§
Motion made, and Question proposed,
That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £10, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1926, for Expenditure in respect of Housing Schemes under the management of the Office of Works.
§ Captain GARRO-JONESIs there no explanation as to what the Vote is for? I suppose it is a Token Vote but I would like a brief explanation of what it is all about.
§ The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Captain Hacking)I did not rise originally because I did not know that the Committee would wish to have any further explanation than that which is given quite clearly on page 12 of the Supplementary Estimate. I am only asking for a net sum of £10. but the exceeding is for £9,800 which with anticipated savings gives a gross total of £7,600 against which there are appropriations-in-aid amounting to £7,590. The exceeding is due to the cost of works which were carried out during the winter of 1924–25 for unemployment relief, having proved greater than was anticipated. The exceeding of £8,500 shown on page 12 is for new road construction which has been undertaken, the actual amount of 471 work being greater than was anticipated, work being to the foundations of the roads not being as firm as they appeared to be when the work was started, and in addition there were the requirements of local authorities and weather conditions. There is nothing mysterious about this matter, and I ask the Committee to be good enough to give me the Vote now.
§ Mr. JOHNSTONI do not intend to take up the time of the Committee, but this is the only possible opportunity, so far as I can discover, that we have of getting at the policy of the Government in its road construction schemes. Some of the schemes are under the Office of Works, which employs men direct. In others they operate through contractors, and I would like to know what are the wages conditions under which the Office of Works operates upon these road construction schemes. Do they only pay wages per hour when the men are able to work? When there is inclement weather, do the men drop their wages? Do they keep stores of their own for food supplies? Do they sell the men food supplies at reasonable prices, or do they do as the contractors are doing on the private road schemes and only pay wages when the weather is such that the men can work, giving the men no wages when the weather is inclement? When the men can no longer stick it owing to getting wages of 12s. 2d. and 12s. 6d. a week, do they, like the private contractors, hand the men over to the Employment Exchanges with instructions to the Exchanges to refuse to give them benefit? How does the hon. and gallant Gentleman differentiate in the treatment he metes out to these men as compared with the treatment meted out to them when employed by contractors?
§ Mr. MACLEANI would like to have some statement as to the number of men employed on these schemes, because it seems that the actual sum that is being spent is very small, and the number of men must be very small when this sum represents both the material for the roads and also the wages for the men. The number of men employed must only be a drop in the bucket in the relief of unemployment. There is one other point I want to make. The hon. and gallant Gentleman made a statement that the additional cost is in some degree due to 472 the condition of the unemployed men taken on on these particular road schemes.
I wish to know from the Minister whether the condition of these men, owing to their long period of unemployment, has been of such a character that they require to employ more of them or whether the men themselves, because of lack of physical endurance, were compelled to leave off the job. Like my hon. Friend the Member for Dundee (Mr. Johnston), I wish to know whether, in the circumstances the Minister has himself depicted as to the conditions of these men, special consideration was given to them in order to put them into a fit and proper physical state to carry on the projects under the Office of Works.
§ Captain HACKINGIn reply to the hon. Member for Dundee (Mr. Johnston), there has been no differentiation made of any kind or description. These men are paid trade union rates of wages and work under trade union conditions. It is true that when the weather is too bad to work they do not get paid, but that is quite in accordance with the usual trade union conditions for this kind of work.
§ Mr. JOHNSTONWill the hon. and gallant Member say if instructions have been given to the Employment Exchanges when these men can only make 12s. 2d. and 12s. 6d. a week that they are not to get benefit if they do not continue working at these 12s. 6d. wages?
§ Captain HACKINGNo special instructions of that kind are given to the Employment Exchanges. They are treated in exactly the same way as every other working man is treated under trade union conditions and employment exchange conditions and Regulations. In regard to the speech of the hon. Member for Govan (Mr. Maclean), the reason why there is a small amount shown is because these schemes have come to completion, and are practically finished now. The other point the hon. Member put to me was with regard to whether these men were being hardly treated because they were not in a fit condition to work.
§ Mr. MACLEANI did not say "hardly treated"—I took it you were quite sympathetic to these men—but whether they were given special consideration.
§ Captain HACKINGI think we have been very generous to them; otherwise there would not have been an extra charge on the Treasury. They did not do quite as much work for the fixed rate of wages, but the cost of the extra time they had to work on the task comes out of the Treasury, and not out of the men.