DEFENCE (OIL FROM COAL). (Hansard, 22 November 1937)

§ Mr. A. Edwards
In reply to a question I put to the Minister for the Co-ordination of Defence last week I received the statement: I have no reason to suppose that the Falmouth Committee have not received all the information which they require as to processes for the production of oil from coal."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 17th November, 1937; col. 395, Vol. 329.] I hope to-night to give some information to the Minister which will perhaps cause him to change his view on that point, and I hope that he will realise that this matter has no more to do with party politics than the air raid last week by the hon. Member for Stroud (Mr. Perkins), the result of which was the appointment of another committee. I am very much concerned to know whether committees appointed out of controversies of this kind are set up merely to silence controversy or are an attempt to solve the problem. In the case of the Falmouth Committee the terms of reference were: To consider and examine the various processes for the production of oil from coal. There was more, but that was the important part of the terms of reference. We have a Fuel Research Department which has been in existence, I believe, for 20 991 years, and has spent something like £3,000,000 of this country's money. I want to ask the Minister whether the Fuel Research Department has been asked to give evidence to this Falmouth Committee, and if so did it advocate the production of oil by the hydrogenation process or one or other of the low-temperature processes. It seems strange that this committee should have devoted considerable time and expense to obtaining particulars of foreign processes, and yet that those with processes which offer such tremendous advantages to the nation and which are available in this country have not been afforded an opportunity to give evidence before them. I want the Minister to tell us whether the Committee have had particulars of the Fischer-Tropsch process, and how many people with processes of the low-temperature type have been allowed to give evidence before this committee.
I am given to understand that the committee ruled that they were going to ask for evidence only on general principles regarding low-temperature carbonisation processes, but they chose the one man who has a particular process and denied other people who had processes an opportunity of giving evidence. This committee is working by that method, of taking evidence from Colonel Bristow who is the biggest man in the low-temperature carbonisation process and does not produce oil from coal. His process is not intended to produce oil from coal. It produces a fuel. It does as a matter of fact get a certain amount of oil, but very little. Other processes have been put forward in which you do get oil from coal, and that is the question which this committee was asked to look into and to solve; not the production of a fuel. The promoters of one process offered to the committee claimed that it could produce oil from coal upon a commercial basis and with no assistance from taxation. They offered to pay the tax if they could run their process commercially. I think the Minister will agree that that is a matter of national importance to him, as Minister of Defence. They would pay the tax, which at present would run into nearly 30,000,000 a year. I do not suppose that we should rapidly produce all the oil from coal but I am speaking only of the possibilities into which the committee had to inquire.
992 The other process definitely sets out to produce oil from coal, and I have had the pleasure of seeing it. I knew nothing about it until a day or two ago, when I was given an opportunity by the Company to go and examine their process. The Minister did not know anything about the hydrogenation process economics until I came back from a visit and informed the House that the work was being done at a profit. Imperial Chemicals told me that they were making a profit, but in that case they were not benefiting the taxpayer. I do not hold any brief for anybody and I do not profess to know the technicalities of this problem. If a man comes along who is genuine and who can produce all the oil required from coal in this country, he does not have a chance to prove it. He is not given an opportunity.
A large sum of money has been invested in one process by a very well-known philanthropist, with no other purpose than to help to solve the unemployment problem. The promoters are using nothing but Durham coal, which helps to solve the distressed area problem. He wrote and asked very politely for an opportunity of putting their process before the Committee, but received a most offensive letter from the secretary not even a personal letter from Lord Falmouth himself but a most offensive letter which no committee seeking for information ought to have written.

§ The Minister for the Co-ordination of Defence (Sir Thomas Inskip)
I hope the hon. Gentleman is not making a charge against persons who are not here. If he wishes to submit the letter to the House, I suggest that he should read it, but I have not a copy, and I have not the least idea what he is referring to.

§ Mr. Edwards
I have not the letter, but I shall be very glad to provide the right hon. and learned Gentleman with a copy. At any rate, I do not want to take advantage of anyone; but the Minister's first duty is, not to protect officials, hut to get justice. The process to which I was about to refer is a process which produces oil. The firm is not asking for assistance from the Government, but is merely asking to be allowed to prove its claim that, if it is allowed to add a refinery to its plant, as it wishes to do, it can produce 100 gallons 993 of oil per ton of coal processed. I wonder if the Minister has had anything like that submitted to him. The question I want particularly to put to the Minister is: How is it that you are willing to listen to claims for processes which have already been proved to be, and which the Committee have already decided to be, too expensive, and which do not profess to produce oil, when evidence offered to the Committee regarding two processes which can produce oil is refused?
When the Minister announced the personnel of this Committee, he was asked by one of my friends whether he was quite sure that it consisted entirely of people who were not interested in the production or distribution of oil, and that it would therefore be an impartial Committee. The Minister had no reason to suppose otherwise, but I understand that one of the members has left the Committee and taken a post in the oil industry. I was only told that this morning. If refineries are put down in this country, they are going to conflict with vested interests, and there is a considerable amount of British capital invested in refineries abroad. If a refinery is put down in this country, it will refine oil. It will be able to refine any crude oil that is brought to this country, and there are vested interests which do not want that to happen. The milling of flour abroad would never be thought of by the interests in this country; we import wheat and mill it here, and that is a fair analogy with what should be done with oil. But there are very big interests which have in vestments abroad, and I want to be quite sure that this Committee is not being unduly influenced by those interests.
One cannot prevent vested interests from operating, and the only case I am trying to make out—I may be wrong, and these people may be wrong—is that half an hour of the Committee's time could expose them if they are wrong. The Minister could become acquainted with all the facts I have mentioned within two or three hours if he wishes, but if he is influenced by people behind the scenes I am afraid he never will know, and the Committee will not achieve anything. Perhaps it was not intended to achieve anything. But I would like to give the right hon. Gentleman an opportunity of investigating for himself, if other people will not, and of seeing for himself whether there is 994 really something in this case. If he considers that there is, I hope he will change his view on the matter, and will recommend that these people shall have an opportunity of coming before the Committee and giving their evidence.
I do not think it is any exaggeration to say that there are vested interests. We have been told during the Air Debate last week how human lives are being jeopardised by rival rubber companies, and how one company could not get in because another had a monopoly. Had I had an opportunity to speak that day, I could have shown how a new business starting in my constituency does not get an opportunity with the Air Ministry to produce something called "dope." I do not know what "dope" is, but it seems to be an essential. These people claim to be able to produce adope "better than anybody else, but they could not get a chance. Whether the Minister likes it or not, interests are operating, and I am merely asking him whether he can put forward a reason why he could not give this company an opportunity to give evidence, so that this House could be satisfied when it does have a report that it is a genuine report.

§ Sir T. Inskip
The hon. Gentleman gave notice to me last week that he proposed to raise the subject of a question which he addressed to me on nth November. The hon. Gentleman specified by name no particular process, and, until he began to speak about the last process to which he referred, I was under the impression that his question dealt with yet another of these processes, of which there are several. The hon. Gentleman has spoken of the Fischer process. There is also the Freeman process and, I think, the Cannock process, and a number of other processes. Some have been tried only on a laboratory scale, some on a large scale, and a great deal of information has been acquired as to these processes in the last 10 or 12 years, more particularly in the last few years. I have gathered this evening, that, contrary to what I expected, the hon. Gentleman is interested in a process which has been tried on a large scale.

§ Mr. Edwards
I have no interest beyond the fact that these people have been denied an opportunity of stating their case.

§ Sir T. Inskip
I was not referring to the hon. Member's own interest. I was merely saying that his approach—I do not say his reproach—was in relation to a process which has been tried on a large scale. I was merely trying to see whether I could identify it, because he has not named the process. I could not possibly contemplate giving directions to a Committee which I had appointed with the knowledge of the House to conduct a particular inquiry. I believe it would be absolutely foreign to practice that any Minister should first appoint a Committee and then attempt to supervise the way it carried out its work.

§ Mr. Edwards
But you appointed them to examine these things, and they refuse to do so.

§ Sir T. Inskip
The hon. Gentleman must not beg the question in that fashion. They were appointed to conduct the work in the way they thought "best.

§ Mr. Edwards
rose—

§ Sir T. Inskip
I did not interrupt the hon. Gentleman except in regard to a personal matter. He or his Friends will have an opportunity to speak again in a few minutes. The Committee were appointed by me. I have never heard any criticism of any of the names of those on the Committee. Lord Falmouth is the Chairman, and there are representatives of business, accountancy and science on the Committee. They have shown, I have reason to believe, great industry in their inquiry. They have lost no time—I am informed that they have met more than 30 times—and they have been furnished with a mass of information which they have sifted, and as to which I believe they hope shortly to make a report. The hon. Gentleman is asking me, after appointing a Committee, to hear such representations as he and other people might make as to the way in which they have or have not carried out their task, and to hear certain persons who have been represented to me as being qualified to give evidence. The hon. Gentleman must recognise that that is putting an impossible burden upon me or any Minister.

§ Mr. Edwards
I think it is your duty.

§ Sir T. Inskip
If the hon. Gentleman asks me to give directions that the representatives of one process should be heard, what is to prevent some other person in 996 the House, or possibly outside—[HoN. MEMBERS: "Why not?"].—coming to ask me to give directions to the Committee to hear some other persons?

§ Mr. Edwards
Certainly.

§ Sir T. Inskip
It makes it very difficult for me to reply to the hon. Gentleman if he will not listen to me. If he will do me the honour of listening to me, he will appreciate the reason of what I am saying instead of a little impatiently resisting the truth, which is what I am trying to give him. I do not wish to say anything hard, but the hon. Gentleman is not making a reasonable request. This House must trust the committee whose appointment it has approved; and this committee, as I have every reason to believe, has carried out its work with zeal, despatch and ability.
The only thing which the hon. Member has said which for a moment might, if it was justified, have shaken me is the suggestion, first of all, that the Committee has been affected by the care for vested interests, and secondly, as the hon. Member went so far as to suggest, that I have been influenced by people behind the scenes. I am not concerned to defend myself against that suggestion—the House can judge for itself—but I am concerned to say that there is no foundation whatever, as far as I know—I am bound to say that it is a very reckless suggestion—for saying that the inquiry has been prejudiced by care for vested interests. The hon. Member has not produced a single tittle of evidence to that effect.

§ Mr. Edwards
I have given nothing else but evidence to that effect. In fact, the whole of my speech dealt with it.

§ Sir T. Inskip
The hon. Gentleman is mistaken in his assertions that the committee is influenced by a care for vested interests. I say most emphatically that there is no foundation for that suggestion. It is an aspersion upon the honour and integrity of the persons who form the committee. The hon. Gentleman did not suggest that unconsciously they might have been mistaken or come to a wrong decision because they misapprehended evidence. He made the direct charge that vested interests have interfered with the efficiency and integrity with which they have discharged their task.

§ Mr. Edwards
No.

§ Sir T. Inskip
If the hon. Gentleman wishes to correct me in the interpretation I placed upon his language I shall be very glad to sit down, and if he will say he makes no such charge it will be satisfactory to the House and to me.

§ Mr. Edwards
I do not think that I said any such thing. The OFFICIAL REPORT will determine whether I said that or not. I was appealing to the Minister to satisfy himself that he is not being influenced by vested interests, and I gave sufficient information to suggest that there was substantial evidence.

§ Sir T. Inskip
I have no reason to believe, for a moment, that they were affected by any interest, and if the hon. Member has any evidence to that effect, I shall be very ready to receive it. He has not, I am bound to say, produced a single word or tittle of evidence to-night to justify any such suspicion. In these circumstances the committee being perfectly competent to conduct their own inquiry and being perfectly above suspicion also, there is no ground whatever for me to interfere with the inquiries of this committee, any more than any other Minister has interfered with the inquiries of committees set up with the approval of this House. [Interruption.] Hon. Members opposite seem to have developed a little more heat than is likely to produce light on this matter. I am as anxious as anyone to see a process evolved that would be economically and scientifically possible for producing oil from coal. I spent a great deal of time, before this committee was appointed, in seeing, in my own way, whether any such result could be reached. The hon. Member has no right to suggest that I am any less concerned than he is, or any other hon. Member opposite, to find a way of using coal to the great benefit of the industry of the country, and as a defence interest, and, I may add in order to give employment in districts where employment is most desirable.
The hon. Gentleman must take it from me, and certainly hon. Members on this side will, that I am even more interested than is the hon. Gentleman in seeing whether one of these processes can be proved to be successful. What I am repelling this evening is, first, the suggestion that either the Committee or myself are 998 affected or influenced by vested interests, and, secondly, to decline most respectfully the obligation which the hon. Gentleman seeks to put upon me of telling the Committee how to conduct the business with which they have been entrusted with the concurrence of this House. I hope that that short statement will satisfy the hon. Gentleman, and if he is not satisfied, then I am respectfully bound to say that it is the only answer that I can give him.

§ Mr. David Grenfell
I am sure that we all regret that the Minister has chosen to put himself in a position of defence, because the hon. Member who has raised the matter did not desire to put the Minister himself in the dock. The right hon. Gentleman is responsible. He appointed the committee to do a certain task in the interests of the nation under his own general direction. The committee having been appointed, we are all interested in it, whether we sit on this side of the House or on the other. We are all equally anxious in regard to one question, and that is the question of the best possible development of the use of our coal supplies.
We have had many Debates on this question. I spoke about it eight years ago. The Fischer method has been mentioned as well as other methods of low temperature carbonisation, some of which have been operating successfully in foreign countries. The Italian Government are to-day using a process originated in this country and developed in South Wales, which is being worked successfully in the interests of oil production in Italy.

§ Sir T. Inskip
Has the hon. Member any reason to suppose that this committee has not all the information they require as to all these processes?

§ Mr. Grenfell
There is a kind of information which you can get from public documents and a kind of information that you can get by examination. The Commission might feel it to be its first obligation to examine witnesses. A commission that simply takes figures and documents will not get far. I have seen some astounding reports presented. Names have been mentioned to-night—and I hesitate lest I should do an injustice to anybody who may be deemed to be an expert on the subject of low temperature carbonisation. But I 999 attended a demonstration along with my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdare (Mr. G. Hall) and I formed a very unfavourable opinion of the expert gentleman who gave us a so-called expert opinion on that occasion. With my rudimentary knowledge of mining chemistry I thought this gentleman was "talking through his hat "—talking sheer nonsense. I am sorry the Minister has 1000 chosen to take up a position of defence, and I hope he will reconsider what has been said by my hon. Friend, and will see that all these bits of evidence, from whatever quarter they come, are thoroughly examined and considered.