NECESSITOUS AREAS.

HC Deb 16 December 1925 vol 189 cc1522-75

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House doth now adjourn."—[Commander Eyres Monsell.]

Mr. MORGAN-JONES

I desire, on the Motion for the Adjournment, to raise a matter which I think needs no apology from any part of the House regarding its being raised. The subject which I wish to raise is a subject which we have heard of quite frequently in this House, and I think quite rightly, namely, the distressing circumstances of the condition of the necessitous areas in this country. I am quite sure that I speak with the approval of all Members present, when I say that this subject is one that is present to all our minds, and I am sure that it is present to the mind of the Minister, and all with whom he is associated. A certain number of Members of this House have a special responsibility in this matter by reason of the fact that the areas which they represent have particularly difficult problems to meet and par- ticularly heavy responsibilities at this particular time. I would like if I may, to emphasise the point, that certain areas have a problem which is entirely different in its nature and in its complexity from other areas.

8.0 P.M.

In a, return given in this House a week ago, at the request of the hon. Member for West Middlesbrough (Mr. T. Thomson), we were provided with figures giving particulars of the percentage of unemployment in 10 towns where unemployment is most acute, and in 10 other towns where unemployment is least acute, and the returns that were then given by the Minister indicate quite clearly what a vast difference there is in the incidence of this problem, as between certain areas of the country and certain other areas. For instance, in regard to the high rates of unemployment in the 10 areas where unemployment is heaviest I observed, to my surprise in some measure, certainly to my alarm, that of the whole 10, seven of them are to he found in South Wales. I regret to say that the first place that appears in the list is a place which I have the honour to represent in this House. I observed that in Bargoed, which happens to be the centre of my constituency, the percentage of unemployment is as high as 64 per cent. The next highest is Jarrow. Then we have four Welsh areas, following immediately upon each other, with a percentage of unemployment over 51 per cent. That mere fact is enough to justify raising this issue to-night on the Adjournment so that the position might be ventilated and so that the Minister in charge may be able to indicate to us what the policy and the attitude of the Government is in regard to these areas which you call necessitous areas.

I am not quite sure that all Members of this House appreciate why it is that we feel that these areas are in a special difficulty and have a special claim upon the attention of the Ministry of Health. May I speak of an area of which I happen to know very intimately? I happen to represent it in this House and also I have had the advantage of being a member of one of its local authorities for a number of years. What, is the position in these areas? I take the one with which I am most acquainted. It is to be found in the Rhymney Valley. In a very large number of cases these areas are rapidly growing areas. Their growth has been a sort of mushroom growth. I can myself recollect when the place first mentioned in this list, Bargoed, was nothing but a mere village, but owing to the sudden discovery of mineral resources in that area, a township has suddenly grown up. Side by side with that development of that township all kinds of complicated and pressing municipal problems have pressed themselves upon the attention of the local authorities. The, roads have had to be developed, sewers have had to be developed, water resources have had to be procured, and all these problems have crowded in upon each other not within the space of time of half a century but within a quarter of a century or less.

The consequence is that the rates of these areas even normally would stand at a particularly high figure. In the area of which I am speaking; a special difficulty has arisen. I admit that the same conditions appertain to most areas up and down the country although it is particularly difficult for these areas of which I am speaking. Let me lake one illustration of the difficulty in which they find themselves. At the beginning of the War all the local authoritics in my area were busily occupied in laying down a sewage scheme for their areas. That was to cost rather less than £-250,000. How that the War has passed that same scheme has been completed, but at a cost, not of £250,000. but of something very nearly approaching £800,000. Similarly they have a huge water scheme to pay for which is to cost a number of authorities in my area something in the neighbourhood of £2,000,000. My reason for citing these facts is this. That enhanced burden is not due to any failure to deal with their own local problems on the part of the local administrators but on account of (he difficulties which have overtaken them through national causes. The War was after all not created by the people in my locality. It was created for the nation as a whole, and this aftermath of the War, therefore, is to that degree a national burden or a burden created for local authorities by national considerations and national difficulties. I am, therefore, urging that these enormous burdens are burdens which entitle these local authorities to argue that they are necessitous areas in a very special degree.

I want to follow that point out a, little further. What is the consequence of these increased rates in these areas? Take my own area. When I was a member of the local authority our total rate was not much more than 10s. 6d. in the pound. At this very moment the rates in one of my areas is as high as 30s. in the pound. This has its reactions upon the finance of the local authorities. My local authority has already submitted to the Minister of Health a proposal whereby they may be able, to build a number of houses in the area. I grant that a certain number of houses have already been approved of, but because of their difficult financial situation the Ministry of Health turns round to this local authority and says, "Your financial position is so bad that we cannot allow you to build more houses." The very fact, therefore, that their local burden has been made so heavy by the national considerations to which I have referred has been used by the Ministry of Health as an excuse for refusing approval for these necessary local improvements. Not-only that, but it has a worse reaction than that. When the local rates of the local authorities are as high as they are—and, indeed, the increases that one could bring to the attention of this House are staggering in their character—the reactions are worse in another way. When the local authorities have got authority from the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health and his chief the Minister of Health to embark on local improvements or, indeed, on works providing employment for the unemployed miners, and they go into the market to secure money, or, rather, to invite gentlemen to lend money to them, they find that these gentlemen turn round and say, quite naturally, "Your commitments locally are so heavy, your debts are so burdensome, that it is impossible for us to contemplate lending you money in an area where your prospects of being able to repay are not as bright or as hopeful as they are in other parts of the country." The consequence is that these overburdened areas, these necessitous areas, are crippled in every way by reason of the difficulty which they themselves are not responsible for.

There are certain very important human considerations which one must also put to the hon. Gentleman opposite. These unemployed workmen are com pelled by reason of their poverty and their lack of facilities for earning their livelihood to turn to the local boards of guardians. Now they turn with confidence to certain boards of guardians. It depends, of course, on what the complexion of the particular boards of guardians they be. In some areas they are sympathetically treated, for their condition is well understood by the guardians concerned. But in other areas the proposition is not so comfortable for those concerned. I have before me at this moment a document from which I propose to read. It is a letter which has been received indicating the state of affairs in South Wales, in Monmouthshire, and how this state of affairs applies to people who happen to be unfortunate enough to be placed within the confines of an area controlled by less sympathetic guardians. This concerns the case of a miner which was discussed recently before the Abergavenny Board of Guardians. An unemployed miner, with a wife and eight children, ill receipt of 39s. unemployment pay, applied to the Board for assistance. The Board expressed sympathy with the man, but refused any relief on the ground that the man's income was above the maximum scale paid by the Board, namely, 32s. a week. I invite the hon. Gentleman opposite to examine that proposition. Here is a man with a wife and eight children, and they are expected to live upon the impossible sum of 32s. a week. It is utterly impossible for, after all, the cost of living in these areas is as heavy in every degree, taking all in all, as the cost of living in London or in other large towns. Rent is very heavy, and to meet all these enormous demands—I am not speaking of luxuries, of things that people in this condition of life can perhaps do without— they are expected to live on 32s. a week. I am not, as I said, demanding luxuries at all, but I ask the hon. Gentleman opposite to consider how a man with a wife and eight children can reasonably be expected to live and pay the demands that fall on him on that sum.

What is the consequence of all this? There are figures which are eloquent in themselves as to the terrible consequences that are overtaking the families in various parts of South Wales. Objection has been taken recently to certain speeches of my hon. Friends on this side of the House relevant to conditions in South Wales. People say they are exaggerated, and that their statements are overdone. Let us examine the facts. In 1919 the death rate in this particular area was 14.9 per 1,000. In the same year the infantile mortality was 78.85 per 1,000. In the year 1924, in the same area, the infantile mortality had mounted up to the horrible figure of 127 per 1,000.

Mr. LANSBURY

That is murder by government.

Mr. MORGAN JONES

Why is this? The real reason must surely be apparent to every Member. The only logical deduction you can get from these figures is that the poverty and the condition of the home are so terrible and the means whereby the head of the family can meet the day-to-day needs of the family are so limited that even the children have to suffer the natural consequences. It is not such an exaggeration as it seems to be to say that a direct consequence of this abnormal poverty in these areas is that children are, in fact, dying before their parents' eyes because of the horrible poverty from which their families are suffering. I want to compare that figure with the figure for the whole of England and Wales. The infantile mortality for England and Wales for 1924 was 75 per thousand, and in the particular area to which I am referring it was 127 per thousand. The facts only need to be stated to bring conviction, I trust, to the heart of every Member who happens to be listening to me. In the administrative county of Monmouth in 1924 the infantile mortality stood at 75.6, whereas for this necessitous area it stood at the abnormal figure of 127.2 per 1,000. The point I wish to make is this: Here am areas—and I could multiply instances like that, from my own area, from adjacent areas, the Aberdare area, the Rhondda Valley area, the Neath area, from almost every industrial area in South Wales at this moment —in which this position of affairs prevails, and I think this House has a right, and the representatives of these areas have a special right, to ask the hon. Gentleman opposite what methods his Ministry proposes to adopt in order to deal with the special claims of these very hard-hit areas.

There is a good deal of alarm being expressed by hon. Members opposite from time to time as to the growth of what they are pleased to call revolutionary feeling in certain parts of the country. We may perhaps join with them in regretting the form in which this feeling is sometimes expressed, but it has been said repeatedly in this House, and with some truth, that hungry men become angry men, and angry men may not always be depended upon to act in what we are pleased to call a reasonable way. Revolutionary feeling is fed upon a sense of grievance, a sense of wrong, and a sense of injustice, and I feel that if this condition of affairs is allowed to remain very much longer in the part of the country to which I have the honour to belong the consequence will be that sooner or later this kind of feeling may get out of hand. I trust not, but even if it should, though perhaps I might regret it, I should still, I trust, be able to understand the reason for its existence.

But there is another issue raised by this set of circumstances, and it is this: Are we not in fact, in areas like this, approaching the time when local government as we now know it is in danger of complete collapse? Areas such as my own. and such as are represented by the hon. Members for Poplar, the hon. Members for Middlesbrough, and others, are met with problems which no local resources are adequate to meet. It is impossible to expect these areas, with all these problems forcing themselves upon the attention of local administrators at once and together, to confront these burdens with the same measure of equanimity as, let as say, Westminster or other more happily situated areas are able to do. So I ask the hon. Gentleman opposite whether in fact it is not possible for the Ministry to come to the aid in a special way of these exceptionally hard-pressed areas. Is it not possible, for instance, in regard to their difficult housing situation, to have some special procedure applied to them whereby they may be able to meet their exceptional problems of exceptional overcrowding without having to impose upon themselves an added burden to that which they are already bearing, on behalf, as I submit, of the whole of the nation?

I plead, therefore, for special treatment for these local authorities. I am not asking for special treatment for South Wales merely, because I recognise only too well that there are other areas in almost the same condition as we are, but I do plead as earnestly as I can for special consideration for these areas, which in these days are called upon to bear a burden not in any degree comparable with the burdens of much more favoured areas in the country. I trust that before this Debate ends we shall be able to hear from the hon. Gentleman opposite some indication that the Ministry of Health is having regard to the condition of these areas, and not only so, but is prepared also to come to their aid in this hour of their need, and to make special provision to meet their very special condition.

The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the MINISTRY of HEALTH (Sir Kingsley Wood)

Has the hon. Member any special plan to suggest, or could he develop the last part of his speech a little more?

Mr. MORGAN JONES

It is not entirely my work to initiate plans on behalf of the hon. Gentleman opposite, who has been elected to his post to do this particular work, and I am sure that with his very fruitful mind he will not be without some proposals to that end. But I am quite cure that, if I can get the approval of my hon. Friend opposite to the principle I am putting forward, since two heads are better than one, it might be possible and indeed probable that some adequate method, or at least some more adequate method than there is at present, might be found for dealing with this exceptional situation in these hard-pressed areas.

Sir WILFRID SUGDEN

I want to support the appeal that has been made by the hon. Gentleman the Member for Caerphilly (Mr. Morgan Jones) from the Front Opposition Bench, not only for a speeding-up of the Committee that has been appointed by the Prime Minister to investigate the case of the 75 necessitous areas in Great Britain as to special treatment and consideration by the Exchequer, but I want to ask the spokesman of the Government to-night to give us a definite assurance that, when the Committee of Investigation has reported—it can report in no other fashion than for practical help, bearing in mind the starvation and privation that are obtaining, with all our social amelioration at the present time— immediate action shall be taken, and that it will be of a practical nature in regard to grants, cheap municipal finance and rate relief.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health asked hon. and right hon. Gentlemen on the Opposition Benches for some definite, practical proposal. No Member of this House with whom one has had the honour and privilege of "colleagueship" during the six or seven years that I have been a Member will lay to my charge any especial love or affinity for the extreme irrational methods that may be, and have been, propounded sometimes from those Socialist benches. But I do say that if the Parliamentary Secretary wants some guidance and lead, as apparently he does, I would suggest to him that he might consider the scheme that was put forward by the Borough Treasurer of West Ham, and say at once that while one is by no means enamoured of all that is contained in that scheme, there is contained therein some part of a fundamental basis which, with perfect protection to our own Exchequer carefully assured, might be applied in some degree to the problem. Be that as it may, I am prepared to take any risk rather than there should obtain the enormous amount of starvation which exists in Hartlepool to-night. When I read, as I do, that men who have been in continuous employment for over 20 years, men who have endeavoured in all parts of the country to obtain work and have been unsuccessful, are being brought before the magistrates to pay rates and to face the liability of rates, I say the time has come when there should be some assurance from the Government that there shall be some further consideration shown to these hard cases, and something definite done for the easing of rates which the great industrial class carry in many of these districts, particularly in my own constituency of The Hartlepools.

What exactly is the position? The hon. Member for West Middlesbrough (Mr. T. Thomson) has told us on one or two occasions of the rate carried per ton of shipbuilding, etc., in his necessitous area of Sunderland. Speaking as a business man to-night, I say it is good business that a "very well-off " suburban area or such districts in the country as carry by reason of the wealth of their occupants a very low rating value, should help to carry some of the burden of the overrated great industrial areas of the country. You may call it Socialism if you care. No one wilt accuse me of being a Socialist. I call it common sense, for in the long run such wealthy low rated areas will via national taxation be called upon to carry extra taxes to meet costs in necessitous areas. "Socialism," according to my definition is, "A method of academic reasoning not-practicable when applied to present day needs and necessities." All I want to say to-night is that with over 47½ per cent. of our workers in our great industrial regions a areas like Hartlepool—out of work with, the uncertainty of obtaining employment—and I want to pay proper respect and regard to the Minister of Labour for what he is doing;, although I do not think he is always going the best way to work, or availing himself of such opportunities as I have offered him. But that by the way. Some attempt, I agree, is being made. But unless the overweight which is being pressed on these necessitous areas in respect to the price per ton carried in regard to rolled steel, shipbuilding, pig-iron and other sections of industry, varying from 2s. 3d. per ton in some cases to 12s. 9d. in others, this country will never be able perfectly and efficiently to carry its heavy national debt and contribute its full quota in respect of the progressive efficiency of citizenship in the industrial areas, nor in respect to the application and bearing of the poor rates, and compete successfully in the markets of the world. His Majesty's Minister of Health has certain proposals of an excellent character dealing with the reconstruction of the Poor Law. I have carefully gone into those proposals.

Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER (Mr. James Hope)

It is not permissible to discuss proposals for future legislation, but only what happens in the administration and is in the power of the Department under existing laws.

Mr. MacLAREN

But did not the Minister ask us to give him some advice in the way of suggestions?

Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER

I assume he meant some advice as regards the administration of his office.

Sir W. SUGDEN

I bow to your ruling, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, and leave the tempting subject of the Poor Law proposals of the Minister of Health. I would suggest that what we desire from the Minister is not of necessity merely a capita grant of money, and money alone, to relieve our rates. While we say that a reduction in the cost of management of our towns would be distinctly helpful as a byproduct in regard to the cost of that which we produce, and which has to meet in open competition with the world, we want to say that in respect to the health and well-being of the citizens of. our towns and our cities, there are improvements long overdue from the days of the War, improvements which certainly would have been carried our had not the expensive war intervened. For example, in my own constituency of the Hartlepools, the Harbour Commissioners, this shipowners' associations, chamber' of shipping and trades and also the workpeople's representatives and those associated with them, have carefully examined the shipping and harbour facilities. as well as facilities dealing with the transport of goods across the country from Hartlepool which in past days sent goods to all parts of the country and have recommended unanimously that it would be a wry good proposition if two or three millions of money could be spent in enlarging and helping the harbour accommodation, in making possible better facilities of transport from this very fine shipping centre geographically placed to make it a quick and a cheap centre. If this money could be spent, it would help in a great degree to find employment, and would not in he slightest degree detract from the high moral capacity of industrialism and craftsmanship that at present obtains in our centre which unemployment grants carried out year after year has a possible danger of doing. When I brought these matters before? the responsible Minister, I was informed that the money was not available. But the money was available to a wealthy city like Liverpool to make a tunnel under the Mersey, and it is available to other like wealthy sections who are allowed funds by reason of their numerical representation here and by reason, some of us Think, sometime, of their especial heavy political colouring. Again, we have need for more and greater facilities in respect to technical schools: an excellent but overcrowded building does duty for such in my constituency; greater facilities for hospital treatment, etc.—all needed work for suitable out-of-work engineers and craftsmen.

Those of us who represent these great industrial areas, which, more than many other centres are suffering hardships and privations with all the facilities that obtain by way of support and amelioration, are determined that this heavy weight resting upon our shoulders, disproportionately, shall have proper consideration from those who have not so heavy a burden to carry, and that the nation must help us thereon. In conclusion the Parliamentary Secretary asked for proposals in addition to those I have given to him. If he will very carefully diagnose the proposals put forward by Members from every part of the House at the recent interview we had with the Prime Minister and the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and will adopt some of those proposals, he will have full and ample opportunity of relieving the great distress that obtains in many of our great centre?.

Mr. TREVELYAN THOMSON

I wish to join in the appeal which has been made to the Government to give every consideration to the case of the necessitous areas. This is no party matter. As representing the third section of the House, I would note that there is a unanimous appeal to the Parliamentary Secretary that he should give more consideration to the needs of these? districts. Those needs have been placed before him, in the case, first, of South Wales, and in the second case in respect of the needs of the Hartlepools, and I wish in a word or two now to put forward the special need of the North-East coast, and Middlesbrough, those districts adjoining Hartlepools, where we are suffering severely owing to the unemployment in the heavy steel trades. I would remind the Parliamentary Secretary that the unemployment rate in the insured trades for the country is 11'4 per cent. , while on the North-East coast, and in the shipbuilding industry, the figures for last month show 51 per cent. : in the marine engineering, 39.5 per cent. , and in iron and steel, 26.6.

With this appalling witness to the depth of the need it must be obvious that you have a burden falling in a very unequal degree upon districts least able to bear it, and I, therefore, wish to support the appeal put forward by the other speakers that the relief of unemployment should be regarded as, not a local, but a national burden. Figures that were given a little while ago by way of illustration showed that the numbers relieved per 10,000 were: Lanchester, 1,846, Bedwelty, 1,205, Gateshead 1,151, while for Exeter it was 110, Carlisle 114, and Headington, 46. These figures illustrate very clearly how unequal the burden is pressing on one district as compared with another. These figures are re Mooted in the rates and show that whereas in Middlesbrough the. rate was 19s. 4d., and Merthyr Tydvil 24s. 4d. on the pound, if you look at other residential places in the country, Oxford, Eastbourne, Bournemouth, Southport, and Blackpool, you will find that their average rate is 8s. to 9s. on the pound.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health asked for suggestions. My suggestion is that there should be a measure of equalisation of burdens such as this, which should be considered a national charge. The same principle could be applied as obtains in connection with the Metropolitan Common Fund. The same principle as applies in the case of special grants to necessitous is school areas. This same principle, I say, should be applied in the case of the relief of unemployment. We may perhaps be told that there is a Departmental Committee now sitting, and that, it has been taking evidence this week to deal with the claims which have been put forward. The Parliamentary Secretary will probably say that until after that particular report he will not be able, or has not been able, to do anything. I do, however, ask him not to be satisfied with this negative attitude. This Committee was promised as far back as last August. Here we are nearly at the end of the year and nothing tangible has yet been done. How many more months have we to wait?

I urge that the Ministry in the meantime, and until we get the Report of the Committee, should do something to relieve the gross necessities of these particular districts. He asked for suggestions. As my hon. Friend the Member for the Hartlepools has suggested, there are many valuable public works needed in these districts, if only there were adequate financial assistance given. At present, however, the assistance does not amount to more than 25 to 33 per cent. of the total cost. Where you have rates of from 20s. to 30s. in the £ you can, hardly expect—it is more than human nature can stand—to add to those rates by launching further schemes for the relief of unemployment in the particular district. In the district I represent we have already spent over £1,000,000 in unemployment relief work. We cannot indulge in any further capital expenditure unless we get more assistance.

Therefore, I suggest to the Minister that the immediate practical needs of the moment are for him to persuade the Treasury to make increased grants towards these necessitous areas for unemployment. The scheme should be on a national scale because unemployment, as I have pointed out, varies from 10 or 11 per cent. in some districts to over 50 per cent. on the North-East coast. To give the same method of grant for the relief of unemployment in areas where the distress is so very different, surely, is hardly reasonable; and I put in a plea for a percentage grant, the percentage of relief, higher where the unemployment is higher, and vice versa. We should also spend public money in carrying out public works which, as my hon. Friend has pointed out, will be valuable assets to the districts and to the nation. In my district, as in that of my hon. Friend, schemes have been under consideration for docks extension, etc., but it is a question of the finance being forthcoming. Improvements in the shipments of goods from the port, in the workshops and factories, and so on, might be made. In other directions work of a public character could be undertaken on which labour could be usefully employed rather than that labour should be receiving unemployment benefit. Those concerned would rather not have the unemployment benefit. The total extra cost per week on 21st November, in Middlesbrough, owing to the disallowance of benefit, was £636.

That, again, is adding tremendously to the burden of our rates. Then we have the Government's education circular which, if it is carried out in its present form, will increase local rates, particularly in industrial areas where there are a large number of children. Not only is this plea put forward on the ground of common justice, but from the business standpoint. These heavy rates not only hit the poorest of the poor but are a severe tax on industry, and whereas, in one particular works in the borough I have the honour to represent, the local rates in 1913 corresponded to a charge of 7d. per ton on the steel manufactured, this year they correspond to a charge of 2s. 11d. In other works, rates which were equivalent to 1s. per ton are now equivalent to 6s. 3d. In other works in the same district the rates and insurance contributions were equal to 3s. 3d. per ton of steel manufactured; to-day they are equal to 10s. 3d. So I might go on, showing that this is acting, not merely as a measure of hardship on individual ratepayers, but as a handicap to that very recovery of trade which is the only real solution of the problem.

May I give this other figure to the Parliamentary Secretary, to show that our rates are 50 per cent. in arrears? On 1st April rates were levied to the amount of £298,000, and on 1st October £194,000 was in arrear. Out of 13,000 ratepayers more than 6,700 were in default. Surely further evidence is not required to show the necessity of this district. The justice of our claim has been established on all hands. As to the practicability of our remedies, I put it to the Parliamentary Secretary that, instead of paying out these millions of money in poor relief and unemployed benefit, it would be better to spend an even larger sum of money in providing work for the unemployed, because at the end of it we should have something to show for it, and we should have preserved the morale and the physical fitness of our people. That is one of the worst features of the position. There are men in the shipyards who have done no work for two or three years.

Sir W. SUGDEN

Four years, sometimes.

Mr. THOMSON

If this state of things continues the men will not be fit to take up skilled work again. I appeal to the Parliamentary Secretary not to shelter himself behind the fact that a Departmental Committee is sitting. It has been sitting for nearly six months, and it may be another six months before its conclusions are carried out, and meanwhile distress is aggravated and the burden is accumulating. Let us have some imme- diate relief on the lines we have suggested, and then the Debate will not have been of an unfruitful character.

Mr. GROVES

Representing, as I do, a portion of one of the most important boroughs in the country from this point of view, and a borough that has, if I may say so with due respect, had the gloves on with the Minister of Health more than once—I mean by that West Ham—I would like to put it to the Minister, in a perfectly straight way—and he knows that I always endeavour to put my views courteously to him—that West Ham needs attention from the Government on two grounds. In the first place it is necessitous from the point of view of lack of housing accommodation, and it is necessitous on account of the widespread unemployment. The Parliamentary Secretary, who represents a constituency near mine, Is probably as well aware of the causes of this poverty in West Ham as I am. I want to impress upon him that the poverty is not our fault. I was born in Stratford and grew up with it. I knew Stratford when it was prosperous. The questions that have occupied this House over a number of years have proved to me that the War has resulted in the loss of our markets, and Stratford is suffering as a result of that economic stringency. Before the War boats used to go to the Baltic and other parts laden with goods produced in this country, and other boats came from the Baltic into the docks, and our men got wages for loading or unloading this merchandise. Flax, oil, grain, timber, and other things, were brought in, and we sent out agricultural and other implements manufactured by our artisans at home. To-day, owing to the loss of our export trade, our men, instead of loading or unloading boats, are queuing up-well, they were, but they are not to-day, I am sorry to say—outside the Employment Exchanges. The persistence of unemployment has so badly affected my area that men lost first their standard benefit and then their extended benefit, and now a large number of them are not getting any benefit at all.

In addition to the economic side of the question, there is a deep moral side. What is happening is eating into the heart of the manhood and the womanhood of this country. I look upon my men in Stratford, and West Ham generally, as being in an extremely disastrous position when they have to choose between looking their wife in the face and saying, "Mate, there is nothing this week," and going to the relieving officer. I have had quarrels, diplomatic quarrels, with the Minister over these questions. Does he realise how the existence of this state of things is demoralising our manhood? I have seen these men on the day they go to the R.O.—to use the vernacular—for the first time. These men, who years ago were proud British workmen, go with bowed heads when they visit the relieving officer for the first time. When they have been there for a month, they go with head erect. We sometimes denounce these men, but society has taught them that they can get money there without toiling—society has denied them the right to toil. These men are begging, so to speak, at the doors of the Ministry of Health, and we, their representatives, just have to take advantage of these few minutes on the Adjournment to lay their case before the Minister, so that he may feel that the area itself is not guilty, and I know he will agree that it is not.

My West Ham is suffering as the result of great, world-wide economic conditions. We are the second largest borough in the United Kingdom, and we have a good past industrially. As a result of the overtures made when the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carmarthen (Sir A. Mond) was Minister of Health, our borough was urged to go to the Ministry for loans to tide over the difficulty. When West Ham, like other necessitous areas shouldered the burden of unemployment it stood between this country and revolution. There is no doubt about that. These men in the East End of London would not stand starvation after so many of them had been through the War. Our county sent a very large proportion of men to fight for their country, and yet to-day we have. I believe, the largest percentage of ex-service men living on the relieving officer's pittance. That is a very serious thing.

I urge hon. Members to note the economic position of our borough. In company with the hon. Member for Silver-town, I went to the Ministry of Health to urge our last loan. I admit that we were very courteously received, and the only thing we objected to was the cutting down of the amount, and the conditions then imposed were hardly fair according to the circumstances. Our people were placed in a position which they did not seek. In the past they were good and industrious people, and they have been brought down to a state of destitution, and therefore I say that they have a right to declare that after giving their best services to the country they ought not to be living on paupers' bread, and they have a right to claim that the nation should provide them with adequate and humane maintenance. Our trouble in West Ham is a financial one. We have borrowed £2,000,000, and we have paid back nearly £1,000,000. I would remind hon. Members that after all they have said about West Ham, it has stood the test even financially, for we have paid back to the Exchequer nearly £1,000,000, and we are proving that, after the assistance you have given us to tide over this national emergency, we are doing our duty in shouldering the burden without acrimony and almost without food. We are facing the situation as boldly as we can, but in our borough we cannot continue to shoulder this financial burden. We shall shortly have to borrow £200,000 in order to pay the interest on the money we have already borrowed.

I want to point out that this problem is not a local one, because it is the duty of the National Assembly to apply itself to the alleviation of this state of things, and this can only be done by the Government meeting the expenditure and commitments within the Union of West Ham caused by the unemployed. This burden ought not to be shouldered by the local taxpayers but by the National Exchequer and by the taxpayers of the nation. We have 27,000 cases per week receiving unemployment pay and there are 60,000 people in the Poor Law Union of West Ham who are living on ordinary Poor Law relief. That is a great national problem in itself, and its administration perplexes the best tried local administrators. May I urge the moral side of it because you are doing a great deal to demoralise the manhood of this country in this way. I know it is a difficult thing for the Government to promulgate schemes of work for the unemployed. Last year I asked what schemes the Government were going to introduce for the alleviation of distress, and I ascertained that very few schemes were forthcoming.

All I have to say is that if we do not get more schemes for work in West Ham it simply means the continuance of the miserable position of all these men and women practically begging for bread.

9.0 P.M.

I think after all the noble traditions we have heard of, our men and women are entitled to claim that they should be maintained like men and women and not like paupers. West Ham cannot continue to shoulder the burden of Poor Law relief, and they cannot afford to keep 60,000 per annum doing nothing, and therefore it is necessary to treat West Ham as a necessitous area. Notwithstanding the reason which has been put forward by the Minister of Health for the position in which West Ham finds itself, I assert that the reason why West Ham is in the worst position is because it suffers the most, and people ought to benefit according to the incidence of their suffering. I look upon this problem in West Ham as a tragedy. Many of these people went to the War to fight for their rights and for the freedom of this country, and I ask the Government to recognise that there is a fuller mentality in the country to-day. When we were discussing the Communist prosecution there was a feeling aroused that the people are not going to suffer these hardships much longer, and if the Government want to put off the revolutionary spirit I hope they will learn that one way to keep it back is, first of all, to feed the people.

At present our people are simply begging and that is not a right position for the people to be put into. The Government have a solid majority and can do what they like, and if the Minister of Health came forward with a programme of constructive work, I can assure him that he would not get any opposition from this side, but, on the contrary, he would get cordial support. I want hon. Members to feel that they must come to the succour of West Ham financially and assist us to tackle properly the housing problem, because that is a human problem. The people in my borough are living in some cases 10 in one room, and that is a disgrace to any civilised country. We take this opportunity of laying the facts before the Minister of Health, and we ask him to recognise that the time has come for the Government to attempt to master this problem, and declare that the burden of the poverty of the country shall not be imposed upon the shoulders of the local ratepayers but shall be shouldered by the Government in a fair manner.

Mr. WRIGHT

I should like to make a brief contribution to this Debate, and to endorse what has been said by my hon. Friend the Member for Stratford (Mr. Groves) with regard to the urgency of this problem as it applies to my own constituency of Rutherglen. It would be invidious to attempt to declare in any very definite manner what particular part of the United Kingdom is most seriously affected by this problem of unemployment and necessitous areas, but those who know the West of Scotland will agree, I think, that there is no district in the country which is suffering and has suffered more severely than the West of Scotland during this prolonged and unparalleled period of trade depression. That is particularly true in my own division of Rutherglen. We have many highly-skilled workmen, of whom it would be equally true to say, as the previous speaker has said, that they went to the War voluntarily, and have given of their best. They followed very important occupations in the past, and the whole of this area is suffering very intensely and acutely—much more severely than a vast number of people imagine.

I am convinced that our local authorities cannot bear this tremendous burden very much longer. A year ago I submitted a statistical statement to the Minister of Labour and the Minister of Pensions with regard to this area. The parish authorities have appealed to me repeatedly since then, and I have often tried, though I regret to say in vain, to make a contribution on this question to the Debates in this House during the present year. It is perfectly obvious that, unless some special consideration be given to this problem, and unless the burden be removed from the shoulders of the local authorities on to the National Exchequer— because we believe it to be a national burden—very disastrous events will take place, in all probability at no very distant date. I feel certain that our people desire to do a useful day's work. They are perfectly willing to do it, and they are peaceful and law-abiding citizens. I do not want to make any wild or extreme statements, but I think that what people sometimes call revolution would have taken place already had it not been for the fact of this provision of relief, which is said to have cost the nation £225,000,000 during the last five years. That is a sum of money which, had it been spent in productive enterprise, would have met to a very considerable extent the demands that are now being made.

Inasmuch as we have had no visitation on behalf of the Government in our area in the West of Scotland to investigate this problem for themselves, I should like to appeal to the Ministers who are not here. It is rather singular, seeing that this is one of the most distressed areas in the whole country, that there is not a single Minister to pay any attention to what is being said on the matter. There is in fact no Scottish Minister on the Front Bench at the present moment, and I only but express the views of all the Scottish Labour Members here when I say that we are not going to stand this very much longer. It is a shocking state of affairs. Our people are the most highly skilled workmen in this country, and vast numbers of them are absolutely destitute. In my judgment it is a disgrace to the Government, and a disgrace to the nation, that this kind of thing should go on very much longer. If I could do anything to stir them up to peaceful revolt I would very gladly do it, if I thought there was the ghost of a chance of their succeeding in their effort.

If we were living in some distant part of the world, where it was impossible to obtain the essentials of well-ordered life, we might all agree to share whatever was going. But to-day we are living in a land where the power to create wealth was never so great as it is now. By the aid of machinery and mechanical appliances, by the skill possessed by our workmen, we could very easily but for this horrible system of landlordism and capitalism which prevails to-day, supply the needs of our own people in food, clothing and shelter without any real difficulty. There is not a shadow of doubt about that; the Scottish Cooperative Wholesale Society have demonstrated it over and over again. If something drastic be not done at no very distant date, and if the people over the West of Scotland rise in revolt, this Government will be held responsible for it, and no one else. If my colleagues were in my mood, they would go back over the Border, and never come here again, because honestly I do not believe that a serious effort is being made.

The Secretary for Scotland has now come in. He is a neighbour of ours, whom I have invited on more than one occasion to come just a few miles from his own division, and see what is going on in Rutherglen, Cambuslang and Blantyre. But it is all in vain. I feel that if the Minister of Pensions would come and see for himself, I would even undertake to speak with a Conservative Minister on the same platform. In vain I have appealed to the Minister of Labour, under whose Department men are being refused benefit as not genuinely seeking work. This has been going on for fully a year, if not longer. Men have submitted certificates from a dozen employers of labour as evidence that they were seeking work, but they have been refused benefit on this ground, and we still ask in vain for a definition of what is meant by "genuinely seeking work."

We are frittering away our time day after day and night after night in this august Assembly upon twopenny-halfpenny things, in comparison with the great problems of the day. After all, what is the good of a Government if it cannot provide the essentials of well-ordered life for people who are perfectly willing and capable of producing them? In many respects, in this highly civilised and much belauded 20th century, our people are infinitely worse off than people in many of the so-called savage places of the world. If they were living apart from a Government, apart from our modern Press and banking system, and had access to the forces of Nature, they would be living in comparative comfort as compared with the position of affairs to-day. Therefore, what we are witnessing now, although the Government are extraordinarily slow to realise it, is the collapse of the old order of landlordism and capitalism. Sooner or later the nation will realise that that is a fair and correct analysis of what is going on.

I venture to appeal to the Secretary for Scotland. If he will not feel that he is in any way disgraced by my presence and that of one or two of my colleagues, we shall be delighted to spend some brief period during the forthcoming holidays in showing him what there is to be seen in various parts of Lanarkshire. In that case, I venture to say—at least, I hope I am not misjudging the right hon. Gentleman—that he will come back here fortified with a knowledge which he does not at present possess, if I may say so with all due respect to him, and I hope he will then submit some very definite practical proposals for the opening up of work, financed by the nation, if you will, with a large loan, because there is any amount of land to be reclaimed in Scot-land, there are any number of roads to be made, there are plenty of relief works which could be done, if it is not. possible again to re-establish the markets abroad. We have the plant, we have the skill, we have the men capable of supplying those distant markets, and but for the short-sighted policy pursued by the Government during recent years, some measure of relief might have come from that quarter. There is the further fact that this question cannot be delayed very much longer, and, speaking in the name of the parish authorities of my own constituency, I appeal to-night to the right hon. Gentleman, on behalf of Scotland, not to ignore this question any longer. It has been ignored too long, and, if there be any rising in the West of Scotland, the responsibility for that will rest upon the incompetent and utterly incapable Government which is in office at the present time.

Mr. W. PRESTON

It is a great pleasure to me to take part in a Debate which affects my native borough and the town in which I live and which I represent. The Walsall Union embraces, in addition to the county borough of Walsall, the urban district of Darlaston, the Walsall Rural District and part of the Brownhill Urban District, including mining villages. The population of the union at the 1921 Census was 136,555 and the assessable value in April, 1923, was £476,376. This is the fifth winter of abnormal unemployment in the Walsall Union, as shown by the following figures: In March, 1914, the outdoor relief given was £156 per week, but it had pone up in 1923 to £2,328. Fortunately it was reduced a little in 1925, to £1,202, and during the past summer the amount paid in out relief has increased, instead of decreasing, as is usual in the summer period. The amount of capital commitments on unemployment relief schemes in respect of the county borough of Walsall alone up to date is approximately £255,000 on non-revenue producing schemes such as road widening, etc., involving a rate of approximately 7d. in the £, and this will be very seriously increased on the expiration of the limited period during which Government grants are made.

In spite of the re-assessment of the Walsall Union which has been carried out during the last few years, the assessable value per head of the population remains low, and the total rate for the county borough of Walsall during the past six years averages 17s. 9d. in the £. Walsall is peculiarly situated. It is a large area, but is surrounded by small towns which have very large factories. Unfortunately, when those factories have little work, the people who live in Walsall and are employed at them come on to the Walsall Union. We are a town of a hundred trades. There are 632 manufacturers, but they have only small factories, there being only one which is employing 1,000 workpeople. The others on the average do not employ more than 250 each. Furthermore, the majority of the chief manufacturers do not live in the borough. They go outside, and, as a consequence, our rateable value is very low. However, we are hoping for better things, and are looking forward to the inquiry which the Departmental Committee are setting up, trusting that they will devise a scheme for necessitous areas which will do something tangible for us.

Mr. CONNOLLY

Like the last speaker on these benches, I feel it my duty to say that our experiences in these Debates are very regrettable. I think this is the fifth or sixth Debate I have taken part in with regard to necessitous areas and unemployment, and the usual experience has been of a half-empty house, particularly the Minister being absent. After our first Front Bench speech the Parliamentary Secretary put across what I thought was a reasonable question. He asked if my hon. Friend could make any suggestions. That is reasonable enough though, of course, it does not relieve him from the responsibility of also putting forward suggestions. I think we can put a reasonable question to him and ask whether he thinks it proper, in face of this question, which transcends in importance every other question, invariably to have in these Debates empty benches behind him. The least they could do is to come in and hear the discussion upon this very important matter.

The first thing I want to do is to draw attention to to-day's OFFICIAL REPORT and ask what limitation the Department puts upon the answer that was given to the hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Henley-on-Thames (Captain Henderson), who asked the hon. Gentleman whether he was aware that in the borough of Bootle 130 men were employed at full trade union rates by the giving of the full amount of relief from the board of guardians to the corporation; also that this was augmented by grants from the Unemployment Grants Committee to the extent of 75 per cent. of the loan interest and also the capital charge for one half of the period of the loan. To me this is a very important matter as far as palliatives are concerned. It is in this direction that the Ministry will have to move, and I should like to ask whether the Department puts any set limitation upon the grant, and also, with regard to his instructions, how far the guardians can go in the matter. I intend to send this copy of the OFFICIAL REPORT to our local authority, and to ask them to move in the direction indicated by the answer given yesterday, that the Minister himself will give every assistance to corporations and to urban authorities to make applications for grants under these Clauses.

Captain HENDERSON

I think the question was put by my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Bootle (Lieut.-Colonel Henderson).

Mr. CONNOLLY

I am glad the hon. and gallant Gentleman has put me right. There are about five Members of the same name. I want to emphasise the necessity for the extension of these operations. At the beginning of the last-financial year I made application to the Newcastle Council, of which I am a member, to get some very bad roadways in my ward put right. They were in a disgraceful condition. I found the available money was only something like £3,000, and these very necessary repairs had to be diverted to another financial year. If the Ministry will extend, as far as their powers will allow them, the giving of grants to local authorities, to further road schemes, etc., something will be done in the way of a palliative.

With regard to the responsibility for meeting the charges caused by unemployment, I meet our guardians very often, and I was at a meeting quite recently when they were in a very disturbed state as to the fulfilment of their work and carrying on and paying out at the agreed scale. I said to them, "You can only do your best. The responsibility does not lie with you. The responsibility for all this unemployment does not rest in the board of guardians' room, but in the room that I sit in. The policy of the Government of the day—and when I speak of the Government I do not mean a Tory Government, or a Coalition Government, but a Government in the abstract, is responsible for the policy and you in this district are suffering"—as the hon. Member for West Middlesbrough (Mr. T. Thomson) has pointed out—" to the extent of 51 per cent. unemployed." We have in the Tyne districts a larger proportion even than that, for that was the average for the north-east coast. In my constituency there is fully 60 per cent. of our shipyard workers idle. I say now, as I have said many times before, that the responsibility lies here.

Questions have been answered in the House recently, a question was asked yesterday, and another question will be asked to-morrow, with regard to what I consider the real cause of unemployment in our area. In an answer given before, it was stated that we had received over 2,000,000 gross tons of German shipping. We are a shipbuilding centre. The North-East coast and the Tyne and other places in the country are dependent on shipbuilding to give employment to our people. The answer given was that we have received well over 2,000,000 tons. Putting that at the very lowest figure, it comes to over £20,000,000 that we have received in shipbuilding tonnage, and the policy pursued here has thrown our people out of work. The town councils are not responsible for it, the guardians are not responsible for it, and I say seriously to the House that if this policy is to be pursued—I am speaking of reparations, and I am asking a question about this to-morrow as to whether it has definitely ceased or will cease in the immediate future—that policy is responsible for unemployment, and it is the business and the duty of this House, if that policy is to go on, to find some counteracting influence to it, and to find some remedy or at least to find some effective palliative.

The question of the equalisation of rates has been mentioned. That is something that the Minister ought to consider in face of the fact that we are not out of the Slough of Despond yet and that unemployment may go on for quite a number of years. It is a serious matter that industrial centres like Middlesbrough, Glasgow, London and Newcastle, have to bear, not only their own share of the burden of unemployment, but also the burden of such places as Bournemouth, Teignmouth, Margate, Tyne-mouth and other watering places. We have people deriving the whole of their income from our industrial centres where there is 5s. 5d. poor rate to pay, while the total rates in the particular areas in which they live do not amount to that figure. That is a crying injustice, and I am glad we have had from the Conservative benches to-night some backing for the continual protest we have made against this particular form of rating.

There are many other Members who want to get in, but I want to say with regard to this question of reparations, I have again and again asked the House to consider the question of ceasing taking reparation tonnage while we have so much unemployment and have had for the last, not three or four years, but six years. The real importance is that people are gradually going to seed, and they are losing all hope, and the greatest loss to this country is not in finance but in morale. Lord Aberconway, who is not a Labour man, said with regard to this shipbuilding tonnage from Germany, "Far better it had been sunk in the Scapa Flow along with the German Fleet. "Then at least we would have had our morale in our shipyards left intact, and I plead with the Government both on the question of reparations and the policy which has been pursued, that serious consideration should be given to the alteration of that policy. I hope, in conclusion, that the Parliamentary Secretary will be good enough to reply to the little points I have raised and to the questions asked by other hon. Members.

Mr. EVAN DAVIES

I am sure it requires no word of mine to emphasise the importance of this Debate and to show that the House appreciates the difficulties of the problem with which we are dealing. I have been rather thinking that to initiate this Debate on unemployment was rather a mistake because I find that there have been many Debates in this House on this very important question, in which the magnitude of the problem has been demonstrated over and over again, and I find by my own personal experience—although I have not taken part in the Debates myself and I represent one of the most necessitous areas in the country—that every time Debates have taken place in this House the Minister responsible, though informed of the conditions prevailing in these necessitous areas, becomes more hardened after each Debate. It will be admitted that we come from an area in South Wales that is greatly troubled by unemployment and although I have taken no specific part in the Debates, I have made it my business to interview the Minister of Health and the Minister of Labour on deputations from that part of the country and every occasion we have been told that nothing further can be done in order to alleviate the suffering that exists.

It makes a world of difference in the attitude of a man whether he is in opposition or a Minister of the Government. I remember that the present Minister of Health attended a deputation at Downing Street, when the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George) was Prime Minister, when he emphasised the point that we have been trying to emphasise to-night, which is that unemployment is an aftermath of the War and the direct result of mismanagement of the affairs of the country. He stated this very definitely for the deputation when we met the Prime Minister and said this question of unemployment ought not to be considered as a local question, but that the expenses of unemployment should be spread over the whole of the nation and should become a national charge. That was the present Minister of Health during the time he was not a Minister in the Government. Now that he has become the Minister of Health and is charged with the operations of that particular Department, I find that he is becoming more hardened than the hardened Minister who was there before him. All I can say is that the further he advances in years the more he recedes from virtue.

This deputation which waited upon the Prime Minister in those days did succeed in closing up the gap in the unemployment benefits, but the present Minister of Health has so interpreted the present Act of Parliament for which he is responsible that instead of using the discretionary powers that he asked for in the Act in order to bring in people that were really in necessity, and people it would be in the national interest should receive unemployment benefit, he has used it to put as many people out of unemployment benefit as it was possible to do. The Minister comes to this House and makes pathetic appeals to the Opposition, and says he is doing all he possibly can to ameliorate the condition of people in the country, but we know by what actually occurs in our own areas that he is cutting people off the unemployment benefit wholesale, and that men of 65 years of age are being turned off. When a Minister comes to the House and pleads that he is using all the humane treatment that is possible for these people, all I can say is that I do not believe in the sincerity of such a plea.

The result of what is happening is the creation of a mentality in these necessitous areas that will make real difficulty for the Government in a very short time, unless some other treatment is meted out to the people. Take the situation in the Bedwellty Union. There are certain Members of the Government who frequently make sarcastic remarks about such places as West Ham and Bedwellty, as though they were simply adopting a policy in those places of mismanaging local affairs, spending money without consideration and paying out money to the unemployed people on a most lavish scale in order to induce them and encourage them not to seek employment.

The result of the action of the present Minister of Health has meant, following upon the last Act of Parliament and the circular sent out in February of this year, that the Bedwellty Board of Guardians have been compelled to increase the amount of weekly payments by £500. Then, the Bedwellty Guardians are ex pected to go to the ratepayers and to levy rates sufficient to meet the expenditure of this money in order to relieve the National Exchequer. As a result of mismanagement, not of local administration, but of mismanagement from the Department in London, we find that those people who are doing their best to try to meet the situation are held up to ridicule and criticism by the Ministry of Health in London.

Let me give an illustration. I was a member of a deputation from the Bedwellty Guardians which waited upon the right hon. Member for Carmarthen (Sir A. Mond) when he was Minister of Health. The Bedwellty Guardians had laid down a certain principle. I am convinced that it would have been in the interests of all the boards of guardians if they had adhered to the principle laid down by the Bedwellty Guardians. They said that they were not a borrowing authority and did not intend to take upon themselves national burdens and to levy rates upon their local people to meet those burdens. They said that instead of borrowing the money the Government should make grants in order to meet the conditions that arose as a result of the depression in trade in 1921. They fought the then Minister of Health, the right hon. Member for Carmarthen, and told him definitely that they did not require to borrow any money, and that he must make a grant to them in order that they might relieve the pressure that was put upon them.

The right hon. Member for Carmarthen then made a statement to the deputation to this effect: "I beg of you, for the time being, to accept a loan of £60,000. Go back to your area, expend the money in the way you are expending money in order to relieve the depression there." The Government were afraid in those days that a feeling was developing in the country that would make things very ugly. The right hon. Member for Carmarthen said: "Go back to your people, and when you have spent the £60,000, do not levy rates that are too heavy for the people to pay, but come back to this Department and we will grant you further loans. "As a result of adopting that policy and going to the Ministry of Health from time to time to secure large sums of money in order to relieve the unem- ployment and distress in their area, the Bedwellty Board of Guardians have already accumulated a debt of £500,000. Now, the present Minister of Health is accentuating the unemployment difficulty in the area by adopting what I consider to be a most pettifogging policy in his attitude towards the Bedwellty Board of Guardians.

The policy which I have outlined has resulted in the Bedwellty Board of Guardians going to the Ministry of Health and asking for a loan of another £90,000. The attitude adopted by the Minister has been this: "I will lend you the £90,000 you require to carry on with in the Bedwellty area, but you must adopt a particular policy which I will outline." The policy which the Minister has outlined is this: "Instead of paying a man and his wife and one child £1 6s. per week, you must pay £1 5s. per week." Imagine a Minister of Health in a country which boasts so much of its great qualities, going to a board of guardians and insisting upon the paltry condition that they must reduce the relief to a man, his wife and one child by 1s. per Week. As if that is going to make a tremendous difference to the finances of the country.

The Minister then says: "In regard to a man, a wife and two children, instead of paying £l 12s. a week you must pay them £1 10s."Instead of allowing the maximum scale to remain as we have had it at Bedwellty at £l 18s. 6d., the Minister has adopted the paltry attitude of compelling the Bedwellty Guardians to accept a scale of £1 18s. per week. That is to say, 6d. off the maximum scale, and he keeps up agitation between the Ministry of Health and the Bedwellty Guardians with a view to compelling the guardians to accept the conditions that he has laid down. Is the case of Bedwellty singled out because they have a Labour majority? There is no real opposition or interference with a board of guardians such as the Abergavenny Board of Guardians, who are responsible for the figures which have been read by the hon. Member for Caerphilly (Mr. Morgan Jones), where the rate of the infantile mortality has increased from 78 to 127. There is no criticism by the Ministry of Health of a particular policy so long as it is reducing the relief to the poor people in the area. The Bedwellty Board of Guardians will act as they think best, and I shall always encourage them to do it, if the Ministry of Health is not prepared to allow them to administer relief in a reasonable and rational way.

Who will say that £1 a, week is too much for a man and wife to live on? Who will say that £1 6s. 0d. is too much for a man, his wife and one child? Who will say that £l 18s. is too much for a. man, his wife and six or seven children? No Member of this House will dare to get up and say so. The Minister of Health, however, operates that particular principle behind the doors of the Ministry of Health, and then he comes forward to tell the House of Commons that he is doing all he possibly can in order to relieve conditions in the areas. The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health has asked us what remedy we suggest. I will put to him one or two remedies.

I have gone to the Ministry on more than one occasion with proposals from these areas for schemes to provide work instead of relief—but always without success. The Ebbw Vale district, which I represent, has sent to London on several occasions asking for sanctions for loans to erect houses, which are absolutely necessary, to build a new school which His Majesty's inspector has insisted upon and to repair other schools which have fallen into bad condition. The Ministry of Health has refused sanction for these loans although the Board of Education was pressing the local authority to deal with the schools and the ground of their refusal was that the local council was temporarily embarrassed financially. They had an overdraft at the bank of £20,000, but instead of exercising intelligence and helping the authority to convert that overdraft into a loan extending over a period of years—instead of allowing them the opportunity to build schools and houses and adopt unemployment schemes, the Ministry stand fast and say, "We can do nothing because you are embarrassed financially." That is the kind of help we are receiving both from the Ministry of Labour and the Ministry of Health.

I protest emphatically against the attitude of individual Ministers who are acting in a dictatorial fashion and are helping to bring about a state of demoralisation and degeneration among the people. The Minister of Health assumes autocratic powers in dealing with boards of guardians and orders them to pay a scale of relief which he lays down, on the ground that he is lending the money with which those authorities pay the relief. In the case of the Minister of Labour we find that he acts in a dictatorial fashion by ordering that only those people shall receive unemployment benefit who are indicated in the regulations which he sends out. But in the case of unemployment, the employer and the employé provide more than two-thirds of the fund and the dictatorship of the Ministry of Labour is exercised in the spending of other people's money. I have put down a question on that point and I will take every opportunity of protesting against that procedure. It is a sound principle of administration that representation should go with payment, and the law ought to be amended so as to give the rota committees the power to rule properly in their localities, because they have better knowledge of the local situation than the officials of the Ministry. I can understand the attitude of the Scottish people who say that they will not come to London unless there is a change in this procedure. There was a time when Wales claimed Home Rule, and I think we ought to stay away from London also if better treatment is not meted out to us.

It is useless to initiate Debates on unemployment in this House if the Ministers hide, behind their officials in Whitehall, and, instead of helping the situation and trying to secure a more humane administration, only tighten the purse strings still further. There is a strong feeling in South Wales that the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Labour are tightening the purse strings for a special purpose. They know that trouble is likely to take place in the coalfields next May, and they are trying to demoralise the people beforehand. At every conference and protest meeting you find that nine out of every ten speakers suggest that the Government are preparing to demoralise the people in view of the fight which is regarded as inevitable in May next. If the Government want to relieve the pressure, to clear the atmosphere, and to create a better feeling, the Ministry of Labour should not seek to put everybody off benefit, but should rather try to get on all who are entitled to benefit. The Ministers reply always is, "What about the other people who are paying towards the fund?" The people of this country will not quarrel with any Minister who gives a liberal interpretation to the Act of Parliament so that every man will receive unemployment benefit who is genuinely out of work. The present policy is having a disastrous effect in the country, and I warn the Government that the time will come sooner than they think, unless a different spirit is manifested in the administration of these two Departments, when they will have created a psychology in this country which will end in social revolution.

Mr. STEPHEN

On a point of Order. Is it in order that a Debate on this very important matter should proceed without a single responsible Member of the Government in attendance? The Minister of Health, the Minister of Labour, the Prime Minister and the Chancellor of the Exchequer are all disregarding the poverty and misery of the people by not coming into the House to hear this discussion.

Mr. WHITELEY

I am glad to have heard the interesting remark of my hon. Friend the Member for Camlachie (Mr. Stephen), and I hope the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health will at least see that the Ministers concerned have brought to their notice the facts referred to in this Debate with a view to some remedy being put into operation. I represent an area which is passing through a time as difficult as that experienced in any of the areas mentioned. The hon. Member for the Hartlepools (Sir W. Sugden) has told the House of the great difficulties in that borough and Sunderland, South Shields and Gateshead are passing through an equally difficult time while the administrative county of Durham is possibly experiencing a worse time than any of the boroughs.

In that county we have 40,000 miners idle. They are not idle because they want to be idle but because the employers refuse to allow them to work under fair and just conditions. As a result nearly all the areas have bad to levy higher rates and the unemployment affects not only the working class but the small tradespeople who depend on the purchasing power of the workers. I live in a rural area where the rates are 21s. 6d. in the £ and in some urban areas they are 27s. and 28s. in the £ with the prospect that they will be higher. The hon. Member for Ebbw Yale (Mr. Evan Davies) said the Government were adopting the policy of breaking the spirit of the people and bringing them into a physical condition which would make it impossible for them to refuse work if work were offered, under whatever conditions it might be. We find that when we come to the Ministry of Health for a loan for our boards of guardians, there is a suspicion that we receive a different kind of treatment from what some boards of guardians received in the past when they were under different control from what they are to-day.

We are fortunate in the county of Durham that we have a number of boards of guardians under Labour control, and, because they are, they have made up their minds to accept the full responsibility to the citizens in their area to see that they are kept in a proper physical condition, and that they are not going to allow them to starve just to please the Government or anybody else. We have instances of where boards of guardians have come to the Minister of Health to secure loans, and they have asked for £50,000 to be paid within four years, and have got it without a murmur. Now, when the same boards of guardians come along to the Minister of Health to ask for exactly similar sums, he says, "Yes, you can have £50,000, if you will repay it within six months." It is an absolute impossibility. We are called upon to see the Minister of Health in his own room, and then he has to bring in his advisers, and eventually we are able to extract from him, after a good deal of argument, £20,000, to be repaid within three years.

We say it is not fair treatment, because the Labour boards of guardians are not responsible for the condition in which these areas are being placed to-day. We are told by the Minister of Health that there has been a decision. In a country where we are supposed to have some kind of rights, we are being placed in an extraordinary position to-day. Men are prevented from receiving unemployment benefit from a fund to which they have contributed, simply because they have the courage and manhood to refuse unfair and unjust conditions from their employer. They are now told that because they are able-bodied men, they are not entitled to any out-door relief from the board of guardians, and that if the boards of guardians see fit to give out-door relief to their wives and children, then these able-bodied men have to accept the responsibility and the liability of refunding such amounts as are paid to their wives and children.

If the able-bodied man is out of work a sufficiently long time, and the board of guardians starve him during that time, and he becomes physically unfit, then it is a right of the board of guardians to pay outdoor relief to a man who is physically unfit when he has gone past the needs of outdoor relief. We say the time has come when the various Government Departments of this country ought to cooperate in such a way as to prevent things like that happening. It is no good the Minister of Health putting into operation certain Regulations that have already been referred to to-night, and simply putting young men off the unemployed benefit, because they happen to be living with their parents. Their parents ought not to provide unemployed relief out of their income. These young men have paid their contributions. They are citizens of this country, and they are entitled to be treated as citizens. The Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Labour ought immediately to be getting together in order to frame some scheme by which these people can have proper assistance.

In Durham County we happen to have the good fortune—it may be good fortune, I do not know—of having a Labour county council, and this Labour county council has been down to see the Minister of Transport in regard to certain schemes that have already been approved, and to get these schemes under way to find employment for our unemployed in order to relieve the ratepayers in our areas. We have been turned down there again. I have in my hand communications from three urban district councils in the county of Durham asking us to press upon the Government not to allow the Chancellor to take any of the Road Fund, but to see that it is increased for the purpose of bringing it into operation to provide work for our unemployed. In conjunction with my colleagues, I want to urge upon the Government not to treat this thing lightly, but to remember, first and foremost, that their policy means that our citizens in this country are becoming physically unfit to meet the needs of life when they are going to have the opportunity, if ever such an opportunity comes, of again being employed. The various Departments of the Government should co-operate in order that the citizens of the country might have the opportunity, if not to work, at least to live as decent citizens ought.

10.0 P.M.

Mr. N. MACLEAN

The Debate that has been taking place to-night is one that the House has grown rather familiar with during the past five years, and I can remember occasion of no longer ago than 12 or 13 months when the Under-Secretary for Health, standing on this side of the House, questioned the Minister of Labour who represented the Labour Government, two weeks after the Labour Government had opened in this House, asking the Minister of Labour what schemes for employing the unemployed the Labour Government were going to produce. Twelve months after that, the same individual representing the Ministry of Health, asks from that Box if the Labour Opposition can give any suggestion as to schemes of employment. Is the Tory Government so bankrupt after its 12 months of office? Did it not go through a campaign during the election, telling the people what was going to be done for them if they would have the courage to elect a Tory Government? Unemployment was to be wiped out of existence. [HON. MEMBERS: "No!"] Unemployment was to be wiped out of existence. [HON. MEMBERS: " Who said it? "] The Prime Minister in his address to the country. [HON. MEMBERS: "No!"] Never? Well, then, I am afraid the English language has different meanings to different people. Scotsmen apparently can understand the English language best.

The Tory party put forward the claim that it could solve unemployment if it were elected. Instead of solving unemployment, it has augmented unemployment. The numbers of unemployed are greater to-day than they were 12 months ago. There are less opportunities for finding employment than there were last year, and the Tory Government that is now in office cannot find anything better than to come forward to this House with a scheme to tax gas mantles in order to throw light upon the unemployment problem for themselves. It is rather a bad light they have thrown upon themselves.

The Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Unemployment or the Ministry of Labour, and all the Departments of the Government that are there with the object of doing something to lighten the burden of distress or the burden of ill-health in the community, instead of taking up the responsibility of their office in a way they ought to have done, to have tried to alleviate the distress and to have endeavoured to find employment, have mocked at the miseries of the people, and have driven the people deeper into distress than they were previously.

The Ministry of Health—one might rather describe it as the Ministry of Death! There is a greater infantile mortality in working-class areas in industrial communities in this country to-day than there was 12 months ago. People are worse off, conditions are worse, yet this great Government with its majority of 200 cannot produce a scheme for unemployment.

Do the right hon. Gentlemen opposite agree with the statement made 18 months or two years ago by the Colonial Secretary that there could no longer be found employment in this country for all those seeking employment, and that for the next five or six years we would be faced with a problem of over 1,000,000 and probably 2,000,000 unemployed? Do they agree with that? It seems to me that their silence is evidently an indication that they do accept it, and that they are agreed to look forward with equanimity to a period of five years with 1,000,000 people unemployed. That means, with their dependants, that there will be 4,000,000 of the population of this country unemployed and in distress. Yet the Tory Government, after their year of office, have nothing to show for their work, nothing to produce to this House to alleviate the distress.

The Secretary for Scotland accompanied the Prime Minister to Dundee. I do not know if he went with him to the slums, the "Blue Mountains" of Dundee. The Prime Minister expressed his horror at the condition of the houses there. The Secretary for Scotland knows perfectly well that in Glasgow we have places where the housing accommodation is at least as bad as any that could be found in Dundee.

The SECRETARY for SCOTLAND (Sir John Gilmour) indicated assent.

Mr. MACLEAN

He admits that. It is the first indication of life upon the Government Bench. What has been done? Hundreds of thousands of people are living in insanitary houses. Rent is being charged although the houses have been condemned, and not only is the rent being charged but practically the whole of the 40 per cent. increase with the addition of the increase in the rates over the pre-War sum that was paid by the owners. That means a 40 per cent. increase for condemned houses. Is it not a scandal? Can the Secretary for Scotland justify it? No life this time!

There used to be a slum in Dundee which was called the Scouringburn, a filthy slum looked upon with disgust by everyone. Everybody who visited Dundee-used to taunt the Dundee people with this particular slum, and the Town Council of Dundee decided that they would sweep it out of existence. So, one morning, a couple of workmen went out with a hammer and a ladder and a basket. At the corner of a street they erected a ladder against a wall. One of the workmen mounted it, look up the hammer, knocked off the tablet; with the name on it, and put up another. "Scouringburn" had disappeared, because they put up another tablet with the name "Brook Street." There was no longer Scouringburn, but the slums still remained. The houses remained. All that was changed was the name. That is the Tory Government's method of social reform. They change nothing but names, but the conditions remain.

When the House rises, some of you will probably go to your constituencies and tell of the glorious and brilliant work accomplished by the great Government we have in office. Brilliant! They want gas mantles to show the brilliance, and very poor light at that! I want to ask the Secretary for Scotland and the Undersecretary for Health exactly what the Government mean to do. We have had this year three months' holidays at a stretch. [HON. MEMBERS: "NO, no!"] I have not had them, but that is the time the House has not been sitting. We rise next week for another six weeks' holidays. Then we have our fortnight at Easter, and 10 days at Whitsuntide. This year we will only have sat in this Chamber for six months out of the year. Six months' holidays for the Members of this House while thousands of people are starving in the country! You could not devote time to try and solve this problem. Thousands of people starving, yet your Members, according to the Press to-night, are going over the country and over the world. Why cannot they take a trip in their own country and find out some of the distress that exists here I Let them try, if they can, apply the brains they possess to hammering out some solution that will bring some comfort into some of the homes this Christmas.

We will all be wishing each other a Happy Christmas as we leave on Tuesday. We shall all be hoping to spend an enjoyable new year. Yet we know that there are hundreds of thousands all over the country to whom Christmas and its pleasures will be a mere mockery. There will be thousands of children all over the country to whom the dawn of Christmas morning will seem only a flick in the face. If is nothing to them. They know nothing of its pleasures. This Government, with their 200 majority, could, if they liked, have brought in measures of social reform that would have gone a long way towards relieving a great deal of that discomfort and distress.

An hon. Member, a, colleague of mine from the Clyde area, said it would be a good thing if Scottish Members did not come here. An hon. Member for Wales expressed himself in much the same manner in regard to the Welsh Members. After the War finished the Government of that time had to face a problem. There were hundreds of thousands of men who had been trained in the use of weapons and who were being demobilised. The fear of what might happen if those men, demobilised in a. hurried fashion, could find no employment whatever and nothing to keep starvation from their door, the fear that they might be rendered desperate, and might break out into violent breaches of the peace, and even rioting of a very serious nature, made the Government come forward with a special remedy in order to prevent the likelihood of any of those outbreaks. They provided a. special unemployment benefit for all those who were being demobilised—an insurance against revolution it was called. Do hon. and right hon. Members on the opposite benches think that the people to-day have now been tamed to such an extent and cowed to such a degree by unemployment that they cannot now be rendered desperate by the sight of the miseries that exist in their own homes and their own streets? Do they think it is safe now to gamble with life and death in the industrial areas? Do they think the people have got out of the way of thinking of those scenes of slaughter that they left behind in Flanders?

If you want the people to be peaceful, treat them as they ought to be treated, as human beings. An hon. Member asked what could be done about it. There is not a man in this country gifted with a brain, having two arms with 10 fingers at the end, who could not, if allowed to do so, by applying his intelligence and his skill to the machinery of production or to the land, produce more in six months than would maintain himself and his family for 12 months, and the private ownership of land and of the machinery of production keeps those men walking the streets and refused unemployment benefit. It is time that the Government took some action. We cannot go on in this House playing with the problem of unemployment much longer. If the Government is not prepared to solve it, I warn it that the people outside who are suffering from these things may take the solution of that problem out of its hands and solve it in a manner that may not be liked by many hon, and right hon. Members on the benches opposite.

Mr. SNELL

It can hardly be called a Debate where the speeches are all from one side of the House. We have not had the advantage of any contribution to the speeches on this very grave problem from hon. Members on the other side of the House, who are always telling us that their sympathies are as keen as ours in this matter.

Sir W. SUGDEN

The hon. Member does me an injustice.

Mr. SNELL

The hon. Member for the Hartlepools (Sir W. Sugden) was a very notable exception. Neither have we had the opportunity of hearing a word from the Government in answer to the very serious appeals that have been made to it. I do not wish to follow what has been said by other speakers in the way of illustration. One area may be more acutely distressed than another area, but for the purpose of this Debate we may take it as granted that all working-class areas are in a state of distress, and some are very acutely distressed.

I wish to say a word or two from the standpoint of London, which has so far not been put in this Debate. It seems to be assumed that if an area is in special trouble, it is because of some weakness on its own account or some failure to do what it might have done, but in reality many of these areas that are suffering such distress are so suffering because they have had special responsibilities thrown upon them in the national service, and the nation has not responded to their needs. Now we claim that in this matter something like the principle of the equalisation of rating should be applied. If it is a colliery district in South Wales that is in trouble, that colliery district has served the nation to the best of its ability. It has given everything that it had to give. The nation has required its industry, and the people would have been poorer if that industry had been withheld. If, in the development of our national industry, some particular area chances to be stricken more than others, it is the business of the whole community to come to its aid, and not to leave it to suffer on its own account. That is what we claim.

Let hon. Members reflect upon what is involved. Many of the boys who left in this area went out to the War and died that the property of hon. Members in the more prosperous areas might be secured to them. There is an honourable obligation upon every Member to see that these particular areas that are so suffering are given all the help that is practicable, as well as never-failing sympathy on the part of this House. So far as many of the London boroughs are concerned, they are in a state of despair, practically at the end of their resources, and you cannot go on in a locality borrowing and borrowing without getting into serious difficulties. I do not want to particularise localities to-night, but all down the riverside, as other hon. Members will corroborate if necessary, there is the most grievous state of uncertainty and anxiety as to what the future is to bring, and in the area which I specially represent, for which the Government has a very particular responsibility in calling from that area for its needs 100,000 men to work for it, and, having used up the nerve, strength, blood and energy of the men, it-throws them on the streets, just as if they were driftwood, and has no further use for them. We claim in such a case, at any rate, that the obligation upon the Government is beyond all question. In addition to that you have some of the most skilled men in the world on the Clydeside, in Woolwich, and elsewhere, men whose fingers have been trained to do the most difficult and necessary work for the community, left idle until their skill is departed, and we have lost everything of training we have put into them.

That is the problem with which we are faced, and so, far we have had no indication of the policy of the Government in this matter. What seems to me to be suggested by the silence of hon. Members opposite is that they have sunk back into an economic fatalism in this matter, that it is, and must be, and, therefore, silence is the best thing. Of all the things we should not be, it is to be fatalists. We must apply all our minds and all out energies to this problem. I, for one, believe there must be a way out somewhere, if the Government will face it in the proper spirit. Not only is physical suffering involved, but the spiritual demoralisation of hundreds of thousands of men and boys and homes. All the spiritual qualities that have been, built up through friendly societies and other methods seem to be in jeopardy, and if we do not face this problem, and find a solution for it, I think the outlook for us is very black, indeed.

I do not like to sit down without making one or two suggestions in answer to the hon. Member who invited them from this side. Has the Government in its inquiries gone into the question of the possibilities of land development and reclamation of waste areas? Has it seen whether something cannot be done on these lines? Has it; applied itself to the problem of re-afforestation in a vigorous and scientific manner? I understand that there is the greatest need for main roads through the country. The Government might have developed before this some policy in that way. There are houses for the working classes needed in every locality. Finally, there is the question—and we require this in my judgment above all—of a great development and exploitation of our national and Empire resources. If the Government would apply itself to these objects it seems to me that the solution of them would be found. We are approaching the period of Christmas. I do hope, therefore, that in reply to the appeals that have been made to the Parliamentary Secretary, we shall have some message of hope for 1926, so that we may go away from this place feeling that we are approaching the beginning of better days.

Mr. TAYLOR

It would be as well to face the facts, that it is no use pretending even to ameliorate the problem of unemployment in the necessitous areas either by grants or by schemes of relief works. As a matter of fact, anyone who has had any experience of local administration in necessitous areas during the last four or five years will, I think, readily agree that every local authority of that kind has reached the end of its development so far as public commitments on these lines are concerned. I should like to draw the attention of the House to what this problem really is. When you come to consider the concrete details of a. practical scheme you will find, on an average, that out of every £3 you spend £2 are required for the supply of material and to cover administrative charges, and that possibly, in order to provide money to carry on these schemes, the terms on which the municipality has to borrow means that for every £2 it expends it has finally got to pay £9 for sinking fund and loan.

On an average, in the constituency that I represent, it has cost us £9 to put £l into the pockets of the unemployed worker when we have attempted to deal with the problem by means of the organisation of relief work. That involves very considerable burden upon these necessitous areas which will last for the next 20 years. It means that the industrial undertakings of these areas are suffering from a very unfair handicap as compared with undertakings of a com- petitive character where there has1 been no abnormal unemployment. Therefore, that being true of all the necessitous areas, at least so far as they have expressed their opinion in representative conferences, it is quite obvious that nothing is to be hoped for by the development, or the extension, of this system of capital grants.

What, then, can be done in a practical way by the Ministry? If you go into necessitous areas in different parts of the country you will find that, in almost every case, if they extend their normal services, they have got to provide the money. There is the amount they are spending on the maintenance of the road apart from the provision of the road. There are services in that direction of waterworks. These could be tremendously extended, and should provide a similar amount of work, if the local authority had the money. The very areas suffering from abnormal unemployment cannot possibly afford to continue the present method of financing that kind of work, and I suggest the Ministry might consider the desirability of going into those areas, finding out the details of the local problems, and then making special grants for this definite work apart from the system of financing it all on the basis of loan. That seems to be a perfectly legitimate request, because I do not think there is any question that the causes of the abnormal unemployment are not peculiar to the locality, are not the result of bad administration. The causes are national, due, in the main, perhaps, to a mistaken foreign policy or monetary policy. Many of the problems in the localities are the direct result of the deflation carried on during the last four or five years. All their commitments in the way of loan charges have been turned into very much heavier burdens than they were when they were contracted, while the resources of the community to meet them are very much less. That makes it very difficult for the localities to organise work on the basis the Government now lay down.

Another suggestion is that the Government might give some attention to the possibility of encouraging the establishment of new industries in certain of these distressed areas. By a scientific survey of the problems in each area it might be discovered in some cases the staple in- dustry had been destroyed, probably permanently, and it might be that the Government, in agreement with the local authority, could work out definite plans for the attraction of new industries into the area. In the constituency I have the honour to represent we have had additional burdens piled on our poor rate by reason of changes in the administration of unemployment insurance; and, further, hundreds of men in the city of Lincoln are tramping the streets to-day absolutely and entirely because the Government refuse to extend the Trade Facilities Act to Anglo-Russian trade. During the last mouth very considerable orders have gone to Germany that might have been executed in our city, entirely owing to the fact that credit facilities under that Act are not available for financing long-term credit business. These are practical difficulties which those of us have to face who are engaged in local administration.

I suggest there is a perfectly simple method of dealing with the problems of these necessitous areas on the financial side. Most of these areas have incurred burdens, which will last for 30 years in the form of interest and sinking fund charges, for relief works already put in hand. In addition to that, most of them have paid out of revenue very large sums in the way of poor relief, and if the Government see the unfairness of the present situation from the point of view of the manufacturer surely, by making special grants in those areas where Poor Law relief has been abnormal, they could meet many of the objections to the present position. I sincerely trust that these suggestions will be given consideration, and that the Government will make definite inquiries into the position of affairs each year.

Sir K. WOOD

The hon. Gentleman opposite who raised this question tonight will agree with me when I say that he has raised a serious question and a matter that has been long under discussion, and which hitherto, I candidly confess, although considered by many Governments has been found in capable of solution. Let me just state to the House what I regard this question as being, because if I do so I think it will meet many of the questions and suggestions which have been put by various Members to-night. The problem we have to consider is in relation to what are known as necessitous areas, and the hon. Member for Caerphilly (Mr. Morgan Jones) who raised this question asked the Government to come to the assistance of those particular areas up and down the country in what he called a special way. When he said that I ventured to ask him to elucidate the matter a little further, and go into details as to what it was he desired the Government to do, because that is the real basis of the problem which we have to face. As hon. Members will realise, it means no; only special assistance by the Government, but special assistance to a particular locality meaning better financial aid to that particular locality than to other parts of the country. [An HON. MEMBER: "Hear, hear!"] I am glad to have agreement on that point. This matter has been considered by successive Governments, and in 1924 the matter was raised in this House, and most of the suggestions made to-night were made on that occasion. We have been told to-night that unemployment should be treated as a national matter, and that the burdens of those particular localities should not be thrown upon the local ratepayers, but should be shouldered by the nation. It is interesting to observe the reply that was given on that occasion by the then Minister of Labour (Mr. T. Shaw) who said, replying to a speech made by the hon. Member for West Middlesbrough (Mr. T. Thomson): He has submitted one or two points that I think carry him further than he gives them credit for. If the Government once accept the principle of paying for ordinary municipal work out of the taxpayers' money, I am afraid that, though we may have an almost bottomless purse, the bottom of that purse will be found. It is impossible for any Government to look with equanimity at a proposal for paying for the ordinary work of the corporations out of the taxes. The position that confronts the Government is rather a difficult and delicate one. After three or four years of acceleration of work, the time has come when it is getting more and more difficult to find work to accelerate. The special schemes which might have been postponed for five or ten years have nearly all been carried out, but in spite of that the work at present going on is work that normally would not have been done had there been no Government grant at all. Then there is the difficulty when one tries to discriminate between one authority or another, discrimination in the view of the Government after careful con- sideration would in practice be most difficult, and we have come to the conclusion that whatever terms probably are offered those terms must apply to approved schemes from all the municipalities."—[OFFICIAL REPORT. 4th August, 1924; col. 2572, Vol. 176.] That is how the right hon. Gentleman, in the last Government, dealt with the suggestion of shouldering the matter from a national point of view. Many hon. Member's to-night have said: "Surely there ought to be some way of dealing with this situation, not by asking that the whole of the exceptional burdens of these areas should be dealt with toy the National Exchequer, but by some arrangement, which can surely be found, by which a fair formula for dealing with the situation could be arrived at." I should like to read to the House what was said on another occasion in response to that suggestion—

Mr. BUCHANAN

Why do you not reply for yourself?

Sir K. WOOD

I will reply in my own way. The point I am endeavouring to make is that we are showing no lack of sympathy, but that there is difficulty in dealing with the situation. Let me just give another quotation, again in reply to the hon. Member for West Middlesbrough. This is what was said by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Labour on the 10th March, 1924: A very interesting point is raised by the hon. Member for West Middlesbrough in relation to the grants made to necessitous areas, and I should like to give him a definite statement of our policy on that point. The hon. Member dealt with a deputation which went to the Ministry of Health with a proposal that special assistance should be given to necessitous areas by means of a grant based on a complex formula. After careful consideration, the Government has not been able to accept this. The formula, if applied, would give rise to the most grotesque differences in the grants to the various necessitous areas. It is very difficult to find a formula which would be fair. The general policy of the Government is to extend the unemployment programme, and in this way greatly to relieve the local authorities of some of their burden. That is definitely the policy of the Government on that point.—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 10th March, 1924; cols. 2086–7, Vol. 170.] It will be observed that the policy of the Government—and I do not think hon. Members opposite will accuse that Government of any lack of sympathy or consideration—was, as the Minister of Labour said in the passage I quoted before, in the first place, not to shoulder these burdens from the National Exchequer, and, secondly, not to endeavour to find some formula which could at any rate give assistance to these particular areas. The policy that was then adopted by the Government of the day was that the whole situation should be dealt with in its entirety, not by distinguishing between necessitous areas and other areas, but by developing the unemployment programme. Again to-night, and since the present Government took office, the matter has obviously again come forward for consideration, and hon. Members opposite have referred to the difficult and undoubtedly distressing circumstances of very many of these areas. The hon. Member for Bow and Bromley (Mr. Lansbury) talked, as we sometimes rather expect him to do, about murder by administration.

Mr. LANSBURY

I mean it

Sir K. WOOD

He means it. If that is so, then murder by administration has not only been going on for some time, but was going on last year, and we find, perhaps, a worse situation in respect of many of these areas to-night. At any rate, I would say to hon. Members opposite who will believe what I say, that this Government is just as desirous and anxious of meeting a very difficult case of this kind, if it can be fairly and justly done, having regard to consideration of the National Exchequer and of doing the fair thing to local authorities up and down the country. Instances have been given of refusal by the Ministry of Health with regard to various applications which have been made for loans by various authorities who are, certainly, in a most unfortunate financial position.

The hon. Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Evan Davies), who will agree that a great deal of consideration has been given to that particular case, has instanced the fact that they recently applied to the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Health for various sanctions for loans. They wanted a loan only a short time ago of £40,000 for the erection of a school. I regret to say that if you look at the unfortunate financial position of that district you find it is unable actually to meet its current expenses from rate sources. A loan of £25,000 was a short time ago sanc- tioned for this purpose, and only a small sum has been repaid. Any Department which has an application for a further £40,000 in circumstances like these is undoubtedly confronted with a very difficult situation.

Mr. MORGAN JONES

Does not that prove that it is an exceptionally necessitous area?

Sir K. WOOD

Undoubtedly, and I am going to state the policy of the Government and their intentions in the matter, but I want to answer some of the charges which have been made.

Mr. EVAN DAVIES

Will the hon. Gentleman make it clear that the £25,000 to which he is referring is a bank overdraft and not a long-time loan?

Sir K. WOOD

That may very well be, but the hon. Member, I think, will agree that it is somewhat difficult to sanction a further loan of £40,000 when the County Council is not paying its way and only a very small sum has been repaid of the previous loan. Let me answer another charge. Reference has been made to West Ham. West Ham has recently come to the Ministry of Health and asked for a loan to make provision for hard tennis courts and bowling greens in various recreation grounds in the borough.

That loan, I at once admit, has been refused on the ground of the high rates in the borough—23s. l1d. in the pound— which even really does not represent the true rate as so much of the Poor Law expenditure in that district is undoubtedly capitalised. In those circumstances, I say at any rate to Members of the House who give this matter careful and fair consideration, that no Department in whatever Government of whatever political complexion, would be justified, in circumstances such as these, and with rates of that extent and magnitude bearing upon the people of that district, in sanctioning a loan for the provisions of hard tennis courts and bowling greens.

Mr. MACLEAN

What about the Singapore Base?

Sir K. WOOD

Perhaps the House will permit me to say what the Government have done in this matter. Various Governments have considered the matter, including the Labour Government. I have put before the House the statement of Ministers who, at any rate, will not be accused of being unsympathetic by hon. Gentlemen opposite. They have been unable to find a solution of this problem. During their term no special assistance above that to any other area was given to the necessitous areas of the country. The other day a deputation, to which the hon. Gentleman the Member for West Middlesbrough referred, waited on the Prime Minister and again put forward the undoubtedly distressing circumstances of very many of these areas up and down the country. A further attempt is about to be made, and in fact is now being made, once again to consider the situation. A Committee has been formed and is now at work under the chairmanship of a very distinguished man—Sir Harry Goschen—with wide terms of reference. The terms of reference are to consider and report on any scheme which may be submitted to them for special assistance from the Exchequer to local authorities of necessitous urban and quasi-urban areas. In order that full justice may be done to the various local authorities, there are on this Committee representatives of the Municipal Corporations Association, the County Councils Association, two representatives from Scotland, and a representative from Wales, with various other official members.

Mr. BUCHANAN

Is there any Labour representative?

Sir K. WOOD

It is a very expert Committee, well composed, and likely, if a solution can be found, at any rate to deal effectively with the situation as we find it.

Mr. R. MORRISON

This winter?

Sir K. WOOD

Perhaps the hon. Member will allow me to add the Committee have already met, and I may tell my hon. Friend the Member for The Hartle-pools (Sir W. Sugden) that this very week they are considering three proposals which have already been made to them, including the one to which he referred by the Treasurer of West Ham. Any other scheme which any hon. Member of this House may care to put forward to this Committee will be welcomed. It must be a scheme of general application, and I would like to point that out to Members who have so kindly made various suggestions in relation to increased unemployment, that, as they will see, any scheme which deals with necessitous areas in order to be effective must be of general nature and application in order to deal fairly with all areas alike.

Mr. STEPHEN

You mean "general" only to depressed areas.

Sir K. WOOD

Of general application to necessitous areas. The Committee are already considering three schemes and they will gladly consider any others. If a proposal is put to them of that nature they will consider it, and their recommendations will be made to the Government, and if the Government decides to give assistance on the lines they recommend, then a solution will have been found which certainly has not been presented by any Government to the House for a good many years. Whether it is possible or not I cannot say. I think hon. Members who, at any rate, have given special study to this particular problem and who will, at any rate, not deal lightly with it by a few odd suggestions as to unemployment in particular districts, will agree with me when I say the problem is a peculiarly difficult one.

If this Committee is able to formulate any fair and just scheme, which is fair all round, fair to the National Exchequer, and fair to the other localities—I would remind hon. Members that other localities suffer from unemployment although not perhaps of so extensive a character as in the necessitous areas—then I think we shall be very successful. I hope the House will recognise that this Government is not lacking in sympathy towards proposals for dealing with this problem. What we desire to do is to find a fair and equitable scheme and, if possible, come to the assistance of localities which, I frankly admit—

Mr. R. MORRISON

Can the hon. Member say whether the Government are bringing any pressure to bear upon the Committee to present an interim report?

Sir K. WOOD

There is no necessity to do that. The Committee are meeting to-morrow and they are receiving evidence. I think the hon. Member for Middlesbrough is attending before the Committee to advocate one particular scheme. The Committee are, therefore, engaged on the work, and there is no necessity to urge upon them the necessity of getting on with the work. They are fully seized with, the importance of it. Sir Harry Goschen has had a great deal to do with this particular question for many years and has rendered great service to the State. The House can, with confidence, believe that the Committee will give a very fair and impartial investigation to a very difficult problem.

Mr. BARNES

I consider the Minister's reply is thoroughly unsatisfactory. We want to know whether the Government has the will to get on with the solution of this problem. The Minister has referred to the problem as something which so far cannot be solved. I submit to him that the solution of the problem of necessitous areas is not more difficult than the prosecution of the last War. During the War we had great difficulties which had to be solved. We are always confronted with difficulties. The purpose of Parliament is to meet difficulties and overcome them. There was the problem of the production of munitions and of dealing with food supplies during the War. In the post-War period we have had the problem of bolstering up certain industries in this country.

Let the House contrast the efforts of Governments in post-War periods in regard to such things as the Trade Facilities Act, the Export Credits Act, and other legislation of that description, where they have done so much towards dealing with the complexities of trade, and much more than they have done towards solving the problem of necessitous areas. What is the difficulty in these particular localities? The problem of poverty and destitution is abnormal in certain localities not because the difficulties there are of their own local creation. It has been created because this is the sixth winter of severe unemployment. Who is responsible for unemployment in Great Britain? The responsibility does not rest with West Ham, Middlesbrough, South Wales, and Sheffield. It is because of the incapacity of hon. Members on the other side of the House who control industry to organise industry so as to provide the people of this country with employment. If you keep people dependent upon employment in your industry, it is your responsibility to provide employment. If you cannot provide employment, and cannot give labour a reasonable access to the means of livelihood, you ought to maintain them in decency and comfort until you can find them employment.

It being Eleven of the Clock, the Motion for the Adjournment of the House lapsed, without Question put.