputation from the union referred to on Wednesday next to consider the notice.
      Mr. SMALLWOODasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he is aware that owing to the recent call up for national service of coal porters and carmen there are wharves in the London district without a man left to work them; and whether he proposes to take any steps to deal with such cases?
      Sir A. STANLEY: While the recruitment of coal porters and carmen has interfered to a certain extent with coal distribution, no cases of the kind mentioned by the hon. Member have come to the notice of the Controller of Coal Mines. The Controller will inquire into these cases if furnished with particulars. An arrangement has now been come to between the Board of Trade and the Ministry of National Service which it is believed will relieve the situation.

      IRISHMEN IN GREAT BRITAIN.
      Colonel Sir J. HOPEasked the-Minister of National Service whether the 40,000 Irishmen who, since October, 1916, have come to Great Britain to engage on munitions and other Government work are liable for military service under Section 1 of the Military Service (No. 2) Act, 1918; and whether he will issue instructions under which these men may be obtained for military service in all cases where the War Office are able to provide as substitutes British soldiers of medical categories other than A?
      The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the MINISTRY of NATIONAL SERVICE (Mr. Beck): The men referred to in my hon. and gallant Friend's question come within the operation of the Military Service Acts. As already stated in the House, an undertaking has been given that no alteration will at present be made

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      as regards the liability to military service of Irishmen who are now temporarily resident in Great Britain for the purposes set out in my answer of 17th April.
      As regards Irishmen who come to Great Britain in the future, it is proposed that they should be called up for military service in the same manner as other British subjects, unless they have come, or have been brought, to Great Britain by the Ministry of Labour for agricultural work, and are in possession of a certificate to that effect issued by an Employment Exchange.
      The Ministry of National Service takes every opportunity of recommending the use of discharged men, and, as my hon. and gallant Friend is aware, the War Office has arranged for a considerable number of lower grade and specially skilled soldiers to be released for urgent work, such as agriculture and shipbuilding.
      Sir E. CARSON: May I ask my hon. Friend whether Irishmen of military age in these munition works will be allowed to stay there while older men are being called up for service in England?
      Mr. BECK: I do not think that that quite arises. I understand that the position is that a number of men were recruited in Ireland by Government machinery and brought over to do certain work of national importance here, and these men will not be recruited under compulsory service until they are given an opportunity of returning to Ireland.
      Sir E. CARSON: Are these men of military age and much younger than the men who are being called up here?
      Mr. BECK: I have no knowledge, but I imagine many of them are of military age.
      Mr. LOUGH: Will my hon. Friend say whether the change he has indicated in regard to Irishmen who may come over in the future can be made without legislation?
      Mr. BECK: I think so, because the men that my right hon. Friend the Member for Dublin University (Sir E. Carson) referred to would be liable to military service, unless there was administrative action protecting them on the ground that they had come over in response to a request by the Government.
      Mr. LOUGH: But does not the Act provide that Irishmen who come over, but who are not usually resident here, are not to be liable, and has he not said that they may be liable in the future? Can that be done without legislation?
      Mr. BECK: There is no change in the law at all.
      Mr. PRINGLE: But why should there be such trouble about breaking a pledge to these Irishmen when pledges have been broken in regard to so many people in this country?
      Mr. BECK: Perhaps the hon. Member will give notice of that question?
      Sir C. KINLOCH-COOKE: Is the hon. Gentleman not aware that about four months ago he wrote me a letter, in which he said these men were going to be sent back to Ireland, and that no other men were to be taken in the munition firms who came from Ireland?
      Mr. BECK: I think that if my hon. Friend looks into that letter he will find that I did not quite say that.
      Sir C. KINLOCH-COOKE: I think so; very much the same thing.

      FARMERS' SONS.
      Mr. WATTasked the Minister of National Service whether his attention has been called to the number of farmers' sons who have reached eighteen years of age since the beginning of the War and who have, although just left school, been called ploughmen, shepherds, and horse-keepers and thus saved from military service; and will he say what action he is taking, if any, with such men?
      Mr. BECK: I have not recently received complaints on the matter raised in the hon. Member's question. By an agreement with the Board of Agriculture and the Scottish Office, a quota of 35,500 men is at present being recruited from the agricultural industry in Great Britain. The selection of men for this quota is made by the agricultural executive committees and by the Board of Agriculture in Scotland, in the first place from Grade 1 men under twenty-three, any deficit being made up by Grade 1 men under thirty-one. I have no evidence that any farmers are guilty of the unpatriotic actions suggested in the question.

      UNREGISTERED MEN.
      Mr. WATTasked the Minister of National Service whether he has any official information showing that a considerable number of men in the country omitted to register under the Registration Acts, and are therefore overlooked in the calling-up notices; and is he aware that an opinion exists among those called up that such a body exists?
      Mr. BECK: No, Sir; I am not aware that any considerable number of men have failed to register under the National Registration Acts. The provisions of the Act passed this year, and the importance of being able to produce a registration card at Employment Exchanges and in connection with the food-rationing schemes ought to secure a fairly complete check, and the National Service registers are being constantly revised. In spite of this, it is possible that there may be cases of failure to register, and if my hon. Friend knows of any such, I hope he will let me have full particulars.

      VOLUNTEER CONDITIONS.
      Mr. JOWETTasked the Undersecretary of State for War if there is an Army Council Instruction or other Army Order requiring men who hold certificates of exemption on occupational grounds and who are already fulfilling all the conditions in regard to drilling with the Volunteers imposed upon them by military service tribunals as conditions of exemption to go into camp for a period of training during this summer?
      Mr. MACPHERSON: No such instruction has been issued by the War Office.

    FOOD SUPPLIES.

      MARKETING FACILITIES.
      Mr. ROWLANDSasked the President of the Board of Agriculture (1) whether he is aware how many county marketing committees have been organised for the purpose of marketing the surplus fruits, vegetables, etc., of small cultivators, and in which counties; what is the number of members; (2) in how many places arrangements have been made under Scheme 2 of the Board, through the trade agent, for marketing the surplus fruits, vegetables, etc., of the small cultivators; what is the number of marketing committees and the names of the towns
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      and villages where it is being worked; and (3) whether he can state the number of places in which arrangements have been made, under Scheme 3 of the Board, by small markets and market stalls, for marketing the surplus produce of small cultivators; and can he say where the scheme is in existence?
      The PRESIDENT Of the BOARD of AGRICULTURE (Mr. Prothero): I should explain that the schemes are being put into operation by the Food Production Department on a county basis, and I can give my hon. Friend information only as to counties. In thirty-eight counties a central county marketing committee has been set up, or other arrangements made, for the collection and disposal of produce throughout the county. In four other counties similar organisations are in process of formation. Scheme 2, described in the Board's pamphlet, has been adopted so far by Herefordshire only. Scheme 3 is in operation in eight counties. I am sending my hon. Friend a list of all these counties. I regret that I am unable to state the number of shareholders or members of the marketing societies, most of which have only come into existence in the course of the last few weeks.
      Mr. LOUGH: Will the right hon. Gentleman say whether in those counties in which the marketing committees are set up it is legal for the grower to dispose of his produce through other channels if he pleases?
      Mr. PROTHERO: I should say most certainly it was, but if the right hon. Gentleman will repeat his question, I will find out definitely on that point.

      FARM TENANCY, HEMEL HEMPSTED.
      Mr. WATTasked the President of the Board of Agriculture whether his attention has been called to a case at Hemel Hempsted where a farmer was ordered out of his farm by the Department of Agriculture, after twenty-four years' tenancy, under the Defence of the Realm Regulations, and where the landowner got a rent of £250 from the new tenant against £162 from the farmer ordered out; and, if so, will he say what measures he proposes to adopt to prevent the Department's action leading to much increased rents?
      Mr. PROTHERO: On 17th May, 1917, the Board authorised the landlord at his discretion to determine the tenancy of the

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      farmer referred to on account of bad farming. The Board understand that the farm has been relet at an increased rent, as stated in the question, but this fact constitutes no reason why the powers of the Board should not be used in such cases. The presumption is that the previous rent was unduly low. In any case, the Board could not agree that land should be allowed to remain in the possession of a tenant who is not farming it properly merely because it might fetch a higher rent from another tenant who is prepared to farm better, In the case referred to the Board satisfied themselves, by obtaining a report from their own Commissioner, that the determination of the tenancy was essential in the interest of food production.
      Colonel WEDGWOOD: Is it not a fact the landlord gets this increased rent because of the passage of the Corn Production Bill?
      Mr. PROTHERO: No, Sir; I am afraid that the Corn Production Act so far as prices are concerned is not now in operation, owing to the fact that the prices of corn are far in excess of the prices in the Act.
      Colonel WEDGWOOD: Is it not perfectly well known that the Corn Production Act gave a promise of future high prices, so that the rents are kept up?
      Mr. HOLT: Is it not a fact that in consequence the Chancellor of the Exchequer gets large sums in better Income Tax?
      Mr. PROTHERO: Out of the landlords?
      Mr. HOLT: And the farmer.
      Mr. PROTHERO: Very probably.
      Mr. BILLING: Can the right hon. Gentleman say whether the increased rental is taxed as excess profits?

      CHINA TEA.
      Mr. LOUGHasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Food whether on the 28th January and the 5th February a promise was given to the House that 3,000,000 lbs. of China tea would be imported on behalf of the Ministry, which would be sold at prices to be later fixed; and, seeing that nearly six months has elapsed since this undertaking was given, whether he can now state that there is any prospect of its being fulfilled?
      The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the MINISTRY of FOOD (Mr. Clynes): No, Sir. My statement was that tea would be bought in China on behalf of the Ministry of Food for importation to the United Kingdom in neutral tonnage, and that if sufficient tonnage were available it was intended to purchase 3,000,000 lbs. in the present year. Some China tea has been bought, and is at present on passage to the United Kingdom, but, in view of the shortage of available tonnage, no considerable quantity is likely to be distributed for some months.
      Mr. LOUGH: As the right hon. Gentleman finds so much difficulty in bringing in China tea, will be allow the merchants to bring it in?
      Mr. CLYNES: That is a matter for argument.

      MILK.
      Mr. LOUGHasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Food if he will say, with regard to the pledge given by him that if the price of milk was raised the increase would be made to operate so as to compensate the producer for the period in which he received the lower price, and seeing that only 1s. per gallon was paid from the 1st May to the 10th June as compared with a price now fixed of 1s. 4d., how the proposes to give effect to his undertaking?
      Mr. CLYNES: Effect has already been given to my undertaking. The intention was to raise the price of milk for the five summer months by an average of 3d. per gallon, but as this increase did not come into operation until 10th June, the actual rise in price from that date until 30th September has been fixed at 4d. per gallon, in order to compensate the producer for the period from 1st May till 9th June, when the price paid to him was 1s. per gallon.

    MUNITIONS.

      HOSTELS AND CANTEENS.
      Major NEWMANasked the Minister of Munitions the total loss of public money incurred in the past financial year in the equipment, running, and maintenance of various hostels, canteens, and places of refreshment by his Ministry for its employés?
      Mr. KELLAWAY: The audit of the accounts of the hostels and canteens is not yet complete. If the hon. and gallant Member will repeat his question at a later date the Financial Secretary will reply.
      Major NEWMAN: Has the hon. Member seen what the Comptroller and Auditor-General has to say about these accounts?
      Mr. KELLAWAY: I would rather leave the matter to the Financial Secretary.

    MR. A. HENDERSON (DELEGATION TO FRANCE).
    General CROFTasked the Secretary to the Treasury whether the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Barnard Castle, prior to his resignation from the Government, applied to the Treasury for a draft to cover the incidental expenses of a visit to France; whether the delegation was composed of the right hon. Gentleman, the hon. Member for Leicester, and the hon. Member for Stock-port; and whether such draft was actually paid to the right hon. Gentleman?
    Mr. BALDWIN (Joint Financial Secretary to the Treasury): Owing to a misunderstanding, an imprest was on 26th July, 1917, issued to meet the expenses of a party including the three Gentlemen named. The whole amount was refunded by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Barnard Castle on 3rd August.
    General CROFT: Can the hon. Gentleman say whether the right hon. Gentleman applied for this grant as a Cabinet Minister, and whether he gave the impression that the grant was applied for as a Cabinet Minister?
    Mr. BALDWIN: I shall require notice of that question.
    General CROFTasked the Secretary to the Admiralty whether the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Barnard Castle, prior to his resignation from the Government, applied to the Admiralty to place a vessel at his service; whether such vessel was actually placed at his service and took the right hon. Gentleman and two of his Parliamentary colleagues to France; and whether the journey undertaken was on Government business and at the request of the Cabinet?
    The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the ADMIRALTY (Dr. Macnamara): My hon. and gallant Friend must, I think, have overlooked the replies given on this subject to the Noble Lord the Member for Dover on the 1st and 8th August last year. No Admiralty vessel was placed at the disposal of the right hon. Gentleman on the occasion referred to.

    SENIOR SURVEYORS OF TAXES.
    Sir ARTHUR SHIRLEY BENNasked the Secretary to the Treasury whether he is aware of the volume of work caused by war conditions, and particularly the new Excess Profits Duty, which has fallen upon the senior surveyors of taxes; and will he say what increase of salary or war bonus has been given to senior surveyors in charge of most important districts whose ordinary salaries are upward of £550 per annum, and who are, in some cases, men with large families dependent upon them?
    Mr. BALDWIN: I am well aware of the severe pressure entailed upon surveyors of taxes generally, and especially upon senior surveyors, by the requirements of war finance. Some improvement in the position has already been effected, and a further representation from the Board of Inland Revenue on the same matter is now under consideration by the Treasury.

    ROYAL AIR FORCE.

      AERODROMES, LANCASHIRE
      Mr. MALLALIEUasked the Undersecretary of State to the Air Ministry if his attention has been called to the wasteful expenditure incurred in the construction of aerodromes in a district in Lancashire; that this waste is having a prejudicial effect upon national war savings efforts in that part of the country; that as a consequence two local war savings committees have refused to organise a special war weapons' week, alleging that it would be useless to appeal to the public in view of the existing conditions which prevail; and whether he proposes to take any action in the matter?
      The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the AIR MINISTRY (Major Baird): There have been several allegations of wasteful expenditure at the works which

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      my hon. Friend has in mind. The Administrator of Works and Buildings has investigated the case closely, and I understand that though at the outset the labour available was not fully utilised, for reasons beyond control, matters are now as satisfactory as can be expected in present conditions. No information is available to support the suggestion in the latter part of the question.
      Mr. BILLING: Having regard to the fact that various instances of wasteful expenditure at aerodromes have occurred, will the hon Gentleman recommend to the Air Minister that a Committee be appointed to inquire into the arrangements for aerodromes on which money has been spent?
      Major BAIRD: I will report the hon. Member's suggestion to the Air Minister, but I think the matter is sufficiently in hand to obviate that necessity.

    MADSEN GUN.

      STATEMENT BY MR. MACPHERSON.
      Colonel Sir CHARLES SEELYasked the Prime Minister what was the date of the meeting of the Army Council which rejected the proposal made by him when Minister of Munitions, at the request of Field-Marshal French, to purchase 5,000 Madsen guns; whether any Report on the gun from the Hythe School of Musketry was laid before the Council; whether the meeting was unanimous; and, if not, who were the members voting for and against the proposal?
      The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for WAR (Mr. Macpherson): As regards the first part of the question, the matter was not brought before a formal meeting of the Army Council, and the several parts of my hon. and gallant Friend's question do not therefore arise. I should like, however, to explain that at the date referred to the whole subject of the supply of machine guns to our forces was receiving most careful consideration, and was discussed departmentally in the usual manner. Lord French did not ask for a specific number of Madsen guns, but suggested that it should be considered with a view to supplementing the existing supply.
      Trials of the gun had been carried out in France at his request, and had favourably
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      impressed the experts at General Headquarters. A trial order of the Madsen gun was actually placed by the War Office, but it proved impossible to deliver the guns. Later the Ministry of Munitions inaugurated arrangements for the manufacture of the gun in this country. By the time the equipment of the factory was nearing completion there was a more urgent need for aeroplane engines; and, further, the deliveries of the other types of machine guns then in use had been largely increased, and the position in this respect was secure. The Field-Marshal agreed that it was undesirable to multiply further the number of types of guns in use, provided the output of the existing types was satisfactory.
      For these reasons, it was decided not to make use of the Madsen gun. There was at this time no question of substituting the Madsen gun for any of the existing types, but only of ensuring a sufficient supply for the needs of our forces. So long as it was possible to do this with weapons which had proved efficient, it was considered undesirable to introduce a further type which the experts did not regard as superior to those then in use.

    CONTROL COMMITTEES.
    Sir H. CRAIKasked the Prime Minister whether the various control committees act on their own independent authority or are responsible to any Department of State; and, if they are not so responsible, by what means the control of Parliament can be maintained?
    The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER (Mr. Bonar Law): The various committees or boards of control set up by the Government are all subordinate to some Department of State, and the Ministers in charge of such Departments are responsible to Parliament for their action.
    Sir H. CRAIK: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that several Ministers repudiate that?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: No, Sir; I am not aware of that.

    LAND SALES.
    Major NEWMANasked the Prime Minister whether his attention has been called to the amount of land that is being

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    disposed of by its owners owing to the price obtainable; whether he is satisfied that the effect of such sales will not make the acquisition of land by the State or local authority for the purposes of colonisation and settlement after the War difficult and more expensive; and, if he is not satisfied, does he propose to take the necessary precautions either by special enactment or by Regulation under the Defence of the Realm Act?
    Mr. PROTHERO: My right hon. Friend has asked me to answer this question. The whole subject of the acquisition of land for the purpose of colonisation and settlement of ex-Service men after the War is receiving very careful consideration, and the Government are fully aware of the position in regard to present sales of land to which the hon. and gallant Member draws attention.
    Major NEWMAN: Before land changes hands now is it inspected by any Government inspector to see if it is good land for colonisation?
    Mr. PROTHERO: No, Sir.
    Mr. BILLING: May I ask the Leader of the House whether it is possible for any British subject to purchase land in this country?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: I must have notice of such a question.

    Mrs. PANKHURST.
    Mr. R. LAMBERTasked the Prime Minister whether he can particularise the Allied interests in connection with which Mrs. Pankhurst is now in America?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: I have no information on this subject.
    Mr. LEES-SMITH: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that Mrs. Pankhurst stated that she was speaking for the women of this country, and that the majority of the women societies state that they have no connection with her?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: I was not aware that she stated that she was speaking for the women of this country, but I notice that my hon. Friend and others claim to be speaking for the men of this country.
    Mr. KING: Does not Mrs. Pankhurst's going to America involve breaking the rule against women travelling at the present
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    time? Did it not come before the War Cabinet, and, if so, what was the War Cabinet's decision?
    Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Member must give notice of that question.
    Mr. LEES-SMITH: Is the right hon. Gentleman not aware that I am speaking for the soldiers of this country?
    Mr. LAMBERTasked the Patronage Secretary to the Treasury whether the War Aims Committee was consulted about, or recommended, the granting of a permit to Mrs. Pankhurst to visit America; whether the Propaganda Department, under Lord Beaverbrook, was consulted on or advised Mrs. Pankhurst's journey; and whether any money or expenses were furnished or promised to Mrs. Pankhurst in this connection.
    Captain GUEST (Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury): The answer is in the negative.

    ENEMY ALIENS.
    Mr. JOYNSON-HICKSasked the. Prime Minister whether he is making a thorough investigation of the measures taken by the several Government Departments which are interested in the alien question with a view of tightening up the system; and whether he can give the House any information as to such investigation?
    Major NEWMANasked the Prime Minister whether he has received or has knowledge of resolutions passed by various borough councils in the East End of London demanding that a period should now be put to the delay of the Government in dealing with the internment and repatriation of aliens; and can he hold out any hope that the demand formulated by these local authorities that the alien-infested districts of London shall be restored to Britishers will be listened to?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: The whole subject is being again investigated by the Government, and a statement will be made as soon as possible after the Home Secretary has returned.
    Major NEWMAN: Will the right hon. Gentleman answer the first part of my question about certain resolutions which have been passed?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: Yes. They have been received.
    Mr. BILLING: Is the right hon. Gentleman prepared to place on the Table of the House a list of all the real Members of His Majesty's Government?
    Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Member must hand in that question, and let me see it before it is asked.
    Sir ARTHUR FELLasked the Prime Minister if his attention has been directed to the case of Charles Alfred Vernon, who was employed by the Ministry of Munitions when the name of this man was really Carl Hahn and had been recently changed to that of Vernon; and will be consider the suggestion that no person should enter any post office or Government Department without signing a declaration that the name he bears is his real name and has not been assumed or changed by himself or his parents?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: The answer to the first part of the question is in the affirmative. As regards the last part of the question, I would refer my hon. Friend to the answer I have just given to the hon. Member for Brentford.
    Brigadier-General CROFT: On whose authority was this man appointed by the Ministry of Munitions?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: I should require notice of that.
    Mr. BILLING: I beg to ask permission at the end of questions to move the Adjournment of the House to call attention to the pernicious influence of aliens in this country to-day.
    Mr. JOYNSON-HICKSasked the Home Secretary if he will state the rules regulating visits to interned alien enemies at the present time, and have they been altered during the last two years?
    The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. Brace): The rules vary according to the circumstances of the different places of internment. In the Isle of Man, where visits are necessarily very rare, the matter is left to the discretion of the Island Government. In Islington and the Alexandra Palace, where the prisoners are, almost without exception, men with British wives and children, weekly visits are allowed. As regards Wakefield, the old military rule allowed one visit a month for not more than two relatives and lasting not more than fifteen
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    minutes; but the Commandant was empowered to extend the time up to an hour.
    In October, 1916, when the Home Office, at the request of the War Office, took over the responsibility for the visits to interned civilians in all camps, this rule remained in force, but instructions were given to the Commandant (1) not to give extra visits to solicitors and others intended to facilitate the conduct of an enemy business; (2) to use his discretion with regard to the duration of visits from wives and other relatives who had come from a distance; and (3) to refer any special cases to the Home Office for decision. No alteration has been made since October, 1916.
    Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: May I ask whether these rules will be reconsidered by the Prime Minister? Are they going up to him?
    Mr. KING: As these rules are so much more generous than the rules which regulate visits to the Irish interned prisoners, will these latter be placed upon the same basis?
    Mr. BRACE: I must have notice of that.
    Mr. BILLING: May I ask whether any distinction is made with regard to the social position of the people who wish to visit interned persons?
    Mr. BRACE: No.
    Mr. BILLING: Are you quite sure? You know better.

    LAND PURCHASE.
    Major NEWMANasked the Prime Minister whether it is the intention of the Government to make it impossible, either by legislation or Order in Council, for an alien or neutral, whether naturalised or not, to at present acquire by purchase, assignment, or gift, land in the United Kingdom?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: Adequate protection against any such danger as is suggested in the question can be secured under the Defence of the Realm Regulations. General legislation as proposed in the question is not considered to be necessary.
    Mr. BILLING: Can enemy banks purchase land in this country to-day?
    Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Member has already been asked to give notice of that question.

    COMMERCIAL TREATIES (DENUNCIATION).
    Mr. HOLTasked when the Government propose to make their statement on the denunciation of the commercial treaties?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: I am sorry that I cannot yet name a day, but I hope that the statement may be made within the next two or three weeks.

    GERMAN BANKS.
    Mr. R. McNEILLasked the reasons which have led the Government to decide that it is not possible to introduce legislation to deal with the question of German banks and banking in the United Kingdom after the War without at the same time dealing with other matters?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: The question of imposing restrictions on trading by enemy banks in this country after the War is only one aspect of the general question of the future trade relations between the United Kingdom and enemy States. In my opinion there would be no object in dealing separately with enemy banks.
    Mr. McNEILL: Has not my right hon. Friend said that it was impossible to deal with this question apart from others that were connected with it?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: No. What I meant was that it was perfectly useless to deal with one aspect of a general question by itself.
    Mr. McNEILL: Having regard to the fact that many other people hold a different opinion, will my right hon. Friend reconsider the matter?
    Mr. BILLING: Is not the inability of the Government to deal with this question due to the German banks financing British parties?

    ROYAL NAVAL RESERVE (SKIPPERS).
    Sir A. WILLIAMSONasked the First Lord of the Admiralty if James Milne, of Nairn, a qualified skipper and extra master since April, 1914, who has been acting as master of a trawler with eight men under him since June, 1915, on boom defence, has now been ordered to be transferred to the Royal Naval Volunteer
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    Reserve as an ordinary seaman, also if John Main and David Ralph, both of Nairn, with similar qualifications and experience, have received similar instructions; and, if so, whether an oversight has occurred in employing men with masters' certificates as ordinary seamen?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: These men are members of the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve (Section Y), in which fishermen are voluntarily enrolled for service in the Trawler Section of the Royal Naval Reserve when required. Their services are now required, and they have been called up. It is not the practice to enter such men direct in the Trawler Section as skippers, as they must first be tried under service and war conditions, but their qualifications are noted at the time of entry, and if found suitable they receive early advancement.
    Sir A. WILLIAMSON: Do I understand that these men have been employed by the Admiralty as skippers for the past two or three years, and are now reduced to the position of ordinary seamen without any fault of their own?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: No; they were fishermen who were voluntarily enrolled in the Royal Naval Reserve.
    Sir A. WILLIAMSON: As skippers?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: Yes.
    Mr. HARCOURT: Are not men with the experience stated in the question entitled to higher rank than that of ordinary seaman?
    Dr. MACNAMARA: I understand my hon. and gallant Friend's point, and will put it to the naval authorities, but we have to have regard to the Service.

    TRADE BOARDS ACT.
    Mr. HOLTasked the Minister of Labour how many Provisional Order Bills have been passed for the purpose of extending the operation of the Trade Boards Act, the number of such Bills introduced which failed to pass, and the stage of procedure at which the failure took place?
    The MINISTER of LABOUR (Mr. George Roberts): In 1913 a Trade Boards Provisional Orders Confirmation Bill was introduced which included five Provisional

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    Orders. One of the Orders, which proposed to apply the Trade Boards Act to calendering and machine ironing in steam laundries, was opposed, and the Bill was referred to a Special Committee. The Committee rejected the Order relating to laundries and reported the Bill with this Amendment to the House. The Bill was then passed as amended. In 1914 a Bill was introduced to confirm a Provisional Order applying the Act to calendering and machine ironing in laundries. A petition was presented against this Bill, and it was referred to a Special Committee, which reported that it was unable to confirm the Order, and the Bill was accordingly withdrawn.

    PRISONERS OF WAR.
    Lord H. CAVENDISH-BENTINCKasked the hon. Member for Sheffield (Central Division) whether the representatives of the British Government at The Hague are empowered to make the necessary arrangements for the ship to leave Alexandria for the relief of the British prisoners in Turkey?
    Mr. JAMES HOPE (Lord of the Treasury): The necessary arrangements for the sailing of the repatriation ship, both those with the Turkish Government and those to be made by His Majesty's Government alone, are already complete in so far as they can be completed at the present time. All that is awaited is, firstly, notice of the date on which the Turkish Government will have the first 1,000 British prisoners ready for embarkation, and, secondly, the assurance from the other enemy Governments that the ship will not be attacked. On the first point the Netherlands Minister at Constantinople has been requested to press the Turkish Government, and on the second point the British delegates at The Hague have been instructed to press the German delegates to obtain an early reply from the German Government. A similar request has also been made of the Austrian Government through the Spanish Ambassador at Vienna.
    Mr. JOYNSON-HICKSasked the Under-Secretary of State for War whether on Whit-Sunday Lieutenant Medlicott, Royal Flying Corps, and Captain Walker, M.C., of the Queen's Regiment, were shot dead while attempting to escape from Bad
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    Colberg camp, in Germany, while at approximately the same time three German officers named Brane, Thielman, and Klaiff, who escaped from an internment camp at Water Lane, Stratford, were taken back on recapture, and then provided with hot baths and a substantial meal; and, if so, whether he can in any way justify the difference in treatment?
    Mr. MACPHERSON: From a report which has been received it appears that Captain Walter and Lieutenant Medlicott escaped from Bad Colberg and were recaptured. On the way back to Colberg they again attempted to escape, and refused to stop when called on by the guard. The latter fired, and both officers were mortally wounded. The three German officers who escaped from the camp at Stratford were given a hot bath twenty-four hours after their arrival back in camp. This was considered necessary by the commandant. They received, in the cells in which they are confined, the ordinary meal at the same time as all other officer prisoners of war interned in the camp.
    Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: Will the right hon. Gentleman answer the last part of the question as to the grave difference constantly recorded between the treatment of prisoners of war here and the treatment of prisoners in Germany?
    Mr. MACPHERSON: I am afraid it is quite impossible to effect any comparison between the two cases.

    NAVAL AND MILITARY PENSIONS AND GRANTS.
    Lord H. CAVENDISH-BENTINCKasked the Pensions Minister whether he is aware that local pensions committees are not informing the widows of sailors and soldiers of their right to receive a training Grant, but are advising them to take up work of a purely temporary nature which will cease at the end of the War; and whether he will give an undertaking that training Grants for widows will be available at the end of the War so that those who are now taking up temporary war work will not forfeit their right to the Grant?
    Mr. PRATT (Lord of the Treasury): My right hon. Friend is not aware of the fact stated in the first part of the question,

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    but he will undertake that the training facilities given by the Ministry shall remain open for a sufficient period after the end of the War, to enable widows, now engaged in war work of a temporary nature, to take advantage of them.

    SINN FEINERS INTERNED.
    Mr. KINGasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether facilities are provided weekly for all Irish interned persons who desire to attend Mass in the Roman Catholic chapels to be present at such religious service; whether those in Lincoln Prison have since their internment been prevented on any Sunday from attending Mass; if so, why; and whether in future all Irish Catholics interned will be allowed to attend Mass on days of obligation?
    Mr. BRACE: My right hon. Friend has asked me to reply to this question. Facilities for attending Mass weekly in the Roman Catholic chapels are provided for all the Irish prisoners interned in this country. Owing to his parochial duties, the priest at Lincoln is not able to say Mass in the prison on Sundays, but it is said on a, week-day. The same difficulty in the way of saying Mass on Sunday occurs at some other places of internment, but the priests will in all cases do their best to provide the necessary ministration.
    Mr. LOUGHasked the Home Secretary whether his attention has been drawn to a complaint from Mr. Darrell Figgis, now confined in Durham Prison, that, although he is allowed to receive Irish newspapers, when they arrive they are taken from him to be censored and never returned, so that they do not reach the prisoners, and that his letters from Ireland take a fortnight and three weeks in transmission; and whether he can have these matters put right?
    Mr. BRACE: Yes, Sir. There has been some delay, partly delay in the post, but not, I think, so great as suggested in the question. Arrangements have now been made which will expedite the delivery of newspapers, and letters will not be held up longer than one day for their examination by the Censor.
    Mr. LOUGH: Will my right hon. Friend see that newspapers are not taken away when they do arrive?
    Mr. BRACE: I do not understand that they are taken away.
    Mr. KING: Are Irish newspapers allowed to these prisoners, or only Unionist and such-like papers?

    WAKEFIELD CAMP (COMMAND).
    Sir H. CRAIKasked the Undersecretary of State for War what steps are to be taken with regard to the command at Wakefield Camp, in view of the disclosure at the court-martial held upon Quartermaster and Honorary Lieutenant Albert Canning?
    Mr. MACPHERSON: I have not yet received the court-martial proceedings in this case, and I regret, therefore, that I am at present unable to answer my right hon. and learned Friend's question.

    ARMY ORDNANCE CORPS (CLAIM FOR COMPENSATION).
    Sir B. FALLEasked the Financial Secretary to the War Office if he is aware that G. Herbert, of 3, Henrietta Street, Portsmouth, was pushing his truck along the high road on 29th November last when he was run into and knocked down by the runaway horses of the Army Ordnance Corps attached to a Red Cross van; that his truck was smashed; that he sustained a compound fracture of the left arm and had some ribs injured; and that a Court of Inquiry was held at Aldershot when it was stated that no blame attached to the Army and Herbert was referred to the National Insurance; and if he will see into the case and obtain compensation for Herbert, who is in his sixty-third year?
    Mr. FORSTER: My hon. Friend wrote to my right hon. Friend the Under-Secretary about this case in March last, and I found on inquiry that the facts were as stated by him. The accident appeared to have been quite unavoidable, and no liability whatever rested upon the public; but it was decided, in view of Mr. Herbert's age and circumstances, to make him an ex-gratia grant of £10, which Mr. Herbert accepted in full settlement of his claim towards the end of last month.

    WOOL PURCHASING DEPARTMENT.
    Mr. WATTasked the Financial Secretary to the War Office whether the same representative of the Wool Purchasing Department is to do the work this year in the South-West of Scotland; if so, will be give his name and previous experience in wool before becoming the War Office representative for this work; what remedy in the way of appeal against his decisions are farmers to have whose wool is wrongfully, in their view, graded as second-class or as broken wool; and have they simply to accept the buyer's statement of the value or are they to have any remedy for his wrong valuation?
    Mr. FORSTER: The answer to the first part of the question is in the affirmative. With regard to the second part, I would refer the hon. Member to a reply given to him on 19th December last. Any farmer dissatisfied with the district officer's valuation is at liberty to ask him to refer his case to the Advisory Committee on Wool Purchase for Scotland.
    Mr. WATT: Will the parties have an opportunity of being present while the wool is being condemned?
    Mr. FORSTER: I do not think we can give permission in every case, but it will be given as far as possible.

    VENEREAL DISEASE.
    Mr. LEES-SMITHasked the Home Secretary whether, in recent cases at Eastbourne and Newport Pagnell, women charged under Regulation 40D of the Defence of the Realm Act with having sexual intercourse with a soldier while having venereal disease have had their names and addresses published while the name of the, infected soldier has been withheld; and, if so, whether he will give instructions that either the names of both the man and the woman be published or both kept private?
    Mr. BRACE: I am informed that both at Eastbourne and Newport Pagnell the soldiers concerned went into the witness-box, and gave their names in the usual way. I do not know whether their names and those of the defendants were published in the Press or not. In any case, the Home Office has no authority either to compel or to prevent the publication of the names of defendants and witnesses.
    Mr. LEES-SMITHasked the Horn© Secretary whether he will issue instructions that women charged under the new Regulation 40D of the Defence of the Realm Act shall in all cases be informed that there is no power to compel them to submit to a medical examination against their will?
    Mr. BRACE: The Home Secretary has no authority to give instructions of this kind to magistrates, and no information has reached the Home Office to show that the issue of any circular on this subject is called for.
    Mr. LEES-SMITH: Cannot the Home Secretary give instructions to the chief constables, and is the right hon. Gentleman aware that in all these cases the women only submit to this examination, because they think it is compulsory, and that throughout the country this Regulation is being worked simply by trading on the ignorance of these women?
    Mr. BRACE: There is no necessity to issue instructions to chief constables, who know what is their position under the law.
    Mr. LEES-SMITH: Have instructions been issued to chief constables in connection with the Regulation to tell the women of their rights under the law?
    Mr. BRACE: I can only say for the Home Office that there is no reason for the issue of a special circular, but I will again look into the matter.

    HOLLAND AND GERMANY (RAILWAY TRAFFIC).
    Mr. R. MCNEILLasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if he can give any information as to the terms on which the Dutch Government have agreed to allow Germany to pass traffic over the railways through Limburg; whether this traffic will be subject to effective inspection by Dutch officials; and whether the effect of the agreement is to set free for purely military traffic the German lines to Belgium through Vise and Liége?
    Lord R. CECIL: Although His Majesty's Government have repeatedly pressed the Netherland Government for precise information respecting the arrangement arrived at with Germany, I regret to say that their request has so far not been met, though we have been told that the traffic

    721
    is to be confined to "civilian goods." I cannot usefully make any further statement on the matter at the present stage.

    CONSULAR SERVICE.
    Mr. R. McNEILLasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if he will say how many persons of enemy parentage hold official positions in the Consular service in stations in Allied or neutral countries; and whether it is the intention in future to employ exclusively persons of British birth and nationality in the Consular service?
    Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: There are no Consular officers in the salaried service of enemy birth. In the unsalaried service there is one unpaid Consul of German birth who was naturalised in 1898. His case was fully considered in 1915–16, and it was decided that his loyalty to this country could not be questioned. Amongst the Proconsuls whose duties are purely notarial there is one German who was naturalised in 1883. His case has also been considered. He has rendered excellent service during the War. With regard to the latter part of my hon. Friend's question, I would refer to the statement made by my Noble Friend in this House on 22nd August, 1916.
    Mr. McNEILL: May I ask whether the answer he has given covers all persons in official positions in the Consular service?
    Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: As far as I know, it covers all persons in official positions in the Consular service.
    Mr. BILLING: Does that also apply to the Foreign Office itself?

    MEDICAL WAR COMMITTEES, DERBYSHIRE.
    Sir H. CRAIKasked the Minister of National Service whether there is any local medical war committee acting in Derbyshire; and how it happens that Shirebrook, with a population of 12,000, has only two doctors, while Ashbourne, with a population of 4,000, has three doctors?
    Mr. BECK: Local medical war committees are now acting in the Glossop and Chesterfield areas of Derbyshire, and efforts are being made to form a new committee
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    for the rest of the county. With regard to the case of Ashbourne, the practitioners referred to serve not only Ashbourne but a wide surrounding district of hilly and difficult country. With regard to Shirebrook, a third doctor, who was in practice there, joined the R.A.M.C in 1915.

    WORK OF NATIONAL IMPORTANCE (ERNEST KABISCH).
    Mr. JOYNSON-HICKSasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will state what efforts he has made to find work of national importance for Ernest Kabisch, of the firm of All-hausen and Company, of Carter Lane, E.G., who it was stated would be required to undertake work of national importance forthwith; and will he say why Kabisch is still carrying on his own business?
    Mr. BRACE: I am informed that Kabisch is now employed in South Wales on work of national importance under the Controller of Timber Supplies.
    Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: Since when? He was working his own business last week.
    Mr. BRACE: Recently.
    Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: Since the question was put down?
    Mr. BRACE: No.
    Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: I think so.

    LONDON SCHOOL TEACHERS.
    Mr. KINGasked the President of the Board of Education whether he is aware of the number of temporary teachers now required by the London education authority; that this deficiency is due to many teachers resigning in order to take up better-paid work with more favourable prospects, and that there is discontent among women teachers; and what action he proposes to take?
    The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of EDUCATION (Mr. Herbert Fisher): I understand that the London County Council require in all about 800 "supply" teachers. A large number of such teachers is always needed in London, and some increase is now required; but I do not think it is largely attributable to resignations for such reasons as are suggested,

    723
    but rather to the absence of 2,000 teachers on military service, and to other exceptional circumstances. I am aware that there is some discontent among the women teachers, but on this point I would refer my hon. Friend to the answer given to him on 10th June.
    Mr. KING: As the discontent appears to be growing and persistent, will inspectors be sent into the schools to inquire what the real feeling of the women is?

    WIRE NAILS.
    Captain BARNETTasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Shipping Controller whether, in view of the shortage of wire nails and the necessity of obtaining immediate supplies from America, shipping space for this purpose was allocated early in May; whether he is aware that no wire nails have yet been shipped notwithstanding that large supplies have been ready for shipment; and, if so, whether this delay is due wholly or in part to the fact that the Shipping Controller in New York is without definite instructions?
    The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the MINISTRY of SHIPPING (Sir Leo Chiozza Money): I am obtaining information by cable, and will communicate it to my hon. and gallant Friend as soon as possible.

    CLAPHAM ELECTION.
    Mr. BILLING (by Private Notice)asked the Postmaster-General whether he is aware that at noon on Thursday, the 20th instant, a telegram was handed in at the Post Office at Clapham Common by Captain II. Spencer in the presence of the hon. Member for East Herts, addressed to the Prime Minister; whether he is aware that the Post Office authorities have informed the representative of the party machine that this telegram was never received; and what steps the right hon. Gentleman proposes to take to prevent the possibility of this incident reflecting upon the credit of one of His Majesty's Departments of State?
    The ASSISTANT POSTMASTER-GENERAL (Mr. Pease): Presumably the hon. Member refers to the Clapham Common office, and I am informed that this telegram cannot be traced.
    Mr. BILLING: Will the right hon. Gentleman make inquiries, and he will discover—
    Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Member is entitled to ask for information, but not to give it.
    Mr. BILLING: Has the right hon. Gentleman made inquiries of the assistant to the effect that she has admitted both to Captain Spencer and the Member for East Herts that she received the telegram and omitted to send it?
    Mr. PEASE: There are several offices in the district, but, so far as this particular office is concerned, there is no trace of the telegram.
    Mr. BILLING: Will the right hon. Gentleman accompany me to the office in question?

    WAR WORK VOLUNTEERS.
    Mr. ALBION RICHARDSON (by Private Notice)asked the Minister of National Service whether his attention has been called to statements in the Press that the Ministry propose to offer men in the later military classes work in civil life as an alternative to military service; and whether, in view of the importance of this matter to the men concerned, as well as to tribunals throughout the country, he can now state precisely of what these proposals consist?
    Mr. BECK: It is intended to afford protection from military service to certain classes of men who are accepted for vacancies and enrolled as War Agricultural Volunteers or as War Work Volunteers. It is not practicable to give the details of the proposals in answer to a question. Full instructions are being issued and copies will be placed in the Library. My right hon. Friend will also take the opportunity of explaining the proposals fully on Thursday.

    PUBLIC DEPARTMENTS (EMPLOYES).
    Mr. BILLING: I beg to ask leave to move the Adjournment of the House to call attention to a matter of urgent public importance, namely, the pernicious influence of both naturalised and un-naturalised subjects employed in public

    725
    Departments and enjoying the places made vacant by those killed or still serving in this War.
    Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Member will get an opportunity of raising a discussion of that matter upon the Consolidated Fund (No. 2) Bill which we are just approaching. He will be in a better position then than taking his chance of getting support to move the Adjournment of the House.
    Mr. BILLING: Will you take official cognisance of the fact that I am in the House on this occasion?

    PUBLIC DEPARTMENTS (EMPLOYES).

      Holloway Prison (Treatment of Female Prisoner).
      Mr. KINGasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether his attention has been called to the treatment of a young woman, charged on remand for travelling on rail without a ticket on 23rd May and following days, at Holloway Prison; whether this young woman was placed in a padded cell and forcibly fed; whether she was left for hours sobbing and crying, praying to God aloud so that other prisoners heard her, left alone without water, and insufficiently clad; and whether any inquiry, other than asking the Governor and prison officials for a report, has been or will be made?
      Mr. BRACE: I have seen in a newspaper the statement by another discharged prisoner upon which the hon. Member's question appears to be based. The young woman referred to in the question was remanded to Holloway Prison on the 24th May for medical observation and report. She was located in the observation ward of the hospital, but an attack of acute mania developed, and as she was very noisy and violent and was disturbing the other inmates, she had to be removed to the padded cell about 2 a.m. on the 25th. Later, owing to her refusal to take food, which she flung about her cell, she was given liquid nourishment by spoon. The statements that she was left without food or water for any considerable time, and that she was insufficiently clad, are quite unfounded. I am satisfied from the inquiries I have made that she was treated with the utmost consideration and care by the officers in charge of her, and that the allegations of ill-usage are malicious and untrue. The medical officer reported to the Court that the woman was in need
      726
      of asylum treatment, and she was accordingly handed over by the Court to the Poor Law authorities, and is now in Good-mayes Asylum.
      Mr. KING: Has the right hon. Gentleman observed that these statements have been widely published, with the name of the person who vouches for them, and is any action to be taken with regard to that person if, as stated, her statements are malicious?
      Mr. BRACE: I have personally gone into the evidence, and I have no hesitation in coming to the conclusion that the statements are both untrue and malicious.

      Juvenile Offences, 1917.
      Lord H. CAVENDISH-BENTINCKasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he will state the total number of children and of young persons, respectively, charged with offences in the juvenile Courts during 1917?
      Mr. BRACE: The number of children was 32,192 and of young persons 20,108. These figures are provisional and may need slight correction.
      Mr. WHITEHOUSE: Can the right hon. Gentleman state whether that shows a large increase over previous years?
      Mr. BRACE: Will my hon. Friend put that question down?

CABLE FACILITIES.

  STATEMENT BY MR. LEVERTON HARRIS.
  General CROFTasked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether, during 1916, the Chief Cable Censor was asked by a member of the Trade Department of the Admiralty to grant special cable facilities to a firm of which he was the principal shareholder; whether the Chief Censor acceded to this request after pointing out that it was absolutely necessary to confine all exemptions to strict and well-defined limits; if so, whether any advantages were gained by these special cable facilities; and whether the Government intend to take any action?
  Dr. MACNAMARA: From information furnished by the Chief Cable Censor at the War Office, I understand the facts regarding the matters raised in this question

  727
  are as follows: In April, 1916, the firm of Harris and Dixon, Limited, applied through my right hon. Friend the Member for East Worcestershire (who was then assisting in the Trade Division of the Admiralty) to have their cablegrams to their office in Spain exempted from delay. The ground of the application was that these cablegrams had reference to the chartering of Spanish steamers, mainly for carrying iron ore and food to this country or the Allies. The Chief Cable Censor, after requiring and receiving an assurance that the delay to these cablegrams was detrimental to national interests, granted the concession, which already at that date applied to a number of other firms whose business related to urgently needed war supplies. In September, 1916, the question was reconsidered by the Chief Cable Censor, who came to the conclusion that these concessions were not satisfactory, and a new system was devised, as a result of which they were withdrawn.
  General CROFT: In view of the conflict between the various answers given in this House, I beg to give notice that I shall call attention to this whole question on the Consolidated Fund Bill to-day.
  The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the MINISTRY of BLOCKADE (Mr. Leverton Harris): With your permission, Sir, I would ask for the indulgence of the House whilst I make a short statement regarding the charges which the hon. and gallant Member for Christchurch (General Croft) has thought fit to make against my personal honour in a question which he has to-day asked in the House. At the beginning of the War I offered my services to the Admiralty, and I was officially attached to the Trade Division, where I had to deal mainly with commercial matters. In April, 1916, I received a communication from the firm of Harris and Dixon, Limited, a firm in which I was at that time a large shareholder, but my directorship of which I had shortly before thought it proper to resign. In this communication the firm pointed out that the delay of sometimes three days in cables which they were exchanging with their branch office in Bilbao (and which largely related to the chartering and insurance of Spanish steamers which were carrying iron ore and food to this country or to the Allies) was making business impossible, and causing great delay to shipping, and they asked
  728
  whether their name could be added to the existing list of firms whose cables were specially dealt with by cable censor. If this request had been made by any other firm than one with which I was connected I most certainly should have followed the usual course, and would have asked the Department for which I was working to put forward an official recommendation to the Cable Censor that the name should be added to the list, but, in view of my connection with this firm, I considered that my correct course was not to put forward any recommendation whatsoever officially, but simply to inform the Chief Cable Censor (an official over whom I had no control, and for whom another Government Department is responsible) of Harris and Dixon's request and to leave the matter in his hands to decide.
  I want to make it perfectly clear to the House that the statement in the hon. and gallant Member's question that I had asked the Chief Cable Censor to grant special cable facilities to this firm is absolutely untrue. I merely communicated the firm's request to the Censor for him to grant or refuse, as he thought best. The Chief Cable Censor, in acknowledging Harris and Dixon's request, pointed out that no exemptions were made in private interests, but that if I would give an assurance that the firm's telegrams to Spain were mainly or largely on Government business and the delay was detrimental to national interests, he would add the name to the list. To this I replied that I felt no hesitation in stating that the delay in these telegrams was detrimental, and might be very detrimental, to national interests, and I added that, if the Chief Cable Censor should desire, I would gladly see the proper authorities at the Board of Trade and Ministry of Munitions and have my opinion confirmed.
  May I permitted to say that as this firm has been largely employed by the Government, and members of it have represented, and are representing to-day, the Government in important negotiations abroad, I thought some time ago that in view of my official position it might be more proper to entirely sever my connection with a family business which has been in existence for 150 years. I accordingly disposed of my shares to the other shareholders, and to-day I have no interest of any sort whatever in the business.
  I wish to thank the House for granting me that indulgence which it is always

  729
  ready to grant to any Member whose personal honour has been attacked, and for listening to this statement.

MILES' DIVORCE BILL [Lords.]
Message to the Lords to request that their Lordships will be pleased to communicate to this House Copies of the Minutes of Evidence and Proceedings, together with the Documents deposited, in the case of Miles' Divorce Bill [Lords].—[Mr. Clyde.]
ORDERS OF THE DAY.

  CONSOLIDATED FUND (No. 2) BILL.
  Order for Third Reading read.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read the third time."
  Mr. G. LAMBERT: The present occasion offers an opportunity for some suggestions and possibly some criticisms of the method in which the War has been conducted for the last three months. So far as I am concerned I shall indulge in nothing in the way of criticism that savours of a party character, nor shall I have anything whatever to do with personal recriminations. There is, however, one aspect of national feeling of which, I think, the Government cannot be ignorant—that is, that the country at this moment is irritated, apprehensive, and suspicious; and this House, though it may be constitutionally defunct, is, after all, still the mouthpiece of the people of the country. I hope that the House, and the Government, will not lose touch with public feeling in this matter. We have been fed with bucketsful of pap from the various fronts, though I am very glad indeed to acknowledge the inspiring news from Italy. We cannot, however, at this moment forget that the Germans in France are preparing another great spring—are preparing to launch another great offensive. There is a feeling, I say, expressed to me a few days ago by a very clean-living, honest English workman that it cannot be persistent bad luck that attends our Armies; there must be something behind it. That has been, I think, reflected in various localities and in other spheres of public interest. We have had an election of late which turned upon the question of the internment of aliens. It was a very significant election. Some 40 per cent. of the electors who polled voted against the Government candidate. It will be well if the Government are able to assure the country that they are taking every step to prevent anything in the shape of undue favouritism to Germans and others, born or naturalised, and now resident in this country. The Press at one time formed a means of educating and gauging public opinion. At this present moment, however the Press is gagged by the Censor to a degree which has never been known before. I want in this matter
  744
  to ask the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who is representing the Government, is he quite sure that the Government have given the soldiers fair play during the last three months? Has there not been some suspicion that the politicians are more or less—I hope less rather than more—conducting the War, and that the soldiers and sailors have been constrained to adopt a strategy which is contrary to their judgment? In the early days of the Dardanelles Expedition we knew that that was so—
  An HON. MEMBER: No!
  Mr. LAMBERT: I think my hon. and gallant Friend will forgive me if I say that I wish to convey that opinion. The failure of Russia was known last March twelve months. We were told from that bench opposite on 14th January that the Germans would be able to bring 1,600,000 men from the Russian front to attack our troops in the West. The Germans were preparing up to the hilt. Well, there were not many signs of harmonious energies here. On 12th November last we had a speech by the Prime Minister, who was in Paris. It was hardly eulogistic of the strategy of our General Staff. Then, on 21st January, we had a very violent Press attack upon General Sir William Robertson, and on 18th February General Sir William Roberston was dismissed. These are the dates between which the Government was busy preparing to meet the German offensive in the West. But it seems to me here on this occasion, as on all others, that it was a case of swopping horses in crossing the stream. True, it was that we had the Versailles Council But the Versailles Council as an executive authority broke down on the very-first day of the German offensive. General Roberston said it would break down. He refused to be associated with that particular form of executive authority because he thought it was unworkable. So the late Secretary for War stated. I have no doubt General Robertson had read Clausewitz, where, according to his translator, that eminent strategist was clearly of opinion that
  "A Conference generally results in nobody being convinced, and everybody retaining his original opinion."
  I am not going to say one single word to embarrass the distinguished French general who is the generalissimo of the forces in France.

  745
  The French are, indeed, displaying great fortitude. If we had the Germans within 40 miles of London we should require fortitude too. But there is no doubt in my mind, from what has come out, that there have been convulsions between the War Cabinet and the General Staff. We had the letter of General Maurice. He has stated since that on 30th April he wrote to the Chief of the General Staff pointing out certain facts. On 6th May he published his letter. I cannot believe that this great general officer faced the ruin of his military career for the sake of writing an inaccurate letter to the Press. Reading his criticisms as they have appeared in the "Daily Chronicle," they appear to me criticisms of a very sane and level-headed man. I imagine General Maurice acted the part of a very high-minded soldier and decided to ruin his military career for the sake of the Army of which he was a distinguished ornament. An inquiry has been refused, and we have never been able to get at the facts. Other hon. Members as well as myself have questioned the Government, and we have never been able to get at the facts as to why, on 21st March, the Fifth Army was overwhelmed by the German forces by something like three or four to one. According to General Gough himself, there were fourteen divisions of the British against forty German divisions, reinforced by eight or ten German divisions within two days. I want really to ask the Government whether it was really due to action taken in Whitehall that this Fifth Army had to defend this length of line?
  4.0 P.M.
  We were told in the Chancellor of the Exchequer in answer to a question by myself that Field Marshal Haig took over this line quite willingly and of his own volition. The Chancellor of the Exchequer must know that not once or twice, but more than twice, General Haig pro-tested against taking over this line with the forces he had at his disposal. I will ask still further whether the Government themselves did not, during the latter half of last year and the beginning of this year, neglect and reject the advice they received from their military advisers. I think that if the records of the War Office were searched it would be found that over and over again the General Staff of the War Office asked the Government to strengthen the Western Front and to abandon all secondary enterprises. When this disaster took place in France explanations were
  746
  given here and also in another place, and perhaps I may be allowed to quote the words of Lord Curzon, a member of the War Cabinet, who said:
  "There Seems to have been a tendency in some quarters to suppose that either from a reluctance to tap the available resources of man-power it this country or from a failure to appreciat military advice the British Army in France hat been allowed to decline numerically to a point fraught with peril. There is no foundation for such a suspicion nor were any apprehensions of such a character entertained or received. Our commanders were equally satisfied with the numbers, the equipment, and the moral of their forces."
  I ask the Government, Was this really an accurate statement of facts? Were our Commanders in France satisfied with the number of their forces? I hope I may be able to get an answer from the Chancellor of the Exchequer. I understand it was common knowledge that the Army in France, on the eve of that critical day, the 21st of March, was actually reduced. The divisions were reduced from twelve battalions of Infantry to nine, and brigades were reduced from four battalions of Infantry to three; and that was done a month before the 21st March, the critical day. Surely that fact shows that our forces in France were not up to establishment at that moment. We have had comparisons as between the 1st January, 1917, and the 1st January, 1918, but they do not matter. The critical date is the 21st March when the Germans attacked. I understand that if the British Army had been at its proper establishment on the 2lst March last there would have been from 100,000 to 120,000 more men there. We were told also by Lord Curzon in the House of Lords that the Eastern Expeditions had not withdrawn strength from the Western Front. Again I will read the Noble Lord's words, if I may—
  "I mentioned these two Eastern campaigns only in order to point out to your lordships that neither of them has been allowed to affect the fighting strength of the forces in France or in Flanders. No British troops have been taken from France for any Eastern theatre of war."
  That may be true, but did not the General Staff at the latter end of last year and the beginning of this, press for the withdrawal of troops from Palestine in order to strengthen the Western Front. Was not that the advice of the General Staff? I notice that the Chancellor of the Ex-cheques shakes his head. I must say when we get statements like this there ought to be an inquiry into the matter. I think if the archives of the War Office were

  747
  searched it would be found that the General Staff did make representations to the Government in favour of the withdrawal of forces from Palestine. They were not withdrawn, at any rate, until the 21st of March. I am very sorry to have to arraign the policy of the Government with regard to the East. There is not much doubt that the Prime Minister attached the very greatest importance to the expeditions in the East and so, too, did Lord Curzon, who appears to have played a very prominent part in the War Cabinet. He stated that the Western Front was
  "well equipped to look after itself, and if it had in any respect failed to do so the explanation must be sought elsewhere. It would not be found in denouncing the secondary campaign! of our Army the full value of which wight perhaps be even more visible at the Peace Conference of the future than now."
  Are we to risk the capture of Calais and Boulogne for the sake of keeping Jerusalem and Jericho. I venture to say it is not a good exchange, and if Lord Curzon wishes to be an Eastern Nabob I would suggest that the Government make him Caliph of Baghdad right away and let him assume his duties there at once. As far as I am concerned I do not wish to engage in any criticism except so far as they will tend to promote the successful prosecution of the War. If the Government would only successfully conduct the War, I would even go so far as to say they could close down Parliament and get on with their work. We have lavished men, money, and munitions; we have made many sacrifices, yet to-day we are back to the position of 1914, and the Germans, still arrogant and powerful, are preparing another great spring.
  The heroism and valour of the British troops are beyond all compare, but is there not something wrong in our system of conducting the War? Are we not waging war with the instruments of peace? Are we not conducting our war as if it were a kind of General Election? We proclaim loudly what we will do after the War, but everything depends on the successful prosecution of the War itself, and to-day, although the news is good from the Italian Front, I am afraid we are very far from that goal of victory which the Allied people are so anxious to reach. We have all sorts of legislation passing through this House. The War Cabinet is
  748
  engaged, and must be engaged, day by day with many things other than the conduct of the War. There is an Education Bill before us. There is an Emigration Bill. I really cannot follow all the Bills the House is asked to consider. I should have thought that all this litter of legislation might have been left until we had emerged with success from the War. We are told there is to be some legislation with regard to Ireland. What it is to be I do not know. We are told we are to have Home Rule for India. Do let me impress upon the Government the necessity of devoting their minds only and seriously to the conduct of the War itself. The War Cabinet, it seems to me, is engaged in keeping the peace amongst the various Government Departments. It is devoting itself to the price of potatoes, to horse-racing, to rationing, and such matters, but it is no use disguising from ourselves the fact that during the last eighteen months the present War Cabinet has not been successful in prosecuting the War. In shipping last year we lost very nearly 4,000,000 tons, and this year we have had, although I do not like to say it, some of the greatest military disasters in our history. I say respectfully to the Government that however much we may loathe, as we do loathe, Prussianism in time of peace, Prussianism is very effective in time of war. I do not suppose that Hindenburg or Ludendorff are bothering their heads about Education Hills or Home Rule Bills, or similar matters. These two distinguished men, and able men they must be, have pitted against them the strategy of our present War Cabinet. That is a great handicap for the British soldier to carry. I have not the slightest doubt if it came to the question of making speeches the War Cabinet would easily be their superior. But speeches are no substitute for strategy.
  I would suggest to the right hon. Gentleman, and he has great power in this matter, that the foundation stone of this War Cabinet should be that whoever carries it on must devote himself solely and wholly to the question of the War. I lay it down, I hope not too positively, that two members of that War Cabinet must be the First Lord of the Admiralty and the Secretary of State for War. Their official duties bring them in touch with everything connected with the War. For advising the War Cabinet there must be two men, and two men only—the First Sea Lord and the Chief of the General

  749
  Staff. You cannot be running about for advice in the highways and byeways seeking the advice that may suit you, because you will only then get sycophantic and not honest opinion, and that sycophantic opinion will have undue weight. Sir William Robertson gave to the War Cabinet considered counsel, but I have not the smallest doubt it did not suit the light and airy strategic castles in the air of some members of the War Cabinet. I think I can show that the members of the War Cabinet have gone outside their Chief of the Staff for advice as to the War. We had a speech here from the Prime Minister on the 20th December last in which he spoke in terms of the highest eulogium of the present Chief of the Staff. He said:
  "Sir Henry Wilson is not merely one of the most brilliant minds in the British Army but in and European Army. A profound student of strategy, he made a great reputation at the head of the Staff College and has had a unique experience in this War, not merely on the British but on the French and the Russian Fronts. Above all he possesses the gift of imagination, a gift which is rare even among soldiers."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 20th December, 1917, col. 2213, Vol. 100.]
  I cannot think that the Prime Minister could have eulogised Sir Henry Wilson in these warm terms without having met him. But at that time General Sir William Robertson was the Chief of our War Staff. One thing more I suggest in this connection. Sir Henry Wilson was appointed a member of the Versailles Council on the British side. I would like to ask, Was he appointed with the approval and concurrence of Sir William Robertson? If not, then it is a very serious matter, because it was indispensable that these two people should work in perfect harmony. One suggestion more I make is that in taking the advice of naval officers other than the First Sea Lord at the War Cabinet they should be accompanied by the First Lord himself. I know naval officers who are brilliant men of profound judgment, but they cannot talk, and when they are brought before a body of men whose chief quality is nimble-mindedness they are at a great disadvantage. It seems to me that you must select the best advisers, and you must trust them. In a multitude of counsellors there is not safety, but disaster, as was shown in the case of the Mesopotamia campaign. What I feel is that for any blunders committed at Whitehall our soldiers have to pay in blood, agony, and humiliation. We have never
  750
  yet been told about the things which have happened on the Western front, and many of us have spent sleepless nights thinking of those poor fellows who are undergoing the barbarities of German imprisonment.
  Two units of the German military and naval forces which have done us more damage than anything else are the "Goeben" and the "Breslau." Anyone who reads the description written by the United States Ambassador in Turkey about the arrival of the "Goeben" and the "Breslau" will see with what warmth those two ships were received by the Germans there. I was talking last night in Devonshire with a lady whose two sons went out with the First Expeditionary Force, and one of her sons was killed at Mons, the other being taken prisoner, and he has been a prisoner in Germany ever since the early days of the War, and he is now in Holland She made to me the remarkable statement that the British Government lost the war in the Dardanelles, and they would never have recovered but for the help of America. Be that as it may, the Dardanelles mistake was due to constraining naval opinion to accept advice against their will. We know that Lord Fisher resigned because of the Dardanelles, and he has proved to be right. General Robertson was dismissed on 18th February because he thought the Versailles Council would be unworkable, and he has proved to be right, and because the Government did not accept his advice to strengthen the Western Front in view of the coming German offensive, and in that he has been right. I ask that these two men should be recalled, and then we shall have no fear that our incomparable Navy and our heroic soldiers will render a good account of themselves in meeting the enemy. But they must have leadership, and it is leadership I ask the Government to give to our Navy and to our Army to-day.
  Colonel WEDGWOOD: I cannot help thinking that the speech to which we have just listened ought to have been delivered about two or three weeks ago. At that time the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Fife (Mr. Asquith) failed to make a case, and where the right hon. Gentile-man failed we can hardly expect the case made out in the speech we have just heard to take its place. I wish right hon. Gentlemen on the Front Opposition Bench would understand that in this perpetual bolstering up of the military as against the naval authorities, they are not fulfilling the

  751
  proper rôle of the Liberal party. Perpetual sniping at the Government may be all right, but when it has got a military background it is, to my mind, unfortunate and likely to have a very hampering effect upon the War Cabinet, which must take a strong line in regard to its military advisers. Everybody knows in this House that the ultimate direction of the War must rest with the Cabinet. If we think it is being directed wrongly, let us get rid of the Cabinet, but to hamper them in directing their military advisers seems to me to be the most fatal attitude that could be taken up by this House or by any official party. I think the right hon. Gentleman opposite said that generals complained that they have not got enough troops. Has the right hon. Gentleman ever met a general who thought he had enough troops? Every general naturally wants to strengthen his own forces beyond their present strength, and there has never yet been a general who did not resist every effort to transfer his forces or anything that would not keep those forces at full strength. It is the common practice of all military authorities to keep their command as strong as possible, and resist transferring any of their forces to somebody else. It is only human nature, and to allege that the Cabinet has not to balance the claims of one campaign or one set of generals against another and has not to decide for themselves which campaign has to be supported is unreasonable.
  Mr. PRINGLE: They must take the consequences if they are wrong.
  Colonel WEDGWOOD: Certainly, if a Cabinet is wrong, then it should go, but to say that they must not consider all the elements of the case and decide for themselves, even though their decision is contrary to certain military advisers seems to be foolish. Why should we now have a rehash of all the old struggle and controversy regarding Sir William Robertson and other people? Sir Henry Wilson is our Chief of the Staff now and our representative in France, and it can only weaken his hands to be perpetually girded because Sir William Robertson thinks differently. Sir Henry Wilson has all the information at his disposal, and I think the re-echoing of all these old squabbles in regard to the Dardanelles is unfortunate at the present time. The subject I wish to speak about to-day is the question of our relations with Russia.
  752
  The right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Fife, in his speech the other day, made what to my mind was a most important announcement as to which there has been, so far, no reply from the Government Bench. The Member for East Fife took up this case which, I think, is the true Liberal line. He said that we must not on any account write Russia off the slate. He echoed, and I think he was the first British statesman to echo the words which have been uttered by President Wilson, and he took up the line he has taken over the Russian situation. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Fife said:
  "I am not at all disposed to wipe Russia off the slate, or to assume the attitude of saying to Russia, 'You have failed us; you must now stew in your own juice, and you are no longer any friend to the Allies.' That is a policy of fatal shortsightedness, and in my judgment, with all the reserve of diplomacy and military and naval assistance, we ought if we can before it is too late, build up upon a new foundation the relationship of friendship and intimate alliances with the great Russian people if we can."
  That ought to be the new call to arms of the democracy in this country. For four or five months now we have been dallying in this country with the idea of a counterrevolution, and with the idea of establishing a Government in Russia to carry on the old attitude of the first revolutionary Russian Government. We have done everything in our power to work with those elements in Russia which were no longer in power failing to realise that all those elements in Russia at the present day are pro-German and not pro-Ally. It is true that in the Ukraine, owing to German bayonets the upper classes have recovered their power, but that recovery has meant a fresh enemy for the masses, and the beating back of the only friends we have got in Russia. The whole of Russia is now divided up into the people who have and the people who have not, but the people who have not, and who have the government of the country, are not the friends of the Germans. It is obvious that they cannot be really the allies of the German autocracy. They are being bullied right and left by the German autocracy. It is probably true that a certain number of their administrators are being bribed by German money, and over and over again, in spite of the efforts of the heads of the Bolshevik Government, no doubt some of their subordinates are selling us to the enemy. I

  753
  do not think that can be gainsaid. They are people with no money and are peculiarly liable to be bribed, but that is no ground for saying that the Bolsheviks are pro-German. What is happening must make them the potential friends of the Allied power. President Wilson has realised that the only hope of getting on the right side with Russia is to get on the right side of the Bolshevik Government. He has sent message after message to the Russian people, and has taken the strongest diplomatic action to protect the Russian people, so that now the only one of the Allied powers of whom the Russians will speak well and with whom they are in the least intimate is the American nation. This, although it is an advantage to the Allies, ought at least to be a hint to us as to how we might improve our relations with that power. We must first of all get it into the minds of the Cabinet that the assistance of a counter-revolution, however plausible it may appear, is doing far more harm than it can possibly do good. Every minor effort and every assistance given to anybody of enemy opinion, whether it be financial or otherwise, is immediately known to the Bolshevik circle, and is immediately used by them against Great Britain and the whole of the Allies. We must play the game straight with these people over there. Either do not recognise them at all and be man enough to try to turn them out of power or treat them as though they are, I will not say a sensible people, but at any rate a neutral Power with whom our relations had better be good rather than bad.
  At the present time you have America standing well with the Russian Power, but America has not as yet recognised Russia I want to know whether the question of the recognition of the present Russian Government has been raised by America, and whether we have checked the recognition of the Russian Government by America. That seems to me to be one of the important things. I want to know next what steps our Government are taking to come to a better understanding with the Russian Government. This is not a question of after the War. It is not a question of some future alliance. It is a vital question of to-day, because Germany, and particularly Turkey, are stretching their influence through Russia, through Caucasus, through Turkistan, and through the borders of our Indian Empire. Their influence in Persia and in
  754
  the Eastern Provinces of China is increasing at the present time. You have these things going on. It is true that they are not getting much foodstuffs and much economic assistance from Russia at the present time, but all the time that we are dallying with this question, and all the time that we are not on speaking terms with the Russian Government, this filtration is going on, and it is becoming a very serious danger to the whole of the future of the War. It is not merely that they are approaching the Indian Empire. There is nothing in the past history of Prussia, either in this or in previous wars, to lead one to suppose that they will not exploit the man-power of these conquered provinces, just as they would wish to exploit their economic power. Frederick the Great used the people of Saxony to fight his battles. He enlisted them, he controlled them, and he used them against the Austrians. Just in the same way, I am confident, if the War goes on long enough, you will see the Prussian Power enlist the men of the Ukraine and of Trans-Caucasus and bring them on to the Western Front.
  All this is possible in the future, and it is to stop this action that we must be on better terms with the Russian Government. I believe the Cabinet know that on this question they are simply drifting. They have sent a fresh Mission to Russia, which I do not think is altogether fortunate. I do not know whether they are leaving it to President Wilson, but in this matter it is our duty to take the lead rather than to follow in anybody's wake. The Russians have over here a representative, M. Litvinoff. He is not recognised by our Government, and communications take place with him through an intermediary, a most indirect and unfortunate way of doing business with any Government. I venture to suggest to the Government that they should appoint a Departmental Committee—I say a Departmental Committee, because it is more likely to be agreeable to the Foreign Office than a Parliamentary Committee, though I think a Parliamentary Committee would be more advantageous—and that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Fife (Mr. Asquith) should preside over that Committee, and that its duty should be to see how best relations between this country and Russia can be improved. Let them have before them M. Litvinoff, Mr. Marshall, and various other people who have just come back from

  755
  Russia, and know the people and the conditions there, and even the emigrés who have last their all in Russia, and are naturally bitter against the Russian Government. Let all these parties come before the Committee, and then let the Committee make recommendations to the Government as to how we can improve relations with Russia.
  The solution that I have in view, frankly, is simply this, that we should induce M. Litvinoff, by some means or other, to appeal for help to the President of the United States. There are plenty of occasions. The German Imperialists continue to press the Russian Government, and it is quite certain that they will never dare to make a real peace with the Bolshevik Government. It is toodangerous. There are plenty of opportunities for the Russian Government to appeal for help—I do not necessarily say immediate military help—and an appeal to the President of the United States for help would be the first step towards a satisfactory intervention in Siberia and in Russia by the Allies. Intervention that is asked for is as different as chalk from cheese from intervention forced upon a people against their will. The very idea of sending any of the Allies to intervene in Russia against the will of the Russians seems to me absolutely futile and absolutely damaging to the whole of the Allied cause. It is calculated to throw the whole of the Russian Bolsheviks, as well as the Bourgeois, into the arms of Germany to protect them from the Yellow Menace, not only that, but to destroy the moral of the whole of the Allies by attacking the Russian Revolution, just as we did the French Revolution in 1795, would be a disaster to our cause that we should never get over. Intervention which takes the shape of railway assistance—and already America has sent 300 railwaymen to help to organise the Siberian Railway—which takes the shape of financial reorganisation, which takes the shape of the importation of shoes and clothing and seeds, of which they are in urgent need, which takes the shape of any form of reconstruction and which may be followed afterwards, if you like, by military assistance to keep back the German hordes—anything of that sort at the request of the de facto Russian Government would be the best thing for the Allied cause and for the whole of our future in this War. It seems to me to
  756
  be the only way to prevent Germany from exploiting the man-power, as well as the economic power, of the old Slav Empire.
  To my mind, 25,000 American troops diverted from France to Siberia at the request of the Russians, would be worth 500,000 American troops in France. It is not only that it would attract German troops from the Western Front back to the Eastern Front, but it would make for the solidarity of the democratic powers throughout the Alliance, and it would be a nucleus round which an indefinite force of Slavs would rally for the future salvation of democracy against Imperialism. What you want in Russia to-day is a nucleus round which the people will rally. Not a small armed force which will attack the Revolution, but a small armed force to which the Revolution can rally in order to establish some sort of order, even a Revolution order, in Russia. I hope hon. Members will not go away with the impression that any form of counterrevolution in Russia is possible or practicable at the present time. The Revolution has given to the people a vested interest in the Revolution which no counter-revolution can really upset. They have given the people the land, and every man who has acquired land under the Revolution knows that if the Revolution is upset he will lose his land. That constitutes a vested interest in the Revolution far stronger than the vested interest of the French peasant in the French Revolution.
  A counter-revolution is impossible as a permanent solution of the Russian problem. Therefore, I think that the Bolsheviks, however deplorable their action may be, and however bad their tyranny, will at least last for a year, and that whatever change comes about, it will not be a change towards the re-establishment of autocratic rule. You will get, through a gradual modifying of Bolshevik tendencies, due to the amalgamation of the present Bolsheviks, with what they call the Social Revolutionaries of the Left, some form of sensible and stable government. You must not suppose that you have complete anarchy in Russia. There is a great deal of control exercised by the Central Powers over even the furthest confines of the Empire to-day. You have most of the towns governed at the present time by commissaries sent down from Petrograd or Moscow. They go down to the various towns right away at the end of Siberia, and they govern

  757
  and have direct communication with the Central Powers in Moscow. There is not that complete separation from all centralisation that one might imagine from the spread of anarchy in Russia. There is a certain cohesion and that cohesion is probably greater to-day than it was in the time of the Kerensky Government. You have now among these commissaries, who are actually governing the country, that kind of educated Russian Socialist who, although he is corrupt, yet has a vast faith in the social revolutionary doctrines, and a cohesion with his fellow revolutionaries right throughout the Russian Empire, so that at the present time there is, perhaps, more cohesion and more organisation in the Bolshevik Government than there was in the time of Kerensky Government, when there were extreme revolutions going on in the outlying parts and less solidarity of principle among the various governing Juntas. Therefore I come back to my suggestion. The first thing is to get appointed here a Departmental Committee, if possible, with the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Fife as Chairman, which shall consider how best we can improve the relations between England and Russia at the present time, hearing all the evidence, and then giving a concise report to the Government upon which the Government should act. That would stop this policy of drift, which has gone on long enough. It would give us a lead. The chairmanship of the right hon. Gentleman would be a pledge both to Russia and to America that the policy of President Wilson, of no hostility to the Revolution, would be the policy of that Committee. That is the first step to take towards improving our relations with Russia.
  If we are definitely to stem the German advance in the East, we must also see that our relations with India are improved. The Indian problem is one which becomes daily more important as the German and Turkish power gets nearer the confines of India. It gets more important as British Divisions are withdrawn from Palestine and Mesopotamia to fight on the Western Front. The position of India is becoming more important hourly, one might almost say. We are awaiting next week the considered policy of His Majesty's Government upon Indian Home Rule. I only wish to say this, without prejudging in the least what that declaration will be: If that declaration
  758
  can get behind it the full support of the Indian Nationalists, we shall have there a barrier against Germany which the Germans will be the last people to despise, and 315,000,000 of people who are willing to back the British Empire, because the British Empire does lead to liberty, will mean a force beside which the small Indian forces we have in Palestine and Mesopotamia at the present time will seem as nothing. You have got there a great people, only too anxious to back us and the French. I beg hon. Members, when this scheme is brought forward next week to try to see in it what will reconcile India, in spite of the past, with the British Empire, and not with jaundiced eyes to try to pick out all those parts in it which seem to detract from the old lordly position of the Anglo-Indian bureaucracy in India. We have now to look on the problems of our coloured fellow-countrymen with different eyes from those with which we used to regard them five or six years ago. We have now got our backs to the wall. We now want their help. When we are asking for help, do not let us ask them for help because-of the British Empire, because of what we have done for them in the past, but let us ask them for help because we, like they, want to win this War and put down-bullying and Imperialism everywhere in order to make the world safe for all democracies.
  Brigadier-General CROFT: I am not going to follow the hon. and gallant Gentleman (Colonel Wedgwood) in his various wanderings round the world. We should remember, before we take too literally what he says, what I believe is the fact, that he is generally regarded as being a Bolshevik, and has very strong Bolshevik sympathies. I want to deal with the more serious matter which was raised to-day at Question Time, and on which the House heard the statement of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Worcestershire (Commander Leverton Harris), who spoke immediately after questions. The House will understand that anyone who raises a question like-this regrets the necessity of raising a question of such a character. I wish it to be clearly understood that certain references which have occurred in the Press with regard to the right hon. Gentleman have nothing whatever to do with the subject I am raising to-day. I have-nothing to say in regard to certain

  759
  matters which appeared in the Press with respect to the right hon. Gentleman's relatives visiting German prisoners. As there was a persistent rumour in the Lobby with regard to the fact that the right ion. Gentleman was supposed to be in some way friendly towards the German Metal Trust at an earlier time, I may say I have nothing to say on that matter. Those questions have nothing whatever to do with the point I want to raise to-day. I hope that the House will consider this question apart altogether from those other questions, and will not allow those other questions to be considered in this connection at all. It has been suggested that the easy thing to do with a case like this is to let it go by, and that, as the right hon. Gentleman made a statement, perhaps it would be better not to follow it up. I cannot take that view, because it seems to me to be of vital importance that this House should guard its traditions, and, even if the matter is a small one—I think I can prove it is not—it is equally necessary to take notice of a question which, I find, has been known among many people for some time past. I would ask the House first to consider the question as it was raised by my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Ludlow (Major Hunt) on 18th March this year. On that date he asked the following question:
  "Whether ill 1915 or 1916 any directions were given by the trade division of the Admiralty permitting to certain firms priority in cabling; and, if so, if he will give a list of these firms to whom priority was granted and the dates on which instructions for such priority were issued?"
  I want the House to notice particularly the answer of the Parliamentary Secretary to the Admiralty:
  "Dr. Macnamara: I am informed that no general directions have ever been given conferring priority in cabling. When it has been necessary for firms to send cables on Government business, such cables have from time to time been expedited at the request of the Department affected. Each such case has been judged on its merits, first by the Department making the request, and then by the Chief Censor."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 18th March, 1918, col. 646, Vol. 104.]
  The House will see that that directly contradicts the statement of the right hon. Gentleman to-day. He said that he was applying for a privilege which was already extended to certain other firms. Here we have it specifically stated that this had not been done. To-day I received from the Parliamentary Secretary
  760
  to the Admiralty quite a different answer. He made a very frank and perfectly correct statement of the case, so far as I can make out with regard to this subject. This brings me to the fact that my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Ludlow, who I am sorry to say is indisposed and is not able to raise this question himself, asked another question, and again received an evasive reply. The result is that my hon. Friends and I consider that it is really essential that the matter should be raised in the House In the first place, I want to point out that the right hon. Gentleman as he stated to-day, was very much interested in the house of Harris and Dixon, Limited, which is the firm mentioned in this correspondence. He was, I believe, an original director in 1902. He told us to-day that he sold his shares. I do not know when he sold those shares, but I had information that on 24th October, 1917, there was a statement which said that he was still a shareholder, but he may have sold his shares before that time. At any rate up till recently he was the largest shareholder in a company with twelve directors. I do not think that a great deal of comment is necessary. It will, however, be necessary, if the House will bear with me, to read the correspondence, which itself is the best comment. I must read practically the whole of the correspondence, which comprises four or five letters. The first letter which I have here is written from the Admiralty War Staff on 18th April, 1916, as follows:
  "Commander Leverton Harris presents his compliments to the Chief Censor and has been requested by Messrs. Harris and Dixon. Limited, of 81, Gracechurch Street, E.C., to ascertain whether any arrangement can be made whereby the present delay to their cables to and from Spain can be overcome. He understands that cables to Spain are delayed for about forty-eight hours, and as the messages sent by Messrs. Harris and Dixon mostly relate to freight and insurance rates the time taken to obtain a reply makes business practically impossible. Messrs. Harris and Dixon understands that there is a special list of firms whose cables are allowed to go through promptly, and ask if they can be pleased on this list. They are prepared to enter into any bond or guarantee that all their cables are innocent business messages. The outward cables are addressed to Harris, Bilbao, and inwards to Harris Dixon, London."
  My comment on that letter is, firstly, that it should not have been written as from a member of the Admiralty War Staff requesting preferential arrangements for his firm, and, secondly, I think there should have been a statement in that letter

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  making it quite clear that the authority asking for this, namely, the right hon. Gentleman, was himself the most largely interested person in that firm. That is the only comment I desire to make on that letter. The second letter is dated 19th April, 1916. It is the reply from the Chief Censor and reads:
  "The Chief Censor presents his compliments to Commander Leverton Harris, Admiralty War Staff, and with reference to his note of 18th April, 1916, preferring a request by Messrs. Harris and Dixon for preferential treatment in regard to their cable correspondence, begs to say that if the delay in telegraphic correspondence to Spain, which has been imposed at the special request of the French Government, is to remain effective, it is absolutely necessary to confine all exemptions within strict and well-defined limits. No exemptions from the delay have hitherto been made in the private interests of particular firms, and to give an exemption on those grounds would make it impossible to resist innumerable demands for similar treatment. If, however, Commander Leverton Harris gives an assurance that the firm's telegrams to Spain are mainly or largely on Government business, and that the delay is detrimental to national interests, the Chief Cable Censor will add the firm to the very limited number of those who now enjoy an exemption from the delay on similar grounds."
  The only comment I make on that letter is to point out the fact that it is impressed upon the applicant how necessary it would be, if this delay was to remain effective, to keep it within strictly defined limits. I would also point out, following what the right hon. Gentleman said to-day, that the Chief Censor at that time was certainly under the impression that no exemptions from delay had hitherto been made in the private interests of particular firms. The third letter is from the right hon. Gentleman to the Chief Censor and is dated 20th April, 1916:
  "Commander Leverton Harris presents his compliments to the Chief Censor and begs to thank him for his communication C.C./5451 (M.I. 8) regarding the transmission of telegrams from and to Spain. Commander Leverton Harris has received the enclosed letter from Messrs. Harris and Dixon, Limited. Prom this it will be observed: (1) That the cables practically entirely relate to the chartering and insurance of Spanish steamers that are mainly carrying iron ore and food to this country or to the Allies. (2) That they are confined to communications between the firm Harris and Dixon, Limited, London, and Harris and Dixon, Bilbao, which is solely managed by an English manager. Under the circumstances Commander Leverton Harris feels no hesitation in stating that the delay in telegrams passing between the two houses is detrimental, and might be very detrimental, to national interests. If the Chief Censor should desire it, Commander Leverton Harris will gladly see proper authorities at the Board of Trade and Ministry of Munitions and
  762
  have his opinion confirmed. He quite understands the difficulty of making exemptions in particular cases, but in this ease exemption is asked only for messages passing between two British houses."
  5.0 P.M.
  I have read that for the simple reason that the right hon. Gentleman read it at Question Time and desires that that point of view should be made perfectly clear. It is also necessary, although it does not add very much, for me to read the letter enclosed from Messrs. Harris and Dixon to the right hon. Gentleman:
  "Cables with Spain.
  Dear Sir,—In reply to the communication you have received from the Chief Cenor's Department we would respectfully point out that the cables referred to are cables which are exchanged between this firm and our own house, trading in our name, situated in Bilbao, and: which is solely managed by an English manager. The cables practically relate to the chartering of Spanish steamers whose bona fides we are prepared to guarantee, and those charters are mainly for the purpose of engaging these Spanish steamers in carrying iron ore to this-country, in the conveyance of grain and other cargoes from neutral countries to this country and/or the countries of our Allies, and also to the insurance, principally against war risks and marine perils, of the steamers on these voyages and the necessary bunker supplies for the steamers to enable them to perform the voyage. We have found from past experience that the results of the serious delays in getting replies to our cables is that some of these friendly Spanish owners fix their steamers for other businesses and between neutral countries, because they find they have not to experience the delays in exchange of messages with this country and the uncertainty as to the possibility of insuring their interests and securing bunker coals when trading with this country or to our Allies. You will bear in mind that the Spanish owner has no Government war risks insurance scheme into which he can automatically place his steamers when trading to this country, and therefore he is dependent upon our war risk market, which, as you know, fluctuates violently from day to day. Of course there are occasions when he can fix these Spanish steamers with cargoes destined for their own country, Spain, which is neutral, but those fixtures from a minority.—Yours faithfully, Harris and Dixon."
  The next letter was a reply from the Chief Censor, dated 21st April, 1916:
  "The Chief Censor presents his compliments to Commander Leverton Harris, and is issuing instructions to exempt telegrams exchanged between Harris and Dixon, London, and Harris and Dixon, Bilbao, from the usual delay."
  The next is a minute from the War Office, Whitehall, S.W., 21st April, 1916:
  "Telegrams exchanged between Messrs. Harris and Dixon, Limited, of 81. Gracechureh Street, and Messrs. Harris and Dixon, Bilbao, will be exempt from the usual delay of forty-eight

  763
  hours, as they refer mainly to the chartering of Spanish steamers for carrying goods to (the United Kingdom and Allied countries.
  Arthur Browne, Major A.S.,
  Deputy Chief Censor."
  Mr. P. A. HARRIS: Are these official documents, and, if so, how did they get into the hon. and gallant Gentleman's hands?
  General CROFT: These documents are official, and they came into my hands. The important part of this letter is that it has the authority quoted at the bottom, and the authority quoted was the right hon. Gentleman himself. The last communication is:
  "Commander Leverton Harris presents his compliments and begs to thank the Chief Censor for his communication, from which he notes that instructions are being issued to exempt telegrams exchanged between Harris and Dixon, London, and Harris and Dixon, Bilbao, from the usual delay.
  Admiralty War Staff, 22nd April, 1916."
  It will be seen from these letters that the present Secretary to the Blockade Department when a member of the Admiralty War Staff applied for special preferential facilities for a firm in which he was so largely interested, secondly, that the application was made from the Admiralty War Staff, and, I submit, ought never to have been made; thirdly, that the application, if granted, would give Messrs. Harris and Dixon priority over other competing firms so that they could select the cream of the freights offering and could pick and choose their cargoes, if that was so, obviously to the grave disadvantage of other firms; fourthly, the Chief Censor replied that
  "if the delay in telegraphic correspondence to Spain, which has been proposed at the special request of the French Government, is to remain effective it is absolutely necessary to confine all exemptions within strict and well-defined limits."
  Further, he said that no exemption from delay had hitherto been made in the interests of private firms. It seems to me that this was a very emphatic statement which made it all the more necessary that a different course should have been pursued. The right hon. Gentleman went out of his way to take an unusual course. No one who is connected with any business whatever should in any official capacity have been permitted to send such a letter. Further, he submitted the letter without stating that he was connected with the firm, and it was most desirable that he should have mentioned
  764
  that. We are not informed that the Chief Censor could have known it and certainly those in the Department need not have known it. Fifthly, the letter said if the right hon. Gentleman
  "can give assurances that this business is mainly or largely Government business and that the delays are detrimental to national interests special facilities, etc., can be given."
  No such claim could be made. The whole of the shipping of this country is for the national interests at present. They are all equally concerned over such things as iron and feeding stuffs between the Allies and between this country and neutral countries. The right hon. Gentleman put it on the ground that refusal might be detrimental to the national interest. That is true of every single firm engaged in business at present. The final letter sanctioning the preferential treatment to Messrs. Harris and Dixon was signed by the Deputy-Chief Censor at the War Office, and the authority for this was the right hon. Gentleman himself. I make the specific charge that the right hon. Gentleman, whilst on the Admiralty War Staff, asked for and secured a great trade advantage to this firm with which he had very large connections, and from his official position he exercised influence. He was the authority actually quoted in the final decision. The Government must take action in this case. I hope there will be no attempt whatever to say that this is only a small thing. If we in this House condone what may be small matters in the outset of this description, which might run into enormous financial advantages, there is no hope that you are going to keep the administration in this country on pure lines. Unless we take our stand and say that this thing cannot go on we shall be failing in our duty, and I hope the Government will make no effort whatever to excuse it. We have had a great many vague charges made in recent times, which have been in some cases altogether unwise. The result is that when anything of this kind arises we naturally desire not to discuss it, but we have a duty as Members of this House and as representatives of our constituents, and we have a duty above all others, at this time, when the whole nation is engaged in this great struggle for its existence, that we should see that the standard and position of public life are maintained, and we should expose anything which we consider violates its traditions.
  Mr. KING: I do not propose to follow the hon. and gallant Gentleman in dealing with what, though a serious matter, is one of minor importance. I propose to refer to the immense subject which has been so ably treated by my hon. and gallant Friend (Colonel Wedgwood). He referred to the very striking words of the Leader of the Opposition on Tuesday last when he said he was unwilling to wipe Russia off the slate, and had no sympathy with that point of view which would say to the Russians, "You have failed us, therefore we will leave you to stew in your own juice." The applause and general sympathy with which that statement was received from all parts of the House demand that the Government should make some reply. We have had three days of Debate on this Vote of Credit, and it has not yet attempted any reply. I hope we shall not assent to the Third Reading of this Bill without some definite statement from the Government as to their policy and aims in this matter. I shall attempt a few criticisms on the past policy and the present position of the Government. I am glad to bear in mind the words of Lord Curzon, which he uttered before he was in office, on the value of criticism, when he declared that criticism during war was just as patriotic and much more useful than silence. I have always tried to carry out that maxim, and though I have not always been very successful, having in my attempt to deal with the Russian question suffered not only being counted out, being closured, being shouted down, having the Government move that my speech be delivered only in Secret Session, and various other incidents, which I need not particularise, I still feel that I have been, in the main, right on the lines I have taken about Russia, and it is because I am convinced that I have been in the main right and can point to my record in support of that that I propose to say a few words more.
  The main line I will take up to-day is that our policy with regard to Russia in the past has been too much that of bribing or bullying, just as our policy, I believe, with regard to Irish recruiting at present has oscillated between bribery and bullying. We kept Russia in the War by promising Constantinople, and since she went out of the War we have been inclined to threaten and bully her, and, indeed, we have on many occasions actually bullied her representatives
  766
  within our gates. I say that definitely, and I feel it strongly, and it can be supported by figures in connection with the recruiting of Russian aliens here. We have, or we had two years ago, within these islands, something like 25,000 Russian subjects of military age. We have, in one way or another, by voluntary or compulsory recruiting, brought about 5,000 of them into the Army. There are perhaps more. Some figures I have intimate that there might have been 8,000 of them brought into the Army. At any rate, large numbers have been brought in, but there is a constant agitation going on against Russian subjects now here who are not in the Army. Although Russia has gone out of the War, we are still continuing to press into our Army and the fighting forces the Russian subjects here. The Russian Government has protested against this conduct in view of the fact that Russia is no longer a belligerent and no longer in alliance with us. I think that policy needs some justification, but may I point out why I particularly condemn this treatment of the Russians within our gates? It is because we are not treating the other alien inhabitants at all on the same basis.
  We have here some 13,000 Italians of military age, and capable of bearing arms. How many of these have joined the Army? Only 700, whereas you have probably 7,000 Russians—ten times as many from only twice the number. Of course, there is no agitation against the Italians, because it is not organised and incited by the Press. When you see throughout the Northcliffe and other Press constant agitation got up, you may know that it is part of the suggestion or policy of the Government. Moreover, look at this fact. The Russian Exemption Authority has granted about 1,500 exemptions from military service. How many exemptions has the Italian Ambassador granted? Over 3,000. With half the number of men to deal with, the Italian authorities have granted twice as many exemptions as the Russian, and the case is all the more grossly absurd when you come to think of this. The great majority of Russians here are engaged in two trades, the clothing trades, largely in khaki clothing manufacture, and the wood making—which is at the moment almost exclusively working on packing cases for the Army and such furniture as is required for hospitals, camps, etc. The Russians are

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  working in two necessary trades; the Italians, on the other hand, are mostly cooks, waiters, confectioners, or those who carry on small shops of that class and are not at all engaged in necessary trades or trades in which women or unskilled persons could not take their places. I say, therefore, if you compare the treatment which has been meted out by our Government to the Italians and the Russians within our gates, you see that there has been a persistent attempt to bully the Russians here. For the last year and a half, ever since the Revolution, the policy, which had been one of bribery towards the Russian Government before—handing out any amount of ammunition, of monetary loans, assistance of all kinds and terms of vast territorial aggrandisement, like Constantinople and Northern Persia—the policy which we pursued of bribery to Russia before the Revolution has become one of bullying to Russia since. Let me support my contention by referring to another matter, the treatment meted out to two distinguished Russians here after the Revolution.
  At the present time there are very few Russian politicians in power whose names are known—perhaps not more than a dozen. Two of these were recently prisoners within our gates. One of them is Mr. Petroff, who is now the Russian Ambassador to Vienna, and the other is Mr. Tchitcherine, who is the present Russian Foreign Secretary. Of course these men are Bolsheviks, and I am not here to defend them in any particular way, but I do want to point out that when they were here at the beginning of the War they were let alone. Mr. Petroff, indeed, was imprisoned before the Revolution broke out, but it was only after having been here for three years during the War that Mr. Tchitcherine was imprisoned. The treatment that both these men received—and remember they are men at the present time of authority and great influence in Russia—was pitiable. When I asked a question about Mr. Petroff's treatment here in the House the Home Secretary got up and made a statement that one of the reasons why he was interned was that he went about with a German woman. The fact, of course, was that he was married to a German lady, and when he went to Russia later on she was recognised as his wife. But the attempt of the Home Secretary was to ignore the fact that he was married to this woman, and to make it
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  Appear that he was interned for having enemy associations. The whole meanness and absurdity of the Government in regard to the revolutionary Government can be seen in the pettiness of the way in which they persecuted this man. And now, of course, when our Ministers and representatives in Russia ought to be on good terms, at any rate personally, with these men, they have raised personal difficulties in the way of proper negotiation, and have created the suspicion, which is widely spread in Russia, that our country, our Government, and our policy are Imperialist, that they would deal with the Czar and his friends and his policy with a generosity, a wholehearted support which they deny to democratic and free Russia. The reason why I bring up a matter of past history in the way of criticism is that it points a practical suggestion at the present time. I strongly deprecate, and I think the Government ought to deprecate, the vile and unmeasured abuse which is being levied against revolutionary Russia and the leaders of the Revolution at the present time. They may be in manners, in policy, in social matters, and political ideas far away from us; they may be aliens in spirit to us, but, after all, we have got to live in the same world, and I believe that democratic Russia, different though it may be from us, is as worthy of our sympathy and support as was Czarist Russia.
  That evidently is the opinion of President Wilson, who, not a fortnight ago, repeated what he had said previously, and has said in fact frequently, that it was the duty of America to stand by Russia at this time as much as it was the duty of America to stand by France or Great Britain. Are we taking steps to stand by Russia in the spirit of President Wilson's speech? I do not see that we are. I cannot imagine what the Government is doing to show it has either the will or intention or any power to act in this way. Possibly we shall hear later on, but almost every act in connection with Russia that is brought to our notice is at the same time one that will make us suspicious rather than support the policy of the Government. I must refer to another matter which I will do very briefly, the way in which our Government, after the Revolution, continued to pay and support the Ministers and representatives and servants of the Czar. We are at the present time supporting and paying here Czarist

  769
  Ministers, Mr. Nabokoff especially, who have been repudiated by the Russian Government, and who have constant access to our Foreign Office here, while Mr. Litvinoff is not allowed to go anywhere near the Foreign Office, or was not a little while ago. If Mr. Nabokoff is paid by the Government at the present time, with no recognition whatever from the de facto Russian Government, the Russian people can only conclude that we want to turn their present Government out, that our aim is to interfere with the internal relations of Russia, and that we want to set back in power the Ministers whom we continue to pay and support. I mention this matter of history, which is present history, too, for this reason, that it suggests a course of action at the present time. I think what we ought to do at the present time is to ask Mr. Nabokoff to return to Russia or to go to some other country. I do not want in any way to involve him in imprisonment or suffering, and I would not send him to Russia, but the last thing we ought to do is to keep him here continuing his residence at a great house like the Russian Embassy and to continue to pay him his salary. We ought not to continue the salaries of officials of the Russian Government as we are doing. All these things are not helping; they are causing suspicion, irritation, unrest, and, if we are going to get at real relations with the Russian Government that will be helpful and enable us to do, something to strengthen that great territory with all its various inhabitants against German factors and military despotism, it must be by getting some means of contact, some better relations with the representatives of the Russian revolutionary party in power at the present time.
  Let me mention one more fact, which will illustrate the impossible position and the unnecessary suspicion which the Government creates in Russia and amongst the Russians in favour of the Revolution. As no one is allowed to enter Russia at the present time without Mr. Litvinoff's passport, you cannot send a merchant to Russia, or a commercial mission like that which has lately gone there, without the signature of Mr. Litvinoff, and there are various other matters of a formal nature which make it absolutely necessary that there should be some sort of touch with the Bolsheviks. The communications, such as have
  770
  been achieved, have been by means of a messenger, but so suspicious have been the Foreign Office and the Government that, up to recently, this gentleman has not been allowed to go to the Foreign Office. They refused to send communications out to his house, and it was represented to him that if papers were to pass from one party to another it would be necessary that he should meet their messenger somewhere in the street or at a public place, such as a restaurant. The result has been that you have had communications of a regular, unobjectionable and a necessary kind going on between the Russian representatives and our Government under such conditions that he has been unable, because he has not been allowed to go to the Foreign Office door, and he has had to meet a messenger somewhere in the street or elsewhere and deliver or receive papers. I am glad to say that has recently been mitigated, but surely it is indicative of the spirit which lies behind the Government in its relations towards the Bolsheviks?
  The Bolsheviks may not have been our choice, but they are at the present time undoubtedly the choice of the people of Russia. When they came into power at the beginning of November, and every week since, Reuter's and the "Times" newspaper have been prophesying their speedy collapse, but I believe the best authorities and the best informed persons who know the state of Russia at the present time have no such anticipations as to the speedy collapse of the Bolshevik Government. It therefore becomes doubly important for us to get away from these old traditions of bad relations and try to treat the Russian people without suspicion, without irritation, and without injustice, on the same basis as we treat other nations, not by bullying, and not by way of penalising them for the disappointment which they have caused. I, therefore, come to the proposal which has been so well put forward by the hon. and gallant Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme, that a Departmental Committee should be set up at the Foreign Office, and that, if possible, the right hon. Member the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Asquith) should be in the chair, and that that Committee should report as quickly as possible, after taking evidence from men of business, officials, and such Russians as would attend, on the best means by which we can get into closer and satisfactory

  771
  relations with the Russian people. I believe that is a very admirable suggestion. At any rate, it is a practical one.
  It may not be possible to recognise with all the formalities of established government the Bolshevik Government at the present time, but let me remind the Prime Minister that there are great volumes of opinion in favour of that course. One of the papers which has most strongly supported the Prime Minister in most of the matters of the War, the "Manchester Guardian," has for two months past urged that we should recognise the Bolshevik Government in Russia. Whether that is possible or not, I will not say, but, at any rate, it would have this advantage—that the present impossible condition would be brought to an end, under which our enemies, Germany and Austria, have their representatives at Moscow and the Bolsheviks have their representatives in Berlin and Vienna, while we have no representatives on either side. This impossible condition must come to an end, and I hope that, as this matter was raised nearly a week ago, the Government will be able to give some reply and will be able to tell us that they have a policy, well thought out, that will get the support of the Allies generally, and which will place our relations with Russia upon a new and increasingly satisfactory and a sounder basis.
  Mr. PR INGLE: We are delighted to have the Prime Minister with us this afternoon, and it is gratifying to the House of Commons that he can spare from his arduous and exacting duties an hour of his valuable time in order to be present to listen to this Debate. We had hoped that, having come down for that period, he would have been able to intervene before now. Last Tuesday a very important Debate took place in this House, in the course of which, I think most hon. Members will agree, a good deal of valuable criticism was passed on the recent phases of warlike operations. A large number of very important and pertinent inquiries were addressed to the Government. A question was addressed to the Leader of the House as to whether he or the Prime Minister would reply to the criticisms and inquiries, and we were assured that although the reply would not be forthcoming in the course of that discussion that nevertheless on the Third Reading Debate a full reply would be
  772
  available from the Government. It is obviously inconvenient to attempt to recapitulate the observations of all the speeches made last Tuesday, or in any way to cover the ground which was then gone over, but I think my right hon. Friend the Member for South Molton (Mr. G. Lambert) put in a very strong and clear way this afternoon a great many of the points which have exercised hon. Members in regard to the later phases of the War. We know, of course, the arrangement, for which the Prime Minister is himself very largely responsible, which was made in the first instance tentatively in November, in regard to the Versailles Conference. We were then told that it was only an advisory and not an executive body. There was a further arrangement in January, in which the Council which we had been assured was only advisory was made executive, and then we had what appeared to be a supersession of the Council altogether by the creation of General Foch as the supreme strategic officer—I think that is the right term, and not Generalissimo—in connection with the Allied forces in France.
  This House is naturally concerned in regard to all these matters and as to the exact effect which they had had upon the force of the campaign. We are told, for example, that the Supreme War Council never really came into operation; that before the 21st March it had never, to use an American phrase, functioned at all. We should be very glad to be informed by the Prime Minister whether that is the case. A number of questions in regard to what is called unity of command were put in the speech of the hon. Member for Pembroke (Mr. Roch). He asked what effect unity of command was having on the distribution of the British and French forces in the various parts of the line. That question is obviously very important from the point of view of British interests in many ways, not only in view of possibilities if the War takes an adverse direction, but in respect of a matter to which he made very special reference, and that was in regard to the arrangement for dealing with the wounded in the more recent push made by the Germans, which began on Whit-Monday. I think we are entitled to information on all these points. Another question upon which the right hon. Gentleman might give some information to the House is the much canvassed question of the

  773
  strength of our Armies on the Western Front. I am not going to revive the controversy, which has been dealt with in several Debates, as to the comparative strength in our forces this year and last, and whether, for example, the 1st January this year and on the 1st January, 1917, are the right dates to take for the purpose of ascertaining the relative strength of the forces at the beginning of the respective campaigns. The real essential point, as my right hon. Friend opposite said, is the strength of the Army on the 21st March, and I think he raised a very important point in regard to that as to whether the recommendations of the General Staff with regard to the reinforcing of the Army had been carried out for the purpose of this campaign.
  Up to the present we have been left very much in the dark on all these questions, and I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will be able to throw some light upon them. There is another point which I am not sure was made in formal debate, but it is one of relevance, and that is the relative number of our men who are available for Infantry purpose and those who are engaged in other services in France. That is a question upon which men in this country are very anxious to be reassured, because at the present time you are calling up older men all over the country, and there is a great deal of anxiety as to the way in which these men are being called up. If that is so, I think that we should be assured that the men who are actually in the Army are being used in the most effective way possible. I have heard a statement made as to the proportion of Infantrymen as compared with the other Services which indicates that the proportion in our Army is smaller than in any other of the belligerent Armies on the Western Front. I do not know how far that matter has come before the War Cabinet. Some people who have these figures put to them are inclined to lay the whole of the blame upon the Higher Command in France, but I remember that this question was raised more than a year ago by the right hon. Gentleman the Minister of Munitions, and at that time he addressed to the Government the advice that the Army should be told to comb itself. We are naturally anxious, now that the Government has no longer to face such a vigorous critic as the Minister of Munitions, to know whether the advice which he gave as an independent Member
  774
  has been carried out since he joined its ranks. Undoubtedly, if it is true that the number of men who can take their place in the ranks as Infantrymen is so small as I have heard suggested, it is obviously the first duty of the Government to see that more adequate arrangements are made, more particularly in view of the measures which are being taken to call up men in this country.
  There is one other question which I think should be answered by the right hon. Gentleman in relation to the calling up of the older men. When the last Man-Power Bill was introduced, both the Prime Minister and the Leader of the House gave us certain calculations as to the number of men who would become available under it. A certain number—I think something like 50,000—were to become available by the operation of the clean-cut. Then he told us that 7 per cent. of the older men were to become available for the Army, and we received varying estimates as to the numbers that were to come from Ireland. I am not going to discuss the merits of the Government action in regard to Ireland, but we were told that four or five divisions were to come from Ireland, and that these were absolutely necessary for the purpose of obtaining the essential reinforcements for the Army during the present campaign. It is obvious that they are not going to be forthcoming during this year. The question which I now wish to address to the Prime Minister is whether the deficiency caused by the failure to enforce Conscription in Ireland is being made up by making more exacting demands upon the older men than he contemplated before? I think that we are entitled to know that. Either the Government, by failing to enforce Conscription in Ireland, are not getting the necessary number, or they are getting the necessary number by another method, and the only other method available is to call up more of the older men. I want to know from the Prime Minister which of these alternatives the Government have adopted.] do not desire to stand any further between, the Prime Minister and the House. I hope that the rather disjointed observations which I have made will serve him as a peg on which to hang the speech for which he is so obviously in need of inspiration, and in the hope that it has achieved that purpose I will make way for the right hon. Gentleman.

  AUSTRIAN DEFEAT—PRIME MINISTER'S STATEMENT.
  The PRIME MINISTER (Mr. Lloyd George): I do not know whether, as my hon. and learned Friend has stated, I am in need of inspiration, but if so, I am very glad that my hon. and learned Friend has supplied me with it. I came down this afternoon to answer questions which might be addressed to the Government in the course of the Debate, rather than to make a statement, and during the one and a half hours to which my hon. and learned Friend has referred I do not think that there have been many questions of a character which required very much answering as to the general conduct of the campaign, however important they might be in other respects.
  But, before I approach the very specific questions which have been put by my hon. and learned Friend, I may be allowed to make one reference to the subject which was raised by the hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Christchurch (Brigadier-General Croft). I regret that he should think it necessary to occupy the time of the House with a matter which I think was not worthy of discussion upon a great occasion like the passing of a Vote of Credit for a great War. I followed the correspondence which he read—and, by the way, I think that he might have explained how official correspondence passed into his hands. If there is to be an inquiry, I think that that is a far more serious subject. It was a most improper proceeding. I am not sure that it was not a most criminal proceeding on the part of someone. I think that it is an offence against the law of the land to have handed over to anyone a dossier of official communications, with the whole file of letters, which he read to the House, which had come from a Government Department. That in time of peace would be a serious matter, but in the middle of a great War it betrays a looseness on the part of somebody which I think ought to be investigated, because if official documents of the kind are parted with freely to anybody outside who wants to make a personal attack on a Minister, then no one can tell what may happen. Documents of a very serious character may be let out. Therefore, I may tell the hon. and gallant Gentleman that there is a question for investigation, and that in my judgment that is the most important question of all.
  776
  With regard to the case itself, what does it mean? My right hon. Friend (Mr. Leverton Harris) is one of the hundreds of thousands of business men who have voluntarily given up business, in order to do war work. He has worked very hard. There is no Member of this House, and no one outside the House, who has given more assiduous service to the State than he has given voluntarily during the last three years of the War. He has rendered very conspicuous service not only to the present Government, but to the late Government as well and to the first war Government.
  Mr. ASQUITH: From the beginning of the War.
  The PRIME MINISTER: And, as I am reminded by my right hon. Friend, who was then Prime Minister, the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Leverton Harris) has been doing this work from the beginning of the War. He has devoted himself to it with great assiduity, and he has had conspicuous success in the important matters which he had in hand. He did it voluntarily. He gave up his business in order to be able to do so. It is a very difficult matter for business men to give their time to the Government. They cannot altogether see their business go to grief. He spoke of the matter which was important not so much to the firm as to the Government itself, and the remarks of the hon. and gallant Member for Christchurch only show what little experience he has in these matters. This was not the only firm that had this arrangement, and the only thing that was asked was that this firm should be put in exactly the same position as other firms who were dealing with the same class of business. The right hon. Gentleman did not take any advantage in dealing with his own Department in this matter. He simply made a communication to an absolutely different Department with which he was not associated in the least, not even as a volunteer, and over which he had not the slightest control. And he submitted to that Department certain facts as to which he said the Ministry of Munitions and the Board of Trade could give full information, and I really think that it is something like persecution to rake up a thing of this kind, as if it were a grave scandal, in order to interrupt the business conduct of the War merely to discredit a man who has voluntarily rendered great service to the State. I hope that the House of Commons will not in the least

  777
  countenance action of this kind, and I regret that it has been thought necessary to refer to such a matter.
  I now come to another question. I read very carefully the Debate to which my hon. and learned Friend referred, and I naturally paid special attention to the statements made by my right hon. Friend the Member for East Fife (Mr. Asquith) and the questions which were put by him. As far as I can see there were two questions which he put. I do not know that they were questions so much as suggestions. One was that the Government should give us more information. I do not know whether it is about particular battles that have taken place or about the campaign as a whole. The other was about Russia. I really do not know what further information we can give about the campaign, or what additional facts we can supply beyond those which are furnished by my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House. I think that he gave all the information which it was possible to give to the House in present conditions. No one knows better than my right hon. Friend that there is a great deal of information which we could not possibly give. Some of the questions which have been put by my hon. and learned Friend are an indication of it. He raised the question of numbers. Take the question which he put about the distribution of our troops as between Infantry and other arms. That is the kind of thing about which we cannot give information. It is quite impossible. My right hon. Friend (Mr. Bonar Law) went, I think, as far as he possibly could in giving information about the American troops. There is no doubt that the numbers which have come in since the 21st March have been satisfactory. I should go beyond that. It is an amazing piece of organisation which has enabled us to bring vast numbers of first-rate American troops to France since the 21st March.
  Mr. HOGGE: The figures are in the papers.
  The PRIME MINISTER: No.
  Mr. HOGGE: Yes, they are.
  6.0 P.M.
  The PRIME MINISTER: Oh, then, if they are, they are. There is nothing more to be said. If my hon. Friend is satisfied with them, I hope that the Germans also will be satisfied with them, but I cannot give any more information, and it is obviously undesirable that I should. All I can say
  778
  is that they are sufficient to encourage the Allies, and I think quite sufficient to disappoint and ultimately to defeat our foes, and these troops are troops of the very best quality. Many of them are already in the fighting line, and I hope to see many more of them there in a very short time, but I could not obviously give any more information of that kind. Nor do I see what further information I can give about this campaign. If there be any indication as to the character of the information which my right hon. Friend thinks we could give, I should be very happy to give it as far as we possibly can.
  I read the Debate very carefully, and I think my right hon. Friend's (Mr. Bonar Law's) statement of the actual position most accurately represented, at any rate, the view taken by our military advisers of the situation at that moment. My hon. and learned Friend (Mr. Asquith) wants to know something about the numbers, about the relative strength of the enemy and ourselves at given dates. I think I said a good deal about that on the 19th April, and in another speech which I made later. I think the relative strength of the contending forces was very accurately represented by General Maurice himself, in the documents which I quoted, where he said that they were as nearly equal as they could be.
  Mr. HOGGE: You did not tell us that in the Secret Session.
  The PRIME MINISTER: Whatever I said in Secret Session my hon. Friend has absolutely no right to refer to it. It is a most improper observation. As a matter of fact I said nothing in the Secret Session which is incompatible with that.
  Mr. HOGGE: Yes, you did.
  The PRIME MINISTER: No one has any right to refer to anything which took place in the Secret Session. It is a distinct breach of faith to do so. Since the time I made the statement in Secret Session, there has no doubt been an enormous accession of strength to the German Army from Russia. I quoted to the House a statement of General Maurice, which I still think accurately represented the relative strength of the two forces on the 21st March. The Germans themselves claim that they are inferior in numbers; they have done so repeatedly, but that does not always show what is the position They probably do so in order to

  779
  exaggerate their prowess, and they claim that the defeats which they say they inflicted upon our Armies and the French Armies were not in the least attributable to superior numbers. Since that date there are a good many facts which are not ascertainable, but which are elements in the computation of the relative strength of the two forces. For instance, the losses. We know our own losses, but we do not know the German losses. The Germans exaggerate enormously the losses they inflict upon the Allies. That we know. It is just possible that we may be exaggerating the losses inflicted upon the Germans, but, at any rate, it is quite impossible to tell what are the real losses, except that undoubtedly the losses inflicted upon the Germans have been very heavy, and that they have drawn upon their reserves. Until you know exactly what they are, it is quite impossible to make a computation up to date.
  We know what accession of strength the Germans have had from other spheres, and, of course, we know the accessions of strength that have come to us; but there are so many elements which cannot be computed that you cannot say precisely what the relative strength of the forces on both sides is at this moment. American troops are coming at a great rate, and I should be very surprised if in a comparatively short time the Allies' strength on the Western Front were not greater than that of the Germans. The Germans are in the position of having to draw on their last reserves, to be thrown in during the course of the next month or two, and they have no further reserves to call upon, except by a most drastic comb out of men of military age from essential industries. There is some indication that they are resorting to that. That in itself is proof that the Allies have inflicted very heavy losses upon the Germans in the course of this campaign.
  During the next couple of months the position must be a very anxious one, but it is gradually improving from the Allies' point of view, and all I can say is, without any appearance of boasting—which, of course, would be folly in a struggle of this kind—that the Allies' generals feel confident as to the issue. I am not sure that I could say anything which would be helpful beyond that. We are on the eve of very great events. There may be a great blow coming, perhaps coming within the next few hours—certainly within the next
  780
  few days. The issue of this campaign may depend upon it, and the Allies never felt better prepared to meet it. The last attack of the Germans upon the French troops was undoubtedly a failure. They did not achieve the object for which they initiated the attack. They undoubtedly—we have got proof of it—expected to go as far as Compiègne. They failed. They were beaten back by the French Army. They captured some ground, but the French, in a counter-attack, recaptured some of the most important ground of all. The losses inflicted on the German Army were undoubtedly very serious, and, on the whole, the last attack made by the German Armies upon our Allied forces was undoubtedly a defeat. The same thing applies to the attacks made upon us. Their first attack, being a surprise, was a partial, but a considerable success.
  But, as my right hon. Friend pointed out, we have dwelt rather too much upon German successes and too little upon our own. The Germans were beaten, and very severely beaten, in front of the Third Army. They were beaten twice, if not three times, with very great loss, in front of the Fourth and Second Armies. I think that for the last two months there has hardly been a great attack upon our Army, and the last attacks were beaten off with very great slaughter. The same thing applies to the French Army, and, on the whole, although the Allies have sustained some reverses, the Germans have suffered severe reverses; and taking the campaign as a whole, the Germans have not succeeded in achieving their objectives. I am certain of this, that if you had put the question on, say, the 29th March last, to those who are in charge of the Allied Armies, and you had given them an indication of the position on the 23rd or 24th June, and had given the same indication to the German leaders, the leaders of the Allied Armies would have been pleased, and the leaders of the German Armies would have been profoundly disappointed. I say so after having put the question to the leaders of the Allied Armies.
  Sir C. HOBHOUSE: And to the Germans?
  The PRIME MINISTER: Oh, no! I did not get the opportunity, but I have not the slightest doubt of that. There are indications in documents which we have obtained where they intended to go.

  781
  There are indications which have come to our hands which show that the Germans expected to attain much greater things than they have realised or achieved. There is no use in talking in the middle of a battle, and there is no information which I can give which would be of the slightest use, and there is no use giving information unless it is helpful to the conduct of the battle or to the public. I really do not think there would be any use dealing with the tasteless dish of stale falsifications which my right hon. Friend (Mr. G. Lambert) referred to. They have been dealt with over and over again. The time may come when all these things will have to be accounted for, and my right hon. Friend may depend upon it that the Government will not be afraid then to give a full account of what has happened. But this is not the time for dealing with that. We are in the midst of a great battle, and what we have got to do is to work together to win it.
  My hon. and learned Friend (Mr. Pringle) tried to anticipate the discussion which we are to have to-morrow about Ireland. We are to have it either to-day or to-morrow, but let us have it on one day only. One day of Irish stew is quite enough. But I will answer the questions he put to me, which bear on to-day's Debate. He wanted to know whether our failure to get troops in Ireland this year meant that we were making more exacting demands on the older men. No. He tried to put me on the horns of a dilemma. He said, "These were the men you wanted for that purpose, and if you have not got them, you must have gone to the older men." You wanted the Irishmen for a totally different purpose. The men you would have had from Ireland would have been younger men, naturally, who would have been used for other purposes. If they had been there, we should have been very glad to have had them. However. I do not want to anticipate that discussion, because I can assure my hon and learned Friend that that point is not going to be shirked to-morrow in the least, and if it is my hon. and learned Friend will be here. I think that is all I can say usefully about Ireland to-day.
  With Regard to Russia, the House knows the position in Russia just as well as the Government does. Russia is in a perfectly chaotic condition. My hon. Friend sitting in the corner talked about the Russian Government. How many Governments are there in Russia?
  Mr. KING: Only one.
  The PRIME MINISTER: That is exactly where he is wrong. What is the Government of the Ukraine? What is the Government in Georgia? What is the Government when you come to Baku? What is the Government of the Northern parts of the Caucasus? What is the Government in any town and city of the Don? What is the Government, I will no, say in Siberia, but in any city in Siberia? He will hardly find the same Government in any two villages there. It is of no use talking about "the Russian Government" as if there were one Government for the whole country. That is one of the difficulties with which you are dealing there. You are not dealing with anyone who is responsible for Russia as a whole. My hon. Friend referred to M. Nabokoff as the Czarist Ambassador. As a matter of fact, he was the Chargé d'Affaires of M. Kerensky, who was as good a social revolutionary and democrat as my hon. Friend. Certainly he represented M. Kerensky.
  Mr. KING: He was appointed originally by the Czar.
  The PRIME MINISTER: I know, but if he was good enough for a social democrat and a revolutionary like M. Kerensky he ought to satisfy my hon Friend.
  Mr. KING: He was a turncoat.
  The PRIME MINISTER: Nothing will suit my hon. Friend but a Bolshevik. M. Kerensky represented Russia as a whole and its Government as a whole. Russia had not broken to pieces, and M. Nabokoff was then the representative here of a Government which had control over the whole of Russia, from Vladivostok to Archangel and down to the Caucasus. But the situation to-day is different, and there is no use making any pretence about it. There is a de facto Government in Moscow, but there are de facto Governments all over the place, and you cannot deal with any one body of persons in any part of Russia, and say, "These are the people that represent Russia as a whole." That is one of our difficulties in regard to Russia. My hon. and gallant Friend (Colonel Wedgwood), who is a man of great faith, has found a simple method of settling the whole Russian difficulty—"Appoint a Committee."
  Colonel WEDGWOOD: What remedy have you got?
  The PRIME MINISTER: My hon. Friend will know that, but not just yet. That is the method, I agree, when you are in trouble. I do not know what my hon. and gallant Friend is as a diplomatist, but I do know he is a first-rate soldier. He is evidently a good politician, and he says, "We are in trouble; appoint a Committee." I can assure him of this, that the Committee which he would appoint, however capable and however well-informed, would not in the least cope with what are the real difficulties in this case—not in the least. You have got to deal here with a multitude of interests, first of all in Russia itself, and you never know from day to day what Russia is. You get one man saying, "These are facts about Russia," and he knows, as my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary says. You get another man who knows just as well, and he will give you an absolutely different set of facts. You get more than that; you get one man to-day telling you this about Russia, and in a week he will tell you an absolutely different thing—the same man. And then you have got to deal not merely with a multitude of interests in Russia, one of them predominant to-day, and another to-morrow. Of course, it is not a question for decision by us, or by France, but it is a question for decision by the Allies as a whole, and that in itself makes difficultes when you are dealing with a country which is changing every hour. A decision which might be perfect one day might be wrong in about a fortnight's time, and there you have to communicate with five, at least, of the Allies, who have to come to a perfectly unanimous decision in dealing with a country which is shifting and changing from hour to hour. But I agree with everything that fell from my right hon. Friend (Mr. Asquith) about it being not merely our interest, but about it being just and equitable that we should stand by Russia, if Russia wants it.
  Russia has been treated brutally. She has been dismembered; treaties which have been entered into of the sternest character are not even respected by Germany within twenty-four hours after they have been concluded. In defiance of that treaty, she is marching through the Ukraine, through the Don, into the Caucasus, and as far as her troops will carry her. She is marching troops up to the North, she is not in the least respecting her treaty; and no doubt these facts are
  784
  getting well into the minds of the Russian population. The feeling with which we had to deal some months ago in Russia—that there was no difference between one country and another, that we were all merely great Empires striving for territory and trying to satisfy our own greed—is disappearing in Russia. They are beginning to realise more and more what German militarism means. Even in the Ukraine, which entered into a voluntary treaty with Germany—that is the information which I have received in the last few hours—the peasants are in revolt against German interference. There is a partisan war going on there, and the result has been that Germany and Austria, who expected great things from the Ukraine, are not getting them.
  There is another thing of which I was informed on very good authority in the last few hours. In fact, I came straight from the house of someone who knows the country very well, and he said the hatred of the Germans is growing deeper and deeper in the minds of the population of Russia, especially in those parts of Russia which have been occupied by the Germans. He said that Russia is readier than ever she has been for months to take part in any movement which would have the effect of driving out the Germans from the soil of their native land. These things are full of hope. The difficulties are well known. There are the difficulties of access to Russia. There is practically only one country which has access to Russia on a great scale, and that is Japan. My hon. Friend knows the difficulties with regard to that just as well as anybody. I am not sure that I can add anything which would be useful now. I am attempting to answer the questions put by my right hon. Friend, but no one knows better than he does the difficulty of really giving information on the subject as to what is going on, and he will forgive me, I know, if I do not go any further.
  Perhaps I ought to say one word with regard to Italy. What has happened in Italy is full of promise. It is one of the most portentous events of the year. It is one of those military victories which may have infinitely greater results than other victories, which look bigger from the point of view of the number of men engaged in them, the casualties, guns, or territory lost. It is a defeat inflicted upon a Power which is not in the best condition to sustain it. Here is a great offensive

  785
  in which the Austrian Empire has put the whole of her strength. She gathered up all her available strength for this attack; she brought every available man she could spare from the Eastern Front, and she has thrown the whole of her strength upon the Italian Armies. Considerably more than 50 per cent. of the Austrian effectives have been employed in heavy fighting in the battle. A number of them had to hold the line, but over 50 per cent. of the Austrian Army were actually engaged in the fight. They won a certain preliminary success. They crossed the Piave; they captured a very important position on the Montello, and if they had captured the whole of it they might have got behind the entire Piave position, and there might have been a disaster. What happened? They were first of all held. The Italian Armies then began to bring pressure to bear upon them. The pressure increased from day to day. The Austrians are now in full retreat, and the only question to-day is, not whether they are going to retreat, but whether they can retreat. On the Montello, which is a very important strategic position, the Italians have recaptured the whole of the position; they have driven the enemy across; they have crossed themselves, and now they are for the first time for months on the left side of the Piave. Lower down, Italian cavalry have crossed, and are pursuing a part of the enemy's forces. They have captured a number of Austrian guns on the Montello, and have recaptured there, I believe, half of the puns which the Austrians had captured from the Italian Army in the first offensive. In the South a very tenacious rearguard action is being fought, in order to be able to secure their retreat across the two bridges.
  That is the position at the present moment. The Austrian Army and the Austrian Empire have committeed the whole of their strength to a great offensive, and have had inflicted upon them one of the greatest and most disastrous defeats of the War; and that at a time when there is serious discontent in Austria—very serious discontent—when three-fifths of the population are completely out of sympathy with the objects of the War—as a matter of fact, they are far more in sympathy with the aims of the Allies—when three-fifths of the population know perfectly well that their only chance of winning—their only chance of achieving anything in the nature of freedom for
  786
  themselves—is to secure a great Allied victory; and at a time when the whole of the Austrian prisoners belonging to one great powerful race in Austria are actually congregating together in order to come over to fight on the Allied side in Siberia—the Czech-Slovak troops. All this is a matter full of significance, and, I venture to say, full of hope.
  We have naturally been impressed by the very grave events upon the Western Front. And the danger is not over. We must not pretend that it is. It would be a mistake to imagine that it is. But whatever our difficulties, the difficulties of the Central Powers are infinitely greater. The population has been driven by hunger not merely to something in the nature of discontent and sedition, but even in several most important cities of Austria to revolt. More than half the Austrian Empire sympathises with the objects of the countries with whom that Empire is at war. And the Central Powers have other difficulties in other countries—in Bulgaria and in Turkey. I am pointing these things out, not in order to raise false hopes, but in order to emphasise one thing again and again. All we need do is to keep steady, to endure, to stand fast, and I have not the faintest doubt, surveying the whole position, looking at the whole of the facts, that our victory will be a complete one.
  Mr. ASQUITH: I desire to associate not only myself, but, I think, the whole House, with the congratulations which my right hon. Friend has offered to our gallant Allies in Italy, first of all for their marvellous steadfastness in confronting a most formidable attack, and then for the brilliant dash and power of initiative and of aggression which they have shown with such success during the last week. As my right hon. Friend has, I think without any exaggeration, said, it is one of the most remarkable performances in the War, and it has filled us with the greatest possible hope for the future.
  I am not going to say more than a few words in regard to the remainder of the speech to which we have just listened. I entirely endorse the protest which the Prime Minister made against the introduction by the hon. and gallant Gentleman who sits below the Gangway (Brigadier-General Croft) of what seems to me not only an irrelevant, but an unworthy topic, which ought never to have been raised on an occasion like this.

  787
  The charge, such as it was, which he thought it worth his while to put forward and worth the while of the House to listen to, was, as far as we can understand, supported—and supported only—with materials which, as far as I know, the hon. and gallant Gentleman had no right to use, and which could only have come to him by some gross breach of confidence, which I hope will be discovered, with the consequences that ought to follow to an offender so lost to all sense of propriety in the public service.
  Passing from that—I am very sorry it should have been necessary to make any allusion to it—there are only two points to which I should like for a mement to refer. When I expressed the opinion a week ago that, in the stage which we have now reached in the War, it was desirable that the Government should keep the country in as full possession as is compatible with the prosecution of the campaign of all available material, be it favourable or adverse—indeed that, if they saw fit, it might be expedient that we should have periodical statements—I expressly made the reservation, from the experience I have had, that that was not to be considered in any sense a demand for a disclosure of information which would be in any way prejudicial to ourselves or helpful to the enemy. But there is a good deal that could be told, and I think ought to be told, not spasmodically, but, if possible, systematically and periodically, which could be told without injury to the country, and with very great advantage to public intelligence and public spirit. Beyond that I do not go, and, just by way of illustration, the information I should not desire is information which, to a large extent, is based upon the relative forces at any-given time which are arrayed against one another. I think—I am perfectly sure—in the first place, that it is extremely difficult; if not impossible, for anybody to give that information. It must rest, to a large extent, upon guesswork, conjecture, even upon imagination. It is not information—if I may express my own judgment frankly—which the public has a right to demand, and it is not information which it is in the interests of the cause in which we are engaged that the Government could be expected to give. That is the last kind of information for which I am asking or have in my mind.
  788
  On the other hand—to take another instance the other way in which, I think, it is very desirable that we should know—the right hon. Gentleman has been telling us this afternoon now in tills phase of the campaign, this, that, or the other army has encountered and repelled, as in most cases it has, the attacks of the enemy. We do not know—we know very little, at any rate—of the achievements of our different armies. Most of us are concerned—I suppose everybody here, and most people outside, have got relatives, or friends, or acquaintances, or constituents of their own serving in these different forces—and it would enormously hearten the different parts of the country where the gallant units comprised in these various divisions and corps are recruited, if they could, from time to time, hear a little more of what this particular corps, division, or army is accomplishing in, the face of the enemy. That is information which, after the event, at any rate, might very safely be given in greater copiousness and greater detail than hitherto has been the case. As I said before, I am as guilty as anyone in this House of the crime—if it be a crime—of reticence. I practised It, as my right hon. Friend knows—I suppose he is in very much the same position—not because it was my own inclination, but in deference to military and naval judgment, which we are bound to respect. Every civilian would be only too glad to disclose every taing—perhaps more than is expedient—to this House and country, but you must restrain yourself to a large extent by what expert naval and military opinion prescribes.
  The other point on which I want to say a word is one to which I adverted last week, and that is our relation to Russia. It is quite true, as the Prime Minister has said, that it would be a misnomer to speak of any power which now exists in that country as the "Government of the country." I should not describe it myself as a case of the co-existence of a number of Governments, but rather as the absence of any Government. One very often means the other, and in this case it certainly does. Practically, if you look at Russia as a whole—as a unit—there is no Government in Russia at this moment, and that is one of the great difficulties of the situation. That goes to the very root of the question, and the suggestions I make, I think, are perfectly well understood—I understand they are not in any way dissented from by the Government—

  789
  and they are these: My right hon. Friend says, it is all very well to be ready to help Russia; but are you sure Russia wants you? I think it is very important Russia should know—and by Russia here I mean, not the Russian Government, but the Russian people, which does exist, which, as the Prime Minister says, is growing dissatisfied to discover what are the real ulterior intentions and purposes of Germany, and in which there is an opinion, it may be crude, it may be immature, it may be almost embryonic, but an opinion held by them hostile to German designs and German control.
  I think it is of the utmost importance that we should let the Russian people, among whom that phase of opinion is germinating, be assured in the most unequivocal and surest terms that we are their friends, and not merely their friends in the sentimental sense, but friends whose friendship is in no way cooled or impaired by the disastrous defection of the Russian Government of the past, but who believe that the real, permanent, and enduring interests of the Russian people are at least as strongly enlisted in the purposes and causes of the Allies as those of any other member of the Allied Powers. In fact, as I said last week, and I repeat to-day, I wish it could be known in Russia as clearly as it is understood here, that Russia has more to gain from the victory of the Allies, and she has more to lose by the victory of Germany, than any other people in the whole civilised world.
  Let us with no uncertain and no divided voice send that message to the Russian people, and let us, as and when opportunity offers, be prepared to back it up by every means, diplomatic or otherwise, which the circumstances of the case allow. The difficulties are enormous, but I doubt not the Government know them; and if we do not know them we can conjecture them. Sometimes they present themselves—I will not say more than that—in unexpected forms. The difficulties are very great. They have to be surmounted. To surmount them requires patience as well as tact. I hope I am not pressing the matter unduly, and I do not wish to do so, but I do strongly urge my right hon. Friend—in these matters of such vital importance to the Allied cause as well as to Russia—to leave no step untried to bring about amongst the Allied Powers such a frame of mind and such a course of action as will enable us to bring into real and active operation those latent forces in
  790
  Russia which, I am certain, are glowingly upon our side. I do not think I can usefully add more on that point upon matters in regard to which one must speak with considerable reserve and caution. I am satisfied, however, that not only here in this country, but among all the partners in our Alliance, no consideration of any sort ought to weigh more strongly than the association of the Russian people with our common policy.
  Mr. D. MASON: I should like, in a word, to say how I support what has been said by the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Asquith) in regard to Russia. The Prime Minister referred to the condition of Austria. I desire to draw the attention "of my Noble Friend (Lord Robert Cecil) to two speeches which have recently been made by Baron Burian, the Austro-Hungarian Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. These speeches are so remarkable that I believe they will draw from the Noble Lord a reply, and, in any case, the matter is, I think, well worthy the attention of the House. The first speech to which I would refer is one by Baron Burian, who replied in it to a speech made by Lord Milner on the 8th of this month. Baron Burian said in reference to this speech
  "Lord Milner's speech (reported in the 'Times' of 15th June) once more affords a deep insight into the psychology of our enemies. In it expression is again given to our opponents' desire to represent the war aim of the Central Powers as an emanation of the intention ascribed to the Germans to obtain domination not only over their opponents but also over their own Allies. Our Peace treaties with Russia and Roumania have in this latest case been represented as an illustration of this lust of domination. Have, then, the Russians come under foreign domination by the conclusion of peace with the Soviet Republic? Or would, perhaps, a victorious Britain have treated any colony of our Allies more mildly than we have acted towards Roumania? But our opponent does not dispute that, and by the portrayal of the awful consequences of this plan ascribed to us of enslaving the world the peoples of the Entente are to be convinced of the necessity of battling desperately until they are completely exhausted."
  The second speech, which has just been reported by Reuter, was one made by Baron Burian in response to a resolution passed by the Labour Council of Vienna. In his reply, Baron Burian made this most remarkable statement. The resolution passed by this very representative council emphasised the urgent necessity for bringing about a speedy improvement of the

  791
  food conditions—a subject to which the right hon. Gentleman the Prime Minister referred. We all know the grave condition to which Austria is at present reduced, almost, as the Prime Minister said, amounting to famine and hunger throughout the Austrian Empire. The resolution of the Vienna Labour Council pointed this out, and then went on to ask for the attainment of a general peace or understanding, for which, in given circumstances, the Government should take the initiative, and the establishment of a League of Nations. A remarkable statement was made by Baron Burian in reply to that resolution. This, happening on Saturday, shows it is a most recent statement by a responsible Minister of the Central Powers. Baron Burian said that he was conscious of the great importance of the food question, and was constantly endeavouring energetically to promote negotiations with Germany regarding a reciprocal food supply. He then went on to say:
  "Regarding peace, our policy has undergone no change, since, as before, we are solely waging a war of defence. It is far from our thoughts to prolong the War for a single day for conquests of any kind or the attainment of Imperialistic aims. Should an inclination to negotiate show itself on the part of our opponents they would always find us ready to enter into discussions to conclude a peace which would be acceptable and honourable for both sides."
  I believe the Noble Lord will agree that that is a statement which may be regarded as a very responsible one. If it be accurate it is, I think, an advance, and the most remarkable one, which has yet been made by the Central Powers. It entirely confirms the statement made by the Prime Minister as to the conditions which many of us know have for some time been present in Austria, and it follows the speech—the very moderate speech—made by our own Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs in this House last Thursday. While still adhering firmly to our original attitude in regard to secret treaties, it is taken, collectively, that we are not to be regarded as appearing to oppose any reasonable offer being considered by the Allies. Here then is this statement which I have just read to the House, and which, if words mean anything, is a very distinct indication on the part of the Central Powers for further "conversations." The responsible Minister must, of course, have read the speech delivered by the right hon. Gentleman
  792
  the Secretary for Foreign Affairs, and when the Austro-Hungarian Minister makes a speech of the character I have quoted, that should this country show any inclination to negotiate they are prepared to enter in to discussions to conclude peace which would be acceptable and honourable for both sides, it seems to me, and I think to many Members who take the trouble to study these two announcements—of our own Secretary for Foreign Affairs and of the Austro-Hungarian Minister—all it requires now is for some golden bridge to be formed, or for some neutral Power to supply the connecting link, so that these discussions and conversations may be still further developed. I hope, therefore, although I have given the Noble Lord very short notice to raise this matter, and I, therefore, cannot expect, in the nature of things, that he should be prepared to commit the Government to any further declaration of policy than that which we already know, that on consideration of the most remarkable utterance on the part of Baron Burian I trust we shall get at least a sympathetic reply. For here is a very distinct invitation on the part of Austria-Hungary to offer to conclude a peace with us and with our Allies. It seems to me that that is worth, and I have no doubt it will receive, some consideration by the Noble Lord and possibly further consideration by the Government of which he is a member.
  I would like, further, to call attention to a recent statement made by Mr. Lansing, in which he said,
  "The American people, by a gradual process of reasoning, have reached the firm conviction that a German victory in the European struggle would result in the greatest peril to this country and to those principles which have been ours since we became an independent nation."
  That is a statement to which we would all subscribe. I think there is no exception to it. I should like, further, to call attention to what Viscount Grey said the other day at the conclusion of his pamphlet. We hear a great deal as to the destruction of militarism. Mr. Lansing goes on to elaborate that point in his speech. Viscount Grey, however, finally concludes his remarkable pamphlet with these words:
  "When those—"
  He is referring to Germany—
  "who accept this idea and this sort of peace can in word and deed speak for Germany—"
  That is to say, a peace based on a League of Nations—
  "we shall be within sight of a good peace."

  793
  I should like to remind the Noble Lord of the fact, that is doubtless not absent from his memory, that on a previous occasion Germany had said she was prepared to join such a League, and she tried to show that she was enthusiastic about the idea. She said she was prepared to head such a League. I did not read into that the interpretation that some people did when they said she meant that she desired to dominate. Rather I should have thought she wanted to show her enthusiasm for the idea. Some may doubt that! Still, the fact remains she did say that. When a statesman occupying a position similar to that which Viscount Grey occupied in the counsels of Europe says that when Germany is prepared to take the view I have mentioned, then we are not far from a good peace—taken, I say, the statement of Viscount Grey in conjunction with those made by Baron Burian, there are elements which, without being unduly sanguine, offer some encouragement, and perhaps hope, that peace conversations may be developed, and still further extended.
  The MINISTER of BLOCKADE (Lord Robert Cecil): I do not think my hon. Friend will desire that I should make an elaborate statement in answer to what he has just said. I shall say a few words, and a few words only. Naturally the statement made by Baron Burian has been brought to our notice. I cannot say that it impresses me very much as a serious contribution towards peace discussions. What does he say? He says:
  "They would always find us ready to enter into discussions to conclude a peace which would be acceptable and honourable for both sides."
  7.0 P.M.
  There is nothing there but a mere phrase. It comes to nothing at all by itself. I cannot forget two things about Baron Burian when I am asked to attach great importance to a statement made by him. In the first place, it is known that he is the nominee of Count Tisza, who I believe to be as responsible as any man in Europe for this deplorable War. In the second place, only the other day the same Baron Burian made a speech, in which he explained with great emphasis that Austro-Hungary was completely and indissolubly united with Germany in the War. He said:
  "The complete unity of our group in the struggle and in our war aims is our strength."
  I see nothing in the present speech of Baron Burian to recede from that. Therefore what we have to consider with
  794
  regard to Germany's war aims is what is consistent with what he would call an acceptable and honourable peace to both sides. That being so, I am afraid I cannot regard this as a very serious communication of any readiness for such a peace as this country can accept. Baron Burian says he has always been ready for such a peace. We have asked, and asked in vain over and over again, for a clear and definite statement of the war aims of the Central Empires. The Allies have given such a statement, but we have never yet had any reply to our reptated requests made in this House and other places. All we do know is what they have done. We see the peace that Germany has made when Germany has been ready to make it. It is a peace of a kind that would be, disastrous if it was to be imitated in the general European settlement. It consists in the subjugation of every nationality which Germany has been able to overrun by the force of her arms. I read the other day a description of what it amounts to. I will not give the actual authority, but it was from an Austrian source and not too highly coloured. It said this:
  "The treaty which is to-day published confirms the apprehensions which have been aroused by the communication of Count Czernin regarding negotiations at Bukarest. It is not a peace by understanding; it does not realise the principle of concluding a peace without annexations and contributions. It brings to Austria-Hungary a very considerable increase of territory. The iron gates are secured by a fundamental alteration of the frontier. Along the whole frontier to Transylvania, the summits of the mountain chain which used to belong to Roumania fall to Hungary."
  It concludes in this way:
  "It is no peace without annexations and also no peace without contributions. Roumania is not indeed openly and expressly compelled to the payment of a war indemnity, but in a hidden form economic contributions are laid upon Roumania. She has to pay for the maintenance of the Army of occupation including the requisitions required for it. Even after the conclusion of peace the country is occupied by the Central Powers: railways, post offices, mineral oil wells, industrial undertakings, remain under the military administration of the Army of occupation. German military courts can judge Roumanian citizens, German commanders are entitled to issue orders to Roumanian civil authorities. Roumania, deserted by Russia and threatened in the rear by the occupation of the Ukraine, had to submit to these conditions. Germany and Austria-Hungary could carry through what they wished, but many here will doubt if it was clever to make this use of the power which we had,"
  and so on. That is what the Central

  795

  Powers have done. Until they show that they seriously and genuinely regard their action at Brest-Livotsk and elsewhere, it is useless to cite general statements by Austrian statesmen as any indication that they are really desirous of a peaceful settlement which could form the basis of an enduring settlement of the European situation.
  Sir R. COOPER: I desire to make some observations on the statement which the Prime Minister has recently made in answer to the case put forward by the hon. and gallant Member for Christchurch (General Croft). In my opinion, the answer which the Prime Minister made to that case is extremely unsatisfactory from the point of view of public life in this country. For my part, I entirely associate myself with my hon. and gallant Friend in bringing this case forward, and I readily accept full responsibility with him in bringing it before the House to-day. As this House knows, some of us have for some time been driven to the conclusion that this country has suffered very very grievously indeed during the War, and generally for fifteen years before the War, from the fact that as we regard it, the standard of public life in this country has deteriorated, and is very different from the traditions and character of the public men which in bygone days have made this country what it is. There are two reasons why we consider it a public duty that this matter should be brought forward. No one will appreciate more readily than the Prime Minister himself, who is really the custodian of the honour of the House and responsible for the proper behaviour and actions of the Members of the House, that there is attached to the privilege of membership of this House a responsibility greater than, perhaps, attaches to any other public man in this country, and, if we believe, as we do, that the case in point is one which ought not to be lightly passed over, touching, as it does, a Member of this House, who has, I have no doubt, as the Prime Minister said, rendered very strenuous and valuable service to the country during the War, just as a majority of the Members of this House have done, yet, in a case like that, more than in any other, if, in our judgment, there is a wrong action, we are bound, as a matter of duty, to bring it forward. There are certain principles with
  796
  regard to the standard of public life which nobody, however humble they may be, can disregard. There is a second reason for bringing this matter forward. Anyone who moves about the country, especially in commercial circles and in the city, is constantly hearing suggestions made that of those people who hold public positions and public power in the administration of this War, there are some, at any rate, who are using it to their own general advantage. Whether that be true or false, there is, I am afraid, no doubt whatever that there is very considerable suspicion amongst the public that that is the case, and the greatest service that can be rendered is to clear up any cases as they may arise, so that the public may feel that their suspicions, at any rate, are confined within their own limits, and that whenever there is an opportunity of bringing a matter to light, it will be done.
  The Prime Minister, in the first part of his speech, expressed surprise that this matter had been raised on the Consolidated Fund Bill. I understand my hon. and gallant Friend was to have asked a question this afternoon with the intention of obtaining leave to move the Adjournment, but as the Consolidated Fund Bill was coming before the House, and as that is an occasion on which any hon. Member can raise any question that relates generally to the administration of the War can be raised, he considered that that was a fitting opportunity for him to raise this question, and probably he would not have been granted leave to move the Adjournment had he asked for it. Now I come to the Prime Minister's speech. As I understood it there were two points of defence put before the House by the right hon. Gentleman. But before I take those two points I would say a word as to what fell both from the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the House and later on from the Leader of the Opposition with regard to the fact that documents had come into the possession of my hon. and gallant Friend which were official and, therefore, privileged documents which ought not to have been handed over even to a Member of this House. I am acquainted with all the circumstances of this matter. These papers were sent anonymously to the National party, and my hon. and gallant Friend has done nothing in any way whatever to get the information. He did put a question to-day with the object of

  797
  ascertaining if the facts as stated were true, and he proposed to base on the answer to that question a Motion for Adjournment, but the answer given by the Secretary to the Admiralty admitted that the facts were as stated. Now I come to the two points of defence put forward by the Prime Minister. The first was that there was a great difficulty in getting ore, which is, of course, urgently wanted for war material, and the second was that this was not the only firm that got this privilege.
  Take the first point. It is quite true it is difficult to get the amount of ore which this country wants for the prosecution of the War, but I submit to the House that all people interested in shipping, even those who do not carry food or ore, are equally interested and will be equally serving a national advantage if in any way their services can be improved, or their voyages be expedited. Therefore, that point of defence does not attach particularly to this case, any more than it would attach to the case of other steamers and vessels sailing the ocean. The second point is more important, and as it has been answered by the Government, it should not be loft exactly where it is. It is that this firm is not the only one that got this privilege. The right hon. Gentleman said that this accusation against the right hon. Member for East Worcestershire (Mr. Leverton Harris) is nothing but persecution. But the House may recollect that on 18th March of this year a direct question was put to the Secretary to the Admiralty with regard to priority in cabling, and two years after the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Worcestershire made this appeal for priority we are told by the Financial Secretary to the Admiralty that no general instructions had been given and that priority was only granted for cables on Government business, and that each case has been judged on its merits. If that is true, and it is taken from the OFFICIAL REPORT, the Prime Minister's statement that other firms are enjoying this same privilege is not consistent with the facts, and he has been misinformed by some of his officials. The right hon. Gentleman himself urged at Question Time to-day, in a personal explanation, that he took this action in the national interest in connection with ships carrying food or ore, or both, to this country. It may be true that priority granted to this firm in certain specific cases might have
  798
  some advantage in some particular sailings in material to this country, but our complaint is that the right hon. Gentleman did not ask for this priority in the national interest for all ships, but only for the ships with which his own firm was associated and that is a material point. If he had asked for this privilege as a general one for all shipping it would have been just to other shipowners, and it would have been beyond reproach, but he asked for this privilege solely for his own firm, and anyone with any knowledge of shipping knows perfectly well that priority in cabling with regard to ships, freights and other things can be of enormous financial advantage to the persons owning the particular ships in question.
  I hold, in view of the facts that have been disclosed, that the right hon. Gentleman did use his official position to obtain a personal financial advantage which was not granted to all his competitors, and that seems to me to be an abuse of official power, and if it is condoned by the Prime Minister on behalf of the Government, and if the Government condone what has happened, and if the Leader of the Opposition agrees, in my judgment if this kind of thing is going to be condoned there is a very poor outlook for the future public life of this country. Until there is a much more satisfactory reply or explanation of the case which my hon. and gallant Friend has put forward, I shall not rest content with this matter being left where it is, and I shall not hesitate to raise any other case of a similar character that may come to my notice. I deplore the attitude taken by the Government this afternoon, in the absence of any clear and convincing statement from the head of the Government that we are labouring under a delusion, that the facts of the case are not as stated, and that the right hon. Gentleman has done nothing on his own behalf that was not equally done for a number of other firms in the country. As the matter rests, there is grave injustice lying against ail shipping firms who do not enjoy this priority in cabling.
  If anybody should speak further for the Government, I hope we shall be encouraged to think that a little more consideration is going to be given to this matter. If it is left as it is, then it is going to have a very bad influence on the country generally. Many cases have cropped up during the administration of

  799
  the War. Perhaps some months may pass between them and we are apt to forget them, but I doubt very much whether the public generally forget these matters as readily as hon. Members. From the early days of the War up to the present time there has been a very unpleasant tabulation of cases, not confined to Members of this House, but a number of cases that do affect men who have power and position of great responsibility, which, so far as we have been able to judge, they have abused to their own advantage. I do not see that my hon. Friend and I can do anything more to-day beyond protest that there has been no fair and square answer to the case as submitted to this House by my hon. and gallant Friend. We are powerless to do anything more for the moment, and we have to leave the matter where it is; but I may say that in this and other cases we are determined to the best of our ability, where we believe public interest is to be served, and where anything can be done to keep up the standard of public life higher than has prevailed for the last fifteen years, we are going to do everything in our power to achieve that desirable end.
  Mr. HOGGE: One of the disadvantages of the Debate on the Third Reading of this measure is the manner in which prominent members of the Government deal with their subjects, and, having delivered their speeches, disappear from the House, presumably to get on with the War. I have listened to a great number of Third Reading Debates on large issues, but I confess that I never listened to two speeches—one from the Prime Minister and the other from the ex-Prime Minister—which were less suited to the occasions and which dealt with material of so little importance to the relevancy of the subjects before the House. It is useless to debate this point, as neither the Prime Minister nor the ex-Prime Minsiter is present, but it is useful to put on record, shortly, what one thinks of the way in which these subjects are dealt with in this House. Hon. Members will recall the circumstance that last week the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Fife made a speech in this House in which he demanded information. The second portion of his speech was confined to exaltations in regard to the Government and its policy in Russia, but the important part of his speech was the demand for information; and when the ex-Prime
  800
  Minister gets up and asks for information those of us who are not ex-Prime Ministers, and who, therefore, have not access to the sources of information which are open to ex-Prime Ministers, obviously wonder at the meaning of the demand coming from him with the authority of an ex-Prime Minister. The Member for East Fife asked for information, and I naturally thought he was in possession of information which those of us in other parts of the House could not possibly have; and when one heard, as one did, the Member for East Fife state in his speech that the position to-day, particularly on the Western Front, was one of as much gravity and peril as in the month of September, 1914, then obviously one desires to follow that point up.
  I made a speech last Tuesday in which I put the point to the Leader of the House of Commons, who was then present, as to whether he agreed with the Member for East Fife in the statement he made from the bench opposite with regard to the gravity and peril of the position to-day as compared with September, 1914, and the Leader of the House agreed that that was perfectly right. He agreed that the position to-day was as grave and as perilous as it was in September, 1914, and those facts having been asked for by the Member for East Fife, the right hon. Gentleman gave a pledge to the House that either he himself or the Prime Minister would come down to-day and answer not only the speech of the hon. Member for East Fife, but the other speeches made that day asking for information. Naturally, when the Prime Minister rose to-day, I expected to hear an answer to the speeches which had been made last Tuesday—in fact, I was led to assume that because the Prime Minister assured the House that for the purposes of this Debate he had studied all the speeches made in that Debate before he came down to the House. If the Prime Minister had done that, which I very much doubt, he would have known the points which were raised on Tuesday. I suggest that the Prime Minister did not deal with a single point that was raised in the Debate on Tuesday.
  The first speech that was made from the ordinary benches of the House of Commons last Tuesday was made by my hon. Friend the Member for Pembroke (Mr. Roch), who put four specific questions to the Government, every one of which dealt with a point to which the

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  House of Commons was entitled to have an answer. One of those points raised a very serious question to a great many Members of the House. It was described as the spatch-cocking of British troops with the French troops on the line in the West, and the Member for Pembroke asked whether we could have any information with regard to that method, and as to what it meant and what was behind it, and as to what might happen in the case of which, God forbid, there should be a French defeat south of Amiens. The Member for Pembroke raised the very vital question of the treatment of the wounded of those British divisions that were spatch-cocked with the French divisions, and he pointed out from information available from him, from his own friends and others, that on a recent occasion, on account of the very fact that the British troops had been spatch-cocked in that way, the British wounded had to undergo sufferings comparable to the sufferings endured by the wounded in Mesopotamia.
  Now, the hon. Member for Pembroke is not an extravagant Member of this House, and is not given to expressing extravagant views about anything, or putting too high a construction upon facts, but the Prime Minister never replied to him. Surely there was a point with which the Prime Minister could have dealt in regard to the speeches delivered last Tuesday if he had really wanted to reply! Surely he could have said whether or not precautions had been taken to look after the British wounded who were wounded under those conditions, and whether those conditions obtained on the Western Front! But not a syllable of information was vouchsafed. Then I myself raised the point by way of an interruption, and I pointed out to the Prime Minister that the facts he was giving to the House of Commons were entirely different to the facts he gave to the House in Secret Session, and he told me that I had no right to reveal any facts that were given in Secret Session. I have never revealed any of those facts, and it would be rather interesting to know when he says one was revealing facts given in Secret Session. The Prime Minister nor any other member of the Government, when they come in open session to give facts, and make statements about similar facts and statements given in Secret Session and give them
  802
  differently, cannot expect honest men to sit and agree with them and say nothing about it. So long as I am in this House, and upon every opportunity I have outside this House, I shall say what I said to-day in my interruption, that the Prime Minister does not give the same facts in Secret Session as he does in open Session when dealing with the same subjects. He conceals the facts, but for what purpose I do not know, and I do not mean to debate at the moment. That is the truth, whatever the Prime Minister may care to say about it.
  I now come to the reply made by my right hon. Friend the Member for East Fife. I was almost as astounded at the reply given by the ex-Prime Minister to the Prime Minister as I was at the speech of the Prime Minister. Last Tuesday the ex-Prime Minister got up in the House, and, with the weight of his authority, put a position to us and to the country which suggested that to-day the situation on the West was as grave and as perilous as in September, 1914, but to-day, when the Prime Minister refuses to give him any information, the ex-Prime Minister says, "Oh, I did not mean that. All I meant last Tuesday was: Could you not give us some more facts about the various regiments and divisions in which we are all interested and in which some of us have relatives or friends or constituents? That is the kind of thing that I meant, and that ought to be given regularly." I remember when the ex-Prime Minister sat on this side of the House and refused to give the same kind of information for which I thought he was asking, and which the Prime Minister refused to give to-day. Why should we discuss anything at all in this House if it is going to be discussed in that artificial way? It is either true or false, as was stated by the ex-Prime Minister and by the Leader of this House here a week ago. If it is true, then to debate the subject as it has been debated this afternoon and for the House to be content to leave it there is absolutely ridiculous. It is all very well to ride away on the Italian success. I am very glad that the Italians have succeeded on this occasion, and I would like to see their success as complete as possible, but if the facts are as stated to the House by these two responsible Members it will not help us on the West. It is not worth discussing it in an empty House, and when the responsible Ministers are absent, and I do not mean to discuss it. I only rose for a

  803
  few minutes in order to get the protest on to the Notes of the House, so that subsequently those of us who do take an interest in these matters, and who are not connected with the Government will be able to point to the fact that we were dissatisfied with the position taken up both by the Prime Minister and by the ex-Prime Minister, and that we at any rate were not bluffed by the legerdemain exercised by both Benches with regard to the essential facts of a very serious situation.
  Question put, and agreed to.
  Bill accordingly read the third time, and passed.

MATERNITY AND CHILD WELFARE BILL.
Order for Second Reading read.
The PRESIDENT of the LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. Hayes Fisher): I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a second time."
Attention, called to the fact that forty Members were not present; House counted, and, forty Members being found present—
Mr. HAYES FISHER: This is a Bill which has been much expected and long delayed. It is a Bill which, if passed, will do something at any rate to repair the ravages done by this War to the manpower of our country, because it will enable local authorities to afford further facilities for motherhood and for the care and welfare of the infant population of our country. The Bill seeks to extend the powers of local authorities in England and Wales for saving the lives of mothers and of children. It does that by developing in certain directions the powers which local authorities now have in the domain of maternity and child welfare. It ask for the local authorities of England and Wales the same powers as are now enjoyed by the local authorities of Scotland and Ireland, and which undoubtedly I Scotland have been used with very considerable benefit. It is no new policy. We have long had with us the machinery for maternity and child welfare. Originally it was more set up by voluntary bodies than by local authorities, but every year this policy of maternity and child welfare has grown more and more popular
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with local authorities. There has been a very considerable growth of expenditure by the State on this effort to preserve our mothers and the infant population. In the year 1914–15 the expenditure was £10,439 by the local authorities and £1,049 by voluntary bodies—a total of £11,488 only. In the year 1917–18 the expenditure by the local authorities had jumped up to £92,985, while that of voluntary bodies had jumped up to £29,301, making a total of £122,286 spent on maternity and infant welfare. The sum voted by this House for the present financial year is nearly double that, being £230,000. What is the scheme of the Bill? It is that any local authority to which the Act applies may make such arrangements as may be approved by the Local Government Board for attending to the health of prospective mothers and nursing mothers and children who have not attained the age of five years and are not being educated in schools provided by the Board of Education.
That is the general scheme of the Bill. To what authorities does it apply? It does not apply to all authorities, large and small. That is a question on which there may be some difference of opinion, but it is more a point for the Committee stage. After all, power is left to the Local Government Board, after consultation with the council of any county, before it approves a scheme, and therefore before it is possible for any Grant to be made, to say to that local authority that it is better that certain particular powers shall be exercised, not by the county council but by the district council. Speaking generally, my experience at the Local Government Board certainly leads me to believe that, on the whole, in health matters and in that portion of health matters relating to maternity and infant welfare, it is better to have schemes operating over a large area than schemes operating over a small area. That is true not only of health activities, but I think of many other activities, and when this War is over we shall have very seriously to consider whether our local areas are the best areas in which to operate schemes for higher education, for public health, for electricity, and for matters of that kind. In our administration we are always brought up against the area question. That is not a question in which one, however, ought to go at any length in discussing this Bill. How are these powers to be exercised? We propose in Clause 2:

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of the Bill that "every council in England and Wales which exercises these powers shall set up a committee, that all matters relating to the exercise of these powers shall be referred to such committee, and that the council before exercising any such powers shall, unless in their opinion the matter is urgent, receive and consider the report of the maternity and child welfare committee with respect to the matter in question. The council may also delegate to that committee any of its own powers under the Bill." The idea underlying the setting up of a committee of this kind is the idea which underlies the setting up by all county councils and by all councils of education committees with a view of attracting upon the committees persons who are not likely to obtain a place upon them by seeking election.
Mr. BOOTH: Why not?
Mr. FISHER: The hon. Gentleman asks why not, and it is a very proper interrogation. There are, after all, a great many people, especially women, who are not going to face the unfortunate amount of mud slinging which often is associated with election to local bodies. That is one reason, but there is another. Those who seek election on committees of this kind for the sake of promoting questions of education or of public health are very often specialists in that one branch of public health only. They care for nothing else but education or public health, and they have devoted the whole of their lives to the subject. It has been undoubtedly the experience that on these committees you do obtain a great accession of really valuable material by allowing the councils to co-opt those who are peculiarly well adapted by their experience and their knowledge and their love of the subject. They do good service in the field of education or in the field of public health. Therefore, in considering the composition of this body with several of my colleagues who take as great an interest in this question as I do, we came to the conclusion that in administering these new powers of public health—and they are very important powers—it would be advisable for the council to appoint something like one-third of the committee from those who have not been elected, but who have special knowledge and experience of this subject, and are therefore peculiarly well qualified to promote the interests which under this Bill we
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desire to promote and who would be a valuable addition to any committee upon which they were placed. Let the House notice that we reserve considerable power to the council itself, because two-thirds of the committee must consist of elected members of the council, so that the financial power is preserved to the council. As to the powers themselves, what will these local authorities be able to do if this Bill is passed which they cannot do now, or which, at any rate, they cannot legally do now, or cannot do without serious risk of being held up? Some of them are already carrying out some of these powers. I am afraid that some of them do occasionally go a little beyond the actual law in the matter, and take risks in order that they may do some of these things which they and we equally think that it is most desirable that they should be able to do.
Here are some of the things which local authorities will be able to do if this Bill is passed. They will be able to provide crèches and day nurseries. These are more and more needed in these days, when so many women are going out to work to help their country, and are doing most valuable work in connection with munitions and factories of all kinds. They will be able to establish convalescent homes for nursing mothers and children under five years of age. They will be able to establish homes and make other arrangements for attending to the health of children, under five years of age, of widowed, deserted, and unmarried mothers. Another power is to provide home helps or other assistance for securing proper conditions for the confinement of necessitous women. They can provide food for expectant and nursing mothers and for children under five years of age. As an emergency measure that can be done now, but only under certain Regulations under the Defence of the Realm Act. It would be far better to give this power generally in a Bill of this kind. The Bill will also provide direct authority for services which are performed now, but which perhaps are not altogether within the law now. It would give direct authority for midwives and maternity nurses for necessitous women, and for areas at present in need of this service. Last, but not least, the Bill provides direct authority for perhaps the most valuable of all the powers which are being more extensively used now—that is, the power to provide

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maternity and welfare centres. May I break off here for a minute to point out what extreme value the Local Government Board attach to local authorities getting up within their areas complete schemes for maternity and child welfare centres? I may say that I am doing everything I can to encourage them to use the powers they have. Some of them are a little timid for fear they do not now legally possess these powers. I hope that when this Bill becomes an Act of Parliament they will no longer stay their hands, but will look to those local authorities which have met with the greatest possible success in setting up maternity and child welfare schemes, and that every single local authority will vie with one another and set up the most complete and perfect maternity and child welfare scheme it can possibly find.
May I say a word about expenses? A short time ago I visted a centre which has a perfect maternity and welfare system. It consisted of four health visitors, a whole-time doctor, a dental clinic, a hospital for the more difficult cases of confinement, a centre to which women expecting to have babies could go for advice during the whole period of their ante-natal treatment, and also a centre from which food and milk could be distributed under the certificate of the medical officer of health to all women who were in a necessitous condition or, at all events, whose condition was such that they could not obtain proper food and milk which it was necessary for them to obtain, if they were to go safely and healthily through the peril of their confinement and if they were to bring forth sound and healthy children. That centre also consisted of a maternity home, very well arranged, in which there were sixteen beds. If we take it that those sixteen beds were used throughout the year for a fortnight by each person who was delivered there of a child it would work out on the average to something like 240 women who would be able to go to that home and be confined. When you come to work out the expense to the borough of the whole of this most valuable system it amounts only to ¼d. rate. I ask anybody living in a house rated at £48 a year whether he would not be only too glad to give forty-eight farthings, or a shilling in the whole year, in order that the borough in which he resided might afford this splendid opportunity to the poorer people of having these
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comforts which his wife would probably have for herself when she was in a similar time of need? Those are the powers we seek to give to these local authorities.
Who are asking for this Bill? I believe that the Government—this is a Government Bill—have the whole of public opinion behind them in this matter. Certainly, I have never had deputations approach me which have been so unanimous as the deputations who have come with a request for this Bill. I have had deputations from the leading local authorities, from the leading county councils, from the municipal corporations, from urban district councils, and from rural district councils. I put this question to them, "If you have these powers, will you make use of them?" One and all of them told me that there was no doubt about their making use of them. There is a possibility of applying a little stimulus on the part of the Local Government Board to recalcitrant local authorities, and possibly to timid local authorities by means of Grants, to use their powers in this direction. I propose to use every form of stimulus, if the Bill passes, to get the laggards among local authorities to come into line with the best local authorities and carry out this scheme. I have received many requests from organisations to do my best and to use my influence with the Government and the House of Commons to get this Bill passed. Here is a resolution, the latest, which I received this morning from the Women's Co-operative Guild:
"That this Congress strongly protests against the continued delay of the Maternity and Child Welfare Bill and calls upon the Government to place the needs of mothers and children before the wishes of interested parties and to give immediate facilities for passing the Bill into law."
I maintain that public opinion is behind this Bill. Local authorities are all eager for it. They are all eager to use the powers which the Bill will give them directly it is passed. Who are opposing the Bill? It is opposed by my hon. and gallant Friend the senior Member for Plymouth (Major Astor) and a group of his friends and my friends. I am a little bit surprised that my hon. and gallant Friend should oppose this Bill, because for years past he has taken a very great interest in all public health matters and has used a great deal of energy and influence, most properly, to get these health matters attended to in this House, and

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his general policy is to try and make it more popular with the public. I am therefore a little surprised that he should oppose this Bill, because he must agree with me that this is a measure which is designed to and will effect an enormous saving in infant life. Indeed I have a letter from him signed in his own hand as the Vice-Chairman of the National Baby Week Council in which he informs me that
"A Minister of the Crown has stated that 50,000 babies could be saved each year by Government action."
What Government action?
Major ASTOR: That is the point.
Mr. FISHER: I am going to answer that. Undoubtedly by the passing of this Bill.
Major ASTOR: No!
Mr. FISHER: My hon. and gallant Friend says "No," but he quotes a Minister of the Crown as stating that 50,000 babies could be saved every year by Government action. I know what he means. He means Lord Rhondda, the Minister for whose illness we are all extremely sorry and of whose return to health we would all be glad to hear. We all hope that he will speedily return to good health and carry on his great task. Lord Rhondda did say that the lives of 1,000 babies a week could be saved by Government action. What was the Government action? Here is a quotation from the reported speech made by Lord Rhondda at the meeting of the National Baby Week Council held at Bedford College on 30th July last:
"I proposed introducing a very short Bill relating to maternity and child welfare, simply empowering the local authorities in England and Wales to exercise the powers which are now given to Scotland and Ireland. Well, you would think it inconceivable, wouldn't you, that such a Bill would be opposed for a single moment.… It was only a Bill of a single clause—the effective part of it.… I believe, from information supplied to me by responsible men—I am not making this statement on my own responsibility—that it is possible to save the lives of one thousand babies a week by such a Bill as this. A thousand baby lives a week!"
That is the very Bill for which I am now asking the Second Reading. Lord Rhondda went on to say:
"Isn't it a criminal thing that a baby Bill such as I proposed should be introduced should have been delayed for a single day. It out-Herod's Herod!"
It is this very Bill, therefore I am a little surprised that my hon. and gallant Friend
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should oppose this Bill, because in his letter to me he added:
"Until the Government take action, voluntary action must do the work which they ought to be doing."
8.0 P.M.
Here we are taking action in order that the local authorities may be able to do the work which the voluntary organisations can now do, because the Treasury has been really very generous in the matter. I urged them, and after a very short time the Treasury gave their decision and informed the Local Government Board that they would gladly make new Grants and would make new Regulations for all these things, comprising all these powers of which I have just informed the House, and if these new Grants and new Regulations are made, then for the first time local authorities will be legally empowered to do all these things which voluntary associations can now do, and for which voluntary associations can obtain Grants. That is really carrying out what my hon. and gallant Friend wants to see carried out—the Government taking action in order to enable local authorities to do the very things which voluntary effort up to the present has done. I am perfectly aware that the reason for my hon. Friend's opposition, and for that of several other Gentlemen, is that they think they can use this Bill as a lever for a larger measure, and that if this is not passed it will enable them to agitate the country a little more for the Ministry of Health Bill. This Bill is not a substitute for the Ministry of Health Bill. I believe every member of the Government approves of it. It is a Government Bill. The Ministry of Health Bill also in its main outlines has been approved by the Government. I know some people think an agreed Bill could be introduced and would pass through the House in a very few days. I am not one of them. It is a great measure, which I hope to see passed in an agreed form, covering the whole subject, but I do not believe for a moment that it is possible to carry a Ministry of Health Bill through the House, unless the Government can find time for it. I believe this little Bill really ought to go through, and we ought to get the advantages of it at once. We ought not to delay, because if we can keep a thousand babies' lives a week saved by a Bill like this, the lives of a thousand babies a week are being lost while we delay. You cannot shut your

811
eyes and ears to the observations that you hear if you will only listen. Yes, we are all in favour of the Ministry of Public Health Bill, but when you come to frame it it must be a large measure, and you must give the House of Commons ample time to discuss it.
Mr. ANDERSON: May I ask a question on one point which seems to give some perturbation, whether this Bill will be used in any way as an excuse for postponing the larger measure?
Mr. FISHER: I will answer frankly and fully for myself. I will not accept this in any way as a substitute for the Ministry of Health Bill, and directly the Government can give time—it must be really adequate time—
Mr. BARNES: We cannot get the Health Bill this year.
Mr. FISHER: I think my right hon. Friend means this Session. After all, there may be an Autumn Session. Let the Government give time for the discussion of the Ministry of Health Bill, and I will give any assistance in my power and any influence I have with the Government to enable it to bring that Bill before the House. You may not agree with all the details of the Bill, but the sooner we can co-ordinate the Departments dealing with public health the better. There is no doubt you want to fuse the Local Government Board and the National Insurance Commission, and to carry out many things of that kind. It is impossible really for anybody to go into this question at all deeply without seeing that directly you try to set up a Ministry of Health and deal with the public health policy of this country you are confronted with the whole of the Poor Law system. I am not saying this is insoluble, by any means, but the Poor Law not only must play a very large part in the future public health policy of the country, but when you come to the discussion of public health you cannot ask the House of Commons—it would not be any good to ask it—to discuss the Ministry of Health without to a certain extent discussing the public health policy that is going to follow on after you have created this great public health machine. My plea with my Friends is this: Use all you efforts with the Government to introduce the Ministry of Health Bill. After all, when you have it this is exactly one of the measures
812
Which you will require. Then when you have got the little Bill—after all, we can get it first—the local authorities will make use of their powers under it and the whole power under it would pass hereafter under the supervision and direction of the Ministry of Health after it was set up. That represents the difference between myself and my hon. Friend. They say, "This is a good policy, but wait till you get the Ministry of Health Bill." I say, "No; this is a good policy and do not wait till you can get your Ministry of Health Bill, but give us this, which we want." The local authorities desire to undertake the work, the Local Government Board desires to help them, the Treasury is willing to find the money and the House of Commons has voted the money. Let us get on with this splendid work of trying to save life. We often hear the phrase, "Let us get on with the War." Let us get on with the War even though it involves the death and destruction of hundreds of thousands of our citizens. We know it must be so. But let us get on with this kind of legislation which does something to repair the ravages of the war and to preserve for this country its greatest national asset, and enables children to come into the world under far easier and happier circumstances and with a far better chance of living than they have at present if only these powers are given to the local authorities to use them as I have every reason to believe they will.
Major ASTOR: I beg to move, to leave out from the word "That" to the end of the Question, and to add instead thereof the words,
"in the opinion of this House, a Bill dealing with maternity and child welfare is not satisfactory unless it is accompanied by legislation combining in a Ministry of Health the Local Government Board and the Health Insurance Commissions for England and Wales, and taking powers to transfer thereto the health functions of other Government Departments."
It was not until some time after I had come to the House that I heard this measure was likely to come up for discussion, and I know that several hon. Members who do not belong to the same party that I do, but who hold the same views as I do about this Bill, would have been here to take the same line as I am doing had they known it was likely to come up for discussion. I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for saying that I am very much interested in health matters, but the reason why I put down this Amendment

813
is because I do not want people to believe that it is going to do more than it actually will accomplish. There is a great public demand for dealing with health and health matters. I do not want to make the public believe that something big is being done. Next week is baby week, and I do not want people who come to the opening conference to be told, "Do not go on pressing for a Ministry of Health. You have had your Maternity Bill through. Give that a chance. Wait and see what happens." When listening to my right hon. Friend I felt more than ever convinced that what we need now more than almost anything else is to reorganise our machine. We want to get our administrative machinery in order. Then after we have done that let us proceed to legislate. This is only a bit of the health legislation that this country requires. There is a great deal more dealing with children, with adults, with men and women, and the great preparations which ought to be made for the troops before they return, the diseases which will be brought back from men in the Army fighting in tropical and subtropical areas. We ought to be getting ready with that. We ought to be having one Department, not several, making plans for preventing the spread of malaria, dysentery, and other diseases. My right hon. Friend said, "You must not proceed with the Ministry of Health until you have thought out your policy." I claim that if we are to wait until we know exactly where we are going in health legislation, until we all agree as to what the goal is which we are going to reach, we shall never really proceed.
It seems to me that what we ought to do now is, during the brief intervals that we can snatch between war measures—I am not one who would say anything dealing with health and the saving of life was not a war measure, but I meant the intervals in the time we spend in considering the prosecution of the War. In my opinion we ought to be preparing machinery which will enable us to deal with the problems of reconstruction adequately when the War is over. It is one of the reasons why I am in favour of what is called the federal solution, the creation of other Parliaments, because I do not believe this Parliament by itself could possibly deal with the mass of legislation, Imperial and domestic, which will have to be passed when the War is over. Similarly the other day I was in
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favour of the Trade Boards Bill because that would set up machinery for dealing with industrial questions. It is obvious to everyone interested in social questions that during the War you cannot possibly find time to deal with what we call social reform adequately. What you can do, and what I suggest this House ought to do, is to prepare the machinery or to create such machinery as will be able to deal with these problems adequately and with sufficient rapidity when the time comes, because if we have not got the necessary legislative machinery, I believe we shall be faced with a very serious situation when the War is over. It is because of that that I feel that, instead of trying to tinker with public health, with child welfare and maternity, we should be more usefully employed not in passing legislation for new powers and new functions, but merely creating under one head a Ministry of Health—not a twenty or thirty Clause Bill. A three Clause Bill will be quite adequate. Roughly, the first Clause would unite under one head the main Departments dealing with public health. In the second Clause you might take care to transfer by Order in Council existing health functions from other Departments, such as the Local Government Board and the Insurance Commission, to the Ministry of Health, not to create new powers by Order in Council but to take power by Order in Council to transfer to your new Ministry such existing functions and powers as other Departments possess.
It being a Quarter past Eight of the clock, and there being Private Business set down by direction of the Chairman of Ways and Means under Standing Order No. 8, further proceeding was postponed without Question put.

PRIVATE BUSINESS.

  LOCAL GOVERNMENT (IRELAND) PROVISIONAL ORDERS (NO. 1) BILL [BY Order.]
  Order for Third Reading read.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read the third time."
  Mr. C. DUNCAN: I beg to move to leave out the word "now," and at the end of the Question to add the words "upon this day three months."

  815
  The Second Reading of this Bill was debated in this House on the 5th June, and I and those associated with me opposed this measure because of some difficulty with this district council on account of the treatment of its workmen. On that occasion the. Chief Secretary for Ireland promised to make an inquiry into this matter in this House, and so far as this House is concerned, seeing that very grave charges have been made against this district council in this House and the Chief Secretary publicly promised to make inquiry into the matter, it seems to me that the least we are entitled to on this occasion is to hear from the Chief Secretary for Ireland in this House whether any, and, if so, what, success has attended his efforts in regard to the Lurgan Urban District Council. I think this is an important matter; at any rate it is one that affects very large numbers of men organised in their trade unions. We have always expected that during the period of war every effort would be made not only by the trade unions concerned, representing the workmen on the one hand, but by the employers, whether in a private capacity, under the Ministry of Munitions, or a public authority, to pursue the efforts in the direction of endeavouring to avoid industrial difficulties. In this case the Lurgan Urban District Council has done nothing of the kind. They have cut straight across—
  Mr. SPEAKER: These matters are not contained at all within this Bill. On the Third Reading, debate is confined to matters which are referred to and dealt with in the Bill. The hon. Member is entitled to ask what action the Chief Secretary or the Irish Government have taken, because that was referred to on Second Reading, but I do not think he would be entitled to open up the same questions as were discussed on Second Reading with reference to the dealings of the urban district council with some of their employes. He is entitled to ask what has been done.
  Mr. DUNCAN: No attempt has been made to give any statement to the House on this matter at all, and I think that is a very unsatisfactory position to be in. I know a great deal of interest is being taken in this matter in Lurgan itself. May I point out that, owing to the War, the elections which would ordinarily take place for positions on a public authority of
  816
  this kind do not take place, and I am convinced in my own mind that if such elections had taken place there is not the slightest doubt that the people resident in Lurgan, the ratepayers and voters, would very easily have put sufficient pressure on the urban district council to have righted what we think is wrong? I do not know whether we are to have any statement with regard to what the Chief Secretary has done, but, in any case, I think the only thing I can do is to move the rejection of this Bill.
  Captain A. SMITH: I beg to second the Amendment.
  I think we are entitled to show cause why the Lurgan Urban District Council should not charge 5s. 6d. a 1,000 feet, and that the action taken by the council with regard to its workmen does not warrant any confidence being placed in any Bill being passed through the House by them. I had not the opportunity of being present in the House on the Second Reading of the measure, but in reading the Debate it seems that some astonishing statements were made which certainly call for some explanation by the Chief Secretary for Ireland with regard to this question. It was stated that, in order to get the Bill through, it was to make the actual consumers of gas pay the 5s. 6d., as against paying out of the common fund any deficiency in which the Lurgan Urban District Council gas works might be involved. The people are the authority there, and they are the people who say whether they will place on this authority persons to administer this Bill or any other Bill dealing with their gas works. I submit that so long as the people have not an opportunity in an election to say whether they condone the action of the council in the treatment of their workmen in this matter the Bill ought to be held up until the people have an opportunity of stating their opinion. If they do condone it they ought to suffer with anybody else. As my hon. Friend the Member for Barrow-in-Furness (Mr. Duncan) said, I cannot see how the people in Lurgan can have confidence in a council which has permitted such atrocious dealings by men who remain in authority there. In these circumstances, if my hon. Friend goes to a Division I shall certainly support him in favour of the rejection of the Bill.
  The ATTORNEY-GENERAL for IRELAND (Mr. Arthur Samuels): My right hon. Friend the Chief Secretary for Ireland

  817
  asked me to express his apologies to the hon. Members who have spoken for not being here in person on this occasion. He has given the undertaking which has been referred to, and he at once took steps to carry out that undertaking, which was an undertaking, so far as he could do it, to try and bring the parties together and see if an arrangement could be made. He wrote on the 6th June to the Local Government Board for Ireland and drew their attention to what had happened in the Debate, asking the President whether he would, before the Report stage, send a person down to Lurgan to interview the parties and see whether some arrangement of a satisfactory character could not be made. The Local Government Board for Ireland sent down Mr. Leach, and he had an interview with the chairman, the solicitor, the town clerk, and the manager of the gasworks, and a special meeting of the gas committee was called to go into the matter. It did so, and Mr. Leach pressed the view expressed here. They considered it very carefully, and came to the conclusion that on the whole the matter was not one that they were in a position to reopen. I may mention that they stated that they took up the works from a private company in April, 1916, which was rather a difficult position for them. They immediately went into the question of wages, and considered the whole matter, and they state that the rate of wages they pay are equal to or higher than wages in the towns all round the neighbourhood. They also say that the men who have been there before and left on account of some trouble were all now in other employment, except one. So far as the Chief Secretary is concerned, he has done everything he can to carry out this arrangement, and he has pressed strongly on the Local Government Board the views expressed in this House and the desire that the matter should be brought to arbitration. Under these circumstances I ask that this Bill should be allowed to pass. The question between the men and the gas company will still remain, and I hope it will be amicably arranged. In the interests of the ratepayers, a very large number of whom are in the position of citizens who are not of the wealthy class and who depend to a large extent upon the gas supply, I ask that this Bill should pass. I believe there are certain small industries which will be affected if this Bill is not passed. It is desired that the people who
  818
  consume the gas should pay for it, and that it should not fall upon the general body of ratepayers. I would also say that the city of Cork is involved in this Bill as regards land, and Tralee, from the point of view of water supply, depends upon the passing of this Bill.
  Mr. BOOTH: I am sure that the House has heard with profound regret that disappointing statement. It does not meet the case, and it does not sufficiently inform the House on the points left for decision by the Chief Secretary. It is one of those question where the members of the Labour party have no option but to do an unpleasant duty. I will deal first with the statement of the right hon. Gentleman that this Bill affects two other places. That is not the fault of Lurgan. If that argument had any force it would mean that any objectionable scheme could be got through by linking it up with two satisfactory ones, and then telling the House that if the Bill is not passed it will interfere with Cork or some other place. I give this advice to Government Departments, that when they know that a certain provisional Order is certain to arouse keen opposition they should let it stand or fall by itself, and not link it up with two other places that are perfectly innocent. I feel so strongly about the case of Lurgan that I shall vote against the Bill, even if by doing so it did interfere with other places. I should be very sorry to do so, but I cannot help it. We cannot go into all the details, but, on the Second Reading the Chief Secretary seemed amazed at the strength of the case, and said that he must be allowed to make personal inquiry to satisfy himself that the statements were well founded, and, if so, he would intervene. The hon. and gallant Gentleman who spoke for the district made one of the most curious statements, for he frankly declined to review the case put forward from the Labour benches. As one of the most astute members of this House his silence was more eloquent than his speech. He had no case. All he could tell us was that some arrangement might be made, and that somebody should go down, and he reminded us that two other places were concerned in the Bill. This is one of those cases which makes either a private or a public body stink in the nostrils of fair people. It is one of those cases that handicaps all properly conducted authorities, whilst casting a slur upon an entire industrial

  819
  community. Those who have read the Debate on the Second Reading will agree with me that I am not overstating the case when I say that the friends of the Bill—
  Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER (Sir D. Maclean): The hon. Member is now discussing a matter which was ruled out by Mr. Speaker.
  Mr. BOOTH: No. I understood Mr. Speaker to rule that the case could not be reopened, but that we were entitled to refer to the fact that a case was made out. I am not proposing to go into any details.
  Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER: There is no objection to a question being asked by the hon. Member who moved the rejection of the Bill and an answer being given by the Minister in charge of the Bill as to what has been done in the meantime, but we cannot have a Debate upon it.
  Captain SMITH: Would it not be in order to state, even though it was stated on the Second Reading, what are the wages which this company have paid or proposed to pay before the Bill came to the House?
  Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER: That would be quite proper on the Second Reading, but it is not relevant to the Bill now.
  Mr. BOOTH: The Chief Secretary stated that he would make personal inquiries, and the statement now made on behalf of the Government is not adequate to the promise then made. The Chief Secretary gave the House to understand that the intervening time while the Bill was before the Private Bill Committee upstairs would be used by him and by the Irish Government in order to investigate this case, but I certainly inferred, and anyone reading the Debate would infer, that the Chief Secretary would be in his place to-day and give us his opinion.
  Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER: That is going against Mr. Speaker's ruling and the ruling which I myself have given.
  Mr. BOOTH: I am only coming to what you directed my attention to, and that is the Chief Secretary's promise and the fulfilment of it.
  Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER: We cannot have a discussion on that.
  Mr. BOOTH: When you called me to order before you said reference could be made to it. However, if you wish to revise your ruling I have no objection. The reply given by the Government is unsatisfactory, and I think I am within my rights in objecting to the Bill on its merits. This is a Provisional Order sanctioned by the Irish Government, and I claim that in these matters Ireland is having preferential treatment over England. When a similar proposal which was to go in a Provisional Order was brought forward by my own Constituency of Pontefract, we were told that while the War was on the Government Departments were too busy to deal with these cases. Now I come down to the House and I find Order after Order going through for Ireland, including this one. That is entirely contrary to the statement of the Government, and I think I am perfectly entitled, while I do not offer objection to two parts of the Bill, to object to the House giving its time in this way, when it declines to attend to my own Constituency in England, on a matter quite as important, by saying that there is a war on.
  Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER: That is not relevant to the Clauses of this Bill. I am not quite certain whether this is the second or the third time that I have called the hon. Member's attention to the fact that in my opinion his remarks are irrelevant.
  Question put, "That the word 'now' stand part of the Question."
  The House divided: Ayes, 87; Noes, 14.

  Division No. 50.]

  AYES.

  [8.38 p.m.

  Agg-Gardner, Sir James Tynte

  Bird, Alfred

  Craik, Rt. Hon. Sir Henry

  Archdale, Lt. Edward M.

  Brace, Rt. Hon. William

  Dalrymple, Hon. H. H.

  Baird, John Lawrence

  Bridgeman, William Clive

  Dalziel, Rt. Hon. Sir J. H. (Kirk'dy)

  Baker, Col. Sir R. L. (Dorset, N.)

  Brookes, Warwick

  Denman, Hon. Richard Douglas

  Baldwin, Stanley

  Bryce, John Annan

  Edwards, J. H. (Glam., Mid.)

  Barlow, Sir Montague (Salford, South)

  Bull, Rt. Hon. Sir William James

  Fell, Sir Arthur

  Barnett, Capt. Richard W.

  Butcher, Sir J. G.

  Fisher, Rt. Hon. W. Hayes (Fulham)

  Barnston, Major Harry

  Coates, Major Sir Edward F.

  Foster, Philip Staveley

  Barran, Sir Rowland H. (Leeds, N.)

  Colvin, Col.

  Gibbs, Col. George Abraham

  Beck, Arthur Cecil

  Craig, Ernest (Crewe)

  Gilmour, Lt.-Col. John

  Benn, Sir Arthur S. (Plymouth)

  Craig, Col. Sir James (Down, E.)

  Goulding, Rt. Hon. Sir Edward Alfred

  Greenwood, Sir G. G. (Peterborough)

  Mackinder, Halford J.

  Sanders, Col. Robert Arthur

  Griffith, Rt. Hon. Sir Ellis Jones

  Malcolm, Ian

  Scott, A. M'Callum (Bridgeton)

  Hall, Lt.-Col. Sir Fred (Dulwich)

  Mason, David M. (Coventry)

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

  Hamersley, Lt.-Col. A. St. George

  Neville, Reginald J. N.

  Spear, Sir John Ward

  Harmsworth, Cecil G. (Luton, Beds)

  Newman, Sir Robert (Exeter)

  Stewart, Gershom

  Harris, Sir H. P. (Paddington, S.)

  Nicholson, Sir Chap. N. (Doncaster)

  Tickler, Thomas George

  Havelock-Allan, Sir Henry

  Nield, Sir Herbert

  Tryon, Capt. George Clement

  Hewart, Rt. Hon. Sir Gordon

  Parker, James (Halifax)

  Walker, Col. W. H.

  Hinds, John

  Pearce, Sir Robert (Leek)

  Weston, John W.

  Hope, James Fitzalan (Sheffield)

  Perkins, Walter Frank

  White, James Dundas (Tradeston)

  Illingworth, Rt. Hon. Albert H.

  Pollock, Sir Ernest Murray

  Williams, Llewelyn

  Jones, Henry Haydn (Merioneth)

  Pratt, John W.

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

  Jones, J. Towyn (Carmarthen, E.)

  Pryce-Jones, Col. Sir E.

  Wilson, Col. Leslie (Reading)

  Jones, Wm. S. Glyn- (Stepney)

  Pulley, C. T.

  Wolmer, Viscount

  Joynson-Hicks, William

  Raffan, Peter Wilson

  Yate, Col. Charles Edward

  Layland-Barratt, Sir F.

  Robinson, Sidney

  Younger, Sir George

  Levy, Sir Maurice

  Samuel, Samuel (Wandsworth)

  Lloyd, George Butler (Shrewsbury)

  Samuel, Rt. Hon. Sir Harry (N' wood)

  TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—Lord

  MacCaw, Wm. J. MacGeagh

  Samuels, Arthur W. (Dub. U.)

  Edmund Talbot and Capt. Guest.

  NOES.

  Anderson, William C.

  Galbraith, Samuel

  Rowlands, James

  Baker, Joseph Allen (Finsbury, E.)

  Jowett, Frederick William

  Wing, Thomas Edward

  Booth, Frederick Handel

  King, Joseph

  Buxton, Noel

  Lambert, Richard (Cricklade)

  TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—Captain

  Chancellor, Henry George

  Martin, Joseph

  Smith and Mr. C. Duncan.

  Davies, Ellis William (Elflon)

  Mason, Robert

  Question put, and agreed to.

  Bill accordingly read the third time, and passed.

MATERNITY AND CHILD WELFARE BILL.
Postponed Proceeding resumed on Question, "That the Bill be now read a second time."
Question again proposed.
Major ASTOR: When we were interrupted just now I was pointing out that, in urging upon the Government the, desirability and feasibility of passing a Bill setting up a Ministry of Health, I did not contemplate a Bill of ten, twenty, or thirty Clauses, or increasing the amount of power which the Ministry would have. The first power which you want is, I think, to co-ordinate at the centre under one head the principal Government Departments that deal with public health, and I was engaged in pointing out that it was quite possible to establish a Ministry of Health by passing a three-Clause Bill. The first Clause would put under one head the Local Government Board and the Insurance Commission. The second Clause would give power to transfer, by Order in Council, to that Ministry existing health functions which now are administered by other Government Departments—such as the Home Office, the Board of Education, and the Board of Trade. The third Clause would give power to the Government to take away
822
from that Ministry such non-health functions as would be transferred to it by the first Clause. These are such powers as audit—an entirely non-health function—or the demarcation of local authorities' boundaries, which would at the beginning be put under the Ministry of Health, but which it is not at all necessary should remain there, and much the easiest way of dealing with the matter would be to take power by Order in Council to transfer from the new Ministry of Health any non-health function, whenever that was thought desirable. Poor Law, for instance, might be divided, the health side remaining with the Local Government Board and the non-health side with the Home Office. I give that as an illustration. Audit might be handed over to the Treasury. And so it is possible, by a three-Clause Bill, to set up a Ministry of Health. Having set up a Ministry of Health, and having got your main health functions under one head in one Department and not scattered about Whitehall, you then would be able to decide far more effectively and in a far more statesmanlike manner what new powers are necessary. It would be far easier to carry a Bill asking Parliament to deal with new powers relating to health functions. The mere fact that for the last two years Government Departments have been quarrelling with each other as to whether this Bill ought to be passed is the greatest argument that could be adduced as to the advisability of having one Department and not several dealing with health functions.

823
Everyone who has had anything to do with administration knows perfectly well the amount of time that is wasted by negotiation between Government Departments where their functions overlap or interlock, and it is because of that that to my mind you will advance far more rapidly if you can establish the principle that there shall be one Department, not half a dozen, and one Minister, not half a dozen, dealing with health. If you do that you can not only pass a Bill such as this but many others, and these new powers are needed to develop and increase our health services throughout the country. It is fallacious, misleading, and unfair to talk of a Bill setting up a Ministry of Health as being a large Bill. It is a small Bill. It need only co-ordinate existing functions. Every Member of Parliament knows how difficult it is to get this House to increase the powers either of a central department or of local authorities, but everybody knows how easy it is to get a consolidating measure through this House. At this moment there is great agitation about the overlapping of new Departments with their large numbers of officials. A Ministry of Health would decrease the number of Departments and of officials. Such a Ministry would be dealt with by a small Bill which would put under one head existing functions. It is not necessary to settle what your health policy for the future is going to be. If you set up a Ministry of Health it is sufficient at the start. It is a big step forward to take the existing functions and put them under one head. You will have provided the machinery if you pass a Bill doing this, and then we ought to contemplate not only measures like this but others, wider measures giving numerous wider powers to local authorities to deal with health functions.
We have already wasted at least two Fridays by not sitting. We do not want to mortgage the available days which remain by passing measures which really will not accomplish a great deal, whereas we could pass another Bill in just as short a time consolidating and transferring functions under one head as I have explained. I do not think there would be more opposition, and I am convinced that you would actually do a great deal more by such a proposal. In any case, I suggest that my right hon. Friend and others connected with him in health
824
administration should join and introduce such a Bill, and that it should pass through its First Reading and all its stages pari passu with this Bill. If my right hon. Friend will give me an assurance that he will do that, I will try and facilitate as far as I can, the passing of this Bill. I think this is essentially a matter which ought to be arranged. These two measures ought to be passed and go to the same Committee upstairs, and they ought to be incorporated in one Bill, and I believe my right hon. Friend would make far more rapid progress with this Bill, and would develop more rapidly the health powers and functions of his Department and of the local authorities, if concurrently he were to pass and assist in pushing through another Bill rearranging the health functions of the Government. Why is it that it is so necessary to do away with this overlapping, duplication, and jealousy, and to get your health powers under one Ministry?
Let us glance for a moment at the Departments which deal with health functions and see what, chaos there is and what grounds there are for rivalry, obstruction, and jealousy. There is, first of all, my right hon. Friend's Department, which deals in the main with the prevention of disease and also with the provision and supervision of institutions for institutional residential treatment. My right hon. Friend's Department deals with general sanitation—that is to say, the prevention of disease, housing, water, and so forth. It does not deal with domiciliary treatment, or so much with the cure of disease, as with the prevention of it in hospitals and other institutions. Then you have the Insurance Commission, created very largely because the Local Government Board was not filling the bill. The Insurance Commission, in the main, is curative, and deals with attacking disease in the home—domiciliary treatment through panel doctors. The prevention and the cure of disease had far better be dealt with by one Minister in one Department. You would get ahead far more rapidly if you could have the prevention and the treatment of disease dealt with by one staff under one chief. Then you have got the Board of Education, which is a sort of health department for the children. It deals with the inspection and treatment of school children, and it does so very largely because the Local Government Board in the past was not progressing

825
as rapidly as it ought to have done in the treatment and prevention of disease. If the Local Government Board had been active and pushing in the past, it would have been dealing with the prevention and treatment of disease with children. It is the Department that ought to do it, and it is only because the Board of Education was an enterprising Department that this great and very valuable function is performed by it, and most efficiently performed too. But a new vested interest has been created, and I want to prevent that sort of thing, of new vested interests being created all round Whitehall. The longer you wait the more vested interests you set up. My right hon. Friend proposes to set up an entirely new local authority under this Bill, covering a new area.
9.0 P.M.
The Ministry of Munitions have a Welfare Department, and more has been accomplished during the course of the War in two years in those matters of industrial health that have been occupying the attention of the Home Office for the last generation. Next you have the Home Office dealing with industrial health, and also dealing with the mentally defective or lunatics; you have, as I have pointed out, the Ministry of Munitions going into the question of industrial health; you have the Board of Agriculture connected with public health through, for instance, the purity of milk; you have got the Board of Trade concerned with health on board ship. So here you have sketched out very briefly some of the main functions of the different Government Departments connected with public health. I could go into the matter much more fully, but the outline I have given shows the amount of overlapping and duplication there is in Government machinery dealing with the health of the community. We know perfectly well that overlapping means delay; we know perfectly well the way in which Government Departments hold each other up. It is not a question of two or three Government Departments, but of half a dozen, all trying to deal with different aspects of a particular problem. But, after all, we must look to fighting disease as we now look to fight the enemy in the battle-field. When this War is over we shall still have disease to encounter, and we must be in a position not only to fight it but to defeat it. Surely the methods and principles which
826
make for success in war are methods and principles which might well be applied in counteracting and overcoming disease. Sir Douglas Haig is fighting against the enemy, but in doing so he has, not six general staffs, but one general staff at headquarters. In the same way, the French have one head, not half a dozen heads, dealing independently or by negotiation with each other, but each taking his own plan of campaign after long negotiation. If you wish to have progress, and effect rapid results, in dealing with various kinds of disease, it must be by having one Minister, and not a number of overlapping Departments, and I submit that there can be no adequate and effectual dealing with maternity and child welfare, unless it is conducted under a distinctive head and with proper co-ordination.
This Bill deals with that subject in only a very limited way. Insurance Commissions have maternity benefit, but do not provide institutional or domiciliary treatment; the Board of Education also has its finger in the pie, and deals with the question of instruction in regard to maternity; and, over and above, you have another Department responsible for the training of midwives, the Privy Council. You have the Local Government Board, the Insurance Commissions, the Board of Education, and the Privy Council all playing at trying to deal with maternity welfare, and with the question of reducing infant mortality, but none of them primarily responsible. Where a woman has been improperly treated in a maternity case she does not want to go to the Privy Council, or her husband does not want to do that for her. What the husband wishes is to go to the Minister who can be held responsible for her treatment. There is no Minister in this House to whom the husband of a pregnant woman could go, or who could be held responsible for inadequate provision of maternity treatment. There should be a single Minister whom the mothers of this country and the fathers of this country could hold responsible for seeing that adequate treatment is given, but, as it is, there are so many Ministers that they do not know whom to hold responsible. I was informed only recently that the Ministry of Munitions wanted maternity treatment for, a woman who had left home and gone into munition works, and, as the result, they set up their own Maternity Department. So that while we have so many Government Departments

827
tinkering with this matter, we have this war Department for the making of munitions, establishing maternity treatment, which it puts into the hands of a special Department of the Ministry of Munitions. What we want is to have all these matters connected with maternity and child welfare put under one head, and in that way mothers would be benefited and infantile mortality would be successfully reduced. This Bill does not make one Minister responsible, but still leaves all the overlapping, duplication, and the jealousy between rival Ministers.
My right hon. Friend mentioned the waste of infant life. It is a matter which makes everybody reflect. Nobody wants to do anything to prevent the reduction of infantile mortality. We want to stimulate everybody, every Department, every sound measure which will deal adequately with this question of preventable infantile mortality. We are losing too many useful, valuable lives over in France. We want to save as many lives that will grow up and take their place. The Registrar-General has only recently announced that, since the beginning of the War, 500,000 potential lives have been lost to this country—children that would have been born if it had not been for the War. We want to try to deal with this measure properly. We do not want to make the public believe that something big is going to be done, when, in fact, the matter is not going to be dealt with. Those of us who are here, I always feel, have a great duty in matters like this to the fathers who are in France, who are looking to those in this country to see that their children's lives are protected and are dealt with adequately. It is because of that there has been this growing demand from the public for the establishment of a Ministry of Health, and for the setting up of it at an early date. My right hon. Friend quoted the Food Controller, Lord Rhondda. I was at a meeting in Cardiff, speaking on the question of a Ministry of Health, and Lord Rhondda was there, and he stated emphatically that when he said that 1,000 baby lives could be saved every week if a certain measure were taken, what he had in mind was the establishment of a Ministry of Health such as I have described just now. He was quite clear about it, that it was not this Maternity Bill that in his idea would reduce and prevent this loss of 1,000 baby lives. I was there and heard it, and it was
828
reported. Referring to this measure for the establishment of a Ministry of Health such as I have described—not a thirty Clause Bill, but a three Clause Bill, putting all existing functions under one head—he said:
"This was a measure which could not wait until after the War, for every week that went by meant a great loss of child life."
Lord Rhondda referred, not to this so-called little Bill, but to the establishment of a Ministry of Health. He was quite clear about it. I pointed that out in a letter to the Press, which I thought my right hon. Friend had seen. So that in Lord Rhondda's opinion there was a preventable loss every week of 1,000 babies, and that loss could be prevented not by this Bill, but by the co-ordination of existing functions under one Minister. The Prime Minister said to a deputation, according to the papers, that if agreement on such a proposal as this were arrived at, he would do all he could to help it through. I have read in the papers that the Minister of Reconstruction had been negotiating with the different interests or interested parties—I do not know exactly what is meant by that—but he thought he had got substantial agreement, and that he would be ready to come down to this House and to introduce that Bill for the establishment of a Ministry of Health, which, in the opinion of Lord Rhondda, would do so much to reduce this preventable loss of child life. The Minister of Reconstruction made that statement some weeks ago. Where is that Bill? Who is holding it up? What interest or what Department is preventing agreement on that measure of co-ordination which, in the opinion of Lord Rhondda, is necessary to prevent this unnecessary loss of child life?
I was attending a great conference some months ago on matters dealing with public health, and I remember a message being read out from a member of the War Cabinet, Lord Milner, saying that, in his opinion, the first step was co-ordination at the head—that the first step necessary in public health was to put existing health powers under one Minister. Why have we not got that Bill? Why have we not it here to-night? If these Ministers of the Crown—a member of the War Cabinet and my right hon. Friend's predecessor as President of the Local Government Board—in their considered judgment say that that was the measure which was going to prevent unnecessary child mortality, why

829
have we not got it here now? It is not a twenty-Clause Bill or a thirty-Clause Bill. It is a little Bill, but it will do a great deal. It is true this is a little Bill so far as the number of Clauses are concerned, but it has some rather dangerous principles in it, and I do not think it is going to do so very much. The Leader of the House of Lords, Lord Curzon, speaking only recently, said that the Ministry of Health was being delayed at the moment because of Departmental jealousy. Is not this a case for the War Cabinet to interfere? Is this necessary measure for the saving of child life to be held up indefinitely because of Departmental jealousy? I am only speaking from what I have heard. I did not hear the speech myself, but I understand that that is what the Leader of the House of Lords said. Surely this sort of thing ought not to be allowed. It is a war measure. The men who are fighting in France want to know that this preventable infantile mortality is being tackled seriously, and why the measure which we have been assured on the highest authority will reduce that mortality is not produced. Why is Departmental jealousy making it possible for it to be delayed so many months? Can you imagine any responsible Minister saying that there was a preventable loss of 1,000 soldiers' lives every week, and the Government not at once taking action to prevent it? Why is it that the country does not demand, and the House of Commons does not demand, that the measure should be passed without delay?
There are one or two points connected with the Bill introduced to-day which I should like to raise. First of all, it is an empowering Bill. It does not compel anybody to do anything, and that is a point which the House should bear in mind when it looks on it as a measure of social reform, and likely to reduce infantile mortality. It authorises practically any local authority to provide its particular scheme if it is sanctioned by the Local Government Board. But the Local Government Board does not even lay down the scheme. It leaves the initiative to the local authority. Those of us who have experience of local authorities know what delays there will be in many parts of the country. You will get the backward local authorities, the recalcitrant local authorities, holding back from making the necessary provision. The Local Government Board is not able to compel them to move. It has no compulsory power to move. It can only tempt them
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with Grants-in-Aid. This Bill also enables the smaller local authorities, the rural district councils, to be the authority to deal with maternity. Anybody who has any acquaintance with rural district councils knows how much assistance you are going to get if you leave it to them. I for one am not prepared to leave the development of the maternity services entirely to the persuasive powers of the Local Government Board. I do not believe that you have got the new spirit in the Local Government Board which you require if you want a real development of the health services. It is because of the Poor Law-spirit which existed there, along with some of the traditions, that the Insurance Commission was set up as a separate Department. I believe, if you amalgamate those two Departments, and have that new spirit that experience suggests—and undoubtedly most valuable experience does exist in the Local Government Board—you will then at last get a "move" on.
As I said just now, the Bill is to set up an entirely new local authority—not the old education authority, not the county council, but a new authority for every 20,000 inhabitants. Surely we have got enough local authorities without establishing a new one? If we are going to deal with local authorities let us deal with them properly, and not by piecemeal. Those are some of the main reasons why I have put down the Motion which stands in my name on the Paper. I am very much afraid that the public opinion which has been demanding action, which has been demanding the establishment of a Ministry of Health, will be tempted to say: "Give the Maternity Bill a chance; let us see what happens, do not let us push for the establishment of a Ministry of Health; let us see what this new Bill—which, it is true, even those who introduced it admit is a little Bill—let us see what this Bill, with small and optional powers dealing with small authorities does. Let us give it a run. Let us see if anything happens." I believe we ought to deal at the present time with the reduction of infantile mortality. We ought to establish the machinery which will enable us to deal with these diseases which are going to be brought back from some of these tropical districts and countries where the men are fighting. I think we ought to do that now, so as to be ready with our machinery, with one staff, and under one head. In the last six months we have had examples of the

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value of co-ordination under one head. Within the last month the Allies, who tried to fight Germany separately and by negotiation, came to the conclusion that the only thing to do was to co-ordinate, which they did by the Versailles Council. More recently they have co-ordinated under one generalissimo. That is what we want to do with disease. We want to have one head, not six heads; one Department, not half a dozen Departments, dealing with this great question of fighting disease and infantile mortality. It is because I hold the views I do that I beg to move the Amendment standing in my name.
Major HILLS: I beg to second the Amendment.
I do so on two grounds. I quite agree that the Bill will do something, but, in my judgment, the Bill is a very little one, such as a minimum public opinion demanded, no more; and it has very serious faults. I do not like the Bill. That is my first ground for seconding the Amendment. My second ground is this: I believe it will make it more difficult and less likely to establish a Ministry of Public Health. Let me deal shortly with my objections. First of all, I object to it because it is optional. Surely the right hon. Gentleman knows perfectly well what an optional Bill means! It means that when you come to deal with local authorities—and you will deal with a very large number—on the one hand you will deal with the most progressive who are already, somehow or other, doing the work, and, on the other hand, with the least progressive who do not want to do it, and whom you cannot compel. In a work, it is perfectly well known that an optional Bill at this time will not "do the trick." It really almost savours of eyewash to bring in a Bill of this sort at this time of the War. In the second place, you are making a new local authority. I want the House to realise that quite distinctly. The local sanitary authority, which is the public health authority in the counties and towns all over the land, is passed over, and a new local and a larger authority is made. That may be all right, but it simply means that instead of simplifying the confusion which exists you add to it. You have made a new health department. There is also the further point: My right hon. Friend said, and said quite distinctly, that he believed
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that these questions were better treated by the larger local authorities. I presume by that he meant the county council, the borough council, or the larger county urban authority. In the new Bill a limit of 20,000 population is put. I am sure that is too low. Let me give one single example.
I see nobody here on the Front Bench representing the Local Government Board, and it is really rather a farce to speak when nobody official is listening. I have a question to ask when those concerned come back, as I suppose they will do some time. My question is this: At present the administration of the Mid-wives Act is under the county councils. It is very important that there should be a large area included in the local authority which administers the Midwives Act, because unless you have a large area you cannot employ a good inspector who can keep the midwives in hand by constant inspection. She must have constant inspection or she loses her power; also the smaller authorities cannot afford to pay the same amount as a larger authority. So if you hand over the inspection of mid-wives to these smaller authorities you take a retrograde step. There are further examples that I might cite. The last objection I have to the Bill is in Sub-section (2), at the bottom of page 1, which gives the Local Government Board power to delegate the authority referred to in this Bill to the smallest local authority if it likes. First of all, I think that the Local Government Board are the wrong people to have that authority, and if it should be delegated to anybody it should be to the county council or to the borough council. My right hon. Friend said that he himself favoured the larger local authorities. When, I would like to know, did the Local Government Board arrive at this decision? Their reputation points in a very different direction; it has always been said that they favoured smaller local authorities against bigger ones. I do not think I am unduly suspicious, but the knowledge of what has occurred in the past makes me very doubtful of the advisability of giving them the power to take away from the county councils the control over these maternity and child welfare boards and give it to the smaller local authorities.
Let me summarise my points against the Bill. First, I object because it is optional; secondly, because it increases the existing chaos; thirdly, because it works through

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smaller local authorities; and, fourthly, because it gives the Local Government Board the power to transfer this work to still smaller authorities. Let me say a few words on the question of a Ministry of Public Health. I listened very carefully to all that my right hon. Friend said. He told us that he himself was strongly in favour of a Ministry of Public Health. Then I wish he would throw his great abilities with rather more zeal into the task of passing that Bill. I am quite certain the House would pass it because it does not want a continuance of the absurdities that now occur. Really it is absurd that, in the middle of a great war, when lives are more important than they ever were before—it is, I say, absurd that we should have six or eight different Departments, each of which does a little bit of public health work. Why should we have this work divided up in this way for no reason except departmental and historical grounds, and why should there not be one Minister in this House responsible for the health of the people? My right hon. Friend said he had a great deal of public support behind this Bill; be told us he had received many deputations, and he was good enough to read to the House what some of them had said. May I ask how many deputations he has received urging him to pass a Bill establishing a Ministry of Public Health? Of course I do not know, I am not in his confidence, but judging from the Press and the platform one knows that the demand for such a Bill must be ten times as great as it is for this present Bill. Let us see what is happening, now. I want the House to realise how many different authorities are already called in to deal with child life. Let the House try and realise what occurs to the child now. The child is born under the auspices of the Privy Council, the body which is the national authority for the supervision of midwives. As soon as it leaves the ample arms of the midwife it will, I suppose, be handed over to my right hon. Friend, who will delegate his powers to the maternity centre, if there is one; if there is none, I do not know what he will do. Let the House mark this, the maternity authority under this Bill is only one of the local health authorities which are brought into operation. When the child leaves the care of the maternity authority it reverts, as a member of the normal population, to the charge of the public health authority—the local
834
sanitary authority. Then, as soon as it reaches five years of age—it may be earlier or at any time, for no clear line is cut as to the age, but assuming that our infant has been nurtured under the fostering care of my right hon. Friend until is has attained school age, it then passes to a wholly different authority, a wholly different medical service, but only so far as it is a school child: in its home life it is still under the local authority and its infant body is battledored and shuttlecocked from one to the other of these competing authorities. The absurdity does not end there. The father of the child may be overtaken by financial disaster and may have to go on the poor rate. The child thereupon, so long as the father is insolvent, may be sent to a Poor Law Infirmary, where no doubt he may be pretty well treated, but as soon as the father regains his solvency the child returns to the care of the local sanitary authority, not, however, for any reasons connected with health. Assuming he survives all this and reaches the age of fourteen, he goes to work. He obtains employment in a factory or workshop; then the Home Office steps in to take care of his industrial health. If he transfers his labours to a munition works, he comes under a totally different authority—not the Home Office but the Ministry of Munitions, who seeks to protest him against industrial disease. We have not reached the end of it. The boy's father may have served his country with distinction and have come home wounded; then there appears on the scene the Minister of Pensions, who provides medical treatment and nursing, not merely for the soldier but for all his dependants. At the same time the Board of Agriculture are also benignly watching his health in order to keep him free from certain diseases. Further, I am reminded that his father almost certainly will be one of the fourteen and a half millions of insured persons in this country, and the local insurance committees also come on the scene and concern themselves with this child's health.
Between his birth and the time when he leaves school he has to pass through the meshes of eight or nine different authorities, and he passes from one to the other not for any particular reason, but simply because of the chaotic system which obtains. In spite of all this, my right hon. Friend comes down here and,

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without saying anything about the existing authorities, just adds one more authority, and tells us he believes that by adopting his method the lives of a thousand babies will be saved. I do not think the House will credit that statement. I observe with some regret that my right hon. Friend has some rooted antipathy to the Bill which is being advocated for the establishment of a Ministry of Public Health, although it has received all the encouragement imaginable; indeed, I have never known a stronger call by the Press, on the platform, or in the pulpit than the call for this Ministry. All my right hon. Friend's colleagues are against him, they nearly all favour a Ministry of Public Health as against this Bill. It is common knowledge that before Lord Rhondda left the Local Government Board he had in hand a Bill for the establishment of this Ministry. Where is that Bill? I forget the exact date when Lord Rhondda assumed his present duties, but ever since then the Bill has been held up. When Lord Rhondda spoke of the loss of 1,000 babies a week he had in mind the passing of this Bill for the establishment of a Ministry of Public Health. That is why I feel that we ought not to pass this Bill without a strong protest. My right hon. Friend charged us with using this Bill as a lever for bringing in a Bill to establish a Ministry of Public Health. With all respect, the boot is on the other leg. We are not using this Bill as a lever; we are afraid of him using this Bill as camouflage. We are afraid that when this Bill has passed, doing the very least that will satisfy public opinion, he hopes the whole controversy will be put to rest. It is very curious and inexplicable that when the right hon. Gentleman had the biggest chance a Minister ever had he should have neglected it. He had at his feet the biggest opportunity of helping the health of this country that was ever given to any man. It so happened that there was a consensus of public opinion, and the right hon. Gentleman only had to lift his little finger and he would have got the time from the Government. He has not done so. I do not in the least know what the reasons are, but I fear that, whatever they are, they will still remain. I feel that if we pass this Bill without any assurance that a Minister of Public Health will be instituted, the right hon. Gentleman will have a chance of saying to the public that he has done that which the public
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requires, and this Bill may be used as a means of putting off still further a Bill for the establishment of a Ministry of Public Health. It is for that reason that I speak to-night. As far as the Bill itself is concerned, if it stands on its own merits I should not oppose it, but it is because I feel that it may be used to defeat something far more valuable that I speak against it. Even now I appeal to my right hon. Friend. He will reply soon. Cannot he give some hope to the hundreds of thousands of people who are looking for something to improve the public health. If he would only say that he would bring in the Bill this year and that the Bill had some chance, I am certain that all opposition to this Bill would be withdrawn.
Mr. ANDERSON: Whatever differences manifest themselves as to the method by which this thing should be done, there will be a general agreement in all parts of the House that it is urgently necessary that steps should be taken in the direction of securing the objects of this Bill. That a thousand infants should die every week whose lives could be saved by proper safeguards and legislation is a most wicked and wasteful thing, and it seems to me that legislation has been long delayed on this question because of the lack of imagination to understand all that is involved in this matter. First of all, it is a great waste to the nation itself. It is not only my opinion, and perhaps the children who die get off best of all, but where you have conditions that are killing off a thousand children a week those that remain are maimed and warped and stunted and grow up in that state. Not only this, but it is a question of the pangs of child-birth being inflicted on thousands of mothers merely that the children may perish like flies. It is wrong, and it is not a creditable thing for this nation or the Government that we should have permitted a state of things of that kind to continue so long as we have done.
It would appear that some of the interests with regard to insurance and the like have made it more difficult to get on with life-saving legislation. That is a lamentable state of things, and a measure of this kind throws light upon the social conditions under which large numbers of our people live, for there can be no doubt at all that many of those children die because of bad housing conditions, filthy slums, and adulterated milk, very often sold that a little extra profit may be made

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out of it. What we have to fight in this matter, as in all matters, is that the public good and the public advantage shall have a right of way over private interests and private gain. I am glad that in this matter a new conscience seems to be asserting itself in the country. We are having Baby Weeks to emphasise the importance of this question, and to emphasise from the national and individual point of view the need for some forward step being taken. Therefore, the question comes down practically to one as to whether it is best that this measure should go through, or whether we should urge its delay in the hope of forcing a larger coordinating measure which will set up something in the nature of a Ministry of Health.
I have listened to the well-informed speeches delivered by my hon. and gallant Friends who have spoken, and I am bound to say that I can agree in the main with the lines they have taken on this question. In my view it would have been better if the President of the Local Government Board had taken a bolder step and brought forward a larger measure. I believe he would have had not only the backing of this House in regard to such a measure but also the backing of the country. When he says he has received deputations in order to press this or that measure forward let me assure him that those deputations are not so much concerned for this measure as against that, but they are anxious that every step shall be taken by which life can be saved and where the public health is concerned. The Member for Plymouth (Major Astor) spoke upon the whole question and examined the various phases of it. The point that appeals to me is whether the Bill we are now discussing will really be used as a means of delaying the wider question of the establishment of a Ministry of Health. If I were persuaded that that would be the case I should be against this Bill, because I think that this measure is an altogether inadequate solution of the problem. I am quite sure that it does not in the least fulfil the needs of the case and we do want a co-ordinating measure. We want a Bill that will really make our doctors ministers of health whereas now the doctors flourish most when most disease is about in the economic sense. It would be far better that the energies of all the doctors should as far as possible be directed towards preventing disease rather than curing disease. I do wish to
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impress upon the representatives of the Local Government Board that this smaller measure cannot be accepted as an alternative for the bigger Bill, and that we would much prefer that they should take the step of introducing the bigger Bill. When I am brought face to face with the more practical question of what would be the net result of the Amendment moved by my hon. and gallant Friend, I cannot help feeling that at any rate there would be a danger that we should wreck this Bill without any certainty that the other Bill would be introduced, and I am quite sure that they are equally anxious that no step shall be lost, even if it is an inadequate step, of immediately grappling with this very terrible problem. The matter cannot be allowed to wait, and I differ from the hon. and gallant Member for Plymouth in that I think that the Ministry of Health Bill is not going to be quite so simple a matter as he supposes. It is going to be a bigger and a more contentious and controversial Bill than he imagines, and I am afraid it is not going to be allowed to go through the House quite so easily as it is desired.
The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. S. Walsh): My hon. Friend will remember that some months ago I gave a definite promise on behalf of the Local Government Board that this Bill in no sense whatever would be used to prevent the bringing in of a larger measure. I give that promise on my own honour now, and I am certain that promise will be carried out.
Mr. ANDERSON: I am very glad to have that assurance, although sometimes assurances given from that Front Bench are not so well kept as they ought to be. I am sure, however, that my hon. Friend means what he says and will take every step in that direction. It is important, because it is the crux of the question. Whatever opposition there is, is not to this Bill, except that it does not fulfil the needs, but that there is a danger that this measure, once passed, will be offered as a solution of this problem, and that it will be said that there is far less need for getting on with the bigger Bill.
Mr. WALSH: The point, I submit, is that it will not be used in any sense by the Local Government Board to prevent the larger measure, but Cabinet policy is a matter on which I cannot speak at all.
Mr. ANDERSON: I do not think it will affect public opinion at all in the direction of delaying the larger measure, and with regard to Cabinet policy my hon. and gallant Friend (Major Astor), I believe, has almost daily access to the Prime Minister, and he may be able to put some slight pressure in that direction. In my view this measure is too voluntary. It is too optional. It does not compel the local authorities to do anything. It does not set up any standard for the various municipalities. It leaves the matter optional. Therefore, I think there is a great deal in the argument that the best municipalities will do it, and that the less active and more reactionary municipalities will do little or nothing at all. Yet over and over again it will be in the areas of those less progressive municipalities that there will toe the greatest need for the work. It will be in those very municipalities that are less active and progressive that there will be the largest wastage, of child life and the largest amount of hardship inflicted upon the mothers. Therefore, when we come to the Committee stage it will be necessary to try and brace up the Bill with Amendments for the purpose of seeing whether we cannot get the Local Government Board to put more definite pressure upon the municipalities and get the worst municipalities to come into line with the best municipalities on this question. If all that is possible under the Bill is really carried out by the municipalities there will be a great step forward in regard to the wastage of child life. You will get the establishment of crèches and day nurseries, there will be care for the unmarried mother, it will be possible to provide food for expectant and nursing mothers and for the children, and larger schemes of maternity and child welfare centres can undoubtedly be established under the Bill. All that is to the good, and it is most essential that we should emphasise the importance and value of child life, but I agree entirely with those who criticise the Bill because it falls altogether short of what is really necessary, and say that nothing in this Bill must afterwards be used as an argument against pushing forward with a much bigger scheme.
Sir HENRY HARRIS: The operative Clause of this Bill originally appeared in the Notification of Births Bill, 1915, but it was withdrawn from that Bill because of a conflict of jurisdiction that was going
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on between the two Departments, which, incidentally, is undoubtedly an argument in favour of a Ministry of Health. I objected to the withdrawal of that Clause from the Notification of Births Bill, because I considered it would be of distinct value in saving infant life. Therefore it is not open to me to object to the Clause now it is brought forward in the present Bill, but I am bound to confess that I am strongly in favour of the larger measure, and I have complete sympathy with the desire which is expressed by the Amendment in favour of the Ministry of Health. Concentration and centralised powers are badly wanted, and the sooner we have them the better, but I do not understand how my hon. Friends look upon this as a sort of rival measure to a Ministry of Health Bill. I see no reason why we should not hope to have a Ministry of Health Bill, and I do not know why it is supposed my right hon. Friend (Mr. Hayes Fisher) is not in favour of it. I also agree with the last speaker in thinking that we should find a Ministry of Health Bill a subject of considerable controversy and discussion. I know my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Plymouth (Major Astor) hoped that he had found—and I hoped with him—a short measure which would enable the authority to be set up without raising these controversial questions, but I am afraid that there would be a considerable amount of Parliamentary time devoted to discussing any Ministry of Health Bill.
Therefore I have to face the question. Will the powers contained in the Bill be of any value in saving infant life? I think they will be. You have to face the fact that a great deal is being done now by the local authorities which, so far as I can judge, is scarcely warranted by any statutory power. I know the Local Government Board, perhaps, would not admit it, but I believe it is an absolute fact, and it is being put forward by some local authorities as a reason for not undertaking work which they are urged by the Local Government Board to undertake. My hon. and gallant Friend seemed to overlook the fact that it is not only necessary to concentrate the central health powers in the hands of a single authority, but that it is also necessary for the local authorities who have to carry out the duties to have the necessary powers. I quite agree that the optional Clause in the Bill is not as strong as one would like to see it, nevertheless it does enable things to be done

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which we all want done, and which are now being done by progressive local authorities. Therefore, if this Bill is passed, and vigorous action is taken by the Local Government Board, a great deal of good work will be done at once. We shall at once set about saving infant life. On that ground I, for one, cannot take the responsibility of voting against this Bill. There are one or two points I have been asked to raise by the London County Council, in the hope that they will be considered by the President of the Local Government Board. The Bill provides that
"Any local authority…may make such arrangements as may be sanctioned by the Local Government Board for attending to the health of expectant mothers—"
And so forth. The authorities in London will be the London County Council, the City Corporation, and the twenty-eight borough councils. But there is no indication in the Bill of what the powers of the London Council will be; whether they shall be concurrent powers with those of the borough councils or supervising powers. The London County Council feels, and the borough councils feel with them, that it is not desirable that there should be concurrent powers, and they ask that one authority or the other should exercise the powers. As to the proposal to set up a Statutory Committee, it is felt, rightly or wrongly, by the London County Council that the principle of exclusive reference of special subject-matters to a Statutory Committee violates the principle of administrative freedom essential to the growth of municipal life, and they deprecate that being done. They think it is a matter that requires consideration. It seems questionable whether it is desirable to put maternity and infant welfare into a sort of watertight compartment. There are many other public health questions connected with maternity and child welfare, and the whole thing is very much mixed up. Under the Notification of Births Act, 1915, it is left to the local authority to set up such committees as it pleases, and it is given power to put on the committees persons who are not members of the authority. That would enable the local authority to put on the committee persons with special experience of maternity and child welfare, at the same time not compelling them to set up a Statutory Committee. I hope that these points will be considered by the President
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of the Local Government Board before we come to the Committee stage. While I am in complete sympathy with my hon. and gallant Friends in their desire to see a Ministry of Health established as soon as possible, I feel there is a certain value in this Bill and that it would be a pity if we should lose it.
10.0 P.M.
Sir JOHN BUTCHER: The country, I am confident, will be grateful to my right hon. Friend for having introduced this Bill. They hope, as most of us in this House also hope, that it will be passed into law with as little delay as possible. I should like to say how glad I am that it has fallen to the lot of my right hon. Friend, who has had so long and so honourable an association with the cause of social reform, to introduce this Bill. The matters dealt with in this Bill are urgent to-day. They were urgent before the War, they are more urgent now. It is, perhaps, a somewhat singular, though not altogether unexpected result of the War, that it has had the effect of bringing prominently before the public mind some of those social questions which had been suffered to fall somewhat in the background before the War, but which the exigencies and the sufferings of the War have so brought to the mind of the public that they have to be dealt with without delay. The figures given by my right hon. Friend as to the enormous increase of expenditure upon maternity and the saving of child life during the last four years are in themselves a testimony to the great increase of public interest in these matters and to the urgent necessity of dealing with them. We know there has been a good deal of voluntary expenditure. In an enormous subject such as this, voluntary help is totally inadequate to deal with the matter. When you find, as has been said tonight by more than one speaker, that the large expenditure which has been made on these subjects out of public rates is somewhat open to question, that adds an argument for proceeding with this Bill without delay. It appears that most of the money that has been spent on these matters by local authorities has been spent either under the provisions of a Regulation under the Defence of the Realm Act or, apparently, without any precise legal authority at all. I am sure there is no public body in the country, the Local Government Board or any other, that would desire to

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question the propriety or the legality of these payments. I dare say they turn rather a blind eye towards any excess of powers in which the local authorities may have indulged. This fact however, makes it all the more necessary that we should at once regularise that expenditure and give it sanction in an Act of Parliament.
The only arguments I have heard tonight used against the Bill are two of very unequal importance. The first is that the Bill is optional and not compulsory. To that it may be fairly be answered that if, as I believe is the case, there is a strong public opinion behind this Bill, there will certainly be a strong public opinion behind local authorities for the purpose of forcing them to put the Bill into operation. If that argument does not satisfy my hon. and gallant Friends who have moved an Amendment for the purpose of postponing the Bill, it is quite open to them in Committee to introduce well-considered Amendments with a view to making the Bill compulsory in certain cases. The second argument put forward against the Bill was that if it is passed it will be used as a reason for postponing the larger but undoubtedly necessary measure establishing a Ministry of Public Health. On that point we have had the assurance of my right hon. Friend and of the Parliamentary Secretary that there is no truth whatever in that suggestion, that if this Bill is passed there will be no attempt made by the Government, or anyone else, as I understand it—certainly the Local Government Board will not use it for that purpose—to use this Bill as a reason for indefinitely postponing the Ministry of Health Bill. The argument of my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Plymouth (Major Astor), whose interest in these matters we not only acknowledge but admire, was that it would be better to postpone the immediate dealing with this urgent subject in the hope of getting an early introduction of a bigger Bill. I fear he was far too sanguine in his estimate of the amount of Parliamentary time that would be required for the Ministry of Health Bill. If that Bill is to be of any use at all, it must be a very large Bill, and must be a very well considered Bill. It will be perfectly impossible, considering the nature of the subjects involved and its very far-reaching magnitude throughout all the social
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strata of this country, to get a Bill of that kind passed without very full and complete consideration by Parliament. The time for that is not forthcoming at the moment. We are all agreed that time should be found for it as soon as possible, but, in the meanwhile, having this Bill, which is admittedly a good Bill so far as it goes, it is our manifest duty, as Members of this House, and in response to the great public demand from outside, to pass this Bill into law with the lease possible delay and to the great advantage of the country.
Sir J. SPEAR: I cannot be content merely to give a silent vote in support of this Bill. I desire to say how much we are indebted to the right hon. Gentleman for bringing it forward. There has been a feeling now for many years in all parts of the House as to the desirability of something being done to protect child life, and that feeling has been accentuated by the terrible loss of life through this War. While Hitherto, from humane feelings, we have been anxious to save infant life, now, in the interests of the preservation of the race, we are feeling that it is more than ever important that these steps should be taken. I do not for a moment think the Bill will accomplish all that can be desired, but it is a step in the right direction, and, I believe, will accomplish much. There is a strong feeling in the country in the direction in which this Bill leads, and that is a valuable consideration in entertaining the hope that the Bill, though a small one, will effect a great reform, because people are ready and waiting to use an instrument of this kind to promote the object we have in view. I have been for many years a Member of the House, and I have seen good Bills defeated by the argument, "This is a Bill insufficient for the purpose. Let us wait a bit and the Government will deal with it and bring in a far-reaching measure. That is my experience of housing Bills. I have seen good housing Bills brought before the House in the last ten or twelve years and no section of the House but what considered that they would be of great value; but they have been delayed by the argument used tonight that it is a pity to have piecemeal Bills. Let us wait a bit, and the Government will bring in a housing scheme applying to the whole country," with the result that enough has not been done in the direction of the better

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housing of the people. I feel some hesitation in opposing any action which the hon. and gallant Gentleman (Major Astor; advocates in the direction of social reform, but if we miss the opportunity of having this instalment of a reform in the right direction we shall experience the same disappointment that we have felt in the housing question by rejecting a simple come-at-able Bill which has done much good as far as it went and educated people to have an ambition for something still better. We have delayed the housing question now for many years. On the same principle, if we miss the opportunity of passing this Bill with the idea that we shall spur on the Government to bring in a larger measure it will be a delusive hope and we shall miss the main object we all have in view of promoting the real effective protection of health. I wish the Bill were a little stronger and it may be that in Committee I shall have to vote to make it a little stronger, but it is valuable for what it now contains. It is a step in the direction which people want and so moderate in character that it will encourage their support and lead them on to still greater things in the not distant future. We have again and again felt in the House and in different public bodies, the necessity of a step in this direction and now that we have a chance to embrace it I could not bring myself for a moment to oppose it merely because it does not do all I should like to see done.
Captain SMITH: I cordially endorse all that the hon. Member has said, but I can quite understand why the Amendment has been moved I remember a few years ago sitting on a Committee presided over by the hon. and gallant Gentleman (Major Astor) on tuberculosis and medical research, and I remember the delay which was caused by the conflicting and ambitious attitude assumed by more than one public Department. Anyone who has sat on a Committee on so important a question as that will fully realise the difficulties we are labouring under now in having our public health in so many hands. Apart from that I hope the Amendment will not be pressed to a Division. I feel honestly that although they may co-ordinate all the Departments connected with public health it will require a large measure to make it any real good, and it will occupy the time of the House a great deal more than the hon. and gallant Gentleman mentioned. In face of that I want to
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appeal to the past. It comes to me as a breath of fresh air to see support of the Bill in quarters where years ago the very same Members were speaking as if in the wilderness amongst their own party. If that spirit is animating that part of the House, this and larger measures will have a sure passage through the House.
It ought to be made compulsory on local authorities to set up some system of dealing with this matter. These are very important questions which have been fully realised since the loss of life in this War, but which could not be seen by a great many Members before the War. Questions of this kind were repeatedly brought before the House in argument and the full need of them could not be grasped, but now when it is realised to the full how valuable life is we want to do something to encourage it. If that is the case, we must see that every authority shall set up some system according to Regulations laid down to govern this and to improve and save child lie. For many years back urban district authorities have never had the confidence of the Department in administrative matters. I believe this is one of the matters which you must leave to urban district authorities. It is urged, I know, that county councils in all these matters may administer this more economically than separate authorities, but I claim that the 20,000 stipulated in this Bill is far too large a population to include in it. The more interest you can create and the more responsibility you put on these authorities the more interest they will take in it, and the more value you will get out of your measure. If that is done, I believe this Bill will fulfil all its promises. I quite agree that the measure is not very ambitious, but it is important and very good. Give the people confidence and some encouragement to take part in it, and I believe you will be rewarded by a very great deal of good to this country.
Mr. BOOTH: I think before the Bill passes from the purview of this House it is necessary to give a warning in view of some mistakes that have been made. The view the hon. Member for Plymouth (Major Astor) expressed, that a small three-Clause Bill would probably wipe out the Insurance Act is scarcely warranted. The first of these Clauses was to lump the Local Government Board and the Insurance Commissioners together. Oil and water will not mix.

847
To begin with, the Insurance Commissioners are a joint body of four nationalities. The English Commissioners, the Scottish, the Welsh, and the Irish, all meet together and form the Insurance Commissioners under the Bill. How can that mix with the Local Government Board, that relates to England only? If you are taking the national authority in the case of the Local Government Board to mix with an international authority in the work of the Insurance Commission, I think it will take more than one Clause to accomplish it. I would like to say quite candidly that I do not know on what idea is based this mirage of an agreed Bill that has got before the minds of some speakers and the Government with regard to a Ministry of Health. I do not know on what it is founded. If hon. Members will take the trouble to go individually and convass a number of Members of this House who might well be expected to take an interest in this matter, they will find that there will be a great deal of resolute criticism if the Bill takes a certain shape. If the hon. and gallant Member who introduced this Motion was right in his interpretation, it would be a Bill only taking powers for certain Departments, to put them under a new authority. How can that save a thousand babies a week? You may save pen nibs or blotting paper, but how can you save a thousand babies' lives a week by taking clerks out of one Department and calling them by another name? It could, therefore, only be by extended, and it would seem to me very drastic, powers that you could claim such an alteration. Where are the thousand babies? Some suggest that this Bill will save a thousand. If it will save a thousand, then we are to have a Ministry of Health Bill, ten times bigger and more important that will do ten times the amount of good, then it will save 10,000 babies; this will save 1,000—that is, 11,000 a week. That is what we get by listening to figures in this House. I venture to say that no Bill that can be devised by a Government of eighty or ninety Members like this Government can be immediately passed into law and save a thousand babies a week. That has not been done in the history of the world, and cannot be done now. Matters of this kind are much more difficult to accomplish. What would be the responsibility of 670 Members of this House if,
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by passing a few Clauses of a Bill, you could really improve humanity at that rate? If 1,000 babies per week have died who ought not to have died, who was to blame? It is all very well to blame the Government or the policy.
There is no such a state of things in this country as that 1,000 babies are dying each week when they could be saved by passing an Act of Parliament. That this Bill may do some good I grant. I say quite candidly that I think the Bill will do some good, and I hope it will succeed; but why put forward such an extraordinary chain? I have an Amendment on the Paper. I did not put it down with the intention of moving it, but as an intimation that when Members desire to amalgamate the Local Government Board and the Health Insurance Commission they do not recognise that they would put on the new health authority a great deal of business that does not belong to it. The paying of 10s. a week for men and 7s. 6d. for women and the permanent invalidity benefit have no more to do with the health of the people directly than old age pensions. These things are exactly on the same footing as the old age pensions and payments under the workmen's Compensation Act. The Health Insurance Commission ought never to be mixed up with the Health Department, or what is called preventive medicine. Why should they be troubled with actuarial valuations every five years and questions of rules relating to friendly societies and so on which the National Health Insurance Commissioners have to deal with? If you are going to load the new health authorities with things of that kind, you will make it that it cannot work. I could believe more in the sincerity of those who prophecy so much good from the proposed Ministry of Health if they had studied this question a little more. I can promise anyone who in the middle of a war, when so many insured persons are at the front and the staffs are depleted, that if they think they can turn the whole Insurance Act topsy-turvy, especially after it was amended a few months ago by this House, and expect that they are going to be able to do it in a few hours, they are giving full vent to a lawless imagination.
I do not know how many Members of this House have seen the Bill. Perhaps the Mover of the Amendment has seen it. I do not know whether the hon. Member for Attercliffe has seen this famous Bill.

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I understand that the right hon. Member for Derby has seen a copy of it. I know it has been shown to a number of people, who said they would let me see it but they would have to break their word. I said I would not look at it if it was to be at the cost of someone committing a breach of confidence. The Bill is in print, and copies have been floating about the country somewhere for months. Copies have been shown to vested interests, and interested parties; but they have not been shown to Members of this House or to any Committee of this House. No Committee of this House has considered the question. I believe a copy or two has gone across to Ireland. We keep hearing about the Bill, but we do not know what its contents are. How can we say that it will pass in a day or two when we do not know what it contains? It will probably be a Bill bigger than the Education Bill now before the House. You are going to reconstitute the Local Government Board and a large number of new Departments and the whole Insurance Act, and you expect it to be an agreed Bill when it comes here. A member of the War Cabinet told us to-night that there would be no Ministry of Health this year. One reason is the existence of the War. The hon. Member for Clitheroe (Captain Smith) told us that there was a big change in the membership of this House when there was not much opposition to a Bill like this. Members would oppose it but that so many of them are resolved not to oppose any Bill introduced by the Government while the War is on. I do not think that there has been so much change in the House as my hon. Friend thinks. I do not know whether the Mover and Seconder of the Amendment will go to a Division, but, in view of what was said, I think that perhaps there will be some difficulty, particularly because I think that they are genuine friends of the measure as far as it goes—at least, the Mover is. I think that in Committee the right hon. Gentleman should keep himself free to treat the local authorities sympathetically. One hon. Member seemed to think that the rural district councils were dreadful bodies, but I think that any genuine, practical measure is just as likely to be put into operation by them as by any other body, and perhaps the right hon. Gentleman will keep that in mind and hear what the district councils have to say.
Sir M. BARLOW: I would appeal to the Mover and Seconder of the Amendment not to press it. I am one of those who, frankly, would rather not wait. Here we have a moderate measure of reform. It may not go quite so far as the extremists would like, but so far as it goes it is good. Do not let us, for heaven's sake, be slaves to the idea that we must always go for the best, and neglect the immediate good which lies in our way. It is true that by Ministry of Health proposals, if we could get them, without any severe contention, we might go a step further than we are going by this Bill, but those of us who have worked at this question of infant mortality for a great many years, now know that you can get on—and I believe that in the end it is the only way you can get on—by patient, considerate, unwearying work in the localities, and among the local authorities. You have got to carry the local authorities with you. I hope that I can speak with the assent of the representatives of the Local Government Board when I say—and I am in fairly close touch with the local authorities of municipal areas—that you have got the good-will of the local authorities for a measure of this kind, which you have never had before. I have the honour of being a vice-president of the Association of Municipal Corporations, and I do not wish to say anything which would upset them, but, quite frankly, their attitude over this proposal surprises me. They are taking, and they realise that it is their duty to take, a position with regard to this proposal which I do not think they have ever taken before. Those of us who have worked at the Notification of Births and Deaths Act, at the whole question of inspection of nurseries, and of homes for mothers, know that it is only by patient effort continued over a long time that you can do anything. You collect the money, you erect institutions, you get voluntary workers and have deputations to the local authorities, and it all seems very heartbreaking and very useless, but gradually as it goes on the thing begins to tell, and you know that the number of deaths per 100,000 infants is going down from 200 to 100, and so on down, and down, and down. This Bill goes along the line of patient effort, and I do hope that we will get this measure, though it may not go a great way, as it stands. Local authorities have secured this result, that they have actually got down to zero in the number of deaths

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among infants in the first twelve months of life. I believe this Bill will help in that direction. We are told that we must wait for the Ministry of Health Bill, and that it is practically an agreed measure. We are given that assurance, though perhaps somewhat vaguely, but I suggest that you are bound, having regard to the nature of municipal government in this country, to the differences between Government Departments and to the fact that the Ministry of Health Bill will inevitably carve pieces out of the existing work of various Departments, to accept and support this measure. I hope this will not be made a contentious Bill, and that the Amendment will not be pressed. I want to get this Bill, and even if it is not the very finest, yet it is a good Bill.
Amendment negatived.
Bill accordingly read a second time; and committed to a Committee of the Whole House for To-morrow—[Mr. Hayes Fisher.]

WORKMEN'S COMPENSATION (SILICOSIS) BILL.
Considered in Committee.
[Sir DONALD MACLEAN, Deputy-Chairman, in the Chair.]

WORKMEN'S COMPENSATION (SILICOSIS) BILL.

  CLAUSE 1.—(Scheme for Compensation to Workmen.)
  (1) The Secretary of State may by scheme provide for the payment of compensation by the employers of workmen in any specified industry or process or group of industries or processes involving exposure to silica dust—

  (a) who are certified in such manner as may be prescribed by the scheme to have suffered death or total disablement from the disease known as fibroid phthisis or silicosis of the lungs (in this Act referred to as silicosis) or from that disease accompanied by tuberculosis; or

  (b) who, though not totally disabled, are found on medical examination to be suffering from silicosis, or from silicosis accompanied by tuberculosis, to such a degree as to make it dangerous to continue work in the industry or process, and are for that reason suspended from employment:

  Provided that in the case of silicosis accompanied by tuberculosis provision shall not be made by the scheme for the payment of compensation unless the silicosis was so far advanced as to make the workmen specially liable to tuberculosis infection or, though not so far advanced, was likely to accelerate materially the progress of the disease.
  Mr. ELLIS DAVIES: I beg to move, "That the Chairman do report Progress, and ask leave to sit again."
  This Bill received its Second Reading only on Friday last, and there has really not been an opportunity to put down Amendments. I myself wished to put down an Amendment. I think the Government are dealing rather unfairly with us, because they attempted to do the same thing with the Juries Bill, which they put down to-day for the Committee stage, with no opportunity for putting down Amendments, and it was only at the last moment that my right hon. Friend agreed to postpone it. I think the Government are treating us rather badly in this matter.
  The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. Brace): I hope my hon. Friend will not press his Motion. The Bill is very largely an agreed Bill, and if my hon. Friend had been here on Friday he would have heard me explaining that it is an agreed Bill among employers and workpeople in the chief industries where men develop silicosis, which is a well-defined disease. It was a subject matter inquired into by a Committee, and after a great deal of investigation and negotiations we have at last agreed upon a scheme under which we think we shall be able to establish compensation for these poor people suffering from the disease. Therefore I hope my hon. Friend will not prevent the Bill going through Committee to-night.
  Mr. BOOTH: I do not gather that the appeal is made by my hon. Friend because the Bill is a bad Bill. The point is the rights of the Members of this House. My hon. Friend told me he had a manuscript Amendment which he had not had time to put in print. The Bill could go through to-morrow, I presume. As I understand my hon. Friend, it is not that he wishes to go contrary to the Government, but it is the right of Members of this House that after they have seen a Bill they should be able to put down Amendments on the Paper. As far as I am concerned, I am in favour of the Bill and would probably support the Government against my hon. Friend, but when he says it is a question which affects his constituents that is rather a different matter.
  Mr. ANDERSON: I hope the opposition to this Bill will not be pushed any further, but at the same time I wish to say to the representative of the Government that it is no good coming to the House and saying

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  a Bill has been agreed by some people outside and that, therefore, Members of this House are to be deprived of all opportunity of proper discussion. That is not the way to get Bills quickly through the House. Members have a right to consider this Bill Clause by Clause and to move Amendments, no matter what agreement has been reached in any other quarter, but I hope the hon. Member will not object to the Bill going through now, because it is a good Bill in itself and will do a great service to a number of men.
  Mr. WATT: I desire to support my hon. Friend in proposing to report Progress. My hon. Friend does not in any way object to the Bill, but is desirous of extending the Bill to other diseases beside silicosis. My main objection to the action of the Government is that, having passed Second Beading only on Friday afternoon, and Members not having had an opportunity of putting Amendments which they have in view on the Paper, the House should now be asked to take not only the Committee stage, but the Third Reading. Generally the principle of passing the Second Reading one day and going on to the Committee stage and the Third Reading on the next day is a bad one and ought not to be encouraged. And as my hon. Friend approves of the measure, and desires to extend it to other diseases, that is a point which the House ought to have the opportunity of considering, and of seeing the Amendments on the Paper.
  Question "That the Chairman do report Progress, and ask leave to sit again," put, and negatived.
  Mr. ELLIS DAVIES: I beg to move, in Sub-section (1), to leave out the words "involving exposure to silica dust."
  The right hon. Gentleman rather suggested that I was unaware that this Bill was intended to help workmen. This is one of the things I took up ten years ago in this House. Ten years ago there was appointed by the Home Office a Committee to deal with industrial diseases, and one of the diseases that Committee reported upon and recommended should form the subject of compensation under the Workmen's Compensation Act was fibroid phthisis. The object of my Amendment is that it shall in future afford workmen the rights of the Workmen's Compensation Act. Instead of adopting the Report of the Committee,
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  which was a general one, and dealt with fibroid phthisis in whatever trade or industry, the Bill is limited to cases arising out of silica dust. I do not know exactly what silica, means. I consulted the "Encyclopædia Britannica," but am sorry to say that I am not very much the wiser, and I should be very much interested to learn from the right hon. Gentleman what he means by silica. The "Encyclopaedia Britannica" refers to a gritty sandstone. I do not know whether the right hon. Gentleman means to confine this Bill merely to fibroid phthisis arising out of working in sandstone. This Bill in its present form, and with the words which I propose to leave out, is confined to fibroid phthisis arising out of silica dust, and I want to know to what it applies and what men it will affect. The Committee to which I have referred reported that fibroid phthisis arises out of silica dust and affected slate-quarrymen and workers in slate mines. They recommended that compensation should only be paid to those people who contracted the disease, whether in the factory or the quarry. The Bill limits it to those who apparently are only working with silica. The result of my Amendment would be, not the immediate inclusion for these workmen, but power would be given to the Home Office, if they so desire, to include other workers by proposing a scheme. It would be absurd that no workman should come within the scope of the Bill in these later Clauses.
  Mr. BRACE: I was very nearly tempted to rise to a point of Order as to whether my hon. Friend was in order in moving this Amendment. I think, however, that it would be better to have it explained, and there is really no difference of opinion, it seems to me, between us. If the workmen he has in mind are engaged in the way he says, and they develop-fibroid phthisis or silicosis then they will come within this Bill, and they will receive compensation. It applies to working on sandstone and other silicosis stone and tin mines in Cornwall, and to certain manufacturing processes as stated in the Bill. It will, therefore, be seen that a very extensive provision is made. If the men do not suffer from silicosis, then they do not come within the provisions of this Bill. I cannot accept any extension of the Bill beyond what I have provided in the Bill now before the House.
  Mr. DAVIES: My right hon. Friend is really trying to evade the issue. The point I made was that ten years ago a committee was appointed by the Home Office and it reported that fibroid phthisis, with which this Bill intends to deal, was a general disease amongst workmen and was found in the circumstances narrated. I was responsible for putting forward the medical evidence. All I am asking is that the recommendations of that committee should be carried out. We failed then to get it included, as it was said not to be germane to the Workmen's Compensation Act. Here we have a representative of Labour in the Government introducing the Bill and instead of making it of general application he views it as a case arising only out of silica. He wrongly suggests that he is in agreement with me.
  Mr. WATT: I regret that the right hon. Gentleman has not seen his way to accept the Amendment. The Committee recommended that this fibroid phthisis should be dealt with, but at that time it was not considered wise or suitable to bring in a measure dealing with this complaint. Now we have a Bill where it is being dealt with, and in this measure the right hon. Gentleman thinks it proper to deal with it in a limited form, and to confine it only to workmen who are engaged in working silica or British sandstone. My hon. Friend desires that his constituents engaged in the slate trade and who get fibroid phthisis should be included in this measure, as recommended by a Committee of this House. This disease arises from the working of slate quarries, and I am surprised that the Home Office cannot see its way to accept the Amendment. Certainly, if fibroid phthisis is to be dealt with it should be dealt with thoroughly, and not only workers in British sandstone be given compensation for it, but workers also in the slate quarries represented by my hon. Friend who moved the Amendment.
  Mr. ANDERSON: It is difficult for Members to give an opinion upon this matter, because it is admittedly a technical matter; but it is important to know whether a large number of workers will still be left out, and will have no claim to compensation, even if they do contract fibroid phthisis. That is the real issue. The only workers who contract the disease as a result of exposure to silica dust will be included in
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  this Bill, but there are many who will contract this industrial disease who are not included in the Bill. I hope that the hon. Gentleman has not come down to the House from the meeting where an agreement has been come to with his hands tied so that he is unable to consider Amendments put forward by Members of the House of Commons. That is an undesirable position to get into. While we are anxious that the matter should be pressed forward, and that not a moment should be lost in placing this Bill on the Statute Book, I hope the right hon. Gentleman will consider the Amendments brought forward by Members of Parliament, and will look into the points raised by them.
  Mr. BRACE: I agree with what the hon. Member has said, but I cannot disguise from myself the fact that it is only with difficulty that my Department has found itself in a position to come to this House with a Bill of this kind. It has taken more than a year of negotiation with employers and workmen who are engaged in this highly dangerous industry, and while, of course, I am anxious to meet my hon. Friend, I feel myself in the position that I have now almost got a start in dealing with this great problem, and if I find from inquiry that the most dangerous part of this industry is brought in and I once get a scheme of compensation laid down for it, the question of extending it will be much more easily dealt with. But I cannot at present extend it. I am most anxious to have a start made, and I hope the Committee will not lend itself to this kind of opposition, which is delaying the bringing into many homes something they have been waiting for so many years.
  Mr. BOOTH: I would like to ask if we can know the estimated number of workers who will come under the scope of the Bill, and the additional number that would be brought in under the Amendment? If the Amendment is trivial, that would be one thing, but if it meant a great deal more it might be very serious.
  Mr. WING: I hope we shall not press the Minister on this point. This Bill is an extension of a very great advantage in relation to compensation, and I know from my experience in approaching the Home Office on other matters that there are many other industries left out. I think the Minister has put up a definite scheme,

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  and I hope we shall assist him to build up a foundation far including many other industries which would still be left out of the Bill, even if the Amendment were adopted.
  Mr. DAVIES: The right hon. Gentleman said he had been in consultation with many deputations, but he did not say he had communicated with the quarry owners. I want to know if he has had any communication with them. My complaint is that this question was brought to the attention of the Home Office ten years ago and has been brought to their notice repeatedly since. Medical evidence was brought up from North Wales which proved that fibroid phthisis affected workers in slate mines and quarries, and a committee reported that the workers in slate quarries were people in regard to whom the owners could reasonably pay compensation. As a matter of fact, there was no reference to the Commission on this question. It was never dealt with nor reported upon, with the result that the slate quarry-men are neither within the Workmen's Compensation Act nor are they given the protection now being extended by special rules to the workhouses. Whenever an attempt has been made to induce the Home Office to extend this proposal to the quarries in North Wales, the Home Office have always turned a deaf ear to it. I ask the right hon. Gentleman not to include the quarrymen at once, but to take the power to do so. The words I propose to leave out are words of limitation. The right hon. Gentleman has rather suggested that I am fighting on the other side, but I am really trying to extend the operation of the Bill. I assure the hon. Member opposite that if these workmen are not now included in this particular Bill we shall appeal in vain to the representatives of the Home Office to introduce another Bill. The hon. Member for Pontefract (Mr. Booth) raised an interesting question, and he desired to know—
  It being Eleven of the Clock, the DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN left the Chair to make his Report to the House.
  Committee report Progress; to sit again to-morrow (Tuesday).

TRADE BOARDS [EXPENSES].
Resolution reported, "That it is expedient to authorise the payment, out of moneys to be provided by Parliament, of such further expenses as the Minister of Labour may be authorised to incur under any Act of the present Session to amend the Trade Boards Act, 1909, provided that the sum to be expended shall not exceed £1,000 in any one year."
The remaining Orders were read, and postponed.
Whereupon Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER (Sir D. Maclean), pursuant to the Order of the House of the 13th February, proposed "That this House do now adjourn."
Mr. BOOTH: May I again ask when we shall be able to get a copy of Mr. Justice Atkin's Report? I notice that on Friday the Paper was formally laid, but there is no information yet, at either the Vote Office or the Library, as to when this Report is coming forward. May I ask when we shall be able to get a copy, and may I appeal that at least one day shall be allowed to intervene before the Resolution is actually moved?
Lord EDMUND TALBOT (Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury): Like the hon. Member, I am asking daily when we are going to get this Report printed, but as yet, I am sorry to say, I have not been able to succeed. I will endeavour to give him the time for which he asks before taking the Motion.
Mr. WATT: May we have an assurance that the Motion will not be taken until the Report is in our hands?
Lord E. TALBOT: That is what I have endeavoured to say.
Adjourned accordingly at Three minutes after Eleven o'clock.