HC Deb 08 November 1937 vol 328 cc1500-1

7.51 p.m.

Captain Wallace

I beg to move, That the Import Duties (Exemptions) (No. 11) Order, 5937, dated the eighteenth day of August, nineteen hundred and thirty-seven, made by the Treasury under the Import Duties Act, 1932, a copy of which was presented to this House on the twenty-first day of October, nineteen hundred and thirty-seven, be approved. Perhaps, on this other Order, I may be allowed to say a word in reply to the hon. Baronet the Member for South-West Bethnal Green (Sir P. Harris). It seems to me that it is not so much for the Commissioners to produce a long story for the House of Commons as for the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade to explain the matter. I have said that I should be willing to do that, and I believe I could do it. It was only in view of the particular circumstances of the evening and the fact that, as the hon. Baronet himself has said, this duty is a little one, that I ventured to address the House with a brevity which I hope will be generally appreciated.

This other Order refers to diatomaceous earth, and if during the last 10 days I have been asked once what that is, I have been asked 100 times. I have now been able to find out that it is a light-weight form of hydrous silica. It was placed on the free list in 1934, and it was subsequently found, as occasionally happens even under the best regulations, that the description given to it when it was placed on the free list was a little too wide and comprehensive, and has included various other kinds of diatomaceous earth which it was not originally meant to let in. The purpose of the present Order is simply to readjust the description of diatomaceous earth in accordance with the realities of the situation.

Resolved, That the Import Duties (Exemptions) (No. 11) Order, 1937, dated the eighteenth day of August, nineteen hundred and thirty-seven, made by the Treasury under the Import Duties Act, 1932, a copy of which was presented to this House on the twenty-first day of October, nineteen hundred and thirty-seven, be approved.

The remaining Orders were read, and postponed.