§ Order for Third Reading read.
§ Motion made, and Question proposed," That the Bill be now read the Third time."
§ 11.4 p.m.
§ Sir STAFFORD CRIPPSI rise to move the rejection of the Bill, firstly because the Debate which was taking place on the most important Clause on the Report stage was closured by the Government in the middle of a most interesting speech by the hon. Member for Dundee (Mr. Dingle Foot), and the House had no opportunity to debate fully what is considered to be a very important matter indeed by a great many people who know something of the law. I want to deal particularly with the speech of the learned Solicitor-General on the last occasion, He admitted that this is a matter of profound importance, and also that it makes an exception to what has hitherto been the law as regards habeas corpus. The importance which he attaches to it is not the importance of the infringement of the Habeas Corpus Act, but the importance from what he called, I think, the constitutional point of view, as regards the position of the Dominions vis-a-vis this country. He argued that there had been very few cases where the writ of habeas corpus had been used in this country as regards naval or military courts-martial within the last century. It is true that there are very few such cases reported in the books, but it does not seem to me that that is a very good argument. It reminds one rather of the argument "because it was only a little one."
The fact of infringements of this sort upon the liberty of the subject is none the less serious because the writ of habeas corpus has not been used frequently in this kind of proceeding. It is, indeed, the restraining power of some over-riding prerogative writ of this sort 1484 that renders people very careful in the procedure of court-martial, and the value of it is very largely the fact that it exists, rather than the fact that it has constantly to be used. The hon. and learned Gentleman put what he conceived to be the real principle in these words:
The propriety of acceding to the request of the self-governing Dominions, whose constitutional status, after all, is recognised rather than granted by the Statute of Westminster, that the same privileges should be accorded to their visiting forces as are by. the comity of nations accorded as between Sovereign States."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 7th March, 1933; col. 1123, Vol. 275.]That is the statement which, with the permission of the House, I want to examine. In my submission, such an argument can only arise from a fundamental misconception of the legal position. First of all, one has to examine what is the comity of nations. That is the first step in the hon. and learned Gentleman's argument. If I take his own quotation from Chief Justice Marshall of the United States, given in column 1124 of the OFFICIAL REPORT, though I do not agree that it is a statement that meets with universal acceptance, the point which is there stressed is that a Sovereign is understood to cede a portion of his territorial jurisdiction when he allows the troops of a foreign prince to pass through his Dominions. That is dealing with a matter quite different from the matter with which this present Bill is dealing. That is dealing with the question of the right of free passage of armed forces, when they are passing through a country on their way from their own country to some other country upon the other side.That, naturally, is a thing that has never occurred, and never could occur, in this country, so long as we are an island. Therefore it could not have become, in this country, at any rate, a part of any accepted practice. The other case which he cites is the case of a ship. The position as regards a ship of war is, of course, entirely different. A ship of war is deemed to be foreign territory altogether, and is not dealt with as part of the territory within the jurisdiction of this country. The matter which he cites was the position of our own troops in France, during the Great War. That, of course, was a time of war, and of martial law, and the position, as he himself states later, was entirely different. 1485 He emphasised the point that we did not then require any law in order to regularise the position.
The position here is that we do require law, and that is why this Bill is being passed into law. The question before the House is whether, in enacting that law, it is intended to insert a term to preserve the right to the writ of habeas corpus, or whether it is intended to insert the term, as it stands at present, to take away that right. Let me assume that, even in the case of visiting forces who have not been granted a right of passage through the country, there were some international law which took them out of the territorial jurisdiction of the country in which they found themselves. In that case, according to our domestic law in this country, that would not be the domestic law unless it could be found that it had been expressly adopted, either by legislation, or by the decisions of the courts, or by a long course of customary usage. None of these pertains as regards this country.
There is no example, in any of the books of domestic law in this country that I have been able to find, of any such provision that the writ of habeas corpus does not run as against foreign forces resident or visiting here. I have looked to see whether there is any such principle laid down in any of the standard books of law, and I have been unable to find it; and, in my submission to the House, it is wholly wrong to suggest that our courts could hold at the present moment that it was part of our Common Law that the writ of habeas corpus does not run in the case of a foreign soldier visiting this country.
But the real basis of the fallacy which lies behind the hon. and learned Gentleman's argument is that he is treating the Dominions as if they were foreign countries. He said, in his speech to the House, that the Dominions did not wish to be regarded as foreign countries, and then he went on to say that we have already accorded them constitutional status in many respects indistinguishable from that which foreign States enjoy. He seems to have overlooked the fact that there is one vital and important difference—common allegiance to a single Crown. I hear that he knows that, but he does not seem to have regarded it in his argument. The whole of his argu- 1486 ment was based on foreign sovereignty, that is to say, two different sovereignties, the one sovereign in this country giving some special privilege by virtue of the position of another sovereign who is not within his jurisdiction. So far as the Dominions are concerned, how can any question of foreign sovereignty arise at all? I am surprised at the hon. and learned Gentleman treating so lightly and as so unimportant a factor this fundamental principle—what one might call the very linchpin of the British Commonwealth of Nations. I should like to know whether he suggests taking the true analogy that the High Commissioners of the Dominions are entitled to ambassadorial privilege, because that is precisely the same position. I venture to suggest that it will indeed be a new theory of law if the hon. and learned Gentleman suggests that the High Commissioners are entitled, by virtue of something akin to foreign sovereignty, to exemption from the domestic law of this country. The truth is that none of the attributes of foreign sovereignty upon which the hon. and learned Gentleman based himself in his argument is present when one comes to consider the question of Dominion status and the British Commonwealth's Constitution.
There can be no analogy between the Dominions and foreign countries upon this vital point. Indeed, if the hon. and learned Gentleman really puts this forward as his argument, it means that he is doing away with one of the conceptions that keep the British Commonwealth of Nations together. He is in fact saying that there is no more in the unity of the Crown than there is between us and any foreign country. It is a curious thing if we are going to treat our fellow British subjects from the Dominions worse than foreigners and in a way that makes them foreigners with a vengeance from a legal point of view. The constitutional point that he has raised in this way, I agree, is one of profound importance and one which, I think, would finally bring to an end the British Commonwealth of Nations if it were insisted upon. But I regard the point as regards the liberty of the subject as one that is equally important. I am surprised to find the Tory party not only the protagonists of the cutting down of the age long right of habeas corpus but of an argument that says there is 1487 nothing in our common sovereignty of the British Commonwealth of Nations and that we are indeed to treat them, not only in spirit but in law, as being under a foreign Sovereign. I ask the House not to show themselves so careless of these two great principles which are now involved just because it may be convenient for the commanding officer of some visiting forces from the Dominions to have rather greater freedom as regards courts-martial than he would have if he were a subject of this country. As we have no other effective way of protesting against this action by the Government, we shall feel it our duty to vote against the Third Reading.
§ 11.18 p.m.
§ Mr. MALLALIEUThis matter has by now been very fully debated, not, I regret to say, from the Front Bench but from all other quarters of the House, and I certainly should not have risen at this time of night if it had not been for the rather peremptory manner in which the Government brought the Debate to an end when last the matter was before the House. There has been a most extraordinary consensus of opinion not only in legal circles, but amongst all Members of both Houses of Parliament, not that this is a Bill that is entirely unnecessary and wrong, but that certain effects of the Bill are not only unnecessary but actually wrong and harmful. The Solicitor-General, when last he addressed the House on the matter, seemed to try to have it both ways. At one moment he said it was a matter of profound importance, and the next minute he said there was practically nothing in it at all. Yet it is on this matter, although there was such a consensus of opinion against the Government, that the Government thought fit to apply the Closure. I am not going over all the old arguments which have been submitted by persons much more learned than myself. I am only going to say what is sufficient for the sake of the merest clarity. The position in this country at present is that there is no appeal from the military courts to the civil courts in the ordinary sense of the word "appeal," which means, I take it, the right of obtaining either a a new trial by the first court, or else a complete re-hearing by the second court. There is merely that very limited right of 1488 review by the Judge Advocate-General. Therefore there is no question at all here on the part of myself and my hon. Friends who think like me of interfering with the discipline of the forces. It is merely an attempt to exercise some sort of control over the persons who exercise inferior jurisdictions with a view to seeing that they do not exceed those jurisdictions and overstep the powers which have been given to them by Parliament. I thought it a singularly unfair use of the word "appeal" by the Financial Secretary to the War Office when last he spoke on this matter and suggested that those who were opposing the Bill were attempting to meddle in some way with the administration of discipline. He said:
The difficulty of making the change suggested in this Bill, to give the soldier the right of appeal to the civil courts in this country, is that it would go against the whole spirit of the Statute of Westminster to allow our civil courts to interfere with the discipline of Dominion troops, and if similar legislation was introduced in the Dominions it would obviously give great concern to our military authorities if they thought that our troops in the Dominions could appeal to the Dominions civil courts against a decision of the military authorities."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 13th February, 1933; cols. 735 and 736, Vol. 274.]In the first place it is not suggested that there should be any such appeal, and in the second place it rather looks as if the Financial Secretary to the War Office was unable to trust the Dominion courts since he expressed such very grave doubts as to whether our military authorities will approve of their supervision. The point is that the moment the military court exceeds its jurisdiction and does something which the law of the land does not permit it to do, the civil courts can come in and make the whole process void. I entirely agree with what the hon. and learned Member for East Bristol (Sir S. Cripps) said. He opposed the very justifiable boast of the Solicitor-General that there had been no successful recourse to the process of habeas corpus, I think he said, for 50 years. Is not the reason why there has been no such successful application precisely that there always was this controlling power of the courts behind the exercise of this jurisdiction? It has been said again and again by the Solicitor-General in the course of his now numerous speeches on this matter that this point is not really a serious matter, 1489 because it will never arise. I submit that, if this thing is bad in principle, it ought not to be allowed by this House merely because the area over which it will work is a small one. If it is bad in principle, we ought to stop it now. Certainly many people, not only in this House, but in another place, have regarded this matter as vitally affecting the liberty of at least a small section of British citizens. As Lord Buckmaster put it so eloquently, it is of the utmost importance that courts entrusted with these solemn powers—powers of life or death in some cases—over the liberty and lives of the people whom they have to judge should know that beyond them there is a power that can restrain any excessive use of the jurisdiction or any overstepping of the powers conferred by this House. If this control is relinquished—military officers are only human—irregularities will creep in, in the course of time.The Solicitor-General ended up his speech by saying that it was a very small infraction of the principle underlying habeas corpus. In my submission there can be absolutely no reason why this House should not take notice of it if it is in fact a pernicious variation of that principle. He also said that the Dominions have asked for this thing, therefore we ought to let them have it, because we have given practically everything else we had to give them. I could understand the argument, which might be put forward with decency, that if the Dominions request us to barter away the rights of their own soldiers, we ought to do it, but I should very much like to hear a justification by the Government of the action of bartering away the rights of our soldiers who happen to visit the Dominions, just because the Dominions ask us to do it. What next shall we do at the dictation of Canberra, Ottawa and Capetown?
There is another matter of importance, and it is this, that it may be necessary in certain circumstances to curtail the liberty of the subject. If that is to be done, I say to those who introduce such a measure to the House: "Do it openly and frankly." Do not come here first of all and say: "We are doing nothing of the sort," and afterwards, when there is very considerable pressure from all parts of the House, say: "Well, perhaps we are doing it, but we are only doing it in 1490 such a small way." May. I, without, hope, any undue violence of words, say that the Government have exhibited a smugness which is only comparable to that of a blancmange at supper on a cold winter's night. They have gone in the face of the very highest legal authority both in this House 'and outside. They have said: "You are wrong and we are right; in any case it is only a small matter." The Solicitor-General always ends up with the statement that it is a little matter. The fact is that it is a very serious and vital matter. He made a cheap debating point by chiding my hon. and learned Friend the Member for East Bristol for not being here on Second Reading or being silent when he was here. Let me say a few words to the Members of the ruling party. There was a notice in one of the chief newspapers not long ago which said that a new bird had been 'added to the Zoo—the "processionary bird". This bird, announced the notice, without intending to be funny in the slightest, had as its only characteristic that of being able and willing to follow any of its species, in single file, without any apparent object and without any limit as to time.
§ Mr. MALLALIEUI regard it as a great compliment that 'anyone should think that the Liberal party had always followed either its leader or anyone else. What I am asking is this: is the great Conservative party merely to follow round the Division Lobbies without exercising any judgment, or follow the lead of those hon. Members who have spoken so well and forcibly on this subject? I am suggesting that Members of the Conservative party should not be content to follow a lead through the Division lobbies which they know to be wrong. I do not believe that they are incapable of understanding the position for themselves, and I suggest that they should rise up in their wrath against the Government in this matter and march through the Division Lobby against this Bill, which has such a pernicious effect upon the liberties of some of His Majesty's subjects.
§ 11.31 p.m.
§ The SOLICITOR GENERAL (Sir Boyd Merriman)I am grateful to the hon. 1491 Member for the Colne Valley (Mr. Mallalieu) for one reference which he made, and that was to the numerous speeches I have had to make on this subject. I do not know about the sweet at the hon. Member's Sunday supper, to which he alluded, but I do know that this is the fourth time that this particular hash has appeared on the table of the House, and this is the fourth time I have addressed it on the matter. I really must ask the House once more to look at this matter in what I believe to be the true perspective. Who are the people about whom we are talking? We are talking about detachments of the forces raised and paid by the self-governing Dominions, who would be in this country at our invitation for some special occasion. With a little imagination we may suppose that it is not unlikely that on such an occasion the Dominion concerned would send us its best men; they would be here because they were the outstanding men in their regiments, everyone of whom would be, as it were, pledged to uphold the honour of the Dominion while in this country. I cannot imagine that there is any likelihood of a court martial at all, still less of there being any necessity for habeas corpus proceedings. It is said that it is only because there is the threat of habeas corpus proceedings that you can make these people careful to try their men properly. The hon. and learned Member for Bristol East (Sir S. Cripps) repeated that argument to-day. On the previous occasion he put it even more strongly. He said that it would be a temptation to ignore all the rules and to conduct their proceedings in a slap-dash way; a somewhat unworthy reflection on the officers of the self-governing Dominions. I have already reminded the House that no one in our lifetime has had an opportunity of judging the effect on officers in the Dominions or in this country of the threat of habeas corpus because no such case has occurred. But let me call the attention of the hon. and learned Member to this, that any single officer who is concerned in deliberately ignoring the rules and conducting court martial proceedings in a slap-dash way is amenable to the courts of his own country and if he is a party to sending a man to prison wrongfully he would be liable to civil damages for false imprisonment.
1492 If we are going to talk about safeguards the fact that a person is liable for heavy damages is a much more effective safeguard than this somewhat impersonal threat of habeas corpus which has never been invoked in our lifetime. But these arguments are in my view of less importance than what I consider is the big constitutional argument on this matter.
The hon. and learned Member for East Bristol told us that no question of international comity arises here, that it is a purely domestic matter, that we are dealing with people who, because they are resident in this country, have got an absolute right to habeas corpus proceedings, and all the rest of it. He said that the quotation which I gave from Chief Justice Marshall could never apply in this country at all. I shall not read it again. The point was that the American Chief Justice of over a hundred years ago said that, where free passage was granted to troops, the Sovereign who had invited foreign troops into his State was taken to have waived jurisdiction over them. He said that it could not occur here. Of course, it can occur. It occurs every time a foreign ship comes into our ports. It occurred when the American troops came to this country on passage to France, and it could occur every time a foreign detachment comes over to us to take part in a review or demonstration or anything of that sort. He said there was no such thing as the immunity of foreign troops from habeas corpus. He invited me to give him any quotation from the text-books about it. He said that he had read all those books. I can only say that I have read very carefully both in Hall and Oppenheim—
§ Sir S. CRIPPSI said a quotation in a book of domestic law. Both of those books are on international law.
§ The SOLICITOR-GENERALBut the hon. and learned Gentleman knows as well as I do that anything which is recognised as being the accepted international law is part of the common law of this country.
§ Sir S. CRIPPSNo.
§ The SOLICITOR-GENERALI have taken the trouble to verify the references. I find there is authority for my contention not very long ago in a decision in the House of Lords, and I am content to 1493 leave it at that. But let me come to the text writers. I will give two quotations. Hall, who is one of the recognised authorities on international law, after referring to the fact that very often agreements are made and that these things are the subject of conventions, says:
It is believed that the commanders, not only of forces in transit through a friendly country with which no convention exists, but also of forces stationed there, assert exclusive jurisdiction in principle in respect of offences committee by persons under their command, though they may be willing as a matter of concession to hand over culprits to the civil power when they have confidence in the courts, and when their stay is likely to be long enough to allow of the case being watched.With regard to foreign warships visiting our ports the writer to whom I have referred, after saying that they have complete immunity states in a footnote and it is in the part of the book that refers to Chief Justice Marshall's judgment:Nor, of course, will a writ of habeas corpusissued by the local court run upon a foreign man-of-war, or upon a prize lawfully brought into a neutral port.And then he gives the authority for it. But when we are told, as we are told by the hon. and learned Gentleman, that there is no analogy between this sort of thing and immunity given to a Dominion, that by bringing forward this Bill we are doing away with the one conception which keeps the British Commonwealth of Nations together, and that we are trying finally to bring to an end the British Commonwealth of Nations, I really do take grave exception to his statement. The hon. and learned Gentleman on the last occasion said that this matter had been settled at what he was pleased to call "some convention or some meeting," when this matter was arranged between the Dominions as a matter of convenience between the naval and military experts. I have taken pains to find out how this matter did arise. There was an Imperial Conference in 1926, and as a result of that the matter was referred to a committee which was to report on the operation of Dominion legislation and merchant shipping legislation, and I fins that the British representatives on that committee were the right hon. Lord Passfield, then Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs, Sir William Jowitt, then His Majesty's Attorney-General, the Treasury Solicitor and the legal advisers of various Government departments including the 1494 Board of Trade. Canada was represented by the Minister of Justice and various other authoritative representatives and so on, through the other Dominions. After considerable deliberation they issued a report in the end of 1929. The hon. and learned Member for East Bristol was not then interested in the government of the country—of which Government he afterwards became so distinguished a member. However, the report was issued. It dealt with the extraterritorial operation of Dominion legislation and recommended a clause in the exact words in which it eventually took shape in what is now Section 3 of the Statute of Westminster which declares and enacts that the Parliament of a Dominion has full power to make laws having extra-territorial operation. The committee, further, reported as follows:In connection with the exercise of extra-territorial legislative powers, we consider that provision should be made for the customary extra-territorial immunities with regard to internal discipline enjoyed by the armed forces of one Government when present in the territory of another Government with the consent of the latter.hope the House notes the words which the then Attorney-General sanctioned: "The customary extra-territorial immunities", which, according to the hon. and learned Member for East Bristol, apparently, exist only in my imagination.Such an arrangement would be of mutual advantage and common convenience to all parts of the Commonwealth, and we recommend that provision should be made by each member of the Commonwealth to give effect to such customary extra-territorial immunities—again I ask hon. Members to note those words—within its territory, as regards other Members of the Commonwealth.That report was issued in December, 1929. The matter, apparently, was still more closely investigated, and eventually came up at a time when the hon. and learned Member for East Bristol had, I think, assumed the office which he adorned for some time—I say that with perfect sincerity. In November, 1930, the matter came, not before "some meeting or convention" but before the Prime Ministers and heads of delegations present at the Imperial Conference of 1930, and it was then decided to put on a statutory basis, this recommendation which the committees had put forward. 1495 Will the House note that at that time there is a perfectly good precedent for the form that the statutory basis should take, because during the presence of the American troops in this country, although for a time the matter was left to "the customary extra-territorial immunities", it was found necessary—obviously when an enormous number of troops were quartered here, they were not confined to barracks, or within their lines the whole of the time—to regularise their position more exactly.Legislation was passed through Order in Council, and verbally that legislation took almost exactly the form of the legislation which we are now discussing, so that when it was decided to put this matter on a statutory basis, they had this very precedent in front of them. That is the bargain- which we are carrying out, not a thing settled in some hole and corner way between a few naval and military experts, but the deliberate wish of an Imperial Conference, deliberately considered for years, and decided upon in 1930. I really suggest to the House of Commons that all this question about the theoretical invasion of habeas corpus fades into insignificance when it is seen that that is the real issue that we are discussing.
§ 11.46 p.m.
§ Mr. KINGSLEY GRIFFITHI want—[HON. MEMBERS: "Divide !"]—I shall not keep the House long, but I want some of those hon. Members behind me to be disabused of the idea that the objection to this Bill comes purely from the Opposition or from a Liberal source. The first Member of this House to call attention in this House to the objections to this Bill was a very learned Member of the Conservative party, the hon. and learned Member for Norwood (Sir W. Greaves-Lord), and in the course of the Debates in both Houses, I believe I am right in saying, there has not been a single legal opinion, except that of the official Government speakers, expressed on behalf of this Bill.
§ The SOLICITOR-GENERALDoes the hon. Member recognise the authority of the Secretary of State for War, who happens to be an ex-Lord Chancellor?
§ Mr. GRIFFITHIf the learned Solicitor-General would pay me the compliment 1496 of noticing what I said, instead of putting other words in my mouth, he would have noticed that I said "except official speakers for the Government." Those were my words, and I gather that in the Upper House the very learned Lord to whom he refers was the official speaker for the Government. I am sorry if he did not follow my point, but I do not think it is my fault. When he came to make his apology for what the Government is doing, he put before the House the supposition that after all these troops would be such fine fellows that there would not be any courts-martial at all in practice. That was his suggestion, not mine. But if that were the case, the necessity for the Bill would disappear. The Bill assumes that there will be courts-martial, and if those court-martialled are, as I think they would be, persons of an exceptionally high quality, there is all the more reason that they should have all the protection that can be given to them.
Another attempt which the learned Solicitor-General made to put into the mouth of the opposition something which they would not say was to suggest that the mistakes against which we seek to guard would necessarily be deliberate mistakes. He said that, if any officer on a court-martial or in charge of the proceedings was to be guilty of deliberately ignoring the rules, he would incur pains and penalties in his own country. I am not considering any deliberate infraction at all. In a brief but enforced cessation of active service during the War, I had to act for a time as Judge-Advocate, and I found that innumerable mistakes were made, not through deliberation at all, but through inadvertence and the pressure of the preoccupations of the war, which did not allow of everything to be considered as fully as it was desirable that they should be considered. There is no question of deliberate mistakes. There may be any amount of injustice done by inadvertence, and before the House passes this Bill I want them to realise what could be done without any power on the part of anyone to rescue the unfortunate victim.
We have to realise that a certificate, which may be signed by any junior officer, is enough to establish that everything has been done in order, although in fact it may be exactly the reverse. The things which under Clause 3 are deemed to have been done are really 1497 very amazing. The court shall be deemed to have been properly constituted, its proceedings shall be deemed to have been regularly conducted, the sentence shall be deemed to have been within the jurisdiction of the court, and, if the sentence has been executed, it shall be deemed to have been regularly executed. Although these things may be deemed to have been done, they may be the reverse. The court may be quite irregularly constituted, the man may be tried for an offence for which he should not come before the court, the sentence may be an improper one. I am not suggesting that all these defects are in the least likely to come together in one case. I am saying that, even if they did, no one would have any power to interfere with them. The only question the court in this country could ask was whether the person concerned was a member of the visiting forces, which could easily be proved. Not only members of the visiting forces will be affected, but also civilians employed in connection with
§ those forces provided they are taken on the strength before coming here.
§ It is no good pretending that there is no danger that these things can happen on British soil and that those who have raised the opposition are merely taking debating points and trying to take advantage of the good nature of the Solicitor-General. We would not have engaged his attention or that of the House so long if this were not a principle on which so great a legal authority as Lord Atkin, who belongs, I believe, to no particular party, took the trouble to write a long letter to the "Times." When judges so highly placed take such a serious view as that, then the members of the House of Commons, who are the guardians of the liberty of the subject, no matter what their party, should forget their party for the time being and join in resisting a Bill which does violence to that liberty.
§ Question put, "That the Bill be now read the Third time."
§ The House divided: Ayes, 157; Noes, 30.
1499| Division No. 79] | AYES. | [11.54 p.m. |
| Agnew, Lieut.-Com. p. G. | Ellis, Sir ft. Geoffrey | McLean, Dr. W. H. (Tradeston) |
| Albery, Irving James | Eimley, Viscount | Makins, Brigadier-General Ernest |
| Apsiey, Lord | Erskine. Lord (Weston-super-Mare) | Margesson, Capt. Rt. Hon. H. D. R. |
| Aske, Sir Robert William | Everard, W. Lindsay | Martin, Thomas B. |
| Attar, Maj. Ha. John J. (Kent, Dover) | Fremantle, Sir Francis | Mavhew. Lieut.-Colonel John |
| Barclay-Harvey, C. M. | Glossop. C. W. H. | Merriman, Sir F. Boyd |
| Bateman, A. L. | Gluckstein. Louis Halte | Milne, Charles |
| Beaumont, Hon. R.E.B. (Portsm'th.C.) | Golf, Sir Park | Mitchell, Harold P.(Br'tf'd & Chlsw'k) |
| Belt. Sir Alfred L. | Goodman, Colonel Albert W. | Morgan, Robert H. |
| Benn. Sir Arthur Shirley | Graham, Sir F. Fergus (C'mb'rl'd, N.) | Morris, John Patrick (Salford, N.) |
| Bird, Ernest Roy (Yorka., Skipton) | Graves, Marjorie | Morris-Jones, Dr. J. H. (Denbigh) |
| Bossom, A. C. | Grimston, R. V. | Muirhead, Major A. J. |
| Boulton, W. W. | Gunston, Captain D. W. | Munro, Patrick |
| Bowyer, Capt. Sir George E. W. | Hacking, Rt. Hon. Douglas H. - | Nation, Brigadier-General J. J. H. |
| Broadbent, Colonel John | Hamilton, Sir George (liford) | Nicholson. Godfrev (Morpeth) |
| Brown, Ernest (Leith) | Hannon, Patrick Joseph Henry | North, Captain Edward T. |
| Brown. Brig.-Gen. H. C.(Berks, Newb'y) | Harbord, Arthur | Nunn, William |
| Burghiey, Lord | Headlam. Lieut.-Col. Cuthbert M. | O'Donovan, Or. William James |
| Buroin, Dr. Edward Leslie | Heligers, Captain F. F. A. | Palmer, Francis Noel |
| Campbell, Edward Taswell (Bromley) | Herbert. Capt. S. -Abbey Division) | Pearson, William G. |
| Campbell, vice-Admiral G. (Burnley) | Hornby, Frank | Peat. Charles U. |
| Caporn, Arthur Cecil | Howitt, Dr. Alfred B. | Penny, Sir George |
| Carver, Major William H. | Hudson. Capt. A. U. M. (Hackney. N.) | Petherick, M. |
| Gaznlet. Thelma (Islington, E.) | Hutchison, W. D. (Essex, Romt'd) | Pickford, Hon. Mary Ada |
| Chorlton, Alan Ernest Leofric | Jamieson. Douglas | Powell, Lieut.-Col. Evelyn G. H. |
| Clayton. Dr. George C. | Jennings. Roland | Raikes, Henry V. A. M. |
| Cobb. Sir Cyril | Kerr, Lieut.-Col. Charles (Montrose) | Ramsay, Capt. A. H. M. (Midlothian) |
| Cochrane, Commander Hon A, D. | Kerr, Hamilton. W. | Ramsay, T. B. w. (Western Isles) |
| Colfox, Major William Philip | Kimball, Lawrence | Ramsden, Sir Eugene |
| Colman. N. C. D. | K neb worth. Viscount | Ray, Sir William |
| Colville. Lieut.-Colonel J. | Law. Richard K. (Hull, S.W.) | Reid, Capt. A. Cunningham |
| Conant, R. I. E | Leckie, J. A. | Reid, James S. C. (Stirling) |
| Cook. Thomas A. | Leighton. Major B. E. P. | Reid. William Allan (Derby) |
| Cooper. A. Duff | Lennox-Boyd. A. T. | Robinson, John Roland |
| Copeland. Ida | Lloyd, Geoffrey | Rosbotham, Sir Samuel |
| Croft. Brigad'er-General Sir H. | Lockwnnd John C. (Hackney, C.) | Rots, Ronald D. |
| Crooke. J. Smedley | Lovat-Fraser. James Alexander | Ross Taylor. Walter (Woodbridge) |
| Crookshank. Capt. H. C. (Gainsb'ro) | Mabane. William | Runqe, Norah Cecil |
| Cruddas. Lieut.-Colonel Bernard | MacAndrew, Lt.-Col C. G. (Partick) | Rutherford, Sir John Hugo |
| Davidson. Rt. Hon. J. C. C. | Macindrew. Capt J. O. (Ayr) | Salmon, Sir Isidore |
| Donner, p. W. | McCorquodale, M. S. | Salt, Edward W. |
| Drewe, Cedric | MacDonald. Malcolm (Bassetlaw) | Samuel, Samuel (W'dsworth, Putney) |
| Dugoan. Hubert John | McKie. John Hamilton | Sandeman, Sir A. N. Stewart |
| Duncan, James A. L. (Kensington, N.) | McLean, Major Sir Alan | Shaw, Helen B (Lanark, Bothweill |
| Smith, Braceweil (Dulwich) | Sugden, Sir Wilfrid Hart | Whltseide, Borras Noel H. |
| Somerveil, Donald Bradley | Templeton, William P. | Williams, Charles (Devon, Torquay) |
| Soper, Richard | Thomas, James P. L. (Hereford) | Williams, Herbert G. (Croydon, S.) |
| Sotheron-Estcourt, Captain T. E. | Thompson, Luke | Wills, Wilfrid D. |
| Southby, Commander Archibald R. J. | Titchlield, Major the Marquess of | Womersley, Walter James |
| Stevenson, James | Touche, Gordon Cosmo | |
| Stones, James | Wallace, Captain D. E. (Hornsey) | TELLERS FOR THE AYES— |
| Strauss, Edward A. | Ward, Irene Mary Bewick (Wallsend) | Sir Frederick Thomson and Lieut |
| Strickland, Captain W. F. | Ward, Sarah Adelaide (Cannock) | Colonel Sir Lambert Ward |
| Sueter, Rear-Admiral Murray F. | Wells, Sydney Richard | |
| NOES. | ||
| Adams, D. M. (Poplar, South] | Edwards, Charles | Mallalieu, Edward Lancelot |
| Attlee, Clement Richard | Foot, Dingle (Dundee) | Milner, Major James |
| Batey, Joseph | Griffith, F. Kingsley (Middiesbro'.W.) | Parkinson, John Allen |
| Bernays, Robert | Janner, Barnett | Price, Gabriel |
| Bracken, Brendan | Johnstone, Harcourt (S. Shields) | Rea, Walter Russell |
| Cape, Thomas | Jones, Morgan (Caerphilly) | Samuel, Rt. Hon. Sir H. (Darwen) |
| Cocks, Frederick Seymour | Lansbury, Rt. Hon. George | Tinker, John Joseph |
| Cripps, Sir Stattord | Lawson, John James | Williams, Thomas (York, Don Valley) |
| Daggar, George | Logan, David Gilbert | |
| Davies, David L. (Pontypridd) | Lunn, William | TELLERS FOR THE NOES.— |
| Davies, Rhys John (Westhoughton) | McEntee, Valentine L. | Mr. Groves and Mr. Cordon Macdonatd. |
§ Bill accordingly read the Third time, and passed, with Amendments.