RUBBER INDUSTRY. (Hansard, 16 November 1927)

§ Mr. CAMPBELL

I beg to move, That leave be given to bring in a Bill to provide for the collection of a contribution by rubber manufacturers in Great Britain and Northern Ireland to the funds 1044 of the research association of British rubber and tyre manufacturers; and for other purposes connected therewith. I have been asked to bring in this Bill, I presume, because I am supposed to know a little about rubber. Immediately on being asked to do so, I made it my duty to inspect the balance sheets of the Rubber Research Association, and to inspect their works at Croydon, to the best of my ability. I have come to the conclusion that this Bill will serve a very useful purpose. You, Mr. Speaker, and other Members of the House have heard me advocate on many occasions the necessity for research, and therefore I was pleased when I was asked to bring in a Bill of this description, by which rubber research will be in the hands of and paid for entirely by those interested in rubber, instead of being financed by the Government, as has been the case hitherto to a certain extent. When this Research Association was started in 1920 it was subsidised to the extent of 50–50 by the Government. In 1925 it got a block grant of £2,000, the grant diminishing by £400 each year, so that in 1929 the Research Association will be entirely without any Government grant whatsoever. The grant is paid from the sum of £1,000,000 allotted to the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research. The rest of the money was found by voluntary subscriptions.

The idea of the Department in giving this subsidy is to enable a research association—this or any other research association—to get on its legs and then run by itself, and, in short, the object of this Bill is to achieve this. As I have said, the Government grant will expire in 1929, and the Research Association is very anxious to have established itself on a firm financial basis and to have procured a steady annual income by that time. At the present moment, a good deal of the income of the Research Association goes on propaganda to obtain new members for the Research Association. If this Bill be agreed to, the funds can be spent on research, and on that only, and that is all to the good. Dr. Young, a high official of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, reporting on this question, said: It is necessary to have a Central Intelligence Organisation. 1045 The scientific assessors said that there was a lack of good senior staff. This was owing to lack of funds. It is also absolutely necessary that they should have a first-class library and a first-class librarian. The chairman of the Library Information Bureau Committee writes that: unless some systematic record be kept much of the time spent in skimming the weekly periodicals and reading occasional articles and scientific papers will have been wasted. The cost is taxed at £15,000, which will all go on research. This will be collected by a collection on the basis of 1–25th of a penny per pound weight on all the raw rubber retained for use in Great Britain. The estimated annual consumption of rubber in this country is 40,000 tons, and, if all the rubber retained for use pays a contribution, the individual sums paid will not be at all excessive. The Bill is based—this is very important because there are those in the House who do not exactly understand what it all means—on the Cotton Industry Act of 1923, which provides for the maintenance of the Empire Cotton Growing Corporation which has proved very satisfactory. There are several of my backers who are cotton men, and they have willingly put their names to this Bill. This Measure is supported by 85 per cent, of the total capital engaged. In other words, out of £50,000,000 capital those representing no less than £44,000,000 have agreed to this Measure. As far as I have been able to ascertain, I only know of two large firms who do not agree with this Bill in principle, although they make use of the Research Association. The Bill is limited to five years, and to an average contribution of £15,000. In this connection, we have to deal with keen competition from America, Germany and the rest of the Continent, and to my mind it is absolutely essential that the whole of the rubber industry—research in rubber is still in its infancy—should support this association, and enable them to have this Bill by which they can collect these contributions and spend all the money on research.