Store-Holding Organisation, East Africa (Hansard, 19 September 1950)

§ 18. Mr. Alport
asked the Secretary of State for War why it has been decided to abandon East Africa as an alternative military base for the Middle East.

§ Mr. Strachey
I would refer the hon. Member to my predecessor's reply to a Question by my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Mr. Mack) on 2nd December, 1947, announcing the establishment in East Africa of a store-holding organisation. He added that the "project was to be limited in scope." This organisation was established at Mackinnon Road. New proposals for its further limitation are now under consideration and it may ultimately prove possible to close down the organisation as part of the reorganisation of store holding in the East African Command. At no time was it proposed to use East Africa as an alternative military base for the Middle East.

§ Mr. Alport
Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that ideal circumstances exist in East Africa for the development of that part of Africa as a base; and does he not think that a very great opportunity is being missed in now changing the policy of developing, if not Mackinnon Road at any rate some part of the territory of East Africa?

§ Mr. Strachey
The hon. Gentleman would be quite in error if he thought that the reorganisation to which I have referred meant that there would be no store-holding organisation in East Africa, but it may not be at Mackinnon Road.

§ Mr. A. R. W. Low
Has not a great deal of money been spent on making this a permanent store-holding base? Having regard to the large expenditure which has already been incurred on this, ought not the right hon. Gentleman to reconsider his decision to try to scrap the whole scheme?

§ Mr. Strachey
No decision to scrap the whole scheme has yet been taken, but this has already been limited in scope and it may be limited further. I would not like to pledge myself that Mackinnon Road will necessarily be retained permanently, but all this will be considered in East Africa during this autumn.

§ Mr. A. Fenner Brockway
Will my right hon. Friend take steps to consult the opinion of the African people before extensions are made?

§ Mr. Somerset de Chair
Was not the statement of 1947 about Mackinnon Road, to which the right hon. Gentleman referred, made precisely at the time when His Majesty's Government were negotiating with Egypt and announcing then-intention to withdraw from the Canal Zone, and is this not another example of the Government's vacillation in important matters and their changes of policy?