HC Deb 17 December 1942 vol 385 cc2157-68
Mr. Buchanan (Glasgow, Gorbals)

After the wider subject which we have just been discussing, I wish to call attention to a matter of more domestic concern. I must begin by expressing regret to the Minister and to the House that the hon. Member who it was originally intended should raise the matter of coal distribution, my colleague who sits for Finsbury (Mr. Woods) is not able to be present. I am sure the whole House will regret that his absence is caused by illness. I am in a rather difficult position, because I had only intended to intervene very briefly in the Debate in order to deal with the local position in Glasgow. If I had known that I should be given the chance of stating the case generally, I would have made every effort to get to know the position outside my own locality, because this is a problem which does not affect only Glasgow or the West of Scotland. Other places have their difficulties, and I regret that my hon. Friend is not able to be here, because he is connected with a movement largely concerned with the distribution of coal in the country and therefore has access to a wider range of information and thought on the subject.

In stating the position in my native city and in the West of Scotland, I wish to deal with three points. Firstly, I want to refer to the amount of coal held in stock by householders and the difficulties of tenement dwellers in that regard; secondly, to the quality of coal supplied; and thirdly, to the price. May I say at the outset that in considering the position in Glasgow one has to remember that that city is unique in the matter of housing? The position in regard to housing is very different from that in most parts of the country. I do not think it is a secret we need try to keep from the enemy that Glasgow has a population of over 1,000,000 people collected in a city in which the distance from one end to the other is comparatively short. There are districts of the city like my own which you can walk across in from 20 minutes to half-an-hour, and yet in that area there are packed over 100,000 people. The first thing to remember in dealing with the position of these folk is that they have nowhere to store coal in any quantity. Many of them, even if they had the space to store it, have not money enough to buy coal in any quantity.

I know there is a feeling that everybody is now well off, but that is far from true. Those who are in the Services are certainly not well off. I do not want to get on to debatable ground, but nobody would say their pay is lavish. Even men working in the shipyards are not well off. If you take the case of the labourer in a Clyde shipyard, his standard wage is £3 6s. a week. He is not on piece work, and if it were not for overtime pay added to his normal wage he would have a hard struggle, particularly if he has children, to live on that wage, when you deduct transport and other expenses. To say that everyone is well off is just not true.

But even if they were in an economic position to enable them to buy coal, the great bulk of the people can only store three cwts. or if they put some into pails and other receptacles four cwts. at the most. I stress that point, because weeks and weeks have passed in Glasgow before certain people have been supplied with coal. It is fortunate that we have not so far had extreme winter weather. A man said to me in Glasgow a little while ago that we had had better weather so far this winter than we had in the summer, and that is true. The weather has been magnificent, and it has been a treat to walk to the football match on Saturday afternoon, whereas in the middle of summer we were feeling cold.

But though we have been fortunate in the matter of weather, it is not a defensible position that people should have had to wait as long as six weeks for delivery of a bag of coal. It makes me feel more strongly than ever that we made a mistake in not going on with a rationing scheme. I admit that when my attention was called to the matter and I took it up with the authorities, they acted with great promptitude, and soon everybody got a supply of coal, but it is not everybody who can run at a particular moment to a Member of Parliament. I must say in fairness that the authorities did act with promptitude, but I do not want people to be anything like that time without coal. If we have an extreme winter such as we had three years ago, when the consumption of fuel must be great, it would be criminal to leave people in that position. The Minister has laid it down—I am speaking from memory, but I think I am correct—that up to the 31st of this month 15 cwts. of coal might be delivered to a house and the householder might carry a stock of 30 cwts. But what is the actual position?

The people who can stock 30 cwts. of coal are comfortably-off people. I do not say they are rich, and I do not say anything against them, because I like people to be comfortably off. Moreover, they live in what we call ground-floor houses. A coal man is only an ordinary human being, and if he can sell, as he is allowed to sell, eight bags of coal at a time 10 one customer on the ground floor, he is going to do that rather than carry eight bags to eight different customers up three storeys. That is human nature, and I make no reflection on him. The consequence is that coal is delivered to the comfortably-off people who can take it in quantities involving the minimum of trouble in delivery. If people able to store up to 30 cwts., and able to buy up to 15 cwts. in two months, are to get coal, while other sections of the population are not getting anything, that is a completely indefensible position. Anybody who knows the great Co-operative movement, as most of us do—and the knowledge is not confined to us but is possessed by every type of person in the country—knows that they are great distributors and that no body tries to keep within the law in carrying out their work more than they do. In parts of Glasgow, such, for instance, as Pollokshaw, all that the customer is now getting is one cwt. of coal per week and they are not able to store any. It should be borne in mind that most of these people have no gas or electrical heating. If they have electric light it is only an afterthought and has been fitted in the houses recently. The great mass of the people have to provide their own heat for cooking, heating and washing.

We hear a lot nowadays about the need for family allowances. If there is one need that these people have in the middle of winter more than any other, it is heat, hot water and decencies for children. In this district the great bulk of the men do the dirtiest work. That reminds me that when I was a young candidate in Falkirk, I found that the men who did the dirtiest work made baths, but they had neither a public bath nor private baths in their houses. Many of the men in Pollokshaw are moulders on work that must be dirty and at shipyards which in the nature of the work is dirty too. Some are miners. Yet one cwt. of coal per week is their only allowance. The Co-operative society stopped taking in orders for coal. From their point of view that is a defensible position, but the circumstance should be such that orders for coal from people who need it should not have to be refused. Coal should be sold to people if they require it and nobody should be allowed to refuse to take an order. The position has not yet grown acute because of the weather, but on certain days I have seen pitiful scenes of women trying to get coal. I do not want to see a repetition of last winter and the winter before when people in the tenements were crying out for coal and could not get it.

Let me say a word about the quality. It is bad enough to have only one cwt. a week, but it is much worse when it is found that there is a good proportion of stone in the coal. When people who are living on the ordinary soldier's allowance have to pay 2s. 10d. or 3s. for one cwt. of coal and find chunks of stone in it, it is just too bad. The Minister has rightly said that during war-time we cannot expect to have things as they were in peace-time. He forgets, however, that that many of these poor people never got good coal and they cannot stand having coal which is of poorer quality still. It is easy for me who can get a good quality in ordinary times to put up with a reduction of the quality. It is difficult enough to burn this poor quality coal in modern houses where the grates have a forced draught, but in the grates of old-fashioned houses it is more than ever difficult to burn it, I ask the Minister, therefore, not merely to see that the people for whom I am speaking get their supplies of coal, but that they should get coal of better quality so that when they spend 3s. on a bag they are not defrauded. If any of you bought an article which turned out to be not the article you paid for, the seller could be prosecuted. In the case of coal, however, it seems as if nothing can be done about it.

There is another subject on which the Minister ought to speak to his local people. In Glasgow, where the tenement houses are usually three storeys high and occasionally four, it is not an easy job to carry coal upstairs. I suggest that some attempt should be made for the winter months by the Minister and the Minister of Labour to see that none of the younger men who do that work are called up. Old men cannot do it nor can medical rejects from the Army. The average merchant and the Co-operative Society are ordinary decent people, but my attention has been called to the practice of a small group to claim extra money for carrying coal to the top flights. That may be legal and I have heard that it is, but it seems terrible that poor people, merely because they live on a top storey, should have to pay an extra charge. I trust that it will be stopped at once and I think that if the Minister would say that he did not condone it and that it should stop, that is all that needs to be done. To be fair I do not think that many merchants do it.

I also have a word to say about the price of coal. I am not going to debate the whole question of the increase in price announced the other day, because that is too wide an issue, but I wish to point out that it was said that the increase would not operate until 1st January, and while I was walking down the street I saw coal lorries which had been selling coal at 2s. 10d. a cwt. mark the price up to 3s. I wonder why that should be. The Minister ought to look into it. I am told by owners as well as merchants that there is a tendency to get round things by saying that it is a better quality of coal which they are selling, but I hope that no dodges of that kind will be resorted to in order to enhance the price of coal. Many working people find it difficult to pay present prices.

If I have shown that I am worried about the conditions in the City of Glasgow I would add that I am concerned not merely with Glasgow but with Motherwell, Coatbridge, Airdrie and Greenock, districts where similar conditions prevail and where there is a large population engaged on very vital work. If there is a lack of heating and warmth through the scarcity of coal that may have peculiar effects in other directions. The Minister of Labour, too, ought to take notice of this, because many married women are going to work in factories—the great bulk of them voluntarily. When they go out to work they leave domestic duties at home, and a woman cannot be expected to go to her work if she knows that she has no coal at home for the needs of her family. She will go searching for coal, or she will wait in for it to be delivered. If we want to keep women regularly at their work in factories we must see that coal is supplied to their homes in decent quantities—and coal that can be burned, not stone. In the city of Glasgow there is genuine apprehension about coal supplies—I will not say alarm; there is a feeling that all that is possible is not being done. The Minister of Fuel and Power is starting in a new job following upon a task at the Ministry of Food which he carried out with great success. Everybody wants him to do well at this job. I like him, and when I like people I like them to get on, but I hope he will reconsider the position which he has taken up, because the responsibility lies upon him to see that his methods work, and I am doubtful whether they will work in a city where winter conditions may be very severe. I raise the question now because I do not want to let things wait until a difficult situation has arisen. I want him to act promptly now.

Mr. R. J. Taylor (Morpeth)

We hear many complaints about dirty coal and there can only be one main reason for that, and that is that the process of cleaning the coal is not so thorough as it was before the war. If coal is to be thoroughly cleaned when passing over the screens, the work can be most effectively done by men. Boys are employed to a considerable extent, because the screens are a training ground for the boys before they go down the pits, but a boy has not the sense of responsibility that a man has. At nearly all our mines there has been considerable difficulty in the past in finding employment for partial compensation men, men who have had accidents. As the compensation law stands an employer is not compelled to find employment for the man, and, unfortunately, the number of accidents is so great that there have been more injured men than the pits could find light employment for. Will the Minister look into this question and, if he finds that there is a tendency to employ boys for screening and dispense with men, will he take some action? There is a temptation at the present time for mine managers to employ as many boys as they can, because once a boy is working on the surface at a pit he comes under the Essential Work Order and in that way the manager is in a fair way to getting more labour when the time comes for these boys to pass on into the mine. I am stressing the dismissal of men who have been doing the work, because it is an abominable shame that people should find they are buying stone instead of coal. I remember what happened in the last war, but I do not want to state the case exactly, because the thing was so absolutely disgraceful that it was criminal and I do not want to cast any reflection on the people in the trade; but the only way in which one can be assured of clean coal is by having it screened by men at the surface.

The Minister of Fuel and Power (Major Lloyd George)

I do not think that the hon. Member who initiated the discussion need apologise. I do not think anybody could have covered the ground better than he did. Although he confined most of it to Glasgow, he said that his remarks would possibly apply to a good many places outside. I make no complaint whatever about this discussion being initiated, because in questions of this character Parliamentary countries have a very great advantage over non-Parliamentary countries. You can at least direct attention to the things that need to be rectified. I am certain that no Minister objects to having his attention directed so that, if there is something wrong, it can be rectified in time. Therefore I have no complaint whatever. On the contrary I am grateful to the hon. Member that he has brought up this question and for the way in which he put it forward.

The hon. Gentleman referred, as he said he was doing, mostly to Glasgow. He referred to the amount of stocks and to the particular difficulties of the tenement dwellers. He referred-also to the question of quality. May I say a word first about quality? He obviously has appreciated that you cannot expect the same standard of quality in war time as you can in peace time. You do get occasionally a pretty bad consignment. One hears that the percentage of dirt is slightly greater even coming up than it was before. There are difficulties about labour at the screening operations. The point which was raised with regard to boys I will certainly look into, because I think there may be a great deal of substance in what the hon. Member says. It is important to get efficient labour at the screening. I saw women in Scotland and also in Lancashire doing extremely well at it. It is an important part of the operations. I entirely agreed with the hon. Member when he referred to the effect that this has upon the poorer part of the population. Every ounce of coal they get should theoretically be something they can use. I will do everything I possibly can to see that the quality of the coal is kept as high as possible in the circumstances.

With regard to the amount of stocks, I think I might repeat to the House what I said in the last discussion on this industry. We decided during the summer that it would be advisable to allow stocking to take place within certain definite' prescribed limits by people who could hold a certain amount of coal. The purpose of that was that when the really difficult period came—that is to say, the winter—those who had been able to hold a certain amount of coal would be in a position to look after themselves. Most of the greatly reduced labour and transport available could then be concentrated upon supplying people who have no stocking facilities, such as those of whom the hon. Gentleman spoke. The scheme has already been started gradually, but it comes into full operation on the 28th of this month, when priority will be given to what I might call the small man who has no stocking space and is confined generally speaking to taking small quantities at a time. That scheme will come into full operation on the 28th of this month.

One other point ought to be cleared up. The maximum that can be taken during the two months ending 31st December is 15 cwt. but that does not mean that everyone is taking 15 cwt. There are many people, even in Glasgow, who have already put themselves out of court, shall I say, by obeying the injunction of the Government to stock what they could before. While they hold stock in their cellars they may not acquire any more. Apart from the 15 cwt. limit, the allocation for the City of Glasgow and other cities is fixed according to the number of registrations, though that does not mean that the amount available is equally divided among all. It may well be, and it is in many cases so, that a good deal more than the average can be taken by some, because the 15 cwt. are not taken by the whole population. As to the position in Glasgow, let me first of all say that we are all aware of the fact that less domestic coal is available now than last year. That is the background of all our Debates upon our industry. Part of our effort was to get more production, more industrial and domestic economy. There is less available, but I will say this about Glasgow. It is getting more coal now than it had last year. While we did make a cut which was possibly severe, we have rectified it, and the weekly allowance to Glasgow is now 1.25 cwt. per week each for the registered population. A good many of the people who have registered will not be taking any at all, because they already have as much as they are entitled to under the Order. I am assuming that registration in Glasgow is very good, as I believe it is. As to the stocks in Glasgow, I am sure the House will forgive me here, because I do not want to give figures, for the very obvious reason. I can say, however, that the average stocks held in Scotland are slightly greater than the average for the whole of Britain and that the average for Glasgow is exactly the same as for the rest of Scotland.

The hon. Member referred to two or three cases where people have not had coal at all for six or seven weeks. He was good enough to say that when the matter was brought to the attention of my Ministry it was handled very quickly. I am grateful for that tribute. He asked how many people there were who could go to their Member of Parliament, and I would like to ask him how many people who do so went to their Local Fuel Overseer before they went to their Members of Parliament. We have a machine, and people should go first to the merchant and try it on him. If he fails, he should go to the Fuel Overseer, who is my officer, in every area.

Mr. Buchanan

The woman who first came to me was a widow. She had a family of four, and she is over 60 years of age. She came to my door instead of joining the queue to see the Fuel Overseer. I thought she was wise in doing so and had taken the softest road.

Major Lloyd George

I could not agree with the hon. Member in that last observation. Judging from the amount of work he does in this House on behalf of his constituents, I should have thought he would have the biggest queue in all Glasgow. There must be somebody to go to. We have the Fuel Overseer. It is obvious that every individual cannot have attention, but a good many people do not realise that they can go to the Fuel Overseer, and they do not know how they can go about it. Members of Parliament are very useful, but there is this machine. I would like to make it public that I hope that when there are complaints people will use the machine which has been created for that purpose. I was very disturbed to hear that that has happened for so long, and I am glad that it has been put right. Obviously something had gone wrong there. For the hon. Gentleman's information, let me say that I am sending one of my officers down to Glasgow to-night to see whether anything needs looking into. I hope, as a result of his visit, that any difficulties will be put right.

Mr. Stephen (Glasgow, Camlachie)

Before the right hon. and gallant Gentleman leaves that point, may I mention the case of a person who went to the Local Fuel Officer, who showed a list and said, "We have a waiting list here of people who have not been able to get coal supplies, and we cannot do anything. What are we to do?"

Major Lloyd George

If he said that, he does not really know what the position is. I have just pointed out that the allocation of coal arriving in Glasgow to-day is equivalent to 1.25 cwt. per week per registration. There must be some mistake.

Mr. Stephen

Let me be quite frank. That case occurred in the London area a good many months ago. As the result of a Debate in this House the person wrote to me about it.

Major Lloyd George

I think the hon. Member realises that we have covered a lot of ground since a good many months ago, especially in Scotland. No doubt there were special circumstances at that time in London which were out of my control. I do not think the hon. Member will find it so to-day. The allocation to Glasgow is sufficient.

With regard to the question of tenements, there is, I believe, a practice of allowing a certain amount of extra money above a certain floor, and the money goes to the man who carries the coal. I am not sure of the actual position, but I believe a charge is allowed of a little extra above the fifth floor for the man who carries the coal. That is one of our big difficulties in many towns. Even in peace-time we have our difficulties over these things. One could then always blame the coal merchant. Now I can be blamed. That is the slight change that has taken place since. We have got this difficulty, which my hon. Friend probably appreciates, that the coal distributing trade, like all others, has had to make its contribution to the war effort, and during the last 12 months it has lost 12½ per cent. of its personnel. Lorries are not getting any younger, and there is the need to economise in petrol and rubber, but we are doing all we can to get concentration so that there shall be the most economic deliveries. I am in consultation with my right hon. Friend on the question.

With regard to the price of coal, I have not had time to make inquiries on the question my hon. Friend raised. There has been no rise in Glasgow since September. It may be that a change from one to another quality owing to a temporary shortage is the reason. I am making fuller inquiries and will let him know. Nobody is more anxious than I am to see that we get through this winter, as I said a few weeks ago, with as little inconvenience as possible to our people. The position is that the distribution of our stocks of coal this year is better than it was last year. It is far better distributed throughout the country, and there is no doubt at all that the economies that have been made have very greatly helped the situation up to date. As regards the economies of electricity and gas, we expected a very much greater increase because of munition works and so forth. I will not put the position any higher than this: I am not dissatisfied, shall I say, with the progress that has been made.

People say, "Will there be enough coal to see us through this winter?" I will say this, although I may be taking a great risk in saying it, that provided everyone continues to practise the economies they have practised in the last few months, I can say emphatically "Yes." Assuming there is no major catastrophe and we get our effort in production as well and economy continues, my answer is "Yes." But I would like to make this point very clear: There will be occasional difficulties. There is no machine, I suggest there is no Minister on earth, who can, prevent certain dislocations taking place during winter months. There may be very heavy weather in certain parts of the country which will dislocate transport completely. That is the sort of thing we have to try to meet. But provided economies continue and people realise that they must continue, I think we can get through this winter. The peak demand is in February and March, and possibly part of January.

People may be pleased with economies they have made in the last few weeks, but I must say, while grateful for the efforts they have made, that winter does not start until next Monday. Someone said to me that we are having a very mild winter. I said, "It does not start until next Monday." The period where the peak has always been is the period that lies ahead of us. I am not allowed to discuss the weather, but I have seen in my daily paper that the weather in the Straits of Dover has been very mild for the past week. I wish to give this warning once again: While I know that very great efforts are being made by people in every section of this country to see us through the difficulties, we have not yet started the winter. This is the warning I want to give, but I am perfectly satisfied that if people continue to play the part they have started to play since this Ministry was brought into being, I am confident we shall get through. I shall do everything I possibly can to remove difficulties that may arise from time to time, and I shall never complain if Members bring these things to my notice.