Commons Sitting of 26 November 1952

Preamble
The House met at Half past Two o'Clock
PRAYERS
[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]
PETITION

  N.A.A.F.I. Club, Nottingham
  Mr. Ian Winterbottom: I rise to present a petition addressed to the honourable House of Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in Parliament assembled.
  The humble petition of members of Her Majesty's Forces from Great Britain and Northern Ireland, Canada and Australia shows that it would be detrimental to members of Her Majesty's Forces serving near, living in or visiting the City of Nottingham to close the Navy, Army and Air Force Institute Club which has for so many years catered for their needs, particularly since no other alternative club or organisation catering for all members of Her Majesty's Forces exists within the City of Nottingham.
  There are 246 names on this petition, but, in addition, I have received an appeal in similar terms from 5,000 other serving men and women.
  "Wherefore your petitioners pray that the Institute Club be not closed, and your petitioners, as in duty bound, will ever pray."
  To lie upon the Table.

ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS
  MINISTRY OF FOOD

    Coronation (Children's Sweets)
    Mr. Lewisasked the Minister of Food whether he has any further statement to make regarding the allocation of sweets off the ration to children to celebrate the Coronation of Her Majesty next June; and whether these arrangements will include allocations to organisers of bona fide children's street parties.
    The Minister of Food (Major Lloyd George): The arrangements provide for an allocation for every child, which would be available to any bona fide organisation intending to present Coronation souvenirs to children.
    Mr. Lewis: May I thank the Minister for that reply and ask him if I am to understand that, as does happen in London and other big towns, those who run the children's street parties will be able to make application for sweets off the ration to be given to the kiddies while they are having their tea in the streets?
    Major Lloyd George: In individual cases of that sort, the best thing would be for the organisers to get in touch with their local food office.

    Slaughterhouses
    Mr. G. Williamsasked the Minister of Food when the Committee appointed to investigate conditions in slaughterhouses is likely to report.
    Major Lloyd George: As the Committee has only just started its inquiries, I cannot say.
    Mr. Williams: Would it not be a good thing for the Minister to give them some guidance as to when they should get their task completed, because much anxiety is felt by many people interested in this subject?
    Major Lloyd George: It is an extremely important matter into which they are inquiring, and it is bound to take a little time. I would remind my hon. Friend that the last report took about eight months, but I will certainly get in touch with them.
    Mr. Royle: Is the right hon. and gallant Gentleman aware of the deplorable state of many of the Ministry's slaughterhouses, and will he push on with the longterm policy of building?
    Major Lloyd George: I entirely agree that there is room for a great deal of improvement. As the hon. Gentleman probably knows, before long there will be an exploration of the siting of these slaughterhouses, which, as he will appreciate, is a very important matter.
    Captain Duncanasked the Minister of Food when he proposes to erect a modern slaughterhouse in Scotland; and why none of those sites at present selected are in that country.
    Major Lloyd George: The present Government programme was a strictly limited emergency measure to provide additional slaughtering capacity in areas where facilities were exceptionally poor. We contemplate that any further new slaugherhouses will be built by local authorities or other bodies on the basis of a national siting plan to be drawn up in consultation with the interests concerned, as indicated in my reply to my hon. Friend the Member for Hexham (Mr. Speir) on 5th November.
    Captain Duncan: Does my right hon. and gallant Friend therefore take the view that in Scotland there are sufficient slaughterhouses—and sufficient efficient slaughterhouses?
    Major Lloyd George: No, I do not take that view at all—and that is why we are having a look at the matter on a national scale—but compared to some of the worst parts we have to deal with they are slightly better.
    Mr. Haymanasked the Minister of Food when work will begin on the provision of new lairages at the Redruth slaughterhouse.
    Major Lloyd George: I understand that the construction of the new lairages is due to commence the week after next and to finish by the end of January.
    Mr. Haymanasked the Minister of Food what steps he is taking to get the yard of the Redruth slaughterhouse properly paved at once in view of the anxiety of the urban district council over the bad state of the yard in wet weather.
    Major Lloyd George: I am making inquiries and will communicate with the hon. Member.
    Mr. Hayman: Will the right hon. and gallant Gentleman bear in mind that the conditions of the yard at this slaughterhouse are appalling and that if the R.S.P.C.A. instituted a prosecution now they would probably be successful?
    Major Lloyd George: There are two possibilities—complete paving or a pathway. I understand that there was a meeting yesterday between the authorities concerned in order to see what was the best thing to do.
    Mr. Hayman: Will the Minister inquire whether the urban district council does not agree with a paved pathway across the yard instead of paving the whole yard?
    Major Lloyd George: I will make inquiries and let the hon. Gentleman know.

    Fish (Supplies and Prices)
    Mr. Hector Hughesasked the Minister of Food if he is yet in a position to announce his plans for maintaining an adequate supply of fish for British consumers at reasonable prices.
    Mr. Willeyasked the Minister of Food whether, in view of the threat to our fish supplies, he will consider the re-imposition of price controls.
    Major Lloyd George: I would refer the hon. Members to the statement made by my right hon. Friend the Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries on 24th November, to which I have nothing to add at this stage.
    Mr. Hughes: As the nation's food supply is affected by the conflicting policies of four Ministries, Agriculture, Transport, Food and Fisheries, will the right hon. and gallant Gentleman seek to have this matter raised at a national level so that there may be some continuity of policy with regard to the supply of this succulent food to the nation?
    Major Lloyd George: The hon. and learned Gentleman will realise that at the moment the White Fish Authority is conducting an investigation into the very important question of the distribution of fish.
    Mr. Hughes: Is the Minister aware that there has been undue delay and that the White Fish Authority has not done the job for which it was appointed? Will he seek to have the matter accelerated in the interest of the national food supply?
    Mr. Logan: Is the Minister aware, in view of the high cost of meat and the dearth of meat supplies, of the exorbitant charges being made for fish? Is it not possible, even at this late date, to do something about the matter in view of the fact that the people in my city are unable to pay the price for the food to sustain them in their daily work?
    Major Lloyd George: I can only repeat what I said to the hon. and learned Member for Aberdeen, North, that questions of distribution costs and other things are very important in regard to this commodity, and that is what the White Fish Authority are engaged in investigating now. On the question of price, the hon. Member will appreciate that the cost of catching fish has gone up enormously since the war.
    Mr. Osborne: Is it not true that the price of fish today is lower than it was a year ago?
    Mr. Hughes: I beg to give notice that owing to that very unsatisfactory statement I shall raise the matter on the Adjournment.
    Mr. Willey: On a point of order. As this Question was taken with Question No. 32 which stands in my name, may I ask if it is not customary to allow an hon. Member who has put down a Question to ask a supplementary question?
    Mr. Speaker: I did not realise that the hon. Member had a question down.
    Mr. Willey: Whilst appreciating that the right hon. and gallant Gentleman and the Minister of Agriculture are keeping watch on the position, may I ask the Minister whether he will at least consider the possibility of reimposing controls if the necessity should arise?
    Major Lloyd George: That is a very hypothetical question. The only thing that I would say is that it is not an easy thing to control.

    Meat (Northern Ireland Shipments)
    Mr. O'Neillasked the Minister of Food if he is satisfied with the condition and quality of recent trial shipments of carcase meat imported from Northern Ireland; and if it is his intention to encourage the development of this trade in the future.
    Major Lloyd George: Yes, Sir. But no great expansion of this trade is possible with the limited slaughtering and chilling facilities available in Northern Ireland.
    Mr. O'Neill: Is the Minister aware that the importation of meat in this form would reduce considerably the losses that normally occur in the transport of cattle on the hoof? Is he also aware that the killing of cattle and preparation of meat in this form would give much needed employment in Northern Ireland, especially in centres like Omagh and Strabane where the rate of unemployment is very high?
    Major Lloyd George: I should like to remind the hon. Member that the facilities which exist at the moment are not anything like sufficient for this trade on a large scale. There is also a very old traditional market in live cattle between Northern Ireland and this country, and one would hesitate a great deal before interfering with that.

    Eggs (De-control)
    Miss Burtonasked the Minister of Food if the Government have reached a decision upon the distribution of eggs.
    Mr. Nabarroasked the Minister of Food (1) what steps he is taking to reform and reorganise the distribution of shell eggs;
    (2) what steps he is taking to reduce the administrative costs, including overheads, of approximately £1,300,000 per annum for the eggs division of his Department and the National Egg Distributors' Association Limited; and to what extent this will be reduced in 1953.
    Mr. E. Fletcherasked the Minister of Food whether it is his intention to de-ration eggs before next February.
    Mr. Hurdasked the Minister of Food if a decision on the egg control scheme has been reached.
    Mr. J. T. Priceasked the Minister of Food (1) what decision he has reached regarding the continuation of egg rationing;
    (2) if he has now made plans to ensure a more satisfactory distribution of all the available egg supply.
    Lieut.-Colonel Liptonasked the Minister of Food what changes he proposes to make in the present system of distributing eggs.
    Major Lloyd George: The Government have had under review the present arrangements for the distribution of eggs with particular attention to the maintenance of the principles of Part 1 of the Agriculture Act. 1947.
    The system of allocation is not well suited to current conditions, and has come under severe criticism on the ground that eggs are escaping from control in quantities which make it impossible to secure equitable distribution of the whole supply. This unsatisfactory state of affairs can only be brought to an end and the consumer given access to all the eggs available by creating a market in eggs.
    The Government have therefore decided that the allocation and price control of eggs shall cease next spring. As a consequence, the subsidy must be eliminated. Moreover, some increase in price is inevitable if more eggs are to find their way into the shops.
    The working out of appropriate longterm arrangements for the orderly marketing of eggs must take some time, and it is necessary to proceed by stages. At the first stage, the Ministry of Food will continue to be the sole importer of eggs, and will also be responsible for carrying out the Government's obligation to home-producers under the Agriculture Act.
    My agricultural colleagues and I will enter immediately upon discussions with the representatives of the National Farmers' Unions and other interests with a view to maintaining orderly marketing of eggs in this interim period and to the establishment as soon as possible of a settled arrangement (including scope for a Producers' Marketing Board) for the implementation of Part 1 of the Agriculture Act, 1947.
    Miss Burton: Is the right hon. and gallant Gentleman aware that, although he may save £22 million in subsidies, this
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    means that the housewife will receive less than ever before? Does he also realise that the price will rise to such an extent that old age pensioners will not be able to obtain any eggs at all?
    Why did he not try to work out a better system of distribution? Would he not agree that if he had wiped out the basic poultry feeding ration and given all the poultry feedingstuffs to each farmer in proportion to the number of eggs taken to egg packing stations this black market would have been defeated?
    Major Lloyd George: I do not agree with the hon. Lady with regard to the price or with regard to eggs not being available. The fact of the matter is that at the moment the number of shell eggs available in this country is actually greater than the number before the war yet the number available in the shops is very much less. I am perfectly satisfied, after very careful investigation, that to continue a system of control which has broken down would not bring the eggs into the shops.
    Mr. Webb: Does the right hon. and gallant Gentleman realise that this deplorable decision will cause anxiety not only among housewives and consumers but among farmers and those engaged in the trade? Why has he failed to carry out effective measures to bring the black market to an end? Why has he failed to relate the supplies of very expensive dollar imports of maize and other feedingstuffs to the actual number of eggs we get from these producers? Is not that the obvious way of dealing with this matter? Why has the right hon. and gallant Gentleman not done that?
    Why, at the same time, has the Minister not devised some plan for giving the invalids and children the extra priority supplies of eggs to which they are entitled under the present scheme?
    Major Lloyd George: With regard to the right hon. Gentleman's first question, in which he asked why I had not done something about the black market, he has much more experience than I have had in this matter. Why did he not do something? I am doing the only thing possible. The only way to kill a black market is to have a free market.
    It is easy enough for the right hon. Gentleman to talk, but he should know that there are about 350,000 producers of

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    eggs in this country, and he knows perfectly well from his own experience that he was quite unable to cope with that black market from his own Department. I, therefore, do not propose to continue a control that is quite ineffective.
    Mr. Webb: What does the Minister propose to do about these priority classes of eggs and about maintaining guaranteed prices to egg producers? May I ask what his answer will be to the National Farmers' Union about the orderly market arrangements which they want? He has just discarded all that. Is he prepared to throw this open to a free market when eggs will be 8d., 10d., or even 1s., in the worst part of the year and ordinary householders will not be able to obtain eggs at all?
    Major Lloyd George: Nobody on earth can deal with a plan on the basis that the right hon. Gentleman is suggesting. He is exaggerating grossly. With regard to the National Farmers' Union, if he will do me the honour of reading my answer tomorrow he will see that negotiations are taking place on all these things as soon as this statement has been made.
    With regard to priority classes, I have no doubt at all that during ordinary periods there will be no difficulty whatever in meeting the full requirements, and in cases where there are difficulties with shortages of supply I am going to enter into negotiations and discussions immediately on the matter.
    Mr. Nabarro: While thanking my right hon. and gallant Friend for his welcome statement and the salutary steps that he is taking to restore freedom to the egg trade, may I ask him whether he is able at this juncture to give an assurance with regard to the reduction of the exorbitant charge of £1,300,000 per annum which has resulted from this bureaucracy in the shell eggs industry in the last few years?
    Mr. Price: How long has it been a principle of government in this ancient democracy that, providing there are sufficient law breakers in the land, the law is abandoned? Is this not the most scandalous piece of class warfare that we have seen for a long time?
    Lieut.-Colonel Lipton: Can the right hon. and gallant Gentleman give a categorical assurance that the price of an egg
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    will not go up to 10d. within the next 12 months, as I forecast last week when I put that figure to him?
    Major Lloyd George: I certainly say that there is no reason why in ordinary times the price should be much up at all, and I should be very surprised indeed if they reached the figure which the hon. and gallant Gentleman has suggested.
    Mr. Hurd: Can we take it that while any producer will be free to sell direct to the consumer the Government guaranteed price will continue to be paid through the packing stations on eggs that are going into the shops, and will the Minister also give an assurance that he will do his utmost to get more imported eggs available in the shops during next winter?
    Major Lloyd George: The Government are responsible for the guarantee as laid down. As for imports, there is one thing with which I am satisfied. There is a much better indication from some of our suppliers, and I am satisfied that with a free market there will be much more coming in.
    Mr. Willey: Does the right hon. and gallant Gentleman realise that it is a bad precedent for the Government to be blackmailed by the black market? Does he not concede that the only grounds for de-rationing are adequate supplies?
    Major Lloyd George: The difference between the hon. Gentleman and myself is that he believes in controls and I believe in supplies. He knows perfectly well that there is no alternative to what I have done.
    Mr. Webb: On a point of order. Obviously this is a matter of very serious public importance and we cannot pursue it through Question and answer. Since neither the Leader of the House nor any senior representative of the Government Whips Office is present, may I ask the Minister of Food whether he is able to give an assurance now that we shall have an opportunity for a full debate on the whole of this question at the earliest possible moment?
    Major Lloyd George: The right hon. Gentleman will appreciate that I cannot give such an assurance.
    Mr. Shinwell: Mr. Speaker, are you aware that emerging from just behind your Chair is the Leader of the House? May we ask him the question?
    Mr. Speaker: I was not aware of that, but what I am aware of is that we cannot debate this matter now.
    Mr. Webb: Since the Leader of the House has arrived, may I ask him the question that I put to the Minister of Food?
    Mr. Speaker: The right hon. Gentleman cannot ask a question on business arising out of these Questions on eggs. I understood from the Minister that these changes will take place some time in the spring. I have no doubt that an opportunity can be found to debate them.
    Mr. Nabarroasked the Minister of Food what is the time-span between shell eggs being laid and arriving in the hands of the consumers; and what steps he is taking to reduce the time-span and increase the freshness of shell eggs.
    Major Lloyd George: On average, something between two and two and a half weeks. As regards the second part of the Question, I would refer my hon. Friend to the statement I made earlier.
    Mr. Nabarro: Is my right hon. and gallant Friend aware that the statement which he has made today will undoubtedly lead within a measurable space of time to more, fresher and better eggs?
    Mr. Doddsasked the Minister of Food (1) to give reasons for the unsatisfactory egg allocations to the public, in view of the fact that the fowl population increased from 63,484,000 in June, 1951, to 64,538,000 in June, 1952;
    (2) what is the explanation for 133 million fewer eggs having been received by packing stations during the first nine months of this year, as compared with a similar period in 1951, in view of an increase in the fowl population.
    Major Lloyd George: The numbers of fowls quoted by the hon. Member are for England and Wales, but the reduction in the number of eggs is for the United Kingdom. The United Kingdom fowl population figures for June, 1951, and June, 1952, were 90,067,000 and 89,822,000, respectively, but in the same period the numbers of adult birds, which
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    provide the eggs, fell by more than 2 million. Some reduction in the number of eggs was therefore, to be expected.
    Mr. Dodds: Is the right hon. and gallant Gentleman not aware that the figures I have given were supplied by the Ministry of Agriculture in August, and as there has been a big increase in young birds which will be laying in October or November, should there not now be a big increase of eggs available to the public, and not less?
    Major Lloyd George: I think the hon. Gentleman did not quite catch the first part of my answer. The figures he quoted were for England and Wales, whereas it is the United Kingdom figures that matter from our point of view. There is an actual drop in the United Kingdom figures, although there is an increase in the English and Welsh figures.
    Lieut.-Colonel Lipton: Can the right hon. and gallant Gentleman say what the packing stations referred to in Question No. 13 are going to do between now and the spring when the present moribund system of egg control comes to an end?
    Major Lloyd George: We will carry on as before.
    Mr. Doddsasked the Minister of Food how many prosecutions have been instituted by his Department for black market egg offences since 1st June; and with what result.
    Major Lloyd George: Between 1st June and 31st October, 1952, 170 persons were prosecuted for illegal transactions in eggs and 165 of these were convicted. Fines totalling £1,365 10s., with £260 costs, were imposed.
    Mr. Dodds: In view of the colossal scale on which the black market is being carried on, do these figures in themselves not show that the Minister, by his inactivity, is largely responsible for the position which he has now got to face? Is it not a fact that there should be more enforcement officers and not less? His inactivity has led to this state of affairs which is impossible.
    Major Lloyd George: I am satisfied that if the hon. Gentleman had his way there would be more enforcement officers than hens.
    Mr. Assheton: Would my right hon. and gallant Friend agree that the number of eggs depends on the amount of food which the hens get, and not on the number of hens?
    Mr. Hobson: Is the right hon. and gallant Gentleman aware that he could have avoided this black market by the rationing of feedingstuffs according to the number of eggs arriving at the packing stations? He promised to do so in March last year, and he also promised that he would have an inquiry and consult with his right hon. Friend the Minister of Agriculture on this specific point.
    Major Lloyd George: As a matter of fact, about 60 per cent. of home-produced eggs come from general farms. I have looked at this matter very carefully and am satisfied that this action would have only very small results, if any at all.
    Mr. Dodds: In view of the unsatisfactory conspiracy, I beg to give notice that I will raise this matter on the Adjournment.

    Bacon (Off-Ration Purchases)
    Mr. Lewisasked the Minister of Food if he is aware that rationed bacon is being sold off the ration to non-registered customers in North London; and whether he will make a statement on the evidence supplied to him by the hon. Member for West Ham, North.
    Major Lloyd George: A few cases, including that mentioned by the hon. Member, have come to my notice and appropriate action is being taken. I am watching the position carefully and shall not hesitate to deal with such cases where I am satisfied there has been flagrant breach of the law. But I am hopeful that the difficulties of retailers incidental to the introduction of unrationed cooked gammon will prove to be temporary.
    Mr. Lewis: Bearing in mind the previous answer on eggs, may I ask whether the Minister is now going to say that if there is a big enough attempt on the part of the retailers to sell off the ration he is going to drop the rationing of bacon, and if there is a big enough crookedness among some of the retailers he is going to de-ration the whole of the foodstuffs?

    Hotel Food Prices (Coronation)
    Miss Burtonasked the Minister of Food whether he is aware that many hotels, though admitting their intention to charge more in Coronation week, are refusing to say how much extra they are going to demand because they do not know what will be asked of them by food suppliers; and what action is contemplated to prevent undue rise in food prices at this time.
    Major Lloyd George: To the first part the answer is "No, Sir"; and to the second, "No undue rise is expected."
    Miss Burton: I cannot think where the right hon. and gallant Gentleman has been. Is he aware that I will give him the names of the hotels, and may I ask him whether he is also aware that these hotels have made bookings to their customers on condition that they will accept any increase in tariffs, and that they say that these increased tariffs will be due to the fact that food prices will go sky high next year? Would he agree that that sort of thing should be stopped?
    Major Lloyd George: There is no justification for saying that food prices will go sky high. The hon. Lady has no justification whatever for saying anything of the sort. As there is a great deal of competition amongst the suppliers of food, I just do not understand what those people are talking about.

    Butchers' Shops
    Mr. Royleasked the Minister of Food how many butchers' shops have opened with a minimum of 50 registered customers since the withdrawal of licensing in England and Wales.
    Major Lloyd George: Between 1st and 15th October, the latest date for which I have figures, 11 shops were opened and eight were closed.
    Mr. Royle: In view of the very small number of shops that have opened since licensing was abolished, can the right hon. and gallant Gentleman say what is the difference between licensing and no licensing, bearing in mind that the butchers have to apply for a permit to buy meat from the Ministry?
    Major Lloyd George: It is only just another step towards greater freedom.

    Ration Books (New Applicants)
    Mr. Grimondasked the Minister of Food the policy of his Department in regard to the issue of ration books to new applicants.
    Major Lloyd George: All new applicants who produce evidence that their application is genuine are given appropriate ration documents.
    Mr. Grimond: Are the appropriate rationing documents ration books or temporary ration cards? In one case an applicant who is becoming a permanent resident in this country has been told that she can only get a temporary ration card for three or four weeks?
    Major Lloyd George: I will send the hon. Gentleman details, but I think that if the lady is a permanent resident she is entitled to an ordinary ration book. It is those people who are just visiting who are very strictly limited

    Cooked Ham
    Mr. Crouchasked the Minister of Food what have been the weekly sales of home-cured cooked ham since it has been unrationed; what were the sales of imported tinned ham during the same period last year; what is the price of home-cured ham; and what was the price of the imported product.
    Major Lloyd George: Records of retail sales of home-produced cooked gammon and ham are not maintained. About 2,000 tons a week of gammon and ham of a net weight of about 1,300 tons have been delivered to the trade since 5th October for sale by retail, cooked, boneless and sliced at 8s. per lb. An average of 1,200 tons a week of canned ham and shoulder was imported in the same period last year when the retail price of canned ham was about 11s. per lb.
    Mr. Crouch: Does my right hon. and gallant Friend realise the satisfaction that his reply will give throughout the country, and that this is further proof of the conscientious way in which he discharges the duties of his important office?
    Mr. Fernyhough: Does the Minister realise that since uncooked gammon went up from 5s. 9d. a lb. under his Administration—
    Mr. Baldwin: It was 7s. 6d, under the hon. Gentleman's Administration.
    Mr. Fernyhough: Why cannot the Minister keep his own supporters properly informed? It is sheer ignorance to say that it was 7s. 6d. a lb. The hon. Member ought to know what he is talking about. Would the right hon. and gallant Gentleman agree that the only reason why the sale of boiled cooked gammon has gone up is because millions of people cannot afford to buy uncooked gammon at 5s. 9d. a lb. now, and this enables those people with plenty of money to buy all the cooked ham that should have been going to ordinary people in their rations?
    Major Lloyd George: The hon. Gentleman seems to be saying that people cannot afford it at 4s. 9d., but they can at 8s.

    Butter
    Mr. Osborneasked the Minister of Food the cost, per lb, of producing butter in this country; and what are the distribution costs.
    Major Lloyd George: The practice of my Department, like that of the Milk Marketing Board before the war, is to charge milk used for butter making at a price which will equate the cost of home-produced and imported butter. On this basis the estimated cost of home-produced butter in the current financial year is 3s. 0¾d. per lb. If the milk were charged at its average cost in the butter-making season, the cost of the butter would be about 6s. 10d. per lb. The cost of distribution is 5¼d. per lb.
    Mr. Osborne: Does not the Minister think that since this food is sold at 2s. 6d. to the public more steps should be taken to make them aware of the true cost of food, since they will have to be told one day?
    Mr. Willeyasked the Minister of Food the amount of butter consumed per ration book for the period 31st October, 1951, to 31st October, 1952, and the corresponding period 31st October, 1950, to 31st October, 1951, respectively.
    Major Lloyd George: About 9 lb. and 12½ lb., respectively.
    Mr. Willey: Will the right hon. and gallant Gentleman tell the House what factors have caused this substantial fall in the butter ration and what are the prospects for the next 12 months?
    Major Lloyd George: The imports from Denmark fell—as the hon. Gentleman knows—through disease, and imports from Australia fell very considerably indeed owing to circumstances beyond the Government's control and of which the hon. Gentleman knows—a severe drought; but the prospects are better this year.
    Mr. G. Jeger: Will the Minister tell us what has happened to the Conservative theory that if only buyers were allowed to go out into the world and buy there would be plenty of food supplies available?

    Cornish Cream
    Mr. G. R. Howardasked the Minister of Food whether he will remove present restrictions on the making of Cornish cream in plenty of time for the expected influx of visitors to West Cornwall during Coronation year.
    Major Lloyd George: I will certainly consider this.
    Mr. Howard: Will my right hon. and gallant Friend bear in mind that an announcement should be made in plenty of time so that adequate distribution may be made?
    Major Lloyd George

    Sugar Beet Factory, Southern England
    Mr. Goughasked the Minister of Food whether he is aware that the closing of the Singleton and Cocking railway stations will affect adversely the sugar beet growers and other agriculturists in that neighbourhood; and whether, in view of this, he will reconsider the question of erecting a sugar beet factory at Chichester.
    Major Lloyd George: I understand that although the closing of the railway stations at Singleton and Cocking for goods traffic is being considered no decision has yet been reached.
    Mr. Gough: Would my right hon. and gallant Friend exercise his influence and ask the Railway Executive to make no final decision until it is possible to build a factory in that part of the south of England?
    Major Lloyd George: I am quite prepared to make representations, but the fact is that the total tonnage in this area is about 180,000 and that going through these two stations is only about 2,800.

    Pigs
    Mr. Perkinsasked the Minister of Food whether he will consider reducing the period necessary to keep a pig before killing from four months to three months.
    Major Lloyd George: I shall be reviewing these arrangements in the spring and will keep this possibility in mind then.
    Mr. Perkins: Is the Minister aware that the older the pig the fatter the pig and if he would have leaner pigs he would have better bacon, which would be a source of great satisfaction to all those who have middle-age spread?
    Mr. Hurdasked the Minister of Food if, in view of the continuing increase in pig numbers, he will review the need for retaining the registration and licensing procedure when a pig is kept for home consumption.
    Major Lloyd George: So long as supply considerations make it necessary that livestock for slaughter should be sold to my Department for the ration, killing for home consumption must be controlled by licence. A period of registration is required to prevent the buying of pigs for immediate slaughter.
    Mr. Hurd: As the number of pigs continues to increase will the Minister keep a very open mind on this question, because if he can solve this problem more pig meat will be produced?
    Mr. Royle: Will the Minister resist this agitation until such time as there is enough meat available without rationing?
    Major Lloyd George: What the hon. Gentleman says is quite right. This is essential in order to maintain the ration. That is why I say I am prepared to look at this matter whenever I can.
    Mr. Baldwin: Is my right hon. and gallant Friend aware that if he can decontrol the rationing of feedingstuffs he will do away with the necessity of having any licensing?

  MINISTRY OF DEFENCE

    Training Rights, Wales
    Mr. Watkinsasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Defence what acreage of land is held in Wales, under Regulation 52 of the Defence (General) Regulations, 1939, by each of the Service Departments.
    The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Defence (Mr. Nigel Birch): The Admiralty and Air Ministry do not exercise any training rights over land in Wales under Defence Regulation 52. The War Office exercise training rights over some 11,000 acres under this Regulation.
    Mr. G. Thomas: Can the Minister say whether the Admiralty and the Air Force exercise rights under any other Regulation to control land in Wales?
    Mr. Birch: Yes, they exercise rights under Regulation 51.

    Officers' Pensions
    Miss Wardasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Defence to make a statement on officers' pensions, as a result of his examination of facts placed before him on the inadequate payments payable at present.
    Mr. Birch: I regret I am not in a position to add to the statement which I made on 19th November.
    Miss Ward: A very unsatisfactory answer. Will my hon. Friend kindly convey to the Chancellor of the Exchequer that many Members on both sides of the House think that in respect of pensions both for retired officers and for widows he is very unjust? Will my hon. Friend please see that the Chancellor is fully informed that some action should be taken before stronger representations are made against the continuation of the present scheme?
    Mr. Birch: I will convey my hon. Friend's message to my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
    Sir Edward Keelingasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Defence the estimated annual reduction, through death, of the sum of £2,100,000 which he stated on 30th June would be the annual cost of raising the retired pay of officers who retired before 1st September, 1950, to the rates of those who retired on or after that date.
    Mr. Birch: This question could only be answered by an actuarial assessment of the expectation of life of every retired officer concerned. The amount of work involved would not be justified.
    Sir E. Keeling: Will my hon. Friend explain how the annual estimates of the totals payable in pensions are prepared if no estimate is made of the number of officers at each rate who will have died?
    Mr. Birch: I think that if my hon. Friend reads his Question he will see that it involves an assessment over a number of years.
    Sir E. Keeling: I am asking how the annual estimate is made.
    Mr. Nicholson: Is my hon. Friend aware of the great feeling on this side of the House, and in some quarters on the other side of the House, on this matter, and will he assure the House that this question will be reviewed at an early date?
    Mr. Birch: I am very well aware of the strong feeling that exists.

    Auxiliary Forces (Annual Bounty)
    Mr. Shinwellasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Defence whether it is the intention of the Government to increase the annual bounty from the present rate of £12 for men and women in the auxiliary branches of the forces where the requisite number of drills and attendance at annual camp are undertaken.
    Mr. Birch: No change in the current rates of bounty in the Services is at present contemplated.
    Mr. Shinwell: Is not the hon. Gentleman aware that the Territorial Army has not increased at all in the last 12 months, and is it not desirable to make this service more attractive by offering better conditions, in particular a higher bounty?
    Mr. Birch: Of course, it is very pleasant for everybody to have more money. The suggestion which the right hon. Gentleman made on the wireless is a very expensive one to implement, and I remind him of what he said in the House on the same subject a few years ago:
    "I cannot convince myself that Territorial recruitment and interest in the Territorial Army is exclusively based on monetary considerations."—[OFFICIAL REPORT. 11th May, 1948; Vol. 450, c. 1949.]
    Mr. Shinwell: Never mind what I said. I am asking the Parliamentary Secretary to address himself to the supplementary question that I put to him: namely, is he aware that the Territorial Army has not increased at all in the last 12 months? May I ask the hon. Gentleman to be good enough to say whether the Government will reconsider this matter in order to enable the Territorial force to be increased?
    Mr. Birch: I am grateful to the Night hon. Gentleman for his suggestion, but I cannot give any guarantee that it will be done.

    Operational Language (Standardisation)
    Mr. Edelmanasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Defence what changes have been made in the operational language of the Services in order that it may conform with American practice; and by what agency these changes are made.
    Mr. Birch: Common operational terms and definitions are being agreed by the standardisation and communications agencies of N.A.T.O. and also between our own military authorities and those of the United States. Under these arrangements we have adopted some American terms and they have adopted some of ours.
    Lieut.-Colonel Lipton: Are the other ranks represented on this Committee which is deciding upon the common terms that are to be used?
    Mr. Birch: I should want notice of that question.

    Ireland (Republican Recruits)
    Mr. O'Neillasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Defence the number of recruits accepted into the armed forces from the Republic of Ireland at Northern Ireland recruiting centres; and who are his agents in the Republic of Ireland for this purpose.
    Mr. Birch: Between April, 1949, and now, about 2,400 men and boys and 150 women who gave an address in the Republic of Ireland were accepted into the armed forces through the Belfast recruiting office. There are no recruiting agents for the Services in the Republic of Ireland.
    Mr. O'Neill: In view of that answer, will the Minister explain bow these recruits come to arrive at the Border in, apparently, organised batches and are met there by an officer of the Services, who accompanies them to Belfast? Since these recruits are recruited into the Service by exaggerated promises of conditions and prospects in the Services, does the hon. Gentleman consider it is fair that they should be bound into the Services on arrival in Northern Ireland, as many of them are dissatisfied?
    Mr. Birch: As I have said, there are no recruiting agents in the Republic of Ireland. As far as the conditions of service are concerned, I imagine that men from the Republic of Ireland would not join up unless they were satisfied.
    Sir D. Savory: Is my hon. Friend not aware that these recruits are largely the sons of the Loyalists who joined up in the last war as a protest against the cowardly neutrality of Eire?
    Mr. O'Neill: Will the Minister ignore the remark made by the hon. Member for Antrim, South (Sir D. Savory) and state that during the war many thousands of Irishmen volunteered and that they were not only the sons of the Irishmen to whom the hon. Member has referred?

    Re-armament Programme (Adjustments)
    Mr. H. Wilsonasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Defence whether he will publish the statement sent by Her Majesty's Government to the Secretariat of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, giving particulars of the adjustments that have been made in the armament programme, following the review announced by him in July last.
    Mr. Birch: No, Sir. The statement is not suitable for publication as it contains classified information. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister will be making a statement on the defence production programme next Wednesday.
    Mr. Wilson: Will the Parliamentary Secretary bear in mind that the information asked for is of vital importance to the economic position of the country, and will he impress upon his right hon. Friend the necessity to give this House the very fullest information about the changes that have been made in the armaments programme?
    Mr. Birch: I will convey the right hon. Member's suggestion to my right hon. Friend.
    Mr. Shinwell: Can the Parliamentary Secretary say whether his right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has made, on behalf of the Government, any submissions to the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, not only on the subject of production, but on the subject of manpower? Will the right hon. Gentleman include in his statement next Wednesday some reference to that subject?
    Mr. Birch: That is a different question.
    Mr. Shinwell: It may be a different question, but surely, if submissions have been made to the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation on the question of armaments, some reference ought to be made to the subject of manpower.
    Mr. Birch: Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman will wait to hear the statement.

  CENTRAL AFRICA (CUSTOMS UNION)
  Mr. Hector Hughesasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies to make a further statement indicating in detail how he proposes to carry out the customs union between Southern Rhodesia, Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland recommended by the Civil Service Preparatory Commission in Command Paper No. 8673, set up by him.
  The Secretary of State for the Colonies (Mr. Oliver Lyttelton): The Report of the Fiscal Commission, which contains the proposals to which the hon. and learned Member refers, is under consideration by the Governments of Southern Rhodesia, Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland as well as by Her Majesty's Government. No decisions will be taken on these proposals until they have been discussed by representatives of all those Governments at the conference which is to be held here in January.

  KENYA (SITUATION)
  Mr. Hector Hughesasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies to make a statement on the root causes of the present unrest in Kenya; and apart
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  from the military and police measures now being taken there, what steps he is taking to specify and remove those root causes.
  Mr. Lyttelton: I made a long statement which covered this question in the debate in the House on 7th November. I have nothing to add to that at present.
  Mr. Hughes: Is the Minister aware that events have developed a great deal since then? Is it not clear that the two courses—the military course and also the economic considerations—must be pursued contemporaneously, and that unless this is done and the cause is removed peace cannot be assured in Kenya?
  Mr. Lyttelton: I can only reply to the hon. and learned Gentleman that we are endeavouring to push on with the economic plans in spite of the emergency.

  COLONIAL TERRITORIES (EDUCATIONAL VACANCIES)
  Mr. J. Johnsonasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies the number of educational vacancies in the colonial territories still unfilled by the Colonial Office.
  Mr. Lyttelton: Two hundred and sixty-four, of which 94 have been notified during the last three months.
  Mr. Johnson: Is the Minister aware that there has been undue delay between the holding of the interview and the notification of the final results to applicants, and that this is discouraging to the teachers who apply? Will the right hon. Gentleman please do something about it?
  Mr. Lyttelton: If the hon. Member will give me any specific instance, I shall be glad to look into it.

  ANGLO-AMERICAN RELATIONS
  Mr. Lewisasked the Prime Minister if he will take an early opportunity of meeting the President of the United States of America for the purposes of discussing international affairs and cementing and improving Anglo-American relationships; and whether he has yet made any approach to the United States President along these lines.
  The Prime Minister (Mr. Winston Churchill): It is well known that I should always be very glad indeed to meet the President of the United States of America or the President-elect for the purposes of discussing international affairs and cementing and improving Anglo-American relations.
  Mr. Lewis: May I thank the Prime Minister for that reply, which will be well received by the whole of the people of this country, and, we hope, may have some effect so far as America is concerned?

  UNIVERSITY FRANCHISE
  Miss Burtonasked the Prime Minister whether, as it is the intention of Her Majesty's Government to introduce legislation giving an additional vote to those who have attended a university, he will, at the same time, consider extending this legislation to include other sections of the community, such as housewives, factory workers and farm workers.
  The Prime Minister: No, Sir.
  Miss Burton: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the great majority of democratic opinion in this country, quite irrespective of party, is against this proposal? Is he aware that, although some few Members opposite may not agree, that is the case, and will he inform the House that he thinks that this particular section of the community is better qualified to have two votes than farm workers, factory workers or housewives?
  The Prime Minister: The historical and other arguments that make an exception in favour of the universities in the accepted rule of territorial representation are not, in the judgment of the Government, applicable to broad, amorphous sections of the community.
  Mr. C. Williams: While my right hon. Friend is considering this matter, would he also consider the use of a second ballot?
  Mr. Gaitskell: Are we to understand from the uncommunicative nature of the Prime Minister's reply to the original Question that he does not intend to proceed with this archaic proposal to give an additional vote to those who have been at universities?
  The Prime Minister: No, Sir. That is the reverse of what I said in answer to a Question a few days ago.

  LABOUR ATTACHES (OVERSEAS EMBASSIES)
  Mr. Noel-Bakerasked the Prime Minister to make a statement about the reduction of 25 per cent. to be made in the expenditure on the maintenance of Labour Attachés in Her Majesty's Missions overseas.
  The Prime Minister: The reduction in the number of Labour Attachés is being made for purposes of economy. Five posts are being suspended, and £30,000 a year is thereby being saved out of a total of £170,000 spent on Labour Attachés. The posts to be suspended are China, Poland, Holland, Denmark and Venezuela. China has been vacant since February, 1951, and Poland since May, 1952. The work of the Labour Attachés in Holland and Denmark will be done by their colleagues in Belgium and Sweden, respectively. The Attaché in Mexico will be responsible for Venezuela. Instead of 20 Labour Attachés covering 51 countries, there will be 17 Labour Attachés covering 47 countries.
  Mr. Robens: May I plead with the right hon. Gentleman to reconsider that decision? Does he not recollect that the idea of Labour Attachés was given birth to by his ex-wartime colleague in the Cabinet and the greatest Minister of Labour this country has ever had, the late Mr. Ernest Bevin, and that it was his considered view, with his great knowledge, that this was a real contact that was necessary in order to get the proper realisation of what the ordinary people of other countries were thinking and saying and to communicate that in the ordinary way through the embassies? Would he not—[Interruption.] This is a very serious matter. I am asking the Prime Minister.
  Would the right hon. Gentleman not reconsider this and, at the same time, would he consult the T.U.C., who are doing a very great job in trying to get the Free Federation of Trade Unions free from Communist domination of the trade unions of the world? British Labour Attachés were of enormous advantage.

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  I do earnestly ask the right hon. Gentleman if he will really reconsider this, and please consult the T.U.C. as to the advantages they found in having Labour Attachés to those countries?
  The Prime Minister: I am always ready to consult the T.U.C., and I do not think the principle of having Labour Attachés attached to the different embassies has in any way been compromised or affronted by this perfectly necessary step in an all-round attempt to reduce expenditure on a great number of new offices created during the war.
  Mr. Yates: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the most recent Report of the Select Committee on Estimates made reference to these positions abroad and called attention to the very satisfactory work that is being done? Would the Prime Minister reconsider this matter, and also the recommendation of the Select Committee that it was upon allowances, which had been increased from £400,000 to over £3 million, that economy could be made? Would not that be wiser?
  Captain Waterhouse: Is my right hon. Friend aware that, however beneficial the work of these gentlemen may have been, the need for economy is paramount today, and that this decision will be welcomed by the country?
  Mr. Noel-Baker: May I reinforce the plea to the Prime Minister made by my right hon. and hon. Friends? Does he not agree that this is a particularly bad time to do anything that will weaken the solidarity of the democratic forces in the world?
  The Prime Minister: I think that democratic solidarity throughout the world will not be affected by there being 17 Labour Attachés instead of 20.
  Mr. Bevan: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that every Minister of Labour since the war, including the late Ernest Bevin, attached very great importance indeed to these officers, and that in this disturbed condition of the world today it is a very serious thing indeed to cut us off from the sources of information which these Labour Attachés were able to obtain? Are there not other ways of reducing the establishments abroad without reducing the one single element that is beginning to alleviate the caste system in the legations?
  The Prime Minister: I am naturally interested to see the right hon. Gentleman in his place, but I cannot feel that the question he has asked adds anything to the pith of our discussion.

  U.N.E.S.C.O. (BUDGET REDUCTION)
  Mr. Noel-Bakerasked the Prime Minister to make a statement about the action of the United Kingdom delegation in proposing a reduction in the Budget of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation.
  The Prime Minister: The Director-General U.N.E.S.C.O. recommended a two-year budget of 20 million dollars for 1953 and 1954. The United Kingdom delegation proposed an alternative figure—[HON. MEMBERS: "Speak up."] Be quiet, and I shall not have to speak up. Be quiet, and the House will hear. The United Kingdom delegation proposed an alternative figure of 17.4 million dollars. This would have provided annually appropriations equalling those for 1952. In the opinion of Her Majesty's Government this sum would have been amply sufficient to support a full programme of action by U.N.E.S.C.O. The United Kingdom proposal was supported by the United States, Scandinavian and other delegates. The Conference eventually accepted, with our support, a two-year budget of 18 million dollars.
  Mr. Noel-Baker: Is it not a fact that the proposal made by the British delegation to cut the Budget presented by the Executive Committee has led to the resignation of the Chairman and the Vice-Chairman of the Executive Committee and of the Director-General, and that the countries with less developed educational systems feel very strongly about it? Is this not most unhappily reminiscent of the attacks made on the Budget of the League of Nations before the war, which the Prime Minister regretted as much as we?
  Hon. Members: Answer.
  The Prime Minister: I am always ready to answer a supplementary question, but this supplementary question of the right hon. Gentleman is more like a reinforcing oration.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE (IRON AND STEEL BILL)
Mr. Attlee: I desire to ask your Ruling, Mr. Speaker, as to the position of business today. Last night the Government failed to keep a House and the House was counted out. [Interruption.] I understand the right hon. Gentleman to say that that shows how little the Government supporters care about the Iron and Steel Bill.
The Prime Minister: I was referring to the fact that in resistance to this great "reactionary Measure" only four Socialist Members were in the House of Commons.
Mr. Attlee: I understand that fewer than 20 Conservative Members were on the premises. However that may be, the fact remains that the House was counted out. Now there appears on the Order Paper today in italics "Iron and Steel Bill: Second Reading." I understand that was placed on the Paper after the House had risen, and I desire to ask your Ruling, Mr. Speaker, on that. On page 374 of Erskine May it is stated:
"When it is essential that proceedings on an order of the day, cut short by an unexpected adjournment, should be resumed at the next sitting of the House, a notice of motion is placed for that purpose, in the name of a Minister of the Crown, upon the notice paper for the next sitting, at the commencement of public business; and the dropped order is placed, printed in italics, at the head of the list of the orders of the day, or at the place among the orders of the day at which it is proposed to be taken."
I presume that this has been placed on the Order Paper in supposed conformity with that passage in Erskine May, but the point there is that the ruling word is "essential"—
"it is essential that proceedings … should be resumed."
Now there is nothing whatever essential about the proceedings on the Iron and Steel Bill. It is a mere matter of convenience for the Government as to when it should be taken. I take it, therefore, that "essential" must refer to business which in point of importance or of time must be brought forward at a certain time. My submission to you, Mr. Speaker, is that there is nothing essential about the Second Reading of the Iron
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and Steel Bill; that owing to the remissness of the Government they lost their opportunity, and that therefore they cannot bring it on today.
Mr. Speaker: I have been asked by the Leader of the Opposition a question as to today's business in view of what happened in the early hours of this morning. It is a general rule that notice of Motion must be given before the House rises, and I understand it is common ground that the notice of Motion—
That on this House proceeding to the Orders of the Day the Iron and Steel Bill be ordered to be read a second time—
was placed on the Order Paper afterwards.
I have looked through a great number of precedents on this matter this morning, and there does appear to be a common practice to place this notice upon the Paper when there has been an unexpected interruption of Business, either by a count or by a suspension for grave disorder, or some other cause, and frequently the House has gone on to consider the business of the day that has been put down by means of this Motion. I am bound to say, on looking at them all, that the Bills or Motions which have been thus continued in this way have all been in the non-contentious class, rather like, though not entirely parallel to, the business taken after 10 o'clock.
The only case I could find of this having been done on a contentious Measure was in the case of the Government of Ireland Bill in 1912. There the House was adjourned because of grave disorder, thus creating an unexpected adjournment, such as happened this morning through the Count. On that occasion there was a Motion placed upon the Order Paper for the next day precisely similar to the one which stands on the Order Paper today. On that occasion Mr. Speaker Lowther, though he was not asked for a Ruling in public, must have been aware that there were doubts expressed as to the proper position of the matter and of the appropriate course for the House to adopt, because when this Motion for renewing the matter came up he made a statement, with the first part of which I need not worry the House because it refers to the disorder. He said:
"I cannot help thinking that if the House had an opportunity of rather more consideration of the circumstances in which we stand,

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and of the position in which the parties respectively are in regard to this matter, another solution of the difficulty might be found more in accordance with the old precedents which have governed this House, and would not create or set up a new precedent."
I adopt that as the proper course to be taken here, though I am sure that the statement to which the right hon. Gentleman has referred me in Erskine May is a concise and accurate summing up of the position, when it says:
"When it is essential that proceedings on an order of the day, cut short by an unexpected adjournment, should be resumed at the next sitting of the House, a notice of motion is placed for that purpose, in the name of a Minister of the Crown."
As to what is or what is not essential business, I have no means of judging; that is a matter entirely for the House and not for the Chair, and it could only be decided after debate. But I do say that in the case of a Measure which is contentious I adopt and repeat what Mr. Speaker Lowther said:
"I cannot help thinking that if the House had a further opportunity of considering the matter, another solution of the difficulty might be found more in accordance with the old precedents which have governed this House, and would not create or set up a new precedent."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 14th November, 1912; Vol. XLIII, c. 2090–1.]
The Lord Privy Seal (Mr. Harry Crookshank): The whole House, I am sure, is in your debt, Mr. Speaker, for what you have just said. In the circumstances, the Government consider that the right procedure in the interests of the whole House would be for me not to move the Motion on the Paper.
On the other hand, I do not propose to follow an earlier precedent and move the Adjournment of the House, because we would wish not to deprive the Opposition of their last opportunity of moving the Prayers on the Order Paper, for which we have already made arrangements through the usual channels. That is why I am not proposing the Adjournment of the House. I do not propose, therefore, to move the Motion that is on the Paper, but I must give notice that tomorrow we will proceed with the Bill and the Money Resolution, and then proceed to the business already announced for that day.
Mr. Attlee: I wonder if you, Mr. Speaker, could explain what seems to us to be a rather oracular Ruling of Mr. Speaker Lowther, in which he referred
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to some other method in which some happier solution might have been reached. I am afraid that I cannot understand at all what that solution would have been in these circumstances.
Mr. Speaker: The answer to that is that when Mr. Speaker Lowther had given the answer which I have quoted, the Prime Minister of the day, Mr. Asquith, moved the Adjournment of the House, and the Order was carried on to another day. In other words, on that occasion the Prime Minister moved the Adjournment of the House, just as the right hon. Gentleman has indicated that he is not proposing to go on with this business today.
Mr. H. Morrison: Naturally we are glad that the Leader of the House is not going to move the Motion, but, Sir, it is important that the point of order should be sufficiently clear that hon. Members in all parts of the House know where they are, so far as the future is concerned.
My submission to you, Sir, is that what happened last night was that the House was counted out, and therefore there was no order of the House for the resumption of the Iron and Steel Bill debate. I submit, therefore, that, in effect, the first day of the Iron and Steel Bill debate has not taken place, because in any case it was not a complete day, and nor can it be so regarded, because there was no order of the House for the resumption of the debate. I submit that, in these circumstances, the Iron and Steel Bill debate officially has yet to commence and that two days ought to be available. Secondly, I submit that, in the circumstances, what I have said is in fact upheld by Erskine May, on page 316, where it is stated, that if a quorum is not present
"the immediate adjournment of the House takes place."
and that it is assumed, as in fact was the case, that there was no day appointed for the second day's debate. The usual procedure is for Mr. Speaker to say, "Debate to be resumed" and someone on the Government Front Bench then says, "Today or tomorrow." That did not take place on this occasion. I therefore submit that this debate did not take place.
I submit, further, that it is very important that this point about essential business should be decided, not by the House, but by the Chair, because a

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Government majority would naturally wish to vote it in their favour. I submit that essential business is business of such a character that it must be dealt with by the House by a certain date, as, for example, the Finance Bill and certain other Bills which must be through by a given time. This Bill is not of that character. There is plenty of time left for the Iron and Steel Bill, and consequently, on the question of what is essential business, I think that it is very important that there should be a Ruling from the Chair.
Finally, we shall want information from the Leader of the House on another point. I gather that he proposes that the second day of the Iron and Steel Bill debate shall be taken tomorrow—I submit that it is the first day of the debate—and that then there should follow the whole business of Emergency Powers, which was to have taken the whole day. If that is so, I think that he is treating the House very roughly.
Mr. Speaker: The right hon. Gentleman has stated that he is not moving the Motion, so we must get on to the next business.
Mr. Morrison: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. What I am asking, with great respect, is for the purpose of the good record of the House and the future conduct of the House in matters of this kind. We are not clear as to the Ruling which you have given, Sir, and I am respectfully submitting that it would be for the convenience of everyone, and for the convenience of students of Parliamentary procedure concerning future points of order, if you would be so good as to rule on the point which both my right hon. Friend and myself have raised.
Mr. Speaker: If I understand the right hon. Gentleman's point aright, it is if the question whether the business is essential or not is to be decided by the Chair or by the House. Is that the point?
Mr. Morrison: And as to the other point, that the discussion on the Iron and Steel Bill yesterday must be disregarded in connection with the two days' debate because the House was counted out, and because the House gave no order as to the resumption of the debate.
Mr. Speaker: As to the point of the essential character of the Bill, I think that
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is a matter for the House and must remain so. The Speaker or the Chair cannot assess whether a Bill is essential or not. I have frequently heard one side of the House say, "This Measure must be passed," and the other side say, "There is no hurry about it." That is entirely a question for the House.
As to the second day's debate, I heard it announced on Thursday last that there would be two days of debate on this Bill, and I do not think that there is anything in the Standing Orders or in the practice of the House which renders nugatory the debate we had yesterday. I think that there is nothing contrary to precedent enabling me to rule that. As to the future conduct of the business, that is a matter for the Government and the usual channels to discuss.
Mr. Bevan: On a point of order—
Mr. Crookshank Mr. Crookshank rose—
Mr. Speaker: Order. The right hon. Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Bevan) rises to a point of order, and I called him first.
Mr. Bevan: I understand, Mr. Speaker, that your Ruling means that if the essentiality of a Motion or an Order is a matter for the majority of the House, the Government would then be in perfect order today in proceeding with the Iron and Steel Bill. Is that the Ruling?
Mr. Speaker: If the matter had been left to them and the majority had decided that it was essential, that would have been a decision of the House according to the Standing Orders. But that course has not been taken, so the right hon. Gentleman's question is quite hypothetical.
Several Hon. Members Several Hon. Members rose—
Mr. Speaker: There is no further point of order which can arise on this; we are not on this business.
Mr. Bevan: With regard to what you have just said, Mr. Speaker, if that be the case, then the House is in a helpless position, because it is no longer protected by Notices on the Order Paper, for at any moment, apparently, if the majority of the House wishes, it can put on the Order Paper whatever business it thinks fit and call it essential, and hon. Members will have no notice whatsoever

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of what business is going to be debated. That really would reduce the procedure of the House to a complete farce.
Mr. Speaker: It is not as wide as that; it merely refers to an unexpected Adjournment of the House.
Mr. Bing: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. As I gave you notice that I was going to raise this matter as a point of order, may I—and I think that it is common ground to everyone—call to your attention—[Interruption.]
Mr. Speaker: Order. I cannot judge whether or not to allow this point of order until I have heard it.
Mr. Bing: I was going to call attention to one matter which shows that it would be quite wrong for this notice to be called, for this, in fact, is not a proper notice and it is not entitled to be called.
Mr. Speaker: I must rule against that. There have been many cases where this notice has been given. Now that we have decided to go on to the next business, I must call Mr. Ede.
Mr. Ede: I wish to ask the right hon. Gentleman the Lord Privy Seal a question with regard to the business which he has announced for tomorrow. It was conveyed to me through the usual channels yesterday that it was the desire of
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the Government that the discussions tomorrow should not be too prolonged and I was asked to use my influence with certain hon. Friends of mine who had Notices on the Order Paper not to take too long with them. I undertook to do what I could to bring about that result.
However, I am bound to say that it is quite impossible to consider taking the whole of the remaining matters relating to the Emergency Laws after the House had disposed of the Iron and Steel Bill tomorrow, and the right hon. Gentleman must not think that any arrangement made yesterday can be regarded, in these new circumstances, as being acceptable.
Mr. Crookshank: Indeed, I am beginning to find that no arrangements of any kind are acceptable.
Mr. Wigg: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I gave you notice that I would raise the question that the House was considering a few seconds ago. As I understand it, you based your Ruling today on a decision by Mr. Speaker Lowther, and he, in turn, was basing his decision on what had happened in this House on 10th March, 1890.
Mr. Speaker: I am well aware of that, but we have really settled that point. I take it that the hon. Gentleman is not disputing my Ruling, and there can be no further purpose in continuing the discussion.

FOOD PRICES
3.53 p.m.
Mr. Frederick Willey: I beg to move,
That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, praying that the Sugar (Prices) (Amendment No. 4) Order, 1952 (S.I., 1952, No. 1794), dated 8th October, 1952, a copy of which was laid before this House on 8th October, 1952, in the last Session of Parliament, be annulled.
Mr. Speaker: Order. I ask hon. Members to pass from the Chamber quietly in order to allow the hon. Member who is addressing the House to be heard.
Mr. Willey: I suggest that—
Mr. G. R. Mitchison: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I cannot hear a word of what is being said.
Mr. Speaker: There is generally some disturbance when hon. Members are passing from the Chamber. I must say that I was equally unable to hear what the hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. F. Willey) was saying. I think that, with the lapse of a little time, he will become more audible.
Mr. F. Willey: I share your confidence, Mr. Speaker, that eventually I shall be heard.
I suggest that with this Motion we might take the next five Motions, which seek to annul Orders relating to oils and fats, butter, cheese, bacon and sugar. All these Motions deal with cognate matters and it might be for the convenience of the House to have a general discussion on them, and then, if necessary, to divide against them separately.
Mr. Speaker: The hon. Gentleman is suggesting that the first six Motions be taken together, leaving the last two for separate discussion. I am agreeable to that course if it meets the wishes of the House.
Mr. Willey: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Orders against which we are praying all relate to price increases which became effective on 5th October. Six price increases came into effect then. Sugar was increased by 1d. a lb., margarine, cooking fat and cheese by 2d. a lb., bacon by 5d. a lb. and butter by 6d. a lb. During our proceedings earlier we had some reference
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to gammon. Apart from the price increases which I have mentioned, the Bacon also increased the price of gammon on the ration by no less than 1s. 8d. a lb. and the price of gammon off the ration by between 2s. and 2s. 4d. a lb., very steep price increases. This step was taken only because the Ministry is well aware that the bacon ration is not now being fully taken up and that some channel has to be provided for the sale of bacon off the ration.
The effect of these price increases is that the cost of living has risen two points during the past month. This is a very remarkable thing to have occurred now. As the Organisation for European Economic Co-operation has shown in its published figures, this country is now exceptional in being the only country among the 19 countries with which O.E.E.C. is concerned which shows this sharp increase in the cost of living.
Under the Labour Government this country was remarkable because the cost of living increases were relatively less than those in the other O.E.E.C. countries. Now, under a Conservative Administration, and through the action of a Conservative Chancellor of the Exchequer, the cost of living is still increasing sharply here while in those other countries it is increasing only moderately and even falling in some cases.
As the Ministry of Food explain in its Bulletin, these price increases represent the completion of the Budget operations. We ought, therefore, again to refer to the effect of the Budget operations. The effect so far has been that the increase in the price of bread has cost our housewives £48 million; the increase in the price of tea has cost them £13 million, or, to quote the Parliamentary Secretary, £18 million; the increase in the price of meat has cost them £48 million; and the increase in the price of milk has cost them £20 million.
Before the price increases of 5th October began to operate, our housewives were already, as a result of the Chancellor's action, paying by way of increased prices an extra £129 million this year on food. According to the Ministry of Food, the new increases mean an additional cost to the housewives of about £4 million for sugar, about £4 million for margarine, £1,500,000 for cooking fats, £1,750,000 for cheese, £17 million for bacon and £5 million for butter.

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In other words, the effect of the price increases against which we are protesting today is that, over and above the £129 million which the housewives have had to pay as a result of the operation of the Budget policy this financial year, they will have to pay an extra £33,250,000 as a result of the recent increases. This means that the housewives will have to pay £162,250,000 more this year than they did for the corresponding rations last year.
The Chancellor, the Minister of Food and the Parliamentary Secretary have all said that against this we must offset the increased social benefits. The Ministry of Food Bulletin sets out the extent of those increased social benefits. They are that war pensioners this year will receive an extra £9 million; those receiving National Assistance will get an extra £13 million; those receiving sickness and unemployment benefit, together with those receiving injury and disablement benefit, together with those receiving death benefit, together with those receiving widows' benefit, together with those receiving old age pensions, will altogether receive £4 million, and families, by way of additional family allowances, will receive an extra £23 million.
Therefore, the extent of the additional social benefits which we shall enjoy this year is £49 million. Against the extra £163¼ million which we are being obliged to pay by increased food prices, we are receiving in return £49 million by way of extra social benefits, or, if we include the public service pensions, which amount to £4 million, £53 million.
But, of course, there are other factors besides those we are discussing this afternoon which would entitle all these beneficiaries to expect some increase from the Government. Some of those additional increases upon their cost of living have been directly brought about by the Government, because, apart from the slashing of the food subsidies, the Chancellor imposed an additional petrol duty amounting to £66 million, which affects all transport users, and higher postal charges amounting to £10 million, which affect all who make use of the postal services.
That is why I protest once again at the absence of the Treasury Ministers who ought to be here to reply. In any case, if they read the OFFICIAL REPORT they
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ought to realise that it is very inadequate and ineffective to leave the matter to the Parliamentary Secretary. What we are talking about when we discuss these price increases today is a re-distribution of income as a result of Government action during the past 12 months.
I call the attention of the House once again to the report in the United Nations Economic Bulletin, which reported that, as a result of the Chancellor's action, half the people of this country are worse off and only one-sixth are better off, and not only better off, but substantially better off. In other words, this Budget operation to which we are referred is a taking from everybody equally and sharing out what is received differentially according to the wealth that people possess. The more people have already, the more they obtain from this new re-distribution of income.
The result is that the keynote of the present food situation is already simply this, "Can you afford to buy?" Those with small families are now, in the case of many rations, only buying the rations on two books. Those with very large families are, in fact, buying the rations on only half the ration books they possess.
It is quite obvious that, as far as the bacon ration is concerned, it is not even fully taken up by the grocer. The grocer is taking 10 per cent. less than he is entitled to take, but, of course, the fact that he takes up nine-tenths of the ration does not mean that even that quantity is distributed on the ration. Who can blame the grocer? There now has to be some rough sharing out because time after time the grocer finds that the poorer families are not taking the ration.
As far as tea is concerned—and I am glad to see that the hon. Member for Dover (Mr. Arbuthnot) is with us—I read recently in the "Financial Times" that tea shares have slumped because of the fall in sales following the increased prices. The tea is not being bought, and the expectation of higher sales has not been realised. Even families with high incomes have to face up to this problem of increased costs. But the difference is, of course, that a family with an income of £2,000 a year is at any rate better off to the extent of 15s. or 25s. as a direct result of the Chancellor's policy. A family with 15s, or 25s, more than it had

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before the Budget is, of course, better able to cope with the general problem of higher food costs.
I read recently a statement by someone for whom we all have the greatest respect, Lord Boyd-Orr, who during the summer was addressing the Central Council for Health Education, of which he has the honour to be president. I know that, however embarrassing this may be to the Parliamentary Secretary in his present position, he has a great respect for Lord Boyd-Orr. In addressing the Central Council for Health Education, Lord Boyd-Orr said:
"The rationing system was designed to ensure that everyone had their share, and part of the plan was to bring the foodstuffs within the reach of the poorest, to subsidise the food so that the poorest persons could buy their share. Also the Ministry had food advice centres to advise people on nutrition, informing them of the foods they should eat and the best ways of getting the most out of the foods available. Are we going to be able to keep this up? In the House of Lords recently we had a long debate on subsidies. It was suggested that the need for them had passed. These subsidies meant the poorest of Her Majesty's subjects had sufficient food for health. I think they should have priority. The health and physique of the present generation is the most valuable capital asset we have."
I think the Parliamentary Secretary would agree that that is a very fair statement of the case. I know that he must feel embarrassed, but one of his economies has been to cut out the food advice centres. What is his attitude on this cardinal question? He knows from his long association with the British Medical Association what Lord Boyd-On means when he speaks of the
"health and physique of the present generation"
being
"the most valuable capital asset we have."
What is he and his Government going to do to preserve that valuable capital asset? If they impair it, as the facts already show they are beginning to do, we shall pay very heavily for it in the future. We paid very heavily for the neglect of that capital asset during the late '20s and the '30s. We were told that there would be no further reduction of food subsidies this year, but the Minister had the effrontery to come to the Box today and say that the subsidy on eggs would be cut this year.
The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Food (Dr. Charles Hill): May I intervene straight away? The hon. Member will appreciate, whatever may be his views on the change over, that this is to happen in the spring of next year, and so could not come into effect this year.
Mr. Willey: In the spring of next year? That might very well be before the end of the financial year. The significant thing is that the Minister has chosen to announce it now. This is doing the country incalculable harm, from which we may not recover. If health is impaired, we shall suffer for it. We are calling upon our people to make a maximum production effort, but they cannot do it if they are not fed decently. Their morale will be impaired when they know that the Government are not facing their responsibilities of ensuring that the people are fed decently.
It has been rather fortunate that the neglect of the Government's supporters to support their own Government on the major matter of legislation this Session has given us an opportunity to raise these matters at an early hour. These price increases are the most scandalous thing that the Government have so far done, and I hope that my colleagues will support me in resisting them.
4.12 p.m.
Miss Elaine Burton: I beg to second the Motion.
Like my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. F. Willey) I am very pleasantly surprised that this matter has come on so early, and I am sure that a great many of my hon. Friends will wish to speak.
I want to tell the Parliamentary Secretary about a group of people whom I met in Coventry on Saturday and I hope that he will give some answer to their problems when he replies to the debate. They were a group of old age pensioners representing the area council for Warwickshire and they came to see me about a matter which many of my hon. Friends on this side of the House have raised in the past. They asked me how the Government thought the old age pensioners could possibly afford to take up their rations in view of the continued rise in the cost of living.

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I could hardly believe it the other day, and I am sure that many of my hon. Friends who heard it could equally hardly believe it, when the Parliamentary Secretary—or it may have been the Minister, but that does not matter for the purposes of my argument—told the House, in reply to my hon. Friend the Member for West Ham, North (Mr. Lewis) about the take-up of the bacon ration. The answer from the Government Front Bench was to the effect that my hon. Friend was quite wrong in saying the bacon ration was not being taken up and that the full amount of bacon was sent to the grocers.
Any hon. Member on this side of the House could have told Members opposite what that answer was worth. I find it very hard to believe that anyone with the reputation of the "Radio Doctor" in the past does not know what that answer was worth. It was worth nothing at all. We have frequently told the Minister of Food or the Parliamentary Secretary that people were not able to take up their butter or bacon rations because of the increased cost of living. Hon. Members opposite told us that we were wrong, and I must assume that they believed in all sincerity what they said.
The old age pensioners on Saturday gave me a figure, and I hope my hon. Friends on this side of the House will agree with my figure or will make it even higher. I was told that 50 per cent. of the old age pensioners in Coventry were unable to take up their butter ration, not because they did not want it but because they could not afford it. I do not doubt that if the Parliamentary Secretary makes inquiries he will find that the grocers in Coventry have received their full butter ration and that the full supplies have been purchased. I say that those supplies have not been bought ration by ration according to the ration books of individuals. If the Parliamentary Secretary wants further evidence on that point, I shall be very pleased, and so will some of my hon. Friends, to bring to him deputations from the old age pensioners to prove their point.
I now come to gammon—to bacon. The old age pensioners told me that the number of them in the Coventry area who were not able to take up their bacon ration because of the cost was even Greater than that of those who were not able to take up their butter ration. They did not give me any figure, but it was
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greater than 50 per cent. I do not know how any Government of any party at all can have the nerve—I want to say the opposite of "decency" but I cannot find the word that fits, except the obvious one—or how the Parliamentary Secretary and his hon. Friends can have it, to stand up there and defend a price increase which takes away from groups of people like the old age pensioners—and we can include the lower wage earners—the possibility of buying the food that they need. That is what the Government have done by the price increases against which we are praying tonight.
I imagine that the Parliamentary Secretary will tell us another fairy tale about old age pensioners having had some offset to this rise in the cost of living, but if he does so, and if he has any old age pensioners in his constituency, he will not be with us after the next Election. I note that the Parliamentary Secretary is just asking his advisers how much increase the old age pensioners have had. We do not have to ask; we know. The increase had been more than offset by the increase in the cost of living even before the recent increases. Any association of old age pensioners will tell the Parliamentary Secretary that. We have told the Government quite definitely that it is impossible for the old people to manage on what they have now. I must keep in order on this Prayer by saying that it is impossible for them to buy their supplies of butter and bacon at these increased prices. I imagine that I would be out of order if I went on to coal and tea.
My hon. Friend who moved the Prayer spoke about a rise of two points in the cost of living last month. Two points are a very real item to Members of the House of Commons, but to ordinary people outside who do not reckon in points the rise in the cost of living is much greater than the increase which the old age pensioners enjoy and which the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry has had to go along and ask advice about. I wonder whether the Parliamentary Secretary would tell us in his reply whether all these price increases are included in the 1s. 6d. which the Chancellor said would be the additional cost per person per week. I always thought that a Chancellor of the Exchequer must obviously be good at arithmetic, but the Chancellor ought to ask any family in this country, irrespective of party, whether they consider

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that the price increase has only been 1s. 6d. per week.
Arising out of this point, I would tell the Parliamentary Secretary about one of my constituents, who is a member of my party and whose wife is a member, not of the party of the Parliamentary Secretary, but of the Conservative Party. This husband had always been hearing complaints from his wife of the rises in the cost of living under the Labour Government. Since the present Government came into power the complaints of the wife, like those of the Housewives' League, had quite disappeared. Not long ago he said to his wife, when she asked for an increase in housekeeping, "There are three of us in the family, so here is 4s. 6d. to meet Mr. Butler's rise in the cost of living." I should hate to tell the hon. Gentleman the reply of that wife, but I might say it was not Parliamentary and she did not agree that 4s. 6d. would meet the increased cost for three of them during the week.
I will leave the old age pensioners for a moment to speak of another group of people affected by these Prayers. I also saw in Coventry on Saturday a deputation of shop stewards from the Humber factory. They had come to me to protest about the rise in canteen prices due to the rise in the cost of food initiated by this Government. The shop stewards were not saying that their workers could not afford to pay an extra 3d. or so per meal, but they believed that the firm responsible for running the canteen, industrial caterers called Peter Merchants, were using the example set by this Government in raising the cost of living to raise the cost of meals in the canteen.
This factory employs 5,000 workers and between 800 and 1,000 main meals are served a day. The employees contend that the works canteen pays its way and that it is only the profligate example set by this Government in continually putting up prices which gives those caterers the excuse for raising prices without stating any reason. The shop stewards have asked the caterers for a statement of accounts in order to see whether or not the canteen pays its way. This the industrial caterers have refused to supply, saying that they could not separate the staff canteen from the works canteen which, in fact, is entirely separate.
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I hope the Parliamentary Secretary will use his influence with industrial caterers to give the reasons when they raise canteen prices and I also hope that what I have said will show the hon. Gentleman that there is a need to look after not only the old age pensioners, who have not got the money, but other people also, who may have the money but who do not wish to pay more when they need not do so.
I remember two large posters in my constituency shown at the last General Election. I am quite sure that Members of the Government will remember them to their dying day. The first poster was a lovely, big one. It said at the top, "The Conservatives will bring down the cost of living." Well, even the Parliamentary Secretary must admit that it has gone up. The other poster which everybody must remember was the one with the purse at the top, the hole in it and the money coming out of the hole. This said, "Mend that hole—vote Conservative."
We on this side of the House have never had any doubt that the policy set out in these Orders would be the policy of this Government. I have always believed that people or political parties act according to their fundamental principles. They cannot get away from them. We on this side of the House differ profoundly from hon. Members opposite. I believe we have such a good case that there is no need to decry the Government—it is such a poor one.
I do not know whether the general public realise that over the food subsidies the party opposite ran true to form. The national cake consists of only so much money and we have to share it with everybody. Where we differ in this House is on how we share it. Quite a slice was taken out of the food subsidies and given practically intact to the relief of Income Tax. In other words, money was taken from those who had least in order to give to the people who have more. We believe that is wrong and, speaking as a mere back bencher, I do not think that if we had been returned we should have been able to cut Income Tax. We believe that before we help people with more money, we should help those with least—
Mr. Cyril Osborne indicated assent.
Miss Burton: I am glad to see that the hon. Member for Louth (Mr. Osborne) agrees with me. I hope, Mr. Speaker, that if he catches your eye the hon. Gentleman will be able to answer this point, because I believe quite sincerely what I am saying. The subsidies which have been abolished by some of these Orders are paid by people who pay Income Tax. I know the hon. Member is an expert on finance and he will agree with me on that elementary point. Therefore, the people who do not pay Income Tax get the subsidies for nothing, as it were.
I want some hon. Members opposite to tell us how the people who receive so little income or pension that they do not pay Income Tax get the money to pay the increased cost of food. It is no use telling me that they have had additional pension because that has gone in the cost of living. It is no use talking about relief from Income Tax because they do not pay it, so the relief will not help them.
My main contention about the party opposite, in believing they are not a fit party to govern this country, is that they do not know how the people who experience hard times have to struggle. Even after the exhibition this afternoon of the party opposite cheering about eggs coming off the ration and the prices going up, I shall try to be generous. I should like to assume that there are some nice Conservatives in the world—[HON. MEMBERS: "Where?"] I said I was being generous so I shall assume that there are some.
Mr. Gerald Nabarro: Very generous.
Miss Burton: It is very generous. However, I shall assume that those nice Conservatives, if we can find them—and my hon. Friends seem to be in some doubt—
Mr. Arthur Lewis: No doubt at all.
Miss Burton: —would not wish to see the lower-paid members of the community go without scarce foods. If they really do not wish that, how can they justify taking a lump of money from the food subsidies and giving it to people who are much better off so that they pay less Income Tax?
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I am pleased to have the opportunity of seconding this Motion, and I hope the Parliamentary Secretary will answer my questions when he replies.
4.30 p.m.
Mr. Cyril Osborne: The hon. Lady the Member for Coventry, South (Miss Burton) did me the honour of saying that I knew something about finance. I should like to tell her, before I start on my case, that I also know something of what she said that no Conservative knew. She said that no Conservative really knew how the poor lived or how the cost of living affected them.
I should like to tell the hon. Lady that I came from a working man's home. I do not think that my father ever earned more than 35s. a week. I went to an elementary school, and had to fight my way the whole of my life. I therefore understand that I am one of the exceptions—[Interruption.] If I may be allowed to say so, I know a good deal more of really hard poverty than most of those on the Socialist Front Bench.
If my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Food will allow me to speak for him, the hon. Lady reminded me of the dialogue that is recorded in the book of Job. She said to my hon. Friend, when he was asking his Parliamentary Private Secretary to check a figure, "We do not have to ask—we know." Just that sort of thing was said to old Job, who said in reply, "No doubt, but ye are the people, and wisdom shall die with you." That is just as true of hon. Members opposite today as it was of the "clever" people in those days.
As regards the Prayer generally, I have a great deal of sympathy. The increase in the cost of living is bearing very heavily on the lower paid workers. On the old age pensioner it is a burden the weight of which only those who have gone through the mill can understand. I agree with the hon. Lady that as a matter of social justice, the people who are hit hardest should be the first to be relieved, and it should be the duty of every Government to try to do that.
The hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey), however, completely spoiled the hon. Lady's case before she rose to speak, by overstating it. If I have his words correctly, he attributed all

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the price increases, which started on 5th October, affecting sugar, margarine, butter and cheese, to the Budget proposals of my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The hon. Member knows full well that that is sheer nonsense.
Mr. Willey: Perhaps the hon. Member forgets that I said I was taking that information from the Ministry of Food Bulletin.
Mr. Osborne: I do not care where it came from. I am just saying that the hon. Member knows that these rises, against which he is praying, cannot all be blamed on to the Chancellor's Budget proposals. He knows that to be untrue, and as an honourable Member of the House he ought not to utter such nonsense. I will tell the House why.
Last year, when we were governed—
Mr. R. E. Winterbottom Mr. R. E. Winterbottom (Sheffield, Brightside) rose—
Mr. Osborne: Please allow me to make my case.
In 1951, when we were governed for the major part by a Socialist Administration, this country overspent its income by £550 million. That is the figure which the right hon. Member for Leeds. South (Mr. Gaitskell) gave to the House. Our food imports cost a little over £1,000 million. We import half of what we eat. Therefore, in 1951, under a Socialist Government, this country had 25 per cent. more food than it paid for and earned. That is the background with which we have to deal.
Mr. Willey: Rubbish. That is nothing new.
Mr. Osborne: Of course, it is nothing new, but its significance has not yet reached the hon. Member for Sunderland, North, although it was made public 12 months ago. The House must realise that it is against the background of the international situation that we must look at the problem, while not closing our hearts to the problems of those who are poorest in the country. It is in this light that I want to put one or two facts.
This afternoon, the hon. Member for Sunderland, North was chivvying my right hon. and gallant Friend the Minister of Food about butter. He asked why we
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were not getting more from Denmark. The hon. Member knows full well—at least, he should know, because at one time he occupied the position of Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Food—that we are not getting as much butter from Denmark because we are not prepared to pay the price that the Danes are asking for it. Therefore, a greater proportion of the butter that is produced in Denmark now goes to West Germany, who are prepared to pay the price that the Danes are asking.
I put this to the hon. Lady, whom I take to be a fair-minded, intelligent Member. We cannot distribute the butter that is going to Germany. The only way we could distribute it in this country is, first of all, to earn it. The problem that faces us—it faces the hon. Lady and all of us—is not the immediate problem of distribution, but of whether we can earn enough to keep our people going. Her hon. Friend put all the blame down to my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer. He knows that that is rubbish and nonsense, but he has talked so much nonsense on this subject that he has come to believe that it is true.
Meat negotiations are at present going on in the Argentine. They have been going on since February, and there seems to be no hope of them being settled. The last Argentine meat price was negotiated at £128 a ton.
Mr. Lewis: The Tory Opposition said. "Pay anything."
Mr. Osborne: The last meat agreement, negotiated by the Minister of Food of the hon. Lady's party, was for £128 a ton. Since then—
Mr. Willey: I think I should call to your attention, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, that there is no Statutory Instrument dealing with meat against which we are at present praying. I only mention this because had I anticipated that the hon. Member would go so wide, I should have anticipated him.
Mr. Osborne: Further to that point of order. The hon. Member for Sunderland, North, who moved the Prayer, referred to tea, and there is nothing in the Prayer about tea. The cost of living is affected by all our foodstuffs. Why is the hon. Member so nervous that I should be deploying the case of meat? Is it because he knows that he is on weak ground?
Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Sir Charles MacAndrew): The hon. Member himself is on weak ground, because there is not at the moment an Order connected with meat before the House. We are at present dealing with only six of the Orders.
Mr. Osborne: I claim that to be a fine point, and I will rub the hon. Member's nose into it at the first chance I get.
A few weeks ago, the Minister for External Affairs in the Australian Government made a protest that we were buying both cheese and butter from Australia at considerably lower prices than it cost the Australian farmer to produce them. He warned this country that unless we were prepared to pay the proper price—that is, the price that it costs to produce those foodstuffs—in the near future there would be no food sent to this country. It is not a question so much of distributing between here and there. The basic problem is whether we shall have sufficient currency or will earn enough to buy sufficient to give all of us something to eat.
Miss Burton: That shows completely the difference between us. On this side of the House, we regard the problem as being one of sharing out fairly what food is available. We regard that as the first priority.
Mr. Osborne: That will be my last point, and I will give full measure in answer to the hon. Lady.
If the hon. Lady is concerned only with how the amount of food is distributed, she must face the fact, as I put to her at the beginning, that under Socialism in 1951, we in this country earned only three out of every four bites of food that we ate. Is the hon. Lady going to ignore the fourth bite? I should prefer that we improved our economy and earned the other fourth bite that we all need.
Mr. A. G. Bottomley: How is that brought about when production is falling, for exports and imports, and it necessarily means that there must be less for all? So the policy is altogether wrong.
Mr. Osborne: If I started to deal with general economic production I am sure you would rule me out of order, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, but I am prepared to debate that publicly with the right hon. Gentleman.
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The problem which faces us is not so much that of distribution but the primary factor is, can we continue to get supplies? The hon. Lady, or her hon. Friend, referred to what Lord Boyd-Orr said the other day. He was saying that we should have rationing of food in this country in order that the poorest might get a fair share. The hon. Lady's leader, the right hon. Member for Lewisham, South (Mr. H. Morrison), stated in an Election address that we should not only have Socialism in this country, but international Socialism.
May I remind the hon. Lady that the income per capita in this country, calculated by the United Nations, in 1949 was 773 dollars whereas 64 per cent. of the people of the world had fewer than 100 dollars a year. If we had international Socialism the standard of life in this country would go down catastrophically. The hon. Lady dare not go to Coventry and tell her people, "You are going to share your rations with the people of the Far East."
Miss Burton: I hope I am in order, and that the Press will report, that I would be very glad to go to Coventry and say that, and Coventry would be very glad also.
Mr. Osborne: I do not think that is quite as accurate a statement as the hon. Lady usually makes. Half the food we eat we grow at home. Part of the increase in food prices is as a result of the increase in wages recently paid to agricultural workers. Does the hon. Lady want cheap food at the expense of the agricultural workers? If so, she had better come to my constituency and tell my people so.
Mr. Percy Wells: Does the hon. Member realise that, as a result of what is now taking place, agricultural workers all over the country are demanding that those of us who represent them on the Central Agricultural Wages Board should put in an immediate application for a minimum wage of £7 10s. a week?
Mr. Osborne: I am much obliged for that support. If, therefore, the hon. Lady's hon. Friend supports the claim for a minimum wage of £7 10s. a week, then, obviously, what they produce will cost more and the cost of living will have to go up again. The hon. Lady has

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jumped up often enough to give me answers; I am asking her: does she want cheap food for Coventry workers at the expense of agricultural workers?
Miss Burton: I am sorry to keep getting up, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, but it is essential that I should reply to that. I think that the hon. Member has still quite misunderstood the difference between us. I am saying that what foods are scarce should be shared out equally by people of low income and people of high income. Therefore, we disagree that the subsidies should have been taken off. The hon. Member is not on the point.
Mr. Osborne: But, first, we can only share out the food we earn and we can only distribute on the basis of the price paid for it. Half our food is produced at home and the agricultural workers are asking for another 30s. a week.
Mr. P. Wells: Because the Government are putting up the price of food.
Mr. Osborne: The hon. Lady must face the dilemma. Either she is going to demand cheap food at the expense of my agricultural workers, or she is prepared to agree that they should have a decent wage and be paid the proper price for what they produce.
Miss Burton: If the hon. Member would stop indulging in a backwards and forwards argument I could remain seated. We on this side of the House would have maintained the food subsidies.
Mr. Osborne: The hon. Lady is still running away from the facts.
I come to the point made by both hon. Members opposite. They believe that there ought not to be rationing by the purse, but that there ought to be a fair distribution, they say, between the rich and poor as regards food in short supply. That is the point made by the hon. Lady. The Socialist Party, while preaching this, fail to practise it themselves, even in this House.
We need not go further than the Members' Dining Room, to which most of us will go tonight. One hon. Member, representing a London constituency, stated in the Press not long ago that the cost of food was so high in this House that he had to go to the A.B.C. café
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across the road to feed. There is no fair shares between all hon. Members opposite. They did not rush to his help and say, "We will give him some of our income"—of course they did not. I looked at today's menu for the House of Commons and saw that the cheapest dish is fish and chips, 1s. 10d. and that the dearest is roast duck, 8s. 1s the hon. Lady saying—
Mr. Willey: The hon. Member is now discoursing on roast duck, but again, so far as I am aware, these Orders do not relate to roast duck. I make the point because, whereas, in my submission, there could be an argument relating to subsidies as a result of the cutting of subsidy, it would be wrong to discuss broadly the cost of all assorted foods.
Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I think that what the Orders are about is made quite clear and we must stick to them. There are six Orders being considered together, and the Order relating to meat is coming later in the day.
Mr. Osborne: May I submit to you, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, that both hon. Members who moved and supported these Prayers said they did so because the Orders caused rationing by the purse which, they say, is anti-social and against their principles. I am trying to refute that and to show how absurd is the ground on which they are moving the Prayer. I am using experience in this House to do that.
Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I am at some disadvantage because I only took over my duties when the hon. Member for Louth (Mr. Osborne) was speaking and I did not hear what the hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) nor the hon. Lady the Member for Coventry, South (Miss Burton) said, but I think it is fairly clear that the Orders are not very wide.
Mr. Osborne: With great respect—I will quickly sit down if you order me to do so—the hon. Lady and her hon. Friend did base their charges on the ground that there was rationing by the purse, and I am trying to reply to that.
Mr. Willey: I should like to enlighten you, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, about the points I made in my speech. I referred to tea, for instance, but I referred to the subsidies on tea and said that, because according to the Ministry, they were the

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result of an operation of Budget policy, they had to be taken in sequence. When I referred to consumption I dealt entirely with rationed foods. The sole point I was making was that the consumption of some rationed foods had fallen.
Mr. John Arbuthnot: Further to that, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, before you came to the Chair the debate had ranged very widely. It even ranged as far as petrol price increases and, as the hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) said, included tea. My hon. Friend is only replying to the general tenor in which the debate started.
Mr. Osborne: I shall try not to range too far and shall try to keep in order.
Members opposite supporting this Prayer, as, I think, they will agree, consider that because the subsidies have been taken off prices have risen, the poor cannot buy and, therefore, there is rationing by the purse. That is the whole of their charge and I am trying, with your permission, to reply to that.
I say that for party political reasons hon. Members opposite are always talking about rationing by the purse. It suits them well and gets them votes. But they do not practise it in their own lives. They are preaching one gospel and practising another. To give evidence to my belief I point out that on the menu for today in the Members' Dining Room there are two items which I picked out at lunch-time, ready for this speech. One is fish and chips, 1s. 10d. and one is roast duck, 8s. Some hon. Members opposite will have one because it suits their purse and some will have another because it suits their purse. Therefore, they have rationing by the purse among themselves.
If we had stayed late tonight, as hon. Members opposite and I anticipated, some of us would have walked home tonight, but other hon. Members would have gone home in motor cars. That, again, is rationing by the purse. Why do hon. Members opposite make such a great song about the wickedness and the anti-social effects of rationing by the purse when they themselves practise it?
I asked one hon. Member opposite, and, obviously, I cannot give his name why he did not go into the Dining Room for his meals, and he said, "I just cannot
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afford it; I have to eat in the Tea Room." That is rationing by the purse. If hon. Members opposite were to practise, as a party and as individuals, what they are now preaching, and if they did not allow rationing by the purse to enter into their own lives or the life of their party, I would take more interest in this Prayer, but, as it is, I suggest that it is without foundation, that it has a pharisaical smack about it, and I hope the House will reject it.
4.51 p.m.
Mr. Tom Brown: I am not anxious to make political capital out of this matter, since we are praying against these Orders because we are concerned about how far and to what extent they will have an effect upon the poorer people of the country.
The hon. Member for Louth (Mr. Osborne) referred to poverty, and he indicated that we on this side of the House—at least, this was the impression he gave me—did not understand what poverty meant. I would like to repeat to him what one of the characters in Shakespeare's "Hamlet" said:
"I could a tale unfold, whose lightest word Would harrow up thy soul; freeze thy young blood;
Make thy two eyes, like stars, start from their spheres;
Thy knotted and combined locks to part, And each particular hair to stand on end, Like quills upon the fretful porcupine."
I know it would be very difficult to do that physically, but, literally speaking, I know what poverty is.
Mr. Osborne Mr. Osborne rose—
Mr. Brown: No, let me finish.
I want to support the annulment of these Orders on the ground that their effect will be to make conditions harder and more severe for a certain section of the community—a fact which is ignored from time to time.
As I tried to point out on 10th November, during the debate on the Address in reply to the Gracious Speech, there are three sections of the community upon which these Orders will have a tremendous effect. The first is the chronic sick, the second the permanently unemployed, and the third the old-age pensioners. Who can deny that, within the last few months, the hardships experienced

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by the old-age pensioners have been intensified? On 10th November, I threw out the challenge that, on both sides of the House, there is not one hon. or right hon. Member who could live upon the miserable pensions which are now being paid to the old-age pensioners.
Mr. Frederic Harris Mr. Frederic Harris (Croydon, North) rose—
Mr. Brown: I hope the hon. Gentleman will excuse me. I have sat through many debates, and it is very rare that I interject. I make the challenge, and no doubt the hon. Gentleman will have an opportunity to set about it next Monday and try to live on 32s. 6d. a week, and then come to me, next Friday or Saturday, and tell me how he managed it. That is the challenge, and it is one that should be taken up.
I do not like the idea of hon. Members opposite saying that they have increased old age pensions by 2s. 6d., while, at the same time, they slashed the food subsidies, which really cancelled out the half-crown increase which they gave. This is a remarkable fact. Since the food subsidies were slashed by the Chancellor of the Exchequer in April, 1952, the number of people who have had to seek National Assistance supplementation has increased tremendously, and there is undeniable evidence that the 32s. 6d. pension is inadequate for those people to live upon. The chronic sick cannot get any increase, the unemployed cannot get any increase, while the old age pensioners are finding it extremely difficult to live.
What concerns me is this: how far and to what extent are these Orders likely to intensify the hardships suffered by an already overburdened and hard-pressed section of the people? I am not seeking to make political capital out of this. God forbid that any man in this House should try to make political capital out of the poverty of the people.
We are talking about Prayers, and the hon. Member for Louth is very fond of quoting from the Old Book. May I also quote from it? Every day when this House meets, Mr. Speaker's Chaplain stands at that Table and quotes from the Prayer Book:
"Give us this day our daily bread."
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Yet the party opposite make it more difficult for the people to buy it by Orders of this nature. To me it is sheer hypocrisy for hon. Members opposite to utter that prayer when they make it more difficult for the people to buy the bread. Therefore, these Prayers have been put down simply to help the Government realise the affect which these particular Orders will have upon the people.
I have taken a good deal of interest in the hon. Gentleman who is now the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Food, even before he came to this House—in the days when he used to broadcast, when he put ideas into my head about diet, vitamins C and D and other things which I did not realise existed. I do not know how the hon. Gentleman can stand at that Box today and justify an increase in price in a commodity—sugar—which gives strength and vitality to those able to buy it. For the life of me, I cannot understand why he can stand at that Box and tell us that the increase in the price of sugar will help people to get strength and sustenance.
I am one of those—I know that my philosophy is not always accepted, even by my own colleagues—who believe that it is the duty of every citizen, male or female, to do his or her best for industry and for the State in which they live, and that, having done their best, it is the duty of industry and the State to protect them from poverty, want and starvation. That is a philosophy which has governed me for a great many years, and I cannot sit here without feeling convinced that the application of these Orders will make it harder and more difficult for the old-age pensioners, the chronic sick and the unemployed to exist.
What is the situation which housewives find when they go on a shopping expedition? Incidentally, I do not know whether hon. Members will recall that, about 20 days ago, there was a mass rally in London of 3,000 old-age pensioners, who were protesting against the rise in prices and the increase in the cost of living which has been brought about by the slashing of the food subsidies. My hon. Friend the Member for Coventry, South (Miss Burton) said that she attended a meeting of old-age pensioners last Saturday. Throughout the country vast meetings are taking place. These meetings are not organised by the Housewives' League.

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They are not arranged by people strongly opposed to the Government. They are organised by those who have now discovered the hardships inflicted upon the poorer sections of the community since the last Budget. They protest against the policy of the Government in raising food prices.
It is wrong, unchristian and anti-social to make it more difficult for people to live. The industrial worker has an organisation to protect him, but old-age pensioners, the chronic sick and the unemployed have no one to protect them. Therefore, somebody in this House must voice their cause and stress the hardships which these Orders will create upon the three sections I have mentioned.
It may surprise some hon. Members to know that the number of people in receipt of old-age pensions has grown tremendously during the last 25 to 50 years. That may be due to improved medical science, sanitation and social amenities. Whatever has brought about the improvement, it is a fact that in 1901 we had 1,750,000 people over the age of 65, whereas in May of this year we had 4,250,000. Those people will feel the effect of these Orders upon their purchasing power.
I speak strongly on this matter, because I know what hardship means. I live among these people. I know the experiences through which they are passing. Deep down in my heart there is a burning desire that we should not increase their hardships any further. For these reasons, I strongly support the Motion praying for annulment of the Orders, which have for their objective further food price increases.
5.2 p.m.
Mr. John Arbuthnot: I am glad to follow the hon. Member for Ince (Mr. T. Brown), who spoke very sincerely in support of this Prayer. He said that the three special categories who would suffer especially by the increases in price of these commodities were the chronic sick, the permanently unemployed and the old-age pensioner. These are three special categories who have been deliberately helped by the last Budget and by legislation since then.
It is true, as the hon. Gentleman said, that the number of people in receipt of National Assistance is larger, and I am glad of it because the reason is that the rates of National Assistance have increased.
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We have, as a nation, decided to be more generous to people who are in difficulties. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman would not want to go back. He would not want to remove these increases in price if, at the same time, that meant, as it would be bound to mean, that we should have to remove the benefits that have accrued to the people who are in the most difficult circumstances and whom the Budget and subsequent legislation has been deliberately designed to help.
Dr. Horace King Dr. Horace King (Southampton, Test) rose—
Mr. Arbuthnot: No I will not give way. We have not interrupted hon. Gentlemen opposite, and it is only fair that we should be given the same opportunity. However, I will give way if any Member, to whom I refer, wishes to ask a question.
I now come to the speech of the hon. Member for Coventry, South (Miss Burton). The gravaman of the case she deployed was that it was monstrous that these increases should be taking place, because at the time of the General Election a Conservative Party poster had said that the Conservatives would bring down the cost of living. She said that there was no need for her to decry the present Government because they were such a poor Government and were putting up a poor show. The result of the Wycombe by-election does not exactly bear out what she said.
I would remind her that we said that it would take us a considerable time to reverse the evil effects of Socialism. The cost of living had been going up at a terrific rate under the Socialist Government. It was bound to take us a certain time to slow down the rate of increase and, eventually, to bring down the cost of living. We are getting on towards reversing the swing of the pendulum. Let us remember that during the last year when the Socialist Party were in power the cost of living was rising at three times the rate at which it has risen since then.
We succeeded in bringing down the cost of living during August and September by two points, which is precisely the amount by which these necessary increases which we are now discussing will raise the figure. Therefore, when these Orders came into full operation we

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were back precisely to the position in which we were at the beginning of August. The amount by which the cost of living decreased in August and September makes up for that.
Mr. T. Brown: The reductions in August and September were temporary reductions brought about by the decrease in the price of fruit and potatoes.
Mr. Arbuthnot: I think that the hon. Gentleman was doing rather too much forecasting when he said that the reductions were only temporary. If, in six months' time, he can say that, then it will be legitimate for him to do so; but I would suggest that possibly he was a little over-hasty in saying that the reductions were temporary.
There is another point with which the hon. Member for Ince dealt, and to which I wish to refer: that the increase in the old-age pensions which he referred to as half a crown per head has been taken away by the reduction in the food subsidies. I think he knows that the increase in the old-age pension was not taken away completely and that the reduction in the food subsidies was forecast by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer as involving an increase of 1s. 6d. per head. In fact, it has resulted in a lesser increase—[HON. MEMBERS: "No."]
Among the various items which the hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) referred to was tea, where the full amount of the food subsidy was not passed on to the consumer.
Mr. L. M. Lever: May I put a question—
Mr. Arbuthnot: No—
Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Mr. Hopkin Morris): Order.
Mr. Arbuthnot: I was discussing the swing of the pendulum and the rate at which the increase in the cost of living took place under Socialism; which was three times as fast as it has increased since the present Government has been in power. In August, for the first time, we began to see the cost of living coming down, which shows that the policies of the present Government are being successful in doing precisely what we said we would do—[HON. MEMBERS: "Where?"]—in our Election posters and
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other Election literature. Furthermore, the forecast that we made that it was going to take some time has also proved accurate.
Mr. Deputy-Speaker: The hon. Member seems to be travelling wide of the Order.
Mr. Arbuthnot: In response to your Ruling, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, I must bring myself back to the topic of the Prayers, but I would say that I was replying to the points made by hon. Members opposite, and I understood that the debate would be allowed to range fairly widely.
So far as the Prayer is concerned, the case put by hon. Members opposite is that the increases which have taken place as a result of these Orders are insupportable by the vast majority of the people. It seems to me difficult to maintain that argument when we bear in mind the amount which is being spent on drink and on tobacco and entertainment. I believe that there is considerable scope for a reduction in expenditure on those items and for the amount saved to go to paying the proper price, the cost price, of the food so essential for the maintenance of good health.
5.14 p.m.
Miss Jennie Lee: There is an essential cruelty about the point of view put forward by the hon. Member for Dover (Mr. Arbuthnot) which I believe he himself does not understand. It is extremely easy for the members of any well-off household to shrug their shoulders about a 1s. on the bacon or 1d. on tea, and the rest of it, and to say, "What about it? We shall only have to pay 1s. or 2s. more for bacon, and we can buy a second-hand car for £200 or £300."
I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary will not run away from the case being put by hon. Members on this side of the House by talking of the compensatory reduction in certain items balancing the rise in the cost of essential foodstuffs. If he does, I shall say to him what I must say to the hon. Member for Dover, that he is being not only cruel, but completely inaccurate in his understanding of this issue.
We on this side of the House are not putting forward the case that under a Labour Government we had established perfect economic justice as between household and household. That was

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never our case. But our pride rested on the fact that under a Labour Government we were beginning to have more fair shares and, particularly, that we were easing the situation for those families who in the past had been most harshly treated.
I ask the hon. Member for Dover if he is aware that an old retired couple, with a retirement pension and National Assistance, and who have their rent paid for them, have to live on £2 19s. a week when they start budgeting. I have exact figures which have been taken in a particular case and the very best they can do is to reduce their spending on food to £2 2s. 7d. which, in the case I am quoting, includes 1s. charge for medicine. That, of course, is recovered. They are left with £2 19s.
Mr. Arbuthnot: Will the hon. Lady tell us what is the amount of National Assistance in that particular budget?
Miss Lee: I think the National Assistance they are receiving in supplementation of their retirement pension is 17s. 6d. I am quoting a case from Wolverhampton, but it is similar to cases to be found anywhere else, and it is the total which is essential for us to consider. I agree that the couple have not to live on their retirement pension alone. But the point that concerns us—and I do not see why the hon. Member should want that run away from this—is that when we add the National Assistance to their retirement pension, this old couple—and the husband is a semi-invalid—have to live on £2 19s. a week.
I am quoting from a most remarkable document produced by the Women's Advisory Committee to Wolverhampton and District Trades Council. In this document a very able committee have taken a number of working-class budgets. Every figure they use has been checked, not only by the committee, but has been put back to the business interests in Wolverhampton in order to see that no false prices are quoted. Indeed, the hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Powell), along with other hon. Members, has been given a copy of the document.
The point I am making is in reply to the statement of the hon. Member for Dover that people could spend less on drink and tobacco and could afford thereby to pay the proper price for food. This is a
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standard case which can be found all over Great Britain—
Mr. Arbuthnot: In the absence of being told the National Assistance element in that case—[HON. MEMBERS: "You have been told."]—I cannot believe that the figures are accurate. That element is of vital importance, because I believe that the family could get considerably more.
Miss Lee: I appreciate what the hon. Member is trying to do. He is trying to run away from the statement he made a short time ago. I have already answered his question. I believe that in this instance the National Assistance supplementation is 17s. 6d., but I should have to check that, because the document I have states that £2 19s. is the retirement pension plus the National Assistance they are receiving—
Mr. William Keenan: The amount of 59s. is based on the National Assistance scale for a couple. The contributory pension is only 54s. The 59s. quoted by my hon. Friend is the amount of the scale upon which the supplementation will be based
Miss Lee: The point is that this family have to spend £2 2s. 7d. on their food bill, which is practically three-quarters of their income. And they have only 16s. 5d. left with which to deal with clothes, shoes, furniture, heating, holidays and every other expense.
I turn to another case which hon. Members may be willing to consider. It does not deal with a retired couple, a sick man or any of those special hardship cases; it deals with a married man in full employment in Wolverhampton. He works on the railways and he is married and has one child of 12 years. He has had no benefit from Income Tax reduction because he does not pay Income Tax; his income is below that level. He does not get any children's allowance, for he has only one child, aged 12. Another of the papers presented to the committee deals with this husband, wife and child. They put down every item of expenditure and these items are included in this general figure. This family in October, 1951, was spending a total of £3 8s. 2d. on food. The average of £1 2s. 8d. per person covered the butcher, baker, and any items which come under the general heading of food.

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This family dealt with the Wolverhampton Co-operative, and in March, 1952, instead of spending £3 8s. 2d., they were spending £3 15s. 11d., and in October, 1952, the expenditure of that little household on essential foodstuffs had gone up to £4 8s. 4d. I do not know whether any Member of the House wants to question that figure. We are not here involved in the question of supplementary allowances on compassionate grounds. This man was in full employment, and when he paid for the essential food supplies for himself, his wife and child at £4 8s. 4d. he had already spent more than half his income.
I can tell the House now, not from a document presented to me by a neighbouring constituency though it is a very able and accurate document, but from my contacts in my own constituency, of circumstances even worse than those of this railway shunter. The miner who is working on the surface takes home at the end of the week less than £6 as his full week's wages. I do not think anyone will question that.
The essential cruelty of the case put by hon. Members opposite lies in their failure to accept that the poorer families spend a higher percentage of their income on food, and when a family is spending two-thirds, three-quarters or more of their total income on food, it is not only a pathetic situation for the housewife; it is a frightening situation.
Every time a cup is broken and the housewife has to budget for replacing it, every time she has to go to the shoemaker's for essential repairs to shoes and boots, every time clothing and household necessities have to be provided, she faces the fact that these things must take second place to essential food expenditure. It is really contemptible for a rich man's party to bring in legislation such as that which reduced the food subsidies, which, of course, is class legislation of the most naked kind.
I know that it enables hon. Members opposite to make their rich followers and super-taxpayers a little richer. There are families which can produce statistics showing savings on furniture, cars and semi-luxury or luxury goods which makes these tax reductions worth while for them even though they have to pay more for their food. But I do not think that any
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Member of this House can make a case which can stand investigation supporting these Orders against which we are praying this afternoon.
I hope that when the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Food replies, he will deal strictly with food expenditure and with the percentage of working-class budgets that has to be used for the purchase of food and explain to us why it is that, at one and the same time, we should be supporting so much inessential expenditure in this country and undermining that small measure of security which under a Labour Government we tried to build.
5.25 p.m.
Mr. Frederic Harris: I hope that the hon. Lady the Member for Cannock (Miss Lee) will forgive me if I do not follow her in the detailed cases she mentioned, though we have listened with considerable interest to what she said. I should like, however, to deal with what was said by the hon. Member for Ince (Mr. T. Brown) when he referred to pensioners. There is not an hon. Member in this House who is not approached very frequently about the situation of pensioners. They are the ones who are always the hardest hit in matters of the kind that we are debating this afternoon, and I think that many of us tend to forget that they are obviously the poorest ones, who would be directly affected.
In the OFFICIAL REPORT I came across this reference to this subject not so very long ago by my hon. Friend who has just been appointed Economic Secretary to the Treasury. If I may quote him, he said:
"The poorest of the poor are not the people with the lowest wages, with small families and in households where, perhaps, one, two or three incomes are coming in: the poorest of the poor are the old age pensioners, the war pensioners, people drawing industrial injuries benefits, the sick and the unemployed, the people with large families, the people drawing National Assistance. They are the poorest of the poor and they are precisely the people whom this Budget is benefiting."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 17th March, 1952; Vol. 497, c. 1986.]
The whole of this argument seems to centre on who are doing their best to assist such people who are rightly called the poorest of the poor, and obviously each side of the House has a different view on this matter.

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The food subsidies, in round figures, were, under Socialism, something like £400 million, and my right hon. Friend's Budget was originally designed to bring them down by some £150 million. As I see it, these Prayers are based on the fact that we do not want the prices for particular foodstuffs to rise, but, generally speaking, surely I am right in saying that where these subsidies applied every one, it did not matter who it was, was directly getting a benefit from them. It was being spread over the whole populace, and it did not matter what their conditions were. Whether they dined at the Savoy or whether they dined at home, it made no difference; they still reaped a benefit. [Interruption.] These are natural facts, and it is a question of finding the best answer to the problem.
Mr. P. Wells: Would the hon. Member agree that the man who was dining at the Savoy would make a larger contribution for his foodstuffs in the form of Income Tax?
Mr. Harris: I am not arguing—
Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Mr. Hopkin Morris): I do not think there can be a general argument on the question of food subsidies on these Orders which are being prayed against.
Mr. Harris: Surely the whole basis of the Opposition's case is the question of the food subsidies and whether they should be continued as they were.
Mr. Deputy-Speaker: The general argument cannot be on the issue of the food subsidies, but it is in order in so far as it relates to the specific Prayers.
Mr. Harris: It is very difficult to find out how to split those two subjects, but I will endeavour to do so. My whole point is that it is a question of which is the better method. I maintain that our Government have assisted tremendously. Under the Socialists, I remember the Minister telling us on one occasion that the general rise in the prices of the goods which are involved in these six Orders was somewhere in the region of £250 million. I think that that was put as the average all-round increased figure for 1949, 1950 and 1951. Not so long ago we asked a similar question about the current year, when the figure was given to us as £210 million. So on the face of it the increased cost of food-stuffs
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has been less in 1952 than it was on a general average in the three years previously. I do not think that these figures can be disputed.
At the same time, in 1951 the other benefits that the Government were giving to the pensioners and to all those people who are so hard hit, to whom the hon. Member for Ince (Mr. T. Brown) was referring, was something like £53 million in additional social benefits. We asked a similar question of our own Chancellor and we were told that in the current year the similar benefits are in the region of £135 million.
I am trying to emphasise that during this current year we have managed to keep the average increased cost of food down to £210 million against £250 million and at the same time we have assisted those who are hardest hit—the poorest in this case—to the extent of just over another £80 million. Therefore, if our policy and the policy of the House is to assist those who are hardest hit, then surely our Government, under the policy which they have been pursuing of late, have been assisting those who are so much in need of help.
If these Prayers were successful and we went on to restore the subsidies as they were before, my whole point, on sheer mathematics, comes down to the fact that if we keep Government expenditure on the same level, then in the long run we must take away the direct help that we give to these people. The whole answer to this is that each of us in the House should go on pressing whatever Government are in power to assist more and more those in receipt of pensions and those who find things difficult.
I have played my small part in that task and so have other hon. Members on both sides of the House; but if we try to tackle this problem on a general basis, it is no more than giving a pension to all the people whether they need it or not. That is why I think it is wrong to press for the restoration of subsidies whenever we think, as does every hon. Member, of those in most need.
5.33 p.m.
Dr. Horace King: I gather that the intention of the hon. Member for Croydon, North (Mr. F. Harris) is to prove in some way that the food subsidy cuts plus the social benefits provided by this Government do really

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help the poor and that these Orders are part of a process which really helps the poor people and prevents the rich people from obtaining the benefits which the Labour Government were giving indiscriminately.
Very briefly, the answer to everything that he said is that, whereas this Government have now made it necessary for the rich person in this country to pay 1s. 6d. or 1s. 5d. more per week for his rationed food, they give him 25s. a week from his Income Tax with which to do it. This policy of the Government by no means protects the poor against the rich but helps the rich against the poor.
I should like to answer the hon. Member for Dover (Mr. Arbuthnot) who suggested that we were faced with the dilemma of either not giving increased social benefits to the old age pensioners and the poorest people with whom we are concerned or of retaining the food subsidies, and that had we retained the food subsidies we should not have been helping the poorest in this country. The simple fact is, as he knows, that the petrol duty which was imposed by the last Budget alone would have met the whole cost of the increased charges we made on the social services.
The hon. Member for Dover pointed out that the cost of living went down by two points recently. My hon. Friend the Member for Ince (Mr. T. Brown) pointed out that that was only seasonal. In reply to that, the hon. Member for Dover said that we should wait for six months to see if that was true. The old folk of this country cannot wait for six months. Indeed, some of us are somewhat alarmed from what happened at Question time today as to what other increases decontrolling will make in the cost of the essential foods which the poorest people of this country need. Indeed, my general criticism even of our Labour Government was that there was a time-lag between increased social benefits for the poorest people and the hardship imposed upon them by the rise in the cost of living. Sooner or later some Government will have to tie up the social benefits which protect the poorest people with the cost of living, so that the benefits automatically rise as the cost of living rises.
The hon. Member for Dover boasted that the rate of the rise in the cost of
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living had decreased, as though that was any comfort to the poor. They are not concerned whether the speed of the rise in the cost of living is declining or increasing. They are concerned with the simple fact that since this Government came into power, on the Government's own figures recently given at Question time, the £ has declined in value to 18s. 9d.
I want to say a word about cheese. When my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition visited Southampton during the General Election, a Tory lady staged a demonstration. She stood alone in the midst of 10,000 Labour people, who treated her exceedingly courteously, demonstrating and holding in her hand the pitiful cheese ration that she was allowed to have under the Labour Government. From where we sat on the platform we could see the cheese ration in her hand. If there were a similar demonstration in Southampton today and my right hon. Friend or the present Prime Minister were put in the same position and the lady staged the same demonstration, he would not be able to see the cheese as she held it up.
One of the criticisms of these Orders, as indeed of the whole Government policy, is that the Government having promised to increase all kinds of food supplies, these Orders will not produce a single extra ounce of cheese. This debate gives us an opportunity of pinpointing not only the failure of the Government to implement their promises to increase the supply of basic foods, including cheese, but of pin-pointing the moral harm which they have done to 13½ million decent English people who thought that all one had to do to solve the economic and food problems of this country was to return a Tory Government.
The hon. Member for Louth (Mr. Osborne), to whose contributions in debate I always listen with very serious interest, criticised us because we were objecting to what we call rationing by the purse. He pointed out, quite rightly, that rationing by the purse exists in this House and indeed in the whole country even after five or six years of Labour administration. We have always had rationing by the purse. All that we claimed of the first six years of Socialist Government was that we had moved away from it somewhat, not that we had built an equalitarian society.

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As one of the hon. Members who visit the Dining Room to eat fish and chips, which is the cheapest item on the menu, I make no complaint about the fact that other people are able to purchase more expensive foods there. What has worried people like myself all their lives is not that it has been fish and chips for some and duck for others, but that our system of society has deprived people at the bottom of the social scale of fish and chips and often even of food at all.
Nobody would want physically equal shares of food for thin Members like myself and much fatter Members like some I could mention, but during those six years we sought to protect and guarantee for certain sections of this country—all our children, all our old folk and all the poorest folk—for the first time certain basic minimum food requirements. It is because of the Government's policy of interfering with the food subsidies and because the much more alarming policy of de-controlling certain foods has been set in motion that we are afraid.
In fact, we are already becoming aware that certain basic foods—even the rationed foods—are being lifted out of the reach of certain people in this country. In spite of what was said during two General Elections, it is the policy of this Government deliberately to reduce the purchasing power of millions in this country. There may be an economic case for that, but any good Government, whatever its policy, should go out of its way to protect the weakest and the poorest.
During the week, like many other hon. Members, I have met representatives of the old age pensioners in my town. Four of them came from their conference over the way to see me quite recently, and I say sincerely that I felt ashamed as I talked to them and they presented the very humble requests of the old age pensioners of this country. The things they wanted this winter were special coal and milk allowances; they wanted to be able to buy—
Mr. Deputy-Speaker: Not one of these Orders that are now under discussion deals with either coal or milk.
Dr. King: I am using them as an illustration of the needs of the people who are going to be affected by these Orders.
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Turning from specific needs, since you have ruled them out of order, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, may I say that the simple case of the old age pensioner today is that he has no luxuries, except tobacco which we have been generous enough to provide him at a cheap rate, and his problem today is to get the sheer necessities of life.
I share the views of my hon. Friend the Member for Cannock (Miss Lee) who protested against the cruelty of remarks from hon. Members opposite this afternoon when they urge that things cannot be so bad and that we should cut expenditure on drink, gambling, entertainment and other luxuries. I assure the hon. Member for Dover that very few old age pensioners in this country can afford to indulge even in football pools. They make their entertainment themselves. Indeed, one of the inspiring things that is happening in this country is that the old folk in their clubs are gathering together and creating, in fellowship, all kinds of entertainment for themselves because they cannot afford the entertainment that the rest of the country can have.
It is the impact of these Orders on people to whom every penny in the rise in price of any commodity means so much, that troubles me this evening. We are facing a cold winter. The old people need warmth and food. If what the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Food said was true in the days when he broadcast on the B.B.C. about the importance of good warmth-giving food, it is still true and it is particularly true for the older people in the country. It is because these Orders will take food out of the mouths of some of our people and because they will add to the burdens of the overburdened people in this country, that most of us are praying against them today.
If I may be personal, might I say that when we speak on behalf of the poorer people, the attitude of many hon. Members is different from that of hon. Members on the benches opposite—[HON. MEMBERS: "No."] Let me finish. Challenge me when I finish my statement, by all means. We speak of what we know. Many of us are in this House to protect old people and children from having to suffer the kind of conditions that we went through during the long time when these people opposite were in continuous power.
Mr. Osborne: What does the hon. Gentleman know from personal experience that I do not know?
Mr. Lewis: The Tory Government in the inter-war years.
Mr. Osborne: What does the hon. Member know of poverty that I do not know?
Dr. King: I am quite willing to welcome the hon. Member for Louth (Mr. Osborne) as one who, like most hon. Members on these benches, have found what poverty means—
Mr. Keenan: He has forgotten it since.
Dr. King: —but the bulk of hon. Members opposite have literally no experience of those conditions.
5.47 p.m.
Mr. Gerald Nabarro: I would not have sought to have intervened in this debate had it not been for the gross and grotesque exaggeration of the hon. Member for Southampton, Test (Dr. King). It is a curious fact that a large number of hon. Members on this side of the House represent industrial towns, and there is every reason to suppose that quite a considerable number of men and women in the lowest income group voted for my hon. Friends and myself because they recognised that we would give a sympathetic hearing to their needs and their day-to-day requirements. [Interruption.]
The hon. Member for Cannock (Miss Lee) sought to interrupt me. I apologise for having been compelled to leave the Chamber for a few moments to attend to the requirements of a constituent outside, so I was not privileged to hear her speech. I have since heard a second-hand account of what she said, and evidently it confirms the views expressed by the hon. Member for Southampton, Test, in that they both believe that they have a monopoly, on the opposite side of the House, not only of the support from the lower income groups but of knowledge of conditions of the poorer members of the community, which today have been generally referred to as poverty.
Miss Lee: Any hon. Members opposite who know from personal experience how frightening increases in food prices can be ought to be the more ashamed of
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themselves for supporting a policy which leads to such increases.
Mr. Nabarro: I am obliged to the hon. Lady for her intervention because it precedes immediately what I am about to say about the rise in food prices generally. It is fair to say that the increases in food prices which we are discussing this afternoon are part of a general budgetary policy which the overwhelming majority of men and women in the United Kingdom today recognise as a sane policy.
We are seeking particularly to direct help only to those sections of the community who need such help. It may be argued indefinitely whether the increases in old age pensions, disability pensions and the rates of the National Assistance Board allowances are in themselves, as a result of the Budget, adequate to offset the advances in food prices. What is undeniable is that it is a sound and sane policy to exclude from food subsidies those members of the community who can afford to pay the full and real price for food.
In his speech the hon. Gentleman referred—evidently through a lack of knowledge of the facts of life—to Income Tax payers who received a remission amounting to 25s. per week under the last Budget. He said that they could afford to pay these extra prices for food. Of course they can, but let us get this matter in its correct perspective. There are 22½ million workers in the United Kingdom today, but only 500,000 of them are in receipt of an income which, before deduction of tax, would enable them to claim a remission of tax equal to 25s. per week. In other words, only one in 45 falls into the category referred to by the hon. Gentleman.
Although it may bear hardly on some sections of the community to pay more for their food, I think it is not an overstatement to say that most of the increase in the price of that food has already been offset by additional social service benefits and allowances. I hope that, in the course of the next 12 months my right hon. Friends in the Government will pursue this policy to its logical conclusion and that all subsidies will eventually be eliminated.
Mr. Deputy-Speaker: The hon. Member must not go too far into that question.
Dr. King: We told the electors that.
Mr. Nabarro: I promise not to go too far, Mr. Hopkin Morris. The hon. Gentleman opposite interrupted me to say, "Tell the electors that."
Dr. King: We told the electors that that was the policy of the hon. Gentleman and his friends, and his own leaders denied that it was their policy. We are glad to have his confirmation that it was.
Mr. Nabarro: There is no question of confirmation in this regard. I said earlier in this short intervention—for I was only provoked to intervene—that we are concerned with safeguarding the welfare and the interests of the needy and necessitous sections of the population. The remainder, who can afford to pay the proper price for the essentials of life, should pay that price and should not be subsidised through the general taxpayers. I congratulate my hon. Friend on having the courage to pursue a sane and a wise policy in regard to food prices and I hope that within 12 months we shall be paying the real price—that is, the cost price—for all food which is imported into this country or which is produced here.
Since I started my speech by referring to a note of exaggeration from the hon. Gentleman opposite, I would say, finally, that there have been many references in speeches made from the other side of the Chamber to the effect of the statement made by my right hon. and gallant Friend this afternoon with regard to shell eggs. What did he say? He only said that he was seeking to restore a market in eggs and, as I said in a supplementary question, this is symptomatic of the whole food market position. Restore that market and freedom will result in bigger supplies, better supplies and lower prices. That is always the case.
Mr. Deputy-Speaker: Order. There is nothing about eggs in the Orders prayed against.
Mr. Nabarro: I am so sorry. A few moments before you rose, Mr. Hopkin Morris, I said that it was symptomatic of the whole case that hon. Gentlemen opposite are seeking to make. I hope that we shall see a few more of these Orders, with real prices being paid for all our food and a commensurate reduction in taxation and help for the poorest sections of the community and those that are really needy and necessitous—and
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that, incidentally, does not include the hon. Member for Wellingborough (Mr. Lindgren).
Dr. King: Before the hon. Gentleman sits down, may I ask him one question? We have a tremendous respect for him and his transparent honesty. Will he tell us whether he won the last election on the policy he has adumbrated now or on that of Lord Woolton?
Mr. Deputy-Speaker: That question may be asked on another occasion, but not on this one.
5.55 p.m.
Mr. William Keenan: So far as these eight Orders are concerned, six of which we are discussing, I would say at the outset that it might not be so bad, and some of the observations of our opponents might be taken much more readily and easily, if these Orders against which we are praying were all that was involved in the increase in food prices. But these refer only to rationed goods. The fact is that, in spite of what has been said by the hon. Member for Louth (Mr. Osborne) and other hon. Gentlemen opposite, they apparently know little about what the average housewife has to face.
If they had any knowledge of working-class conditions—I know that generally they move in a different society, where everything they need is delivered, and probably ordered by telephone—they would know that what we are complaining about most bitterly is that the increased price of rationed goods is not the whole of the story. Rationed goods account for only a small part of the increases which have actually taken place. There has been a lot of talk about the increase in the price of these essential commodities, which are about all that the old age pensioners can afford—in spite of what the hon. Member for Dover (Mr. Arbuthnot) said about their having more money for essentials if they spent less on drinking and smoking.
If I may supplement what has been said about the amounts paid to the people whom these Orders will hit most heavily—the pensioners—the contributory pensioner gets for himself and his wife 54s. That is the new figure since October. The National Assistance scale which has already been quoted and which is expected to cover these as well as the

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other increases, is 59s. for a married couple.
Mr. Nabarro: The old age pensioner and his wife get 54s. a week, which is 12s. more than they had before the increase, and that more than offsets the increased cost of food.
Mr. Keenan: The hon. Gentleman says it is 12s. more. If I may respectfully say so, it is not. Before the increase, the contributory pensioner and his wife received 30s. and 20s. respectively—a total of 50s. I suggest that when the hon. Gentleman argues these matters, he should be more correctly informed. He should know better or should shut up and not take part in the debate.
As one who has always taken an interest in old age pensioners—I am the president of a branch of an old age pensioners' organisation in Liverpool and I have been for several years—I have some contact with them and I know what is happening. For the benefit of the hon. Member for Dover I would point out that the old age pensioners get a voucher for one ounce of tobacco a week, which costs them 2s., so that they save something over 1s. on that item.
I am concerned about some of the stupid observations made by hon. Members opposite. The hon. Member for Louth spoke of his experience in earlier days and said that he knew about poverty. But the way he spoke in the debate, suggesting that the hardships which these increases impose do not, in fact, really exist, gives me the impression that he is more hopeless than hitherto I have found him.
A lot of nonsense has been talked on these Prayers. I differ from those who suggest that this is not a political question. Whether it be a Labour Government or a Tory Government, it is the politicians with whom we have to deal, and the approach they make to this question is obviously the approach of their political points of view. If not, why is there so much desire among hon. Members opposite to abolish all the subsidies and ease the burden of the Income Tax payer?
I have been able to observe, both in my own domestic circle and in my constituency, how wrong the Government were when they said that the withdrawal of
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the subsidy would mean an increase of only 1s. 6d. per head in the cost of living. Before the Budget we knew there were to be reductions in subsidies, for there was talk about it even then; and the old age pensioners—about whom hon. Members opposite are shedding tears, which I do not think they mean—pointed out that the cost of living had already gone up by more than 1s. 6d. in the previous two months. The increase which this House eventually gave in allowances—about which the hon. Member for Kidderminster (Mr. Nabarro) does not know very much—was purely an attempt to try to make up for the increase in food prices resulting from the withdrawal of subsidies.
I ask the Parliamentary Secretary to tell us, in his reply, how long it will be before there are further increases. Does his Department know the answer? There are one or two things we ought to know about this, because it raises serious questions. I am sorry that we are not dealing with the Prayer about meat, but that will be dealt with later; at the moment we are dealing with only the first six Prayers. I want to tell the Parliamentary Secretary the facts about meat—
Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I hope the hon. Member will not discuss meat on these Orders.
Mr. Keenan: I have no intention of doing so, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, but the observations I want to make about bacon have some bearing on the question of meat, so that it might not be necessary for me to speak again later.
The Parliamentary Secretary has in the Order a list of the retail prices of all the different cuts of gammon and bacon. We have been told that a large percentage of the people cannot afford to buy bacon, but will he do something to protect those people who can afford to buy it, so that they may see in the shop what is the price per 1b. of the bacon they are buying? Nobody today knows the price of meat because nobody dares to ask the butcher about the price.
I have had a promise that this matter will be seriously investigated, and if it is any consolation to the Parliamentary Secretary, both on the question of bacon and on the question of meat, we were not successful in our request to his predecessors; and we will put the flag up if he meets our request on this occasion.

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It has been suggested, particularly by the hon. Member for Kidderminster, that it would be better if we removed subsidies altogether, which would mean more of these Orders, because prices would go up; although I suppose the real intention is to have a free market with no control and with rationing by price.
One of the major principles of my hon. Friends and myself is to keep down the cost of living, and that is what the subsidies were doing. In this connection, I should like to raise a question about price control. I am sorry that I was unable to speak soon after the hon. Member for Louth; he said that under Socialism we did not do this and we did not do that. But we have never had Socialism in this country; we have had Socialists introducing Measures which were making for reform, but we have never had Socialism, and if we had—
Mr. Deputy-Speaker: This is not a discussion on Socialism, whether we have had it or not.
Mr. Keenan: I was merely replying to observations which were made about how much people could purchase at different times. I agree that price rationing is the logical consequence of these increases and of the eventual removal of control. When the attempt to keep prices down is abandoned—as it is in these Orders—and when control disappears, there will be a disturbance in this country which will mean that some people who today get a lot for nothing will in future have to work for what they get.
6.8 p.m.
Mr. Raymond Gower: Hon. Members opposite appear to arrogate to themselves all knowledge of people who are in need. My hon. Friend the Member for Louth (Mr. Osborne) rightly pointed out that for a long time he was an unemployed coal miner, and there are others on this side of the House, too, who have deep concern for the welfare not only of the country but also of those who are in the least fortunate position.
No hon. Member on this side of the House could like or enjoy introducing or supporting any measures likely to increase prices. Hon. Members opposite must realise that these Orders are essentially unpopular. These Orders are not likely to contribute to an easy popularity for the party on this side of the House, but it
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seems to me that a Government which always seeks to avoid unpopularity sometimes avoids doing its duty. Hon. Members opposite often realised the problems but were afraid to apply what they sometimes knew to be the necessary remedies.
The hon. Member for Ince (Mr. T. Brown), whose interventions everybody on both sides of the House must always respect, said in an impassioned tone, "Give us this day our daily bread." But I wish hon. Members would admit what no one on that side has yet admitted—that at the time when this Government took office, unless there were some changes—not necessarily the kind of changes introduced by the Government through these Orders—then, as a nation, we should soon have ceased to possess the power to purchase our daily bread. It is no use saying impassionedly, "Give us this day our daily bread" and at the same time pursuing a policy which will lose the power to obtain a large proportion of that daily bread.
These Orders, as hon. Members on both sides have pointed out, are part of the budgetary policy. They are consequences of budgetary policy, and they are designed to bring about certain increases, and those increases are on certain classified types of food. It has been pointed out quite correctly that they cannot be viewed in isolation; that they have to be regarded, as many hon. Members have emphasised, side by side with those other things done by the Budget—alongside the Income Tax allowances and increases in pensions and in the rates of National Assistance.
If hon. Members, in moving the rejection of these Orders, pursue their Prayers to their logical conclusion, they must also face the consequences of so doing, because if we reject these Orders we must find the money which we thereby lose, in some other way; and that can be done only either by annulling those concessions made to pensioners and to those receiving the Income Tax allowances or by an increase of taxation—one thing or the other.
That increase in taxation which would result from the annulment of these Orders tonight, should it be a tax on industry, would be an additional handicap on our power to sell our goods abroad. It would be a tax on industry and ultimately on our exports. If it should mean an increase

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crease on taxation of individuals; should it be an increase in direct taxation, in Income Tax, it would affect a large number—those 2 million who were relieved completely of the burden of Income Tax; or it would be an increase of tax on those paid a higher rate of tax. One could only surmise that large numbers of people—the 2 million relieved of Income Tax altogether, and the others whose position was partially improved—would be again faced with increased Income Tax, and that would bring about, just as much as a rise in food prices would bring about, applications for increased remuneration.
Hon. Gentlemen opposite do sometimes speak as though the taxpayers of this country, the wealthy taxpayers, as they sometimes like to call them, are a class of people who have had an easy time, a soft and pampered existence, but let us not forget that the taxpayers of this country are the most heavily taxed class of taxpayers in the whole world. Let us not forget either, when hon. Members opposite draw their sad picture of our position, that, while we conceive in all quarters of the House that the position of those on the lower incomes is not what we would desire their standard of life to be, but something we all aim to improve, that in no other country in the world do the lower tenth, if I may so call them, live with as good a standard of life except where there is a slave State or people are sustained by a slave economy.
The problem, shortly, is whether we negate these Orders and thereby negate the increase in pensions and tax allowances and so on, or whether we permit these Orders to go through to follow those other concessions which have been made and to achieve what many of us believe to be a more realistic balance in our economy? We feel, as we have constantly asserted, that the major objection to the alternative remedy, food subsidies, was that they were indiscriminate in their application. Some hon. Members opposite have said in opposition to that argument, "The Government agreed to family allowances, and they also are indiscriminate in their application." But while those family allowances are subject to tax they are not indiscriminate.
Mr. Speaker: I agree that the family allowances have some relevance to the
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general financial background, but we are really discussing certain specific Orders.
Mr. Gower: I was following largely on what was said before, but, of course, I bow to your Ruling, Mr. Speaker. The present reductions are consequent upon the removal of those subsidies and we feel that this is the fairest way—the way likely to promote the wealth of our economy most efficiently. While, of course, we on this side would not introduce a measure which was likely to be unpopular particularly with those who consider if we could help it, not the public weal, but rather their own immediate personal positions, we feel that these Orders must be passed, to give the nation the chance of re-establishing its economy on a far sounder basis than applied during the last six years, when we have seen a continuous rise in the cost of living and at the same time a continuous deterioration in our over-all national financial position.
Mr. Percy Shurmer: Before the hon. Gentleman sits down, may I ask whether he will not agree that the concessions given by way of relief in Income Tax to the higher order of people in this country far outweigh the loss in food subsidies as compared with the concessions given to the lower order of people in this country in the last Budget?
Mr. Gower: I would admit that if a tax concession is given it is likely to benefit people paying larger tax more than those paying less tax, but I remember that when the right hon. Member for Bishop Auckland (Mr. Dalton) lessened the Income Tax by 6d. a few years ago, that was hailed by hon. Members opposite as a great and beneficent gesture.
6.18 p.m.
Mr. Arthur Lewis: I have been sitting here since 2.30 today and have heard every speech from the Government side and every speech from our side in this debate. I congratulate my hon. Friends the Members for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) and Coventry, South (Miss Burton) on their honesty of intent and purpose but I believe that the case that they could and should have emphasised is the complete political dishonesty of the Government.
Every one of the hon. Members supporting the Government so far has said

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that it is his desire to force up the price of food, and, therefore, hon. Members opposite are against the annulment of these Orders, which implement the Budgetary policy of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The tragedy for the people of this country is that hon. Gentlemen opposite did not have the political honesty to make those statements at the time of the General Election. It was they who said they would bring down the cost of living. It was they who said they would not cut the food subsidies. It was the Conservative Party which said, officially, that they would reduce the prices of food.
Even the Parliamentary Secretary, although he is not, I think, officially a member of the Conservative Party—I think he is his own party chief whip and leader combined as an Independent Liberal National Conservative Member—went to the electorate of Luton and told them that we should have more food at cheaper prices, and that, in fact, there would be no cuts in the subsidies.
I strongly support the annulment of these Orders, because this is the first opportunity we have of showing the electorate that this Government have not only broken their promises, but have acted in direct opposition to those promises.
Mr. Gower: Would the hon. Gentleman also say how he would find the money which has been used on increased pensions and allowances?
Mr. Lewis: I will deal with that point in my own way when I come to it. One way which I certainly would not obtain the money would be by cutting the Income Tax of the well-to-do. Even the hon. Gentleman admitted that only 2 million people had benefited by Income Tax relief.
Mr. Nabarro: Sixteen million.
Mr. Lewis: The hon. Member for Barry (Mr. Gower) said it was only 2 million.
Mr. Gower: My statement was that 2 million were relieved of the burden altogether, and that millions of others had also benefited.
Mr. Lewis: I was going on to say that only 2 million had been relieved of the burden, and that even the remainder did
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not get any major remission because the majority of them were not paying much Income Tax. I say that it is wrong to give Income Tax relief to a group of people who are able to buy their food, while depriving those who are paying no Income Tax, or very little, of the opportunity of purchasing their basic rations. Because of the application of these Orders, in areas such as the one I represent, the poorer working-class areas, the industrial areas around London, there are vast numbers of working-class people who cannot afford to take up their basic rations.
I am glad that the Parliamentary Secretary is here this evening, because he will recollect a meeting we had last week at which I showed him ½ 1b. of bacon I had purchased, which was freely advertised as off the ration and on sale to all.
Dr. Charles Hill Dr. Charles Hill indicated assent.
Mr. Lewis: The hon. Gentleman saw it, and many of my hon. Friends have seen it. That is happening throughout the length and breadth of the country. Those who have the money can go into the shops and buy more than their ration. Although retailers are taking 10 per cent. less than their normal bacon allocation they can supply bacon over the odds to those who can afford the extra, even at the present high prices.
Mr. Nabarro: Is it not a fact that in the last ration period 97 per cent. of all the bacon put out in the country was taken up by the ration book holders?
Mr. Lewis: That most definitely is not true. If the hon. Member for Kidderminster (Mr. Nabarro)—we call him the hon. Member for "Kiddingminster," or "Kiddingminister," I am not sure which—had watched the Parliamentary Secretary he would have seen that he nodded in agreement when I said that retailers were taking up 10 per cent. less of the bacon to which they were entitled.
Dr. Hill: Let there be no misunderstanding. I nodded in agreement when the hon. Gentleman said that he showed me the bacon he had so illegally bought.
Mr. Lewis: Perhaps he will also confirm that, in answer to a Question on the Floor of the House, either he or his Minister agreed that in the last period retailers took up in bacon 9.7 less than

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their entitlement. For easy reckoning I call it 10 per cent. That statement was made and is on record. That shows that a large number of people are not able to purchase their rations.
The hon. Member for Dover (Mr. Arbuthnot) talked about old-age pensioners and others cutting down on their beer, tobacco and gambling and using the savings for food. He has no idea of what is happening in the country.
Mr. Arbuthnot: I did not say that at all.
Mr. Lewis: The hon. Gentleman certainly did, and my hon. Friend the Member for Cannock (Miss Lee) took him up on it. He said that there was far too much spent on beer, tobacco and gambling; that savings could be made on those and used for buying food. My hon. Friend interrupted and pointed out, quite rightly that the old-age pensioners cannot do that because they have not enough to purchase their basic rations, let alone spending anything on beer and gambling.
The hon. Member has no idea, and neither have many hon. Members opposite, of what is happening in the country. Let them come down to my division, and to those of some of my hon. Friends in the dock area, where a quarter of the dockers are unemployed and are compelled to live on £4 8s. a week. They get no supplement; they get no additions. How can they be expected to pay these extra prices that are being introduced, in addition to meeting the effect of the increased cost of living?
I protest very, very strongly against these increased prices. They are politically dishonest, and I think the Government are politically dishonest in coming here and trying to put these prices on to the ordinary housewife. The hon. Member for Gower—
Mr. Gower: Barry.
Mr. Lewis: The hon. Member for Barry talked about what happened under the Labour Government. What he did not explain was that under the Labour Government, whilst the prices of food and basic raw materials were rising rapidly, in the other 19 O.E.E.C. countries prices, particularly of food, rose to a far greater extent. Now, prices in this country have
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gone up far more rapidly than in the other 19 countries quoted. That is not only due to budgetary policy. It is due to the complete ineptitude and lack of co-ordination of policy of the Government, because in other countries throughout Europe the cost of living and the cost of food are dropping rapidly.
In conclusion, I ask all my hon. Friends, not only to support us in the Division Lobby this evening, but to go out into the country and to tell the people the truth; to tell them that if they want to save this country they must get rid of this Government.
6.30 p.m.
Sir William Darling: I think that the hon. Member for West Ham, North (Mr. Lewis) had an unfortunate lapse when he referred to my hon. Friend the Member for Barry (Mr. Gower) as the hon. Member for "Gower." I am not making the mistake of supposing that he represents any other constituency than "Ham," which is one consolation for both of us.
Mr. Lewis: Probably we should be twins and ask the Parliamentary Secretary to join us and make us triplets.
Sir W. Darling: I am sure that to suggest that we should be joined as triplets would be a repugnant idea to him, however desirable surgically or otherwise.
Why are these Prayers with us at this unseemly and unusual hour? These Orders are to increase the prices of lard, butter, cheese, gammon and sugar. Hon. Members opposite are praying against the intention of the Government to increase the prices of these commodities. [Interruption.] I say that with perhaps one exception that is the invariable intention of these Prayers.
If we look at one of these Prayers I see that there is a reduction in price. I would be glad to think that that has not escaped the notice of the hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey). [HON. MEMBERS: "Which Prayer?"] I think that there is a reduction in the price of dripping. [Interruption.] I am grateful for the assurance that well-fed representatives of the proletariat on the other side of the House do not think anything of dripping. I enjoyed dripping when I was a boy, and I enjoy it still. I should have thought that there would have been

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peons of praise for the Parliamentary Secretary making a substantial reduction in the price of dripping, and I hope that subsequent speakers will commend the Government on what they are doing in this field by reducing the price of dripping.
Mr. Lewis: Is the hon. Baronet aware that he is now suggesting that we should go back to the good old days, such as the workers experienced, and have bread and dripping, rather than bread and margarine or bread and butter?
Mr. Willey: Before the hon. Gentleman answers that perhaps he will deal with the point that the price is reduced on first-hand sales?
Sir W. Darling: I will deal with them in sequence. In reply to the hon. Member for West Ham, North, I would point out that I am not an hon. Baronet, and that I was making no such suggestion. Those who care for good roast beef dripping—and apparently there is still some in this country—will, I hope, continue to enjoy it, and all the more now that the price is to be reduced.
The hon. Member for Sunderland, North drew attention to the fact that the reduction is only on first-hand sales, but I take it that the reduction will percolate to the consumer and I should like him to give honour, if only a little honour, where honour is due. This is a Prayer against increases in the prices of particular commodities. I think that notice should also be taken of the fact that the price of tea is being freed. Tea control is also going under these particular Orders. I notice that control has gone from cooked ham.
Mrs. Jean Mann: The hon. Gentleman has men-toned dripping, but I understand that the Order relates to rationed goods only, and I think that all that is in the ration is cooking fat. I do not think that dripping is procurable, and neither is it included in the Order.
Sir W. Darling: If the hon. Lady will apply her mind to the Order, I think that she will see that in the Order under review, there is reference to dripping, bacon and tea. Further, she will see that these Orders increase only the maximum prices.
Mr. Harold Davies: Is it in order for the hon. Gentleman continuously
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to refer to these references about dripping when the Order distinctly says:
"but shall not include dripping."
Dripping is completely excluded.
Sir W. Darling: The hon. Member is mistaken; it is not excluded. This is the fifth interruption. [HON. MEMBERS: "You asked for them."] It is incorrect to say that I ask for them.
Hon. Members opposite are always impatient with anyone who differs from them. In a world where intolerance seems to be growing, they are leaders in that faith, and I deeply deplore it. I remember when the Socialist Party was a tolerant party and sought to understand the problems that confronted us. [An HON. MEMBER: "You were in it."] It was a tolerant party at the time I was there; that tolerance has diminished since I left. There is no reason, when I say things which are contrary to the wishes of the Opposition, for them to suggest that I am saying anything that is not relevant to the subject before the House.
These Orders deal with maximum prices. I engage in retail distribution, and I tell the House that it is not the invariable practice of retailers in their businesses to exact always the maximum price. In recent months, there has been a definite tendency in the opposite direction.
Mr. E. Fernyhough: I wonder whether the hon. Member can give, for the information of his constituents in Edinburgh, the name of a shop at which they can purchase, at less than the maximum price, the goods we are talking about tonight?
Sir W. Darling: I willingly respond to these challenges. If I may adopt an official form of answer, I would say that as the answer contains a great many names and addresses, I shall publish it in the OFFICIAL REPORT. The hon. Member may be assured that there are many businesses in the City of Edinburgh where goods are sold, not at the maximum price, but below it. One firm is St. Cuthbert's Co-operative Society.
Mrs. Mann: Will the hon. Gentleman agree that the St. Cuthbert's Co-operative Society sell at the maximum price, and that if goods are sold at less than the maximum, it is only in respect of the dividend on purchases?
Sir W. Darling: The hon. Lady is a first-class Member of Parliament, Mr. Speaker, as you know, and therefore she cannot have that intimate knowledge of shopping conditions which she would have if she were a housewife. I submit that she has the right to throw away the crown of being a successful housewife, because I think that she is more successful in the ranks of the Opposition. What she says is inaccurate. Many Co-operative societies not only give dividends but actually sell below the prices of similar goods sold in similar competing stores.
I have now dealt with some six interruptions, and I have done so, I think, with some satisfaction. I proceed to say that these Orders are before us because Her Majesty's Government are desirous of moving in a more realistic direction than has been the case during the past six years. The argument of the Opposition is that these increases are oppressive. What is the view of the Opposition? Is the market to remain ever rigid? Is that their conservative principle? Would they apply it in the field of wages and dividends and every other field? Do they live in an entirely static world? Are prices of goods and services not to rise and fall as they grow or diminish in quantity?
If that is their view, they are entitled to pray against these Orders, for they reflect the increases in wages, the increase in world prices and increases in many other circumstances. Are we to take it that the Opposition wish to hold the British society in a rigid immovable frame for ever and ever, amen? If that is not so, then do the Labour Party believe in a resilient society, which, it is true, may fall but which also has the ability to rise to any height the human mind can conceive. These Orders are a reflection of the resilient society.
The simple truth is that prices will never come down until they have first gone up, and the step which the Govern-is taking is a step towards lower prices—and at a not far distant date. Is it the view of the Opposition that food prices should remain unchanged for ever and ever, amen? I do not accept that. I believe we should move progressively and quickly to a free market. The hon. Member for West Ham, South—
Mr. Lewis: West Ham, North.
Sir W. Darling: Is it West Ham, North? It is "hammy" anyway.
The hon. Member pointed out that in countries other than Great Britain the cost of living rose more rapidly during the previous six years than it did here but now it is not rising so rapidly in those countries as it is here. I put it to him that it may well be that the relatively free market of the last six years in countries other than Britain was more realistic than the controlled market in Britain and that we are now suffering from the fact that we did not free the market earlier. I put that forward for his consideration, modestly and with all deference because I know that it is not necessarily right, but it is worth his consideration. I believe that we should return as rapidly as possible to the freest trading possible.
Mr. Shurmer: The good old days.
Sir W. Darling: I do not know about the "good old days." At my age one does not find one day better than another, unless an all-night Sitting is involved.
We should try to return—it will be as the last country in the world to do so—to freer trading conditions. I know there will be pains on entering the market, but the Labour Party are doing the British people no service when they pretend that life can be made smoother and easier by the efforts of persons other than ourselves. That is a degenerating thought which is unworthy of the Labour Party. The idea that our people are to be for ever pauperised in a rigid economy should be repudiated by all men of common sense.
The Parliamentary Secretary is responsive to the movement of the times. He recognises that the markets of the world are bound to fluctuate and that we cannot keep them rigid. With better wages, better conditions and better incentives, prices will rise, and I hope wages and incentives will rise with them, as they always have done. The higher standard of living which the United States enjoys is based on that principle. I am not sure that we should not be doing a great deal better if we sought more and more to align ourselves with the economy of the United States than we are doing at present.

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This is a relatively small step, and it is not worthy of so much knee-bending and praying, but it is a reflection of the realism in the minds of the Government, and I hope that this will, in turn, be reflected in the Opposition. I hope that the Opposition will instruct the people of the country that we are a brave, strong people and will not be pauperised and that such things are not in the temperament of the British people. If there will be pains in the free market, let us face them, because we cannot avoid pain, toil and trouble. I support the Government in this new piece of realism in our food policy.
6.45 p.m.
Mr. Percy Daises: The people of this country will not be sorry that we are not debating an unnecessary Bill but are instead concentrating, although by accident, upon a problem which affects them far more, that of the cost of living.
The Prayers are consequent upon an increase in the cost of living for all our people as a direct result of Government action. I cannot understand how the Parliamentary Secretary reconciles the job which he has to do as a Member of the Government with the attitude which he used to take in—I am certain for him—the far happier days when he was a freelance, before he became admitted to the fold. We can expect him to have a few qualms of conscience when, in his more reflective moments, he thinks of the guidance which he used to offer to the public about nutrition. There is clear evidence that as result of the Government's action the nutrition standards of the people are beginning to fall.
We have heard statements from hon. Gentlemen opposite that there is something particularly healthy, economically sound and desirable in getting rid of food subsidies, and, to be in order I refer to the element of food subsidies in respect of the foods covered by the Orders. I have never held that opinion. In speeches which I made when the Labour Government were in office and since I argued that if we were to spend the enormous sum of money which we do spend in maintaining the National Health Service to cure disease, it was only sound sense, as well as being ethically desirable, to have a basic nutrition standard for all our people as a preventive factor against
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disease. How does the Parliamentary Secretary reconcile that principle with his present job?
It has been said that 97 per cent. of the bacon ration is taken up. How is that figure arrived at? It is said that the total amount absorbed is checked against the total amount issued. That does not give the true picture. What happens in the shops is that persons who can afford to do so take more than their ration and a substantial number of other people take less than their ration. This means that the figures which have been given are completely misleading and do not disclose the facts.
My hon. Friend the Member for West Ham, North (Mr. Lewis) brought half a pound of streaky bacon into the Chamber. The implication of that, too, is rather misleading. In my constituency which is next door to his—to be fair, he did not buy the bacon in his constituency—the cheap foods are so much in demand that unless one gets to the shops early one cannot obtain them at all. That also applies to meat; one cannot get the cheap cuts.
I have discussed the cost of living with women comrades of mine in the Labour Party. I have asked them why they do not go early to the shops in order to get the streaky bacon. Their reply is, "Is it fair and comradely for us, whose husbands earn £8 or £9 a week, to go early to the shops in order to grab the cheap food before the other people get there?"
We can get a far better test of what is happening in the changing pattern of spending on food by looking at the figures of milk consumption. There is clear evidence that in many parts of the country the consumption of milk is showing a very marked fall. The Parliamentary Secretary no doubt can bring out over-all figures to try to refute that statement, but break them down and the evidence is perfectly clear.
I used to have a profound feeling of respect for the Parliamentary Secretary as a broadcaster and as a personality. He certainly could put it over and he did that job very well. I think if he could be free and if two years ago he could have seen where he would be today, he would have taken an entirely different course for himself. Some member of the Government—I do not know

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whether it was the Minister of Food or the Parliamentary Secretary—recently said that one of the prime jobs of the present Government was to wind up the Ministry of Food. I have a feeling that the hon. Gentleman's benign countenance is more likely to go down in political history as belonging to a political undertaker than as that of the "Radio Doctor."
I do not believe the time is anywhere near when we can safely abolish the Ministry of Food, nor that the present economic position, which seems to give so much confidence to members of the Government, is on a secure basis at all. It was only as recently as 1950 that our balance of payments position was in balance, and then things began to go wrong again. Everybody, if he is honest, knows that we are living on a knife edge economically. One slight lurch of the American economy and we shall be back to the position where drastic rationing is again necessary. I deprecate the policy adopted in these Orders, because I hold strongly that the accidental device of the food subsidies which we used in the war is a major element today in maintaining the nutritional standards of our people.
The Parliamentary Secretary knows as well as I do that when there are increased prices for rationed commodities it is only a small part of the picture. Since the increases to which these Orders refer, there has been a substantial rise right through the whole range of items in the grocers' shops. The increased prices arising from these Orders do not justify most of these increases. I noticed that an hon. Member who is concerned with the business of making up prepared foods addressed the House earlier in the afternoon. I looked at some of the commodities from the firm for which he is responsible, and I find exactly the same feature about the prices.
There is something "phoney" about these increases of prices which coincide with Orders such as these. What the Government have done by the adoption of this policy of price increases for food—and here I charge the Chancellor of the Exchequer—is to create a psychology for increased food prices, so that the whole range of foodstuffs move with them.
Sir W. Darling: The hon. Member refers to increased food prices, but I think his own Co-operative society will bear it out that in Quaker Oats, porridge oats and the Co-operative product for making porridge there has been a decrease in price of 1½d.
Mr. Daines: If the hon. Gentleman will look at the list of food prices that I produced in a previous debate, he will find there are about two or three exceptions, but that generally speaking there have been increases the whole way through.
The final point I want to make is this. I believe the Opposition are right in conducting the fiercest possible opposition to the policy which is revealed by these Orders. We have seen demands from the Government back benchers for a further attack upon the food subsidies. I do not believe that hon. Members opposite are necessarily men and women who want to inflict misery on our people because they like doing so. I believe the hon. Member for Louth (Mr. Osborne) when he calls attention to his working-class experiences and former poverty. No doubt he was perfectly sincere.
Nobody—and this goes for my own side of the House just as much as it does for the other side—can truly understand what poverty means unless in some period of his early life he actually lived it and knew precisely what it meant. Unemployment very often goes with poverty, and one does not know what it means unless one has actually experienced it. I will go further and say that a man who really suffers unemployment never again feels secure throughout the remainder of his life. I can understand the hon. Member for Louth making the statement he did, but I cannot understand how a person who experienced poverty before the war can support a party and a Government which will restore the conditions which today will again make that poverty possible. That is a paradox in our political life which I cannot fathom.
We are right to oppose these Orders not because we shall win in the Lobby tonight, because we cannot, but I believe we are right inasmuch as this will be a warning to hon. Members opposite that their campaign for so-called economy is bound to lead, and will lead, to further wholesale slashing of the food subsidies at the time of the next Budget, with a consequent

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rise of food prices to our people. I congratulate my hon. Friends who are responsible for putting down this Prayer, and I warn the Government that in taking this step they are creating a further difficulty that will hamstring them in the difficult and dangerous economic circumstances of the future.
6.58 p.m.
Mr. Harold Davies: It is relevant to expose what I consider to be the manner in which the Government, at the General Election, misled the people in an effort to get into power, and it is equally relevant to recall that when the Labour Party were in power there were Prayers on the subject of food prices night after night, when it was alleged that, through the then Government's incompetence and machinations, there were shortages of food and things were so dear.
It was the Conservative Party who distributed throughout the country the leaflet which I hold in my hand and which is called "Black Record." It is written on black paper with white lettering. The first story they had to tell the electorate was about the high costs of living. This is what they said:
"Year by year the cost of living has soared. Today, it is 37 points higher than when the Socialists took charge in 1945. The excuse that leaping prices are 'all due to Korea and rearmament' is rubbish."
Since then, the Chancellor of the Exchequer has had to contradict even that.
"The cost of living had rocketed by nearly 30 points before the Korean war started."
The whole basis of the approach of the Conservative Party to the housewives of Britain was that if they were in power basic commodities like butter and tea would be cheaper.
At the Conservative Conference, as reported in the Conservative Party's "Daily Notes," the "Radio Doctor," as he was then, referred to the matter. Speaking on 14th February, 1950, he said:
"There's that fairy story about food. We are getting as many calories and as many proteins today as we did before the war. I agree. There's enough fuel for the human engine. As for proteins, well, we can get those from milk, meat, fish, eggs, cheese and, if Mr. Strachey won't mind my saying so, from nuts as well. In total we are getting enough. But we are getting 30 per cent. less meat, 60 per cent. less bacon, 20 per cent. less eggs. Indeed, we are getting less meat and bacon and cheese than we were in 1945. But the total
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is all right. Science is satisfied, so how dare you grumble!"
That approach to the housewife gave the impression that meat, milk, eggs and cheese would all be cheaper and more plentiful if the Conservative Party were in power. We accuse them of having jumped into the seat of power at this difficult, transitional period, by twisting the truth. As for accusing us of not telling the truth, may I remind the House that a former Chancellor of the Exchequer, Sir Stafford Cripps, was called "Misery Cripps" and "Austerity Cripps" because he tried to point out realities of the modern world such as the shortage of fat in Australia, the shortage of butter even in America, and the fact that Australia and Argentina were not able to send us more meat. We were informed by Lord Woolton at that time that if the Government now in power came into office we would have "Ham, spam, and lovely legs of lamb."
Let us be quite honest about these matters, and admit that whichever side had been in power would not be very happy about the world food situation; but there is one thing that we would do differently. We would try to take the burden of the cost of basic foods from off the shoulders of the weakest section of the community. I can completely contradict the economic argument that was put forward from the Government benches a few moments ago, by referring to the White Paper on National Income and Expenditure in this country, produced by the Government themselves. In that White Paper, we were told that personal consumption in Britain had fallen 1 per cent., and that people were buying a little less food, fewer durable goods and less clothing. In spite of that statement, the cost had gone up by £619 million.
We were scoffed at and scorned because we asked questions about the value of the £, but today it was revealed to us that since the present Government have been in power that value has been descending. We are praying tonight because of the cost represented by these Orders. We say that, since 5th October, butter has gone up by 6d. per lb., cooking fat by 2d. and cheese by 10d. Sugar and bacon have also risen in price. Never in history has there been such a steep jump in the basic commodities. That is why it is the duty

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of the Opposition to focus public attention on this terrific jump in costs.
Although we may not be discussing meat at the moment, perhaps I may say that no matter how the Government may struggle, there is no possibility of cheapening the price or increasing the quantity of meat until we have a forthright agricultural policy which will increase the amount of meat produced in these Islands. I grant that that may be a long-term policy, but I accuse the Government of neglecting it at the present moment.
I believe that the Opposition were right and were not frivolous in drawing public attention to the gravity of the tendency to increase in the cost of living, placing the burden ruthlessly on the shoulders of those who can bear it least. If any hon. Member on the Government side jumps up and says that it was part of Budget policy to do this and, at the same time, to increase old-age pensions and bring up the children allowances, I reply that although the Government have done that, yet scores of my constituents complain to me that the National Assistance allowance has been reduced by the same amount as the increase in their pensions, with the result that they are worse off than ever before.
This is being done at a time when a policy of deflation is being followed. In a publication called "The Director" there is an article by Paul Einzig on the policy of deflation. It says:
"It stands to reason that monetary deflation cannot be regarded as effective unless it reduces both wages and profits."
But it is reducing wages at a steeper rate than it is reducing profits. That is why the Opposition have brought on this debate. Through the incompetence of the Government we are fortunate in getting it. We have a duty to the public and to the tens of thousands of housewives who voted at the General Election for the Government because they believed that the Conservatives were telling the truth, whereas all along the line the Government intended to do what they have done.
A candidate in my area published a General Election address in which he said:
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"We have no intention of reducing the food subsidies. If we do, I assure the electorate that I will resign from Parliament on the day that it is done."
There is no doubt that many candidates, especially the younger ones, did not know that the present Government are as deep as the Bay of Biscay and as artful as a basket of monkeys. They were misled into making silly promises and making themselves look ridiculous. I shall have pleasure tonight in going into the Lobby to vote against these Orders.
7.10 p.m.
Mrs. Jean Mann: The Parliamentary Secretary, who will wind up this debate for the Government, is in a pitiable condition. All his training has taught him that the foods mentioned in these Orders are of the utmost consequence to the growth of human life. Cheese, meat, bacon and butter are the protein foods, but under these Orders they will be much less available to the majority of our people—to old-age pensioners and to growing children.
Also, our defence will suffer because the first line of defence is an A.1 nation and any doctor knows that this cannot be built on carbohydrates. We shall probably get a C.3 line of defence if, as a result of constantly increasing prices, mothers are forced to buy inferior food. We now have rationing by the purse and hon. Members opposite have introduced that era. It is well under way and soon it will be complete.
I do all my own shopping and, as I stand in the shops at the week-end, I price everything. While I am standing there I notice old-age pensioners asking for their rations. We have not yet reached the stage when we can say, "I want half a pound of so-and-so at 2s. 6d." We just ask for our ration and, when the butcher hands it over, the old-age pensioners have to ask for a certain amount to be taken off because they cannot afford to take up all their meat ration.
I am considered to be in a good position financially but I cannot afford Ayrshire bacon at 5s. 9d. a 1b., much as I would like it. Therefore, I either go without it or buy a cheaper quality at 4s. Here, again, I find that the mothers around me are not taking up their bacon ration. This must give great satisfaction to those whose purses are unlimited and

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who can take up all that is left by those who cannot afford to pay the price.
I remember the excuse given for increasing food prices. The Chancellor of the Exchequer told the House that it was most unfair that everybody should be subsidised in regard to the food they bought because there were people in the higher income groups who did not require cheaper sugar, who could well afford to pay the full price for bacon, cheese, meat and butter, and that he proposed to withdraw the subsidy and compensate the old-age pensioner and those in the lower income groups by giving them more National Assistance.
The Chancellor also said he would compensate them by increased family allowances. What did he do? Did he draw a dividing line between the upper and lower income groups and say to the £2,000 a year people, "You do not need family allowances"? No, he has given them all family allowances.
Mr. Nabarro: The hon. Lady must bear in mind that family allowances are assessable to Income Tax and Surtax and that those in the higher income groups pay back most of the family allowances. For instance, my wife draws family allowances for my children but I have to pay 3s. of the allowance back in tax.
Mrs. Mann: I do not see anything in that interruption which destroys my argument.
The Chancellor made the excuse that it was unfair to give rich and poor the food subsidies while still giving rich and poor the family allowances. Further, when he got his pound of flesh out of this section of the population, not only did he give family allowances to the higher income groups but they benefitted most from the withdrawal of food subsidies. In other words, the money saved from the poor in subsidies he gave to the rich in Income Tax allowances.
It is true that prices rose under a Labour Government, but only when the wholesale price index was against us. At the beginning of the war in Korea all prices went up. It follows naturally that when the wholesale prices rise, retail prices also rise, so the Labour Government were forced to raise retail prices. But what is the position under this Government?
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The United Nations Bulletin for Europe shows that there has been a steady decrease in wholesale prices over the first seven months of this year but, just as steadily as wholesale prices have been falling, retail prices in this country have gone up.
Looking at the United Nations Bulletin, one discovers that 18 nations out of 20 have either reduced their prices or kept them stable. One nation has increased its price index by one point, namely, the United States. Great Britain has increased her prices by seven points over that period of falling wholesale prices.
We have been told that this is to save the country from bankruptcy. Who is to save the country from bankruptcy? The women and children. They have to do without proteins to save the country from bankruptcy. The hon. Member for Edinburgh, South (Sir W. Darling) said that prices will never go down until they have first gone up. That is a warning to the women of Edinburgh to avoid certain sales that will take place in Princes Street in January. We can now decide whether those are real sale bargains or whether it is a case of prices coming down because they have first been put up.
The argument of hon. Gentlemen opposite is that they have now restored stability, that they have brought the country out of bankruptcy and, for the first time, the balance of payments is in our favour. That is not so. The Labour Government inherited a bankrupt estate—£870 million deficit on the balance of payments, with 9 million men and women who had to be put to work because they were either overseas in the Forces, in the Forces in this country, in Civil Defence or in war industry. They had to be rehabilitated. But in spite of all that, the Labour Government balanced their accounts. In the first three quarters of 1950, just before Korea, we had balanced our accounts and extended our social services.
In conclusion, the Orders against which we are praying indicate that the Government have broken all their Election pledges. All their talk of sympathy for the housewife was sheer hyocrisy. They have placed more burdens on the housewife than any Government, for there are 95 items which have been increased in price in addition to those in the Orders;

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and I think that indicates that the Government are completely bankrupt and ought to resign.
7.22 p.m.
Mr. C. W. Gibson: I should like, first to pick up some of the remarks made by the hon. Member for Edinburgh, South (Sir W. Darling), because his speech indicated quite clearly what is the general attitude of members of the Tory Party to these problems. He went as far as to say that these Orders were bringing a sense of realism into the lives of the people of this country and that the rising prices of food with which these Orders are concerned were introducing a realism which people ought to face. If the hon. Member came to a meeting of women in my constituency, and made those remarks, he would have a very rough time; and he would have a very rough time not so much in the poorest quarters but in those quarters of the Clapham constituency which are better off.
What does the hon. Gentleman mean? Does he, and do other hon. Members opposite, think that the working women of England have no sense of realism? Every time they go to the shops they must adopt a very realistic approach to their buying of goods, and it is a fact, much as it may be denied by some hon. Members, that today not all rations are taken up. I myself know of families who take all their rations but then sell them to other families where the income is a little higher. They go without butter and bacon and, in some cases, margarine.
According to the Ministry's figures, in those case the ration has been taken up, but the fact is that those families who are too poor to buy the rations for their own use have had to pass them on to another family. That is happening in a large number of cases in London, where wage rates, on the whole, apart from the mines, are on a higher level than that in other parts of the country. It is a delusion for Conservatives to imagine that all the rations of essential food are being taken up. The truth is that because of the prices which now have to be paid, an increasing amount of essential rations is not being taken up or, if the rations are purchased, they are being passed on to people who are fortunate to be a little better off.
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I want to take this question of realism a little further. I have seen this rise and fall of prices on more than one occasion, as have most hon. Members who have followed economic affairs in this country since 1900; and for 35 years I spent all my time, as a trade union official, trying to prevent wages from dropping faster than prices were dropping or trying to increase wages as fast as prices were rising. This may be some reflection on my negotiating ability, but it is a fact that, not only in my case, but in the case of all sections of the trade union movement we were never once able to raise wages as fast or as high as the cost of living rose. That is happening now. Prices are rising but wages are not rising as quickly. It is not sufficient for hon. Members to say, as the hon. Member for Edinburgh, South said, that they do not mind food prices rising because wages will follow them. They do, but they follow them a very long way behind and they never catch up.
As the Government develop their idea of a free market more and more, wages will lag further and further behind prices and, whether we like it or not, and much as some people may try to discourage it, we shall have industrial troubles all over the country, because people will not tolerate this state of affairs. I warn the Government that if they continue this policy, as apparently they will, judging from the announcement about eggs which was made today, they will find themselves faced with a very heavy bundle of industrial trouble all over the country.
There have been suggestions that these rises in prices create hardships for old age pensioners and people on sick benefits, but these are not the only people affected. All the millions of people now under-employed are affected. The House knows that the official figures reveal a great increase in the number of people working part-time and short-time. All of them are very seriously affected by any rise in food prices, and it is not sufficient to tell them that the cost-of-living index has risen only one or two points. The things which they need to buy every day in the week, and which they cannot avoid buying, have risen much more than that in price and show no sign of going down at all.
It is all very well to say that carpets, furniture and perhaps radiograms—
Miss Lee: And motor cars.
Mr. Gibson: Well, the average labourer does not use motor cars. I was trying to keep to the articles which are taken into account in building up the retail prices index.
It is no use saying that these articles are dropping in price or that the average increase in the cost-of-living index is only one or two points. The price of essential foods, all of which are affected by these Orders, has gone up very much more, and there is no sign that it will go down during the next few months. Indeed, the signs incline to point the other way.
There is another section of people on low wage rates. Perhaps I may give the House just one example. Only this morning I received a letter from a woman who wrote to tell me that her husband has recently died, that she has one son—a conscript soldier out in the Far East—and that she cannot live on her total income of £5 10s. a week. She gave me details of how that income was made up—partly by the allowances she receives through the Army from her son, a little from one of the daughters who is working and a little which she earns herself. She pays rent which for a London flat is on the low side. It is only 19s. 9d. a week and when she has met other payments she has not enough money to buy all the rations for herself and two daughters. My correspondent was complaining very bitterly and I am asking the War Office to see what they can do to supplement her pension.
There are many thousands of families of that kind in London, with an income below £6 a week. In fact, the average wage in London is not much more than that. Hundreds of thousands of families are hardly hit by the rises in food prices and we would not be doing our duty if we did not strongly oppose every time the Government brings in an Order which has the result of increasing prices.
Not only are we entitled to pray against these Orders but to point the moral that, just as this Government go on reducing food subsidies—if their Press is any indication we are threatened with further cuts in the next Budget—and just as they go on making the market easy for the profiteers, so prices will rise higher and higher and the difficulties of ordinary
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working men and women, as well as old-age pensioners and others, will be made greater. The last state of the country will be worse than it is at the moment.
What the Government ought to do is to take these Orders back and think again. They should seriously consider whether the policy of the Labour Government, of holding food prices, ought not to be adopted, so that at least we can make sure that people are able to buy the elementary necessities of life.
If that means another £150 million on the food subsidies it will be worth it, because the country would probably be saved that amount in wage increases which otherwise would be demanded. From the point of view of the economy of the country as a whole this Government, who could not hold a quorum last night in order to put through one of its first-class Bills, should realise that this policy will result in economic distress all over the country. What is worse, it will result in the breakdown of the sense of trust and belief which was built up under the Labour Government and expressed itself in the steadily increasing total production.
That has now gone very largely because many workers do not trust the Government which is now ruling us. The best thing the Government could do would be to withdraw these Orders. That would strike the imagination of millions of people whose labour, in spite of what the hon. Member for Louth (Mr. Osborne) said, produces all the wealth we enjoy. That wealth is not produced by people making profits out of the increase in the Bank rate but, as hon. Members know in their hearts, it is produced by the labour of men and women in this country.
If the Government want to retain their confidence they will do things which will help to retain it. One of the first of those things is to take active steps to reinstate the policy of the Labour Government of holding food prices so that men and women can get sufficient to live on at reasonable prices.
7.34 p.m.
The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Food (Dr. Charles Hill): Since the hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. F. Willey) opened the debate on the relatively narrow point of the £33 million of increased food costs involved in the Orders which are the subject of

531
the debate, the debate has wandered somewhat wide and even outside the general field of subsidies. I agree with him that, considering as we are today the last stage in this Budget policy, it is appropriate that we should look now, for the first time, at the policy as a whole.
Some hon. Members have criticised the policy of the Government with such intensity—the hon. Lady the Member for Coventry, South (Miss Burton) added intensity to her usual vigour and charm in addressing the House—as to suggest that the principle of reducing the level of subsidy with resultant increase in food prices was wrong. But this is not the first time that there have been substantial increases of price as a result of a lowered level of subsidy.
In the Budget of 1949 the then Chancellor made clear that prospective subsidies on his estimate were then running at £568 million a year and that in that Budget he proposed to reduce the level by £103 million, to £465 million. The following year the level became £410 million. In a period of two and a half years, under the last Administration, the cost of food as a result of subsidy changes was increased by £250 million a year. And that figure ignores the £20 million at which subsidy expenditure was running over the advertised ceiling at the time the new Government took office.
But, the significant thing I want to bring to the notice of the House is that over those two and half years, while food prices went up by £250 million, compensation in the form—
Mr. Keenan Mr. Keenan rose—
Dr. Hill: I have sat patiently throughout the debate and I want to be allowed to develop my argument.
The figure of £250 million represents the addition to food prices as a result of those changes in the subsidy ceiling. During that two and a half years of increased retail prices, compensation in the form of increased social benefits amounted to £61 million. There was £250 million added to food prices as a deliberate act of Government policy and but £61 million put on the other side of the account. I am not surprised, therefore, that some hon. Members opposite have today been seeking to discount the
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compensations which flowed from the Chancellor's Budget Speech, compensations in the form of Income Tax concessions, social security, family allowances and the like.
I want to concentrate on what I believe to be the serious and sinister suggestion which has been made by many hon. Members that this increased level of prices means that some people are unable to obtain the essential foods covered by these Orders. I want to face it quite frankly.
The hon. Lady the Member for Coat-bridge and Airdrie (Mrs. Mann) put it on a broad basis. She said, if I have her words aright, that these essential foods are less available to the majority of the people of this country. Other hon. Members narrowed the field and referred to old age pensioners. Some, like the hon. Lady and the hon. Member for Clapham (Mr. Gibson), called attention to the position of lower-paid workers as well as old age pensioners. I want to put to the House what information there is on this topic, but not because I suggest that that information will necessarily provide the complete answer.
I say straight away that these figures of uptake which have been the subject of Question and answer in the past year are, as the hon. Member for West Ham. North (Mr. Lewis) knows, figures of uptake by the retailers from the wholesalers. Let it be at once agreed that that does not necessarily reflect the position as it really is—the uptake by the purchaser from the shop. [Interruption.] Perhaps I could be spared interjections by those who have not even troubled to sit through the debate. May we look, then, at what the information is? There is some Government information in the National Food Survey, brought into operation in the days of the Coalition Government, continued and used by the previous Minister of Food and still in use today.
I wish to bring to the notice of the House what that information is, with the qualifications which must be attached to it. The first qualification is that the figures relate to the months of July and August this year. That period does not include the £33 million which is the subject of today's debate. But the hon. Member for Sunderland, North contended that this £33 million was being

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added to a heavy burden of previous additions. Subject to that, what does the Survey reveal on take-up?
The statistical method is investigation of purchases actually made. I will not weary the House with the statistical detail, which is subject to all the advantages and disadvantages of that kind of method. The community is divided into four classes—social classes, they are called for this purpose. The main criterion by which they are classified is the one of what the head of the household earns, regardless of what other earnings are there. There are four social classes—A, B, C and D. The A group consists of those households whose head earns over £13 a week; the B group those whose head earns £8 to £13 a week, the C group those from £4 10s. to £8 a week and the D group those under £4 10s. a week.
I wish to tell the House what these figures reveal, and secondly, to state what I believe to be the limitations of these figures. In the case of sugar the uptake is 100 per cent. over the whole field. In the case of bacon the uptake for all households over this period as a whole—July and August—was 96 per cent.—that is, the uptake by the consumer from the shop. In group A which is—I do not wish to use unfortunate terms like highest or lowest—the one in which the head of the household receives the largest income, the take-up is 92 per cent. It is the smallest take-up of all.
Mr. Keenan: He eats out.
Dr. Hill: I am, as I said, coming to the disadvantages of this method. Ninety-two is the percentage for bacon for class A. In class B the percentage is 96, in class C, 96, and in class D there is a full take-up. In the case of old-age pensioners, the take-up is 94 per cent. In short, the smallest take-up is in the highest income group and the biggest take-up is in the lowest income group. What does that mean? I do not wish the House to misunderstand me. I am not asserting that it means that the people in the lowest income group have plenty of money. It means that they find bacon one of the most useful of foods, being suitable for so many meals of the day.
Mr. Lewis: Will the Parliamentary Secretary allow me—?
Dr. Hill: May I finish with these figures? Wherever one looks in this scale of statistics, one finds that the uptake is not one that reflects income; there are many other influences of many kinds. The important point which I wish to bring before the House, having in mind what one hon. Member said about the danger to the physique of this country, and the assertion by the hon. Member for East Ham, North (Mr. Daines) that the danger had materialised since 15th October, is that the take-up figures for all households are in the region of 100 per cent.
In the case of bacon, although the figure fell soon after 5th October—the time when boiled ham was introduced—to below 90 per cent., it is now back at the level of 94 per cent. for the first four weeks following the increase of prices. I do not want anyone to think I am suggesting that that is the answer to the argument. What I am saying is that the facts of the case show that the uptake, as estimated by a method for which the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Bradford, Central (Mr. Webb) is as responsible as anyone, is approximately 100 per cent. even when measured for the individual customer in the shop.
Let us recognise the limitations of that argument. These foods are essential. It would still be possible for the uptake of them to be high and at the same time for persons not to be obtaining sufficient food. I admit that, but do not let us continue with this argument that the uptake is so low—somebody said that only half the ration books were being used. Let us get away from that bogus kind of argument and get down to the realities of the position.
Mr. Gibson: What about the other foods?
Dr. Hill: I shall in due course try to deal faithfully with the points raised.
There is one other general consideration which has important limitations but which at the same time is not irrelevant. My hon. Friend the Member for Dover (Mr. Arbuthnot) raised the point about expenditure in other directions—alcohol, tobacco and the like. He was subsequently accused, quite wrongly, of having suggested that old age pensioners spent their modest substance in that way. He

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was referring to the overall figures. The overall figures as expressed in millions do not mean so much as the proportion of income which people are spending under these various headings today as compared with before the war.
On looking at this calculation, based on the Monthly Digest of Statistics, I find that the percentage of money expended on food in 1938 was a tiny fraction less than 30 per cent. The percentage spent in the third quarter of this year was a fraction more than 32 per cent. The change was from just less than 30 to just more than 32. Looking at other percentages, we find that expenditure on alcohol has risen. If I may give the calculation in terms of alcohol as a whole and not as broken up in the statistics into "beer" and "other," 10.4 per cent. of income was spent on alcohol and tobacco before the war and 15.6 of income is spent on them today.
I am making no comment at this stage. I am drawing attention to the figures. Some percentages have decreased. For instance, 11 per cent. of income was spent on rent and rates before the war; that has decreased to 7.3 per cent. Taking for the moment the overall picture and leaving for a moment the groups to which reference has been made, a country which can increase its expenditure on alcohol and tobacco, whatever we may think of them, by 5 per cent. since pre-war cannot as a whole raise its hands in horror if the percentage spent on food has risen by 2 per cent. in an approach to the economic price of food.
Mr. John Baird: Tell that to the old age pensioners.
Dr. Hill: I now turn to the particular groups. The hon. Member for Sunderland, North referred to a speedy increase in the cost of living. The hon. Lady the Member for Coatbridge and Airdrie has, by a series of questions and observations, been seeking to examine the cost of living problem on the basis of the increases which have taken place in itemised foods.
There are some thousands of foods that make up the national diet, and the hon. Lady knows perfectly well that the only sensible way of assessing the cost of living is to take into account, not only
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the percentage increase in a particular food, but the amount of that food normally consumed. Those two items are brought into account in the budgetary examination related to the cost of living index.
It would be a pity if we began to assault figures which are non-party, the official figures for the cost of living, merely because we thought they were inconvenient for our purpose. Hon. Members opposite have been referring to the Conservative posters on this subject. Let me say that in my constituency the hoardings were dominated by posters seeking to pose the rhetorical question, "Whose finger is on the trigger?" That was the broad issue which hon. Members opposite sought to put across at the Election. But if we ask ourselves what has happened to the cost of living figures, we find, first of all, that from January to October of this year the increase was 4 per cent. and from January to October of last year it was 10 per cent., and we begin to see some progress towards a reduction.
But let me take the complete figures. As a separate part of the cost of living calculation, the increase in the food figures for last year—I know they are uncomfortable figures for right hon. and hon. Members opposite, but let them listen—was approximately 13 per cent. and the increase this year, despite the deliberate addition by the subsidy policy of £101 million to the cost of food figures, is not 13 per cent., but 8 per cent.
Mr. Willey: Give the wage rates.
Dr. Hill: The question of world prices was raised by the hon. Lady. If we were paying economic prices for our food in this country, of course they would change with the changing level of world prices but one of the troubles is, and has been, that we are insulated from the movement of world prices by this artificial structure.
I pass now to a very serious point put by hon. Members opposite, who suggested that the levels of nutrition were in danger. What are the facts? Let us separate the emotion which surrounds the topic from the actual facts. The hon. Member for Sunderland, North quoted Lord Boyd-Orr as president of the Central Council for Health Education. I happen to be the vice-president and a former chairman of that body, and so I am acquainted with it. What is more,

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despite all the boisterous exchanges which are the political currency of this House, I am sincerely interested in the maintenance of proper nutritional standards in this country, and I have looked into this question of where lies the greatest danger.
It may hurt the feelings of some, but the greatest danger for the last few years, and it still exists in a measure today, has not been in the field of the old age pensioner, but in the field of the large family. That is the situation. I am well aware, and I am glad that the hon. Gentleman made the quotation he did, that to be satisfied by a scientific minimum is not necessarily to be nutritionally delighted or digestively well. In the case of old age pensioners, in so far as this objective investigation has been undertaken as part of the National Food Survey, which is outside politics, their position is sufficient. I hope that the hon. Lady will not misunderstand me. I am not saying it is a delightful position. I am talking in the limited field of scientific necessity, and no more. The danger, in so far as it is a danger, lies with the large family, as has always been the case, and it will no doubt remain with us.
I am not going into the level of Unemployment Insurance or National Assistance standards, for that would be outside the scope of this debate. But in so far as there has been this year an increase in the average cost of rationed food at a level of slightly less than 1s. 6d. per ration book, these figures must be viewed side by side with the increased benefits which have gone precisely to those groups which have been the subject of representations here today. [An HON. MEMBER: "You should be among them."] I am not going to compete with hon. Members in the poverty of one's upbringing, but I should not be very far behind them in such a competition. It is not for hon. Members opposite to pretend that they are the providential depository of all the humanitarian feelings. That is utter nonsense.
The benefits which have found their way to the needy few have been the expression of a sound policy of allowing the people themselves to spend their money in their own way; and to make certain, not that everybody consumes all the food that he or she needs—for there is no way of securing that—but that no
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one is prevented by lack of money from obtaining the food which, on grounds of strength, they need. It would be wicked—[HON. MEMBERS: "What are the facts?"] I have recited the facts, and if hon. Gentlemen had been present throughout the debate they would have heard a few more.
I have recited the facts upon which I base the statement that there is no evidence of people not being able to take up their rations. There is no evidence of any decline in nutritional standards. There is evidence of a determined desire on the part of Her Majesty's Opposition to focus their attention on increased food prices; to deny the existence, or minimise the effect, of the compensation involved, and above all, to seek on this and every other occasion to deny their own responsibility for the trouble in which this country was found to be a year ago.
7.58 p.m.
Mr. Maurice Webb: I hope I shall not be misunderstood by hon. Members on either side of the House if I express the personal view that it is a good thing that we have spent today not debating iron and steel, but the very important subject of food prices. After all, as I think hon. Members on both sides of the House will agree, we cannot get iron and steel without food. The people who make the iron and steel are themselves the people who want more food than anybody else in order to be able to produce it. One of the great, practical problems before any Government of this country is how we can manage to feed our people adequately so that they can do their job and help to pay our way and enable us to keep our books balanced.
I suggest that each of these Orders against which we are praying is an imposition on the least protected members of the community. That is why we are praying against them. Each of these Orders—we are discussing six at the moment—is a definite, open breach of the pledges on which the Government secured their present tenuous hold on power in this House. Had I fought the Election on the implied and explicit pledges made by hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite I should have been ashamed to have put my name to any one of these Orders.

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But it is not surprising that they have done so. These Orders are a revelation of the real outlook of the party opposite. They are an expression of their theory. Their theory is a very simple one, and these Orders make it clear. They say, "Let the purse determine the price." The phrase has been used during this debate, and it has been used frequently outside the House by spokesmen of the party opposite, that it is time that we let prices resume their natural level. What does that phrase mean? How would it be applied?
Are the party opposite prepared to take this doctrine and, for example, let the price of produce to farmers assume its natural level? Are they prepared to take away any kind of subvention at all that has been used in the modern world to maintain our economy? If they are really in earnest about this, if they think that a free market is the thing that works, all right; that is logical and clear, let us accept it. But that means going back on all their friends and all the people who returned them to power in this House.
At this moment we are facing everywhere in our modern economy subventions and subsidies of all kinds. There is hardly a single element in our economic life where the question of subsidy is not an important factor in the determination of costs, of wages and prices and of the general organisation of our industry. Therefore, it is humbug and nonsense to come here and say, "We want prices to return to their natural level." Anybody in his senses knows that if that were to be allowed to happen without any safeguards at all the whole of our economy would fall into utter ruin within a space of a few months.
What are we to do? I believe that subsidies are an essential element in any kind of modern economic organisation, not only because of their immediate advantages to the people affected by them, whether they be farmers, old-age pensioners, workers or producers of any kind. I believe that in any community where there is bound to be a large degree of State intervention subsidies are an essential economic shock absorber. They are an indispensable element in any form of planning, whether it be a limited or a large amount of planning.
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They enable the Chancellor of the day, whatever his politics, to insulate this island against all sorts of hazards and risks that arise in the outside world from factors which cannot be foreseen. I should want to maintain subsidies of some sort, on the most appropriate level for that purpose, as a shock absorber in our society to enable us to avoid those pressures which force up prices and lead to demands for wage increases, and so on. That is the policy that we tried to carry out, but this Government have gone back on that policy. They have decided to proceed with the demolition of our conception of organising our economic life in that way.
I wonder if they realise the grave consequences which might arise. The trouble is to detect what is the Government's claim. I am as anxious as the Parliamentary Secretary to arrive at the truth about this matter. The issues are so desperately serious that none of us can afford to be under any illusion. We really must arrive at the truth. I am in the dilemma that I cannot understand what is the Government's claim about their underlying economic policy.
Judging from the speeches which we have heard during this debate, and from speeches made by the Chancellor of the Exchequer and many others, two claims are being made. Those claims conflict. The first claim is that this Government have stopped what is called the rake's progress under Labour; that they have stepped in and prevented the waste of our resources; that they have done their utmost to save us from bankruptcy and the precipice—the Gadarene swine and all that kind of language was used—by deliberately cutting down consumption, deliberately, by certain conscious acts, reducing the amount of consumption that went on in this country. That is one claim.
At the same time, they make the claim, which we have heard again today, that everybody is better off, that nobody at all has suffered from these cuts in consumption. These two claims do not make sense. One of them is right. Both cannot be right. Either they have cut consumption and somebody has suffered or they have not cut consumption and nobody has suffered. The Government cannot continue to argue on both

541
premises as they have done in this debate.
I tried to probe behind this mystery of propaganda to arrive at the truth. The truth, on whatever facts are available to those of us who care to examine them, is that many people are worse off and that, in fact, the first premise of the Government is correct. They have deliberately cut down consumption. They have, by deliberate action, stopped certain people from enjoying certain goods and services; but the people who have been denied those goods and services are the least protected and the most helpless people in the community.
That is our case against the Government. I do not want to follow the Parliamentary Secretary in his dazzling array of figures. I should like him to come to Bradford and tell the same story to the housewives there.
Dr. Hill: I am coming soon.
Mr. Webb: Good. I hope we shall meet. I shall take the hon. Gentleman to some households where I hope that he will repeat some of the remarks that he has made tonight. I know what, in blunt Yorkshire, they will say to him about those figures.
The plain truth is that the average family of anything from three to four, earning up to £700 or £800 a year, is worse off now, in some cases much more worse off, than anybody anticipated. It must be so if the Government's claim to have cut consumption and to have stopped the rake's progress is substantiated.
Dr. Hill: The figures which I used were related to the consumption of the rationed and subsidised foods. It would be possible for those foods to be taken up and for people still to be worse off in other directions. My argument was directed to the rations.
Mr. Webb: I follow the point, but I think the hon. Gentleman will agree that the flow or take-up of rationed goods does, in fact, give a fairly clear reflection of the general flow of goods and services throughout our economy. Therefore, I see no point in that.
What we have to face is the fact that there has been a very big cut in consumption. Buying has ceased in very many
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quarters. I have had complaints from grocers, butchers and other people. The butchers were never on my side at all until I moved from that side of the House to this, and now they are writing me letters pleading for me to do my utmost to get back to the place I left.
What is the cause of that? They are complaining that they are now losing the trade which they had in the old days when we were in office. The point is that these cuts which have taken place and these restrictions which have been imposed have had their effect in the homes of those who have most need, in the homes of those who would require more of our protection in order to do more of the work that is needed in order that we should pay our way. That is our major complaint.
Now I come to some of the speeches which have been made on this issue. I think the most engaging speech we have had today was that from the hon. Baronet the Member for Edinburgh, South (Sir W. Darling), who gave us—[An HON. MEMBER: "He is not an hon. Baronet."] I am sorry; it appears I am a prophet, merely anticipating events. I do not want to engage in a discussion with the hon. Gentleman about dripping. He gave us a graphic account of the value of dripping, with which I agree, but he did announce a most extraordinary doctrine.
I hope I have his words correctly, as I took them down at the time. The hon. Gentleman said "Prices will never come down until they go up." What does that mean? How much, and how long? When do they come down? To what point will they come down? Who organises the coming down? Who carries the burden while they are going up? Having left us that proposition, surely the hon. Gentleman must indicate how far he proposes the country should be taken on that particular doctrine.
Sir W. Darling: I am obliged to the right hon. Gentleman for giving way. I put forward the proposition that, if prices rose very sharply, the number of producers who would be attracted to the market would also rise, and that the more producers there are who go into the market, the more will prices, therefore, fall. If the right hon. Gentleman has no experience of the higgling of the market, I can tell him that I have and that most of us on this side have.
Mr. Webb: We all have a great affection for the hon. Gentleman, but, really, he does belong to a bygone age. After all this talk about the higgling of the market and all the rest, would he expect me to believe that the present Chancellor of the Exchequer believes in that doctrine, and that he is prepared to throw open all the resources of this country to the higgling of the market? Is that the Conservative Party doctrine? We must know where they are, but the hon. Gentleman must not expect us to take that kind of idea seriously.
May I now come to the hon. Member for Louth (Mr. Osborne), who is a most extraordinary man? The hon. Gentleman says a number of things that are really very foolish, but, on the question of food, I am bound to say that he has spoken with much more sense than most people on his side of the House. At least, he has recognised, and I give him credit for recognising, the basic problem—the fundamental shortage of food in the world. The hon. Gentleman has taken great trouble to explain to his constituents, and to the country as a whole, how difficult it will be for this country to earn its living, in terms of food, because of the growing demands on food.
We on this side of the House appreciate what he has done in that direction, but I really cannot understand, if he takes that point of view and believes it, as I am sure he does, the kind of argument which he has put up in this debate today. If he takes that point of view, he should be on this side of the House, voting with us against these Orders, because, given this fundamental shortage, given this dilemma that he knows about, surely it is the duty of any responsible Government to make sure that there are fair shares and these Orders do, in fact, destroy the mechanism which we created for fair shares.
Mr. Osborne: I have always said, and I say tonight, that it is the duty of any Government to see that the least fortunate are properly looked after, and I think that has been agreed on both sides of the House, and that the social conscience of the nation has moved to that point. I agree with him on that.
On the second point, because there is a world shortage, because the world population is growing, because we are finding it difficult to get as great a share
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of this smaller amount which is available in world markets, we have, therefore, to say to our people all the time that the problem of food will be the greatest problem facing us, no matter who governs us. We shall never get the people to realise the gravity of that problem and make the effort that is required while we cushion them too much. I say that, as realists, we should slowly relieve this protection and adopt a realistic policy on food prices.
Mr. Webb: I leave the hon. Gentleman to his own conscience to work all that out. Frankly, I do not follow him myself.
Now I come to the speech of the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Food, who put the case for the Government. It is very difficult to know where to raise the essential points about his argument, because he was so very plausible about so many things, but the simple point that I would want to put to him is this.
Does he really believe that everything that he has stood for, in the way of an advanced, progressive nutritional policy, the adequate feeding of the people, the protection of the more helpless sections of the community, such as invalids and the children, and all that kind of thing, in which, I am sure, the hon. Gentleman sincerely believes, is really being advanced by such announcements as, for example, that about the de-rationing of eggs which took place today? Does he really believe that? If he does not, what is he doing in this Government?
I do not want to press the hon. Gentleman unduly, but these matters must make logic in the end. If he really does believe that that is the best way, given the limited circumstances and resources of this country, which he admits, because that is the situation, he really must agree that there ought to be some conscious direction of the way in which it should be done. He should be opposed to rationing by the purse and to depriving people of eggs because the price has gone up. He should be fighting that kind of thing, and, quite frankly, I do not understand where he is drifting. Or is he now taking a cynical view about it all, and has thrown in his hand and is hoping for the best? I do not know. For my part, I am not at all dismayed by the dazzling jugglery of figures which he presented to the House, because it does not convince anybody at all.

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The fact is that very many millions of homes, by the deliberate act of the Government, are having less food today than they ought to have. That is the simple fact; and there is no escape from it. Whatever figures we produce—and we can go on arguing about it—that is the simple fact. I think that that is wrong, and these Orders are directed to secure that. Every step taken by the present Minister of Food has been a step calculated to dismantle the system of rationing and controls and fair shares in order to secure cuts in consumption by the power of the purse. That has happened over the last 12 months, and there is no escape from the simple logic of that argument.
The hon. Gentleman tried to make a great point about increases in prices. He did not tell the House he was talking about comparative increases in wholesale prices.
Dr. Hill: I was not. I was talking about retail prices.
Mr. Webb: All right. I misunderstood the hon. Gentleman, but the simple fact is that the prices he gave prove my point. When we were in office world prices for the buying of food advanced much more rapidly than they have done in the last 12 months; on the figures that he gave world prices of food, although they are still advancing—and they are bound to advance, because that is one of the inescapable facts of life—are not advancing at the same rate.
What he did not say was that, although we had to deal with a much heavier burden of prices of that sort, we were able to hold the price to the housewife much more successfully than has been the case with the present Government. In
fact, if the Minister had so willed, if he had been able to secure the co-operation of the Treasury, he might have reduced the price of food because he was able to buy food at lower prices than we were able to buy it at that time, and I see no logic, no sense, in the argument on the lines presented by the hon. Gentleman.
We could go on at great length discussing these matters. All I want to say, in conclusion, is that we on this side of the House do not believe in rations and controls for their own sake. We believe that in the modern world they are an indispensable element in any proper organisation of civilised society—certainly, for a country like our own, with such limited resources, having to bargain in a world where demand is constantly increasing, and supplies, if not decreasing, are not keeping pace with the increase in demand.
We believe that it is essential, if we are to maintain the stability of our economy, to retain those controls and those forms of rationing which ensure, broadly, fair shares for all our people. On that basis we stand, and it is because we believe that these Orders are a deliberate departure from that basis that we oppose them, and I would advise my hon. Friends to vote against these Orders.
We do not propose to go through the whole series. We have had a very general debate on six Orders, and we can take the first. But let that be, as I hope we shall regard it, an exhibition of our opposition—our intense and sincere opposition—to what we regard as a retrograde step by the Government.
Question put.
The House divided: Ayes, 208; Noes, 234.

Division No. 19.]

AYES

[8.25 p.m.

Acland, Sir Richard

Blyton, W. R.

Clunie, J.

Allen, Arthur (Bosworth)

Boardman, H.

Coldrick, W.

Anderson, Alexander (Motherwell)

Bottomley, Rt. Hon. A. G.

Collick, P. H.

Anderson, Frank (Whitehaven)

Bowden, H. W.

Craddock, George (Bradford, S.)

Awbery, S. S.

Bowles, F. G.

Crosland, C. A. R.

Bacon, Miss Alice

Braddock, Mrs. Elizabeth

Daines, P.

Baird, J.

Brockway, A. F.

Gallon, Rt. Hon. H.

Balfour, A.

Brook, Dryden (Halifax)

Davies, A. Edward (Stoke, N.)

Bence, C. R.

Brown, Rt. Hon. George (Belper)

Davies, Harold (Leek)

Benn, Wedgwood

Brown, Thomas (Ince)

de Freitas, Geoffrey

Benson, G.

Burke, W. A.

Deer, G.

Beswick, F.

Burton, Miss F. E.

Delargy, H. J.

Bevan, Rt. Hon. A. (Ebbw Vale)

Callaghan, L. J.

Dodds, N. N.

Bing, G. H. C.

Champion, A. J.

Driberg, T. E. N.

Blackburn, F.

Chapman, W. D.

Ede, Rt. Hon. J. C.

Blenkinsop, A.

Chetwynd, G. R.

Edwards, John (Brighouse)

Edwards, Rt. Hon. Ness (Caerphilly)

Kinley, J.

Robinson, Kenneth (St. Pancras, N.)

Evans, Albert (Islington, S. W.)

Lee, Frederick (Newton)

Ross, William

Evans, Edward (Lowestoft)

Lee, Miss Jennie (Cannock)

Schofield, S. (Barnsley)

Evans, Stanley (Wednesbury)

Lever, Leslie (Ardwick)

Shackleton, E. A. A.

Ewart, R.

Lewis, Arthur

Shinwell, Rt. Hon. E.

Fernyhough, E.

Logan, D. G.

Short, E. W.

Field, W. J.

MacColl, J. E.

Shurmer, P. L. E.

Finch, H. J.

McGhee, H. G.

Silverman, Julius (Erdington)

Follick, M.

McInnes, J.

Silverman, Sydney (Nelson)

Foot, M. M.

McKay, John (Wallsend)

Simmons, C. J. (Brierley Hill)

Fraser, Thomas (Hamilton)

McLeavy, F.

Slater, J.

Gibson, C. W.

MacMillan, M. K. (Western Isles)

Smith, Norman (Nottingham, S.)

Greenwood, Anthony (Rossendale)

MacPherson, Malcolm (Stirling)

Snow, J. W.

Greenwood, Rt. Hn. Arthur (Wakefield)

Mainwaring, W. H.

Sorensen, R. W.

Grenfell, Rt. Hon. D. R.

Mallalieu, J. P. W. (Huddersfield, E.)

Soskice, Rt. Hon. Sir Frank

Grey, C. F.

Mann, Mrs. Jean

Sparks, J. A.

Griffiths, David (Rother Valley)

Manuel, A. C.

Steele, T.

Griffiths, Rt. Hon. James (Llanelly)

Marquand, Rt. Hon. H. A.

Stross, Dr. Barnett

Griffiths, William (Exchange)

Mellish, R. J.

Summerskill, Rt. Hon. E.

Hale, Leslie (Oldham, W.)

Mikardo, Ian

Hall, Rt. Hon. Glenvil (Colne Valley)

Mitchison, G. R.

Sylvester, G. O.

Hall, John (Gateshead, W.)

Moody, A. S.

Taylor, Bernard (Mansfield)

Hamilton, W. W.

Morgan, Dr. H. B. W.

Taylor, John (West Lothian)

Hannan, W.

Morley, R.

Thomas, David (Aberdare)

Hargreaves, A.

Morris, Percy (Swansea, W.)

Thomas, George (Cardiff)

Harrison, J. (Nottingham, E.)

Morrison, Rt. Hon. H. (Lewisham, S.)

Thomas, Iorwerth (Rhondda, W.)

Hayman, F. H.

Mort, D. L.

Thomas, Ivor Owen (Wrekin)

Healey, Denis (Leeds, S. E.)

Moyle, A.

Thomson, George (Dundee, E.)

Henderson, Rt. Hon. A. (Rowley Regis)

Mulley, F. W.

Timmons, J.

Herbison, Miss M.

Murray, J. D.

Tomney, F.

Hobson, C. R.

Nally, W.

Viant, S. P.

Holman, P.

Neal, Harold (Bolsover)

Wallace, H. W.

Holmes, Horace (Hemsworth)

O'Brien, T.

Watkins, T. E.

Hubbard, T. F.

Oldfield, W. H.

Webb, Rt. Hon. M. (Bradford, C.)

Hudson, James (Ealing, N.)

Oliver, G. H.

Wells, Percy (Faversham)

Hughes, Cledwyn (Anglesey)

Orbach, M.

West, D. G.

Hughes, Emrys (S. Ayrshire)

Oswald, T.

Wheatley, Rt. Hon. John

Hynd, H. (Accrington)

Padley, W. E.

White, Henry (Derbyshire, N. E.)

Hynd, J. B. (Attercliffe)

Paling, Rt. Hon. W. (Dearn Valley)

Whiteley, Rt. Hon. W.

Irvine, A. J. (Edge Hill)

Paling, Will T. (Dewsbury)

Wigg, George

Irving, W. J. (Wood Green)

Palmer, A. M. F.

Wilcock, Group Capt. C. A. B.

Isaacs, Rt. Hon. G. A.

Pannell, Charles

Wilkins, W. A.

Jay, Rt. Hon. D. P. T.

Parker, J.

Willey, F. T.

Jeger, George (Goole)

Pearson, A.

Williams, David (Neath)

Jeger, Dr. Santo (St. Pancras, S.)

Plummer, Sir Leslie

Williams, Ronald (Wigan)

Jenkins, R. H. (Stechford)

Poole, C. C.

Williams, W. R. (Droylsden)

Johnston, Douglas (Paisley)

Popplewell, E.

Wilson, Rt. Hon. Harold (Huyton)

Jones, David (Hartlepool)

Porter, G.

Winterbottom, Ian (Nottingham, C.)

Jones, Frederick Elwyn (West Ham, S.)

Price, Joseph T. (Westhoughten)

Winterbottom, Richard (Brightside)

Jones, Jack (Rotherham)

Price, Philips (Gloucestershire, W.)

Woodburn, Rt. Hon. A.

Jones, T. W. (Merioneth)

Proctor, W. T.

Yates, V. F.

Keenan, W.

Reid, Thomas (Swindon)

Kenyon, C.

Rhodes, H.

TELLERS FOR THE AYES:

Key, Rt. Hon. C. W.

Richards, R.

Mr. Royle and Mr. James Johnson.

King, Dr. H. M.

Roberts, Albert (Normanton)

NOES

Aitken, W. T.

Boyle, Sir Edward

Cuthbert, W. N.

Allan, R. A. (Paddington, S.)

Braine, B. R.

Darling, Sir William (Edinburgh, S.)

Alport, C. J. M.

Braithwaite, Sir Albert (Harrow, W.)

Davidson, Viscountess

Anstruther-Gray, Major W. J.

Braithwaite, Lt.-Cdr. G. (Bristol, N. W.)

Deedes, W. F.

Arbuthnot, John

Brooke, Henry (Hampstead)

Dodds-Parker, A. D.

Ashton, H. (Chelmsford)

Buchan-Hepburn, Rt. Hon. P. G. T.

Donaldson, Cmdr. C. E. McA.

Assheton, Rt. Hon. R. (Blackburn, W.)

Bullard, D. G.

Donner, P. W.

Astor, Hon. J. J.

Bullus, Wing Commander E. E.

Doughty, C. J. A.

Baker, P. A. D.

Burden, F. F. A.

Douglas Hamilton, Lord Malcolm

Baldwin, A. E.

Butcher, H. W.

Drayson, G. B.

Banks, Col. C.

Campbell, Sir David

Drewe, G.

Barber, Anthony

Carr, Robert (Mitcham)

Dugdale, Rt. Hn. Sir Thomas (Richmond)

Barlow, Sir John

Carson, Hon. E.

Duncan, Capt. J. A. L.

Baxter, A. B.

Cary, Sir Robert

Duthie, W. S.

Beach, Maj. Hicks

Channon, H.

Eccles, Rt. Hon. D. M.

Bell, Philip (Bolton, E.)

Clarke, Col. Ralph (East Grinstead)

Elliot, Rt. Hon. W. E.

Bell, Ronald (Bucks, S.)

Clarke, Brig. Terence (Portsmouth, W.)

Fell, A.

Bennett, F. M. (Reading, N.)

Clyde, Rt. Hon. J. L.

Finlay, Graeme

Bennett, Sir Peter (Edgbaston)

Colegate, W. A.

Fisher, Nigel

Bennett, William (Woodside)

Conant, Maj. R. J. E.

Fleetwood-Hesketh, R. F.

Bevins, J. R. (Toxteth)

Cooper-Key, E. M.

Fletcher-Cooke, C.

Birch, Nigel

Craddock, Beresford (Spelthorne)

Fraser, Sir Ian (Morecambe & Lansdale)

Bishop, F. P.

Cranborne, Viscount

Galbraith, Cmdr. T. D. (Pollok)

Black, C. W.

Crookshank, Capt. Rt. Hon. H. F. C.

Galbraith, T. G. D. (Hillhead)

Bossom, A. C.

Crosthwaite-Eyre, Col. O. E.

Godber, J. B.

Boyd-Carpenter, J. A.

Crouch, R. F.

Gomme-Duncan, Col. A.

548

549

Gough, C. F. H.

McCallum, Major D.

Robinson, Roland (Blackpool, S.)

Gower, H. R.

McCorquodale, Rt. Hon. M. S.

Robson-Brown, W.

Graham, Sir Fergus

Macdonald, Sir Peter (I. of Wight)

Roper, Sir Harold

Gridley, Sir Arnold

Mackeson, Brig. H. R.

Ropner, Col. Sir Leonard

Grimond, J.

McKibbin, A. J.

Russell, R. S.

Grimston, Hon. John (St. Albans)

McKie, J. H. (Galloway)

Ryder, Capt. R. E. D.

Grimston, Sir Robert (Westbury)

Maclean, Fitzroy

Savory, Prof. Sir Douglas

Hall, John (Wycombe)

Macleod, Rt. Hon. Iain (Enfield, W.)

Schofield, Lt.-Col. W. (Rochdale)

Harden, J. R. E.

Macmillan, Rt. Hon. Harold (Bromley)

Scott, R. Donald

Hare, Hon. J. H.

Macpherson, Maj. Niall (Dumfries)

Scott-Miller, Cmdr. R.

Harris, Frederic (Croydon, N.)

Maitland, Comdr. J. F. W. (Horncastle)

Shepherd, William

Harris, Reader (Heston)

Maitland, Patrick (Lanark)

Simon, J. E. S. (Middlesbrough, W.)

Harrison, Col. J. H. (Eye)

Manningham-Buller, Sir R. E.

Smiles, Lt -Col. Sir Walter

Harvey, Air Cdre. A. V. (Macclesfield)

Marlowe, A. A. H.

Smithers, Peter (Winchester)

Harvey, Ian (Harrow, E.)

Harpies, A. E.

Smithers, Sir Waldron (Orpington)

Hay, John

Marshall, Douglas (Bodmin)

Soames, Capt. C.

Heath, Edward

Marshall, Sir Sidney (Sutton)

Spearman, A. C. M.

Henderson, John (Cathcart)

Maude, Angus

Speir, R. M.

Higgs, J. M. C.

Maydon, Lt.-Comdr. S. L. C.

Spence, H. R. (Aberdeenshire, W.)

Hill, Dr. Charles (Luton)

Medlicott, Brig. F.

Spens, Sir Patrick (Kensington, S.)

Hill, Mrs. E. (Wythenshawe)

Mellor, Sir John

Stanley, Capt Hon Richard

Hirst, Geoffrey

Molson, A. H. E.

Stevens, G. P.

Holland-Martin, C. J.

Morrison, John (Salisbury)

Hollis, M. C.

Nabarro, G. D. N.

Steward, W. A. (Woolwich, W.)

Holt, A. F.

Nicholls, Harmar

Storey, S.

Hornsby-Smith, Miss M. P.

Nicholson, Godfrey (Farnham)

Strauss, Henry (Norwich, S.)

Horobin, I. M.

Nicolson, Nigel (Bournemouth, E.)

Summers, G. S.

Horsbrugh, Rt. Hon. Florence

Noble, Cmdr. A. H. P.

Taylor, Charles (Eastbourne)

Howard, Gerald (Cambridgeshire)

Nugent, G. R. H.

Taylor, William (Bradford, N.)

Hudson, Sir Austin (Lewisham, N.)

Oakshott, H. D.

Teeling, W.

Hudson, W. R. A (Hull, N.)

Odey, G. W.

Thompson, Kenneth (Walton)

Hulbert, Wing Cdr. N. J.

O'Neill, Phelim (Co. Antrim, N.)

Thompson, Lt -Cdr. R. (Croydon, W)

Hutchinson, Sir Geoffrey (Ilford, N.)

Ormsby-Gore, Hon. W. D.

Thornton-Kemsley, Col C. N.

Hutchison, Lt.-Com. Clark (E'b'rgh W.)

Orr, Capt. L. P. S.

Tilney, John

Hutchison, James (Scotstoun)

Orr-Ewing, Ian L. (Weston-super-Mare)

Touche, Sir Gordon

Hylton-Foster, H. B. H.

Osborne, C.

Turner, H. F. L.

Jenkins, Robert (Dulwich)

Partridge, E.

Turton, R. H.

Jennings, R.

Peake, Rt. Hon. O.

Vaughan-Morgan, J. K.

Johnson, Eric (Blackley)

Perkins, W. R. D.

Vosper, D. F.

Kaberry, D.

Peto, Brig. C. H. M.

Wade, D. W.

Lambert, Hon. G.

Peyton, J. W. W.

Ward, Hon George (Worcester)

Lambton, Viscount

Pilkington, Capt. R. A.

Ward, Miss I. (Tynemouth)

Lancaster, Col. C. G.

Powell, J. Enoch

Waterhouse, Capt. Rt. Hon. C.

Langford-Holt, J. A.

Price, Henry (Lewisham, W.)

Webbe, Sir H. (London & Westminster)

Leather, E. H. C.

Prior-Palmer, Brig. O. L.

White, Baker (Canterbury)

Legge-Bourke, Maj. E A. H.

Profumo, J. D.

Williams, Rt. Hon. Charles (Torquay)

Legh, P. R. (Petersfield)

Raikes, H. V.

Williams, Gerald (Tonbridge)

Linstead, H. N.

Rayner, Brig. R.

Williams, Sir Herbert (Croydon, E.)

Lloyd, Maj. Guy (Renfrew, E.)

Redmayne, M.

Williams, R. Dudley (Exeter)

Longden, Gilbert

Remnant, Hon. P.

Wilson, Geoffrey (Truro)

Lucas, Sir Jocelyn (Portsmouth, S.)

Renton, D. L. M.

Wood, Hon. R.

Lucas, P. B. (Brentford)

Roberts, Peter (Heeley)

Lucas-Tooth, Sir Hugh

Robertson, Sir David

TELLERS FOR THE NOES:

Mr. Studholme and Mr. Wills.

Question put, and agreed to.

BUTTER AND MEAT RATIONS
8.35 p.m.
Mr. Frederick Willey: I beg to move
That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, praying that the Fats and Cheese (Rationing) Order, 1952 (S.I., 1952. No. 1778), dated 2nd October, 1952, a copy of which was laid before this House on 3rd October, 1952, in the last Session of Parliament, be annulled.
I think that it might be for the convenience of the House if we took together this Prayer and the following Prayer, which seeks to annul the Meat (Rationing) (Amendment No. 6) Order, and had a general debate upon the two matters.
I wish to raise, on the first Prayer, the question of our butter supplies. This Order provided for a reduction in the ration from 3 oz. to 2 oz.—a reduction which became effective on 10th August, and which at the time was described by the Ministry as a temporary reduction of the butter ration. When, on 22nd October, 1952, I called attention to the persistence of the reduced ration, and asked when was the last occasion on which a 2 oz. butter ration was continued as long as the present 2 oz. ration had so far continued, the Minister replied:
"Throughout the period from 30th June, 1941, to 11th November, 1945, but it was 2 oz. for two substantial periods in 1946–1948."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 22nd October, 1952; Vol. 505, c. 113.]
That is grossly misleading. In fact, we had a reduced butter ration of 2 oz. for the first three days of January only, in 1948. I think that it is unfortunate that such a reply should have been given, because it is obviously misleading us as to the true position.
When the butter ration is increased, as it shortly will be, we shall then have been on a 2 oz. ration for 16 weeks. That will compare, if we refer to the last occasion on which our attention was called to this by the Minister, with the two periods—30th October to 8th December, 1946, and 9th November, 1947, to 4th January, 1948. It is clear from this that the last occasion on which we had a 2 oz. butter ration in this country was no less than five years ago. On the last two occasions the 2 oz. ration did not persist even then for 16 weeks; it persisted for only eight weeks. I think the
552
Parliamentary Secretary will agree that an explanation is due from him to the House because, at the time when the last Government went out of office, we had established a supply position in which the normal ration was accepted as being 4 oz. and, in fact, on occasion, ran up to 5 oz.
Since the present Government have been in office we have had a 3 oz., then a 2 oz. and now, again, a 3 oz. ration. I gather that the explanation from the Ministry is that this is due to supply difficulties at the principal sources of supply, aggravated in the case of Australia by drought, and in the case of Denmark, not by the reasons given by the hon. Member for Louth (Mr. Osborne), but by reasons which, according to the Minister, are connected with the domestic economy of Denmark and foot-and-mouth disease ravages in Denmark.
Practically all our butter comes from New Zealand, Australia, Denmark and Holland. The supply position revealed by the latest figures—the House should accept it as a serious one—is that, whereas, in the first 10 months of 1951, we imported 5,472,000 cwt., in the corresponding period this year we imported only 4,171,000 cwt., a very serious decline. The biggest and most drastic fall was in the amount imported from Holland and Australia. Whereas, in 1951, we imported 269,000 cwt. from Holland, this year we imported only 150,000 cwt., and whereas we imported from Australia, in the first 10 months of last year, 657,000 cwt., in the corresponding period this year we imported only 127,000 cwt.
The interesting thing—it is to this that the Parliamentary Secretary should direct his reply—is that in the case of New Zealand and Denmark we are obliged by present bulk purchase contracts to take, in one case, 90 per cent. and, in the other case, 75 per cent. of their exportable surplus, but in the case of Australia and Holland the quantity is arrived at each year. I want to know whether this circumstance has affected the supplies from those countries; in other words, whether we are prejudiced by not having with Australia and Holland long-term bulk purchase contracts similar to those which we have with New Zealand and Denmark?

553
Another point that I wish to put to the Parliamentary Secretary—I know the difficulties, but he should tell us what the position is—is that before the war we imported from Baltic countries and Eastern Europe, and I want to know whether there is any prospect of our again getting butter imports from those sources.
As this is a general Order, the Parliamentary Secretary ought to tell us why the margarine ration has not been increased to a greater extent. There has been an increase in the world of the production of oils and fats over the last 12 months and the prices of vegetable oils have fallen considerably. As a good housekeeper for the nation, the Ministry ought to have increased the purchases of oils and fats to make up the deficiency on the butter by increasing the margarine ration.
Finally, on butter—this point was often put to me when I occupied the Parliamentary Secretary's position; I do not suggest that it is very relevant to the ration itself, but it is something about which he should give us an account—I want the hon. Gentleman to explain why, while we have been on the exceptionally reduced butter ration, we have doubled our exports of butter. That seems a very silly thing to do. It is true that this is a marginal amount of 14,000 cwt., but the increase in the export of butter while we have had the exceptionally low ration is more than double all the butter we have had from the Irish Republic during that time. We are entitled to an explanation from the Parliamentary Secretary.
The second Order reduced the meat ration from 2s. 2d. to 2s. I agree that this is a historical matter, for there has now been a further reduction to 1s. 8d. It is the bounden duty of the Parliamentary Secretary to give the House an explanation about the supply position. It appears that this quarter we shall have consumed less meat than we did in the same period last year and it is certain that we shall have consumed considerably less meat than we did in the corresponding period in 1950.
The intriguing thing is that if we look backwards it appears, under this Order, that the ration has been a trifle above the ration last year while the consumption has been a little below it. This was referred to in the House in a reply which the Minister gave recently. I do not
554
want to continue the discussion we were having on the previous Prayers, but the Parliamentary Secretary should address himself to the question of what is he doing now that the consumption of meat is beginning to fall below the ration entitlement. This is a price ration, and I think it is relevant to ask the hon. Gentleman what consideration the Ministry are giving to this?
But the main point I want to raise is the question of supplies. Home production is much better but the Parliamentary Secretary is too modest to claim any credit for that. The increase in meat production has been due to the action taken by the previous Government. I wanted to say a few words about our imported supplies. Recently, the question was raised of the Ministry losing supplies because those supplies were slipping into manufactured meat. In other words, this meat was taken off the ration.
A serious allegation was made that this slipping of ration meat into manufactured meat was seriously affecting supplies from our main supply country, New Zealand, and in reply to the allegation a statement was issued. I think I ought to put it to the Parliamentary Secretary. It was reported in the Press and this is the statement issued by the Ministry spokesman:
"We discovered that the sausage meat coming from New Zealand was almost 100 per cent. meat. Vast quantities were being shipped to private traders in England, seriously affecting the amount of New Zealand meat available to the Ministry. The meat was going to the manufacturers of pies and sausages, and could also have been supplied to housewives.
We were in serious difficulties. We had to call a halt to the scheme before it caused serious trouble to the home ration. If the traders continue to offer it as sausage meat it can be freely sold off the ration. But if they try to sell it as minced meat they will be committing an offence—for minced meat is part of the ration.
The whole thing is a muddle. Sausage meat is not easy to define. What is sausage meat to a New Zealand exporter might be high-quality meat to butchers at home. What it boils down to is that for a time we were fooled—but fooled in a legitimate way. But as soon as the Minister realised what was happening he clamped down on them at once."
I should like to know what action was taken at the Ministry of Food about that.
Captain J. A. L. Duncan: Would the hon. Gentleman give us the source of the quotation?
Mr. Willey: I have read from the "Sunday Pictorial." [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] It is not so much a quotation from the paper. It is a statement given in quotation marks by a Ministry spokesman and it has not been denied by the Ministry. I am only putting to the Parliamentary Secretary what his own Ministry's official spokesman said.
Mr. William Shepherd: What is the date?
Mr. Willey: It was a week last Sunday. The Parliamentary Secretary will not deny that the Ministry have now changed their policy and that a substantial amount of meat has come into this country off the ration.
I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary is not the sort of man who will let down an official of the Ministry who says that the thing was a muddle, and that what it all boiled down to was that they were fooled, although he said that they were fooled in a legitimate way. I am sure he would not try to shield his right hon. and gallant Friend, although when the Minister knew what was happening in his Ministry he endeavoured to put it right.
This is a very serious matter. We are considering a reduced meat ration, and we shall soon be considering a further reduction. It is preposterous if a contributory factor to the reduction has been the import of this meat off the ration. It means that all this meat has gone to hotels, restaurants and the like, to people who can afford to buy it. This is just as offensive as the matters which we have recently discussed.
Mr. Ivor Owen Thomas: Can my hon. Friend give information of the relative price of this freely available non-rationed meat, compared with the price of the meat officially supplied?
Mr. Willey: I cannot do that without notice.
Mr. Shepherd: Could the hon. Gentleman help his hon. Friend by saying whether the excessive price we paid as the result of the importation of this meat was less than or greater than the excess price we paid when the hon. Gentleman allowed an importation of thousands of tons of sweetened fat?
Mr. Willey: I should be out of order if I replied to that question. I hope we
556
shall have a more satisfactory and suitable occasion to pursue it than the debate on this Order, the subject of which is meat.
Where does the Parliamentary Secretary stand about a matter in which he has shown himself interested, animal protein? Our butter and cheese rations are the lowest we have ever had, and milk consumption is falling. Here we have a reduction in the meat ration and an aggravation of that reduction by the foolhardiness of the Ministry. I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary will address himself more directly to the matters I have raised and will not try to get away with it as he did on the last occasion.
8.53 p.m.
Mr. Charles Royle: I beg to second the Motion.
I shall not take up many minutes of the time of the House, but I want to talk about the second of the two Prayers. My hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. F. Willey) has covered the question of butter very fully, and I am sure that the Parliamentary Secretary will have difficulty in answering the points that my hon. Friend has made. I can speak with a little authority on the question of the reduction in the meat ration.
I am very concerned about this fall in the meat ration. Promises were made glibly by hon. Members opposite—I hate to use these references all the time, but they are very important—and by noble Lords who are now "overlords," about what could be accomplished in his regard if the Conservatives were returned to power. During the Election campaign of 1951, hon. and right hon. Gentlemen and noble Lords almost promised housewives that if the Tories were returned to power more meat would be available. I know how long it takes to produce cattle for the meat ration. I also know that pork and mutton can be produced very much more quickly. The present Government have been in power for 13 months and cannot claim that the amount of the ration is any better as a result. I cannot go so far as to say that it is worse except in regard to price.
The Parliamentary Secretary quoted at length statistics of a social survey set up by my right hon. Friend when he was in office. I have not been at the Ministry of Food and I do not take any notice of

557
statistics, because they bear no relation to experience. There is hardly a butcher's shop in this country which needs to ration meat today. As a result of the action taken by the Government, we find that butchers are pressing meat on those who can afford it. Representing, as I do, a constituency which is almost 100 per cent. working class, I know that my constituents cannot afford to take up their ration of meat because of the prices that have been imposed.
My hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North mentioned manufacturing meat from New Zealand. The reduction in the meat ration is affecting people all the more because the manufacturing meat available to the retail meat trade is at its lowest ebb. It is 3½ per cent. of the permit value. This is very important, because the policy of the Ministry hitherto has been that, as far as possible, more manufacturing meat is made available not only to the large group 1 manufacturers but also to the retail butchers' shops to help that trade. I want to know whether the Ministry are in a position to increase the manufacturing meat allocated to retail butchers' shops.
When all is said and done rationing, and reductions or increases in the amount of meat available to the public, is today almost a farce in view of the prices now imposed. I am told that an Order has been laid on the Table today to effect a further reduction in the meat ration. My hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North and other hon. Members on this side of the House as well as myself will therefore have an early opportunity of praying against a further heavy reduction in the meat ration.
9.0 p.m.
Mr. Baker White: I shall not detain the House for more than a very few minutes, but I feel that a misconception might arise from what was said by the hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. F. Willey). As for the hon. Member for Salford, West (Mr. Royle), I feel that he was in danger of defeating his own argument. He was complaining about the reduction of the meat ration, but he also told us that people could not afford to take up the ration; and if that is followed to its logical conclusion, the hon. Gentleman is in danger of defeating his own argument.
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The hon. Member for Sunderland, North gave certain import figures. He always puts his case very fairly and very moderately, and I am sure he has no desire to mislead the House. In my view, we ought to look at these figures, not over a period of two years, but over three years. If we do so, we find that it is true that our imports of butter in the 10 months ended 31st October, 1952, were 4,170,000 cwt. as compared with 5,472,000 cwt. in 1951; but if we compare 1951 with 1950, we find that in the latter year the figure was 6 million cwt.
In other words, this is a progressive fall which started under the Labour Government. It is not something new which has suddenly happened. It is a progressive fall which is governed by drought, by losses through foot and mouth disease and by a factor which has not been mentioned at all tonight—the rise in world population and the rising consumption in other countries. We are continually faced with the problem of trying to get more food for the rising population of this country out of a world whose own population is increasing very quickly.
Perhaps I may turn to the question of meat. There again, I think we ought to take the figures for three years. In 1950 the imports of meat for the first 10 months of the year were 22,374,000 cwt. Under the Socialist Government, in the same period of 1951 they fell to 17,559,000 cwt. Under the Conservative Government, in the same period of 1952 they have gone up to over 18 million cwt.
Mr. Royle: Did the hon. Gentleman use these arguments from this side of the House at the time when the Labour Minister of Food was defending any action of this sort?
Mr. Baker White: The only point I am making is that these figures should be considered over three years and not simply over two years.
Mr. Willey: As the hon. Gentleman wants the figures over three years, will he give the 1950 figure for meat?
Mr. Baker White: Yes. The 1950 figure was 22 million cwt., but under his own Government that fell to 17,500,000 cwt. Under this Government it has started to go up again, in spite of the world

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factors which I have mentioned. In other words, our procurement of meat is better than it was.
Mr. Willey: I know that the hon. Gentleman wants to put the facts fairly. Will he not agree that if he takes the monthly figures, then the figures now are less than they were 12 months ago, because we are not getting meat from the Argentine.
Mr. Baker White: I have the monthly figures here but I have not studied them. The hon. Gentleman gave details for 10 months and that is what I am working on. There is a compensating factor about which I am sure the hon. Member for Salford will agree—that meat today is of better quality. I think every hon. Member will agree that during the past year he has had fewer complaints about quality than in the previous two years.
Mr. Boyle: I do not agree. The quality is worse.
Mr. J. D. Murray: Will the hon. Gentleman agree that this week the chairman of the meat association in the Brandon and Byshottles area had to refuse carcases of meat because of their shocking condition? He would not allow it to go through the pool.
Mr. Baker White: That is only one district. These things happen from time to time for local reasons. I am speaking generally, and I think the general quality of meat is appreciably better now than it was a year ago.
There is another compensating factor which, again, has not been mentioned, and it is that 2,000 tons of unrationed gammon meat come on to the market every week. That is taking place in spite of the fact that we have drastically reduced our imports of ham. We are producing this unrationed gammon largely from our own home resources, and that is a compensating factor which should be taken into account.
9.5 p.m.
The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Food (Dr. Charles Hill): So many questions have been put to me by the hon. Members who moved and seconded the Prayer that I think it would be convenient if I gave the answers now.
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On the question of red meat, my hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury (Mr. Baker White), in response to the challenging observation of the hon. Member for Salford, West (Mr. Royle), has given some figures. May I sum them up? There has been consumed in this country this year nearly 15 per cent. more red meat than in the corresponding period of last year. The hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. F. Willey) put it in the more scientific form of proteins, so seeking to cover meat, cheese and other building foods—rationed foods, of course, for we could have no knowledge of others. I have the figures for two corresponding weeks of this year and last year, the week ending 26th November. The figure for that week last year was, in grammes per head per week, 91.9 grammes of animal protein and for this year it was 99.6 grammes of animal protein.
After spending so long in rather vigorous debate, I do not seek to arouse hon. Members any more than is necessary, but, since they have asked the question, let them have the answer that in the case of red meat there is an increase of nearly 15 per cent. this year over last year and, in the case of bacon, rather more than a 15 per cent. increase. That, however unsatisfactory to the hon. Member, is the straight answer to a simple question.
Mr. Royle: Is the hon. Gentleman now claiming that the 15 per cent. increase is due to an increase in grammes in the foodstuffs he mentioned?
Dr. Hill: No, I am not. I am giving the straight answer to a straight question. There is nearly a 15 per cent. increase in meat. I am giving a straight answer to a scientific question when I give the figure of 10 per cent. increase in animal protein consumed this year over this time last year.
The hon. Member raised the question of New Zealand. He quoted from a leader in the "Sunday Pictorial" in which it appeared—I think I am summarising it fairly—that the Ministry itself had used the words, "It is a muddle." May I tell the hon. Member what happened? A representative of the Press, about which I make no complaint, rang up saying there was a restriction on minced meat and there was confusion in his mind between minced meat

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and mincemeat. After this representative of the Press had based his question on the problem of minced meat, I am afraid—and I humbly apologise for it—that a member of the Ministry staff released the observation, "You have got it rather in a muddle." He dared to say that to a representative of the Press and it found its way into that leader in that form.
The hon. Member raised the New Zealand question generally.
Mr. Willey Mr. Willey rose—
Dr. Hill: I cannot give way—
Mr. Willey: After all, the hon. Gentleman is casting a reflection on the Press. I gave him his opportunity to make it clear whether he was challenging this report. Is the same explanation to be made of the Ministry being fooled and the Minister not being aware of it?
Dr. Hill: I am referring to that part of the story which I know and I am defending a member of the staff of the Ministry of Food. I am describing the facts, but it does not fill me with horror that I should have to observe that in fact a representative of the Press had come to a confusion about minced meat and mincemeat.
To come to the New Zealand story proper; in March, 1950, sausage meat was placed on open general licence. It was thought that there would not be a substantial import of sausage meat from New Zealand to this country, but somebody—
Mr. Willey: Tell it to the children.
Dr. Hill: I am addressing myself, through the Chair, to the hon. Gentleman. As, in fact, the step which led to the confusion was taken by the Government of which he was a Member, I fail to see the relevance of his remark. I repeat that sausage meat was put on open general licence in March, 1950. It was not thought that the import would be substantial, but somebody in New Zealand discovered that by reducing the admixture of cereal with minced meat the meat kept perfectly well, and he started to increase the trade of importing sausage meat into this country.
We were asked by New Zealand to control that importation because in their
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view it was beginning to eat into the meat which would otherwise come to this country in carcase form. I am not criticising the hon. Gentleman's colleagues for having put sausage meat on open general licence. I am merely stating in fact that it was so operated as to endanger—
Mr. Willey: Oh.
Dr. Hill: The hon. Gentleman can give that complacent smile of his, but it is only really concealing his utter ignorance of the facts.
The hon. Member for Sunderland, North put a number of questions to me about butter. I will give the answers speedily. Production at home and abroad has decreased, and, as hon. Members know, this derives in some part from the increased consumption of liquid milk. We are proud that liquid milk consumption in this country per head of the population is 60 per cent. up compared with pre-war. That has meant less milk being available for manufacturing purposes, butter included. I have said before, and I repeat it, that when we reflect that it takes 20 pints of milk to make a pound of butter it can be seen what the real cost is.
At home our production, which was 46,000 tons pre-war, has now fallen to 15,000 tons, in part for the reason I have given. Overseas we have met problems. Holland is sending more butter elsewhere. If we paid more, if we could afford to pay more, we should, I have no doubt, get a moderate increase in the quantities from there.
Australia has a bigger liquid milk consumption and a poorer butter production. Last year was the worst year on record, with the result that butter exports to this country were down to 4,000 tons as compared with nearly 100,000 tons received from Australia before the war. In the case of other countries there has been the problem of foot and mouth disease, but in general our difficulties are considerable because there is a tendency in the world to discontinue butter production, and the milk drinking policy has resulted in a substantial increase in the cost of butter making.
The hon. Member raised the question, rather critically indeed, of the exports of butter. Such exports are almost entirely

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to Gibraltar, St. Helena, the Falkland Islands and Malta. I doubt whether that is either a serious or an improper drain upon the country's limited supply of butter.
In general, I would add this word about butter. The prospects of increased butter production do not seem to be particularly good. Butter has become an expensive product. The milk drinking campaign has played a big part in bringing about that position, and I should mislead the House were I to suggest that there is an easy or an early way out of the difficulty. Although the discussion on butter has taken place on an Order reducing the ration from three ounces to two ounces, there has today been laid an Order that puts the butter ration back to three ounces on 30th November.
As for the Prayer to annul the Order reducing the meat ration from 2s. 2d. to 2s., it will be known to hon. Members that a further reduction has been announced and in fact an Order has been laid today which revokes the Order which is now before the House. As the hon. Member said, there will be ample opportunity for him and for his hon. Friends to raise this matter again, and perhaps on that occasion we shall discuss it on some day other than the 40th day of the permitted period.
9.16 p.m.
Mr. William Keenan: I wish to make a point which arises on the meat Order. I should like to know whether the Minister can tell us how much meat a customer is likely to receive for his 1s. 8d. or 2s., whether it be mutton or beef or anything else. There may be a difficulty, particularly in view of what has been admitted by the Minister, because a large number of people are not taking up the whole of their meat ration, although I do not accept the figure of 15 per cent. which he stated. I think that is rather more than has actually been available to rationed customers. I do not know whether that meat has found its way into places where it can be obtained at high prices, although I have no doubt such places have done very well out of this situation.
I am concerned that a housewife does not know what weight of meat she gets when she goes into a butcher's shop to spend her 1s. 8d. or 2s. The butcher
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may charge 7s. 6d. for the meat supplied to a customer who produces, perhaps, four ration books. But the customer does not know the weight of the meat sold to her. Sometimes at the back of the butcher's shop, or perhaps it may be near the till, which may be some distance away from the customer, there is a typewritten list which shows the price of the various cuts. What is the position when the butcher says, "It is a bit over-7s. 6d."?
Dr. Hill Dr. Hill rose—
Mr. Keenan: I will not give way. The hon. Gentleman could have replied to this point if he had allowed me to speak earlier. I showed that I wanted to speak before he got up to reply to the debate.
Dr. Hill: I was rising to apologise to the hon. Gentleman for not dealing with this matter earlier. He mentioned it during the previous discussion.
I am fully alive to the problem of enabling the housewife who so wishes to check up on the scheduled price and the price of the meat. We have met difficulties. One is that to enforce by law the price ticketing process is prohibited by a piece of legislation of some 25 years ago. We are examining the possibility of a statement in the form of a bill for joints sold across the counter. We are examining ways and means of doing what the hon. Gentleman wants us to do. We feel that, unless the trade are willing more vigorously to adopt voluntarily some form of ticketing or billing, we shall have to consider what can be done.
Mr. Keenan: I thank the hon. Gentleman for that reply. I am satisfied that what other Members and myself have been saying for some time has been receiving attention. However, I would point out that it is not 25 years since almost all meat in the shops in Liverpool and Bootle, and other places that I know, was ticketed. What the Minister says may be correct, If the difficulty exists and the Government are prepared to deal with it, that is helpful.
9.21 p.m.
Sir Waldron Smithers: Do not the figures which the Minister has quoted of the great reduction in the supplies of butter and other commodities prove what I have tried to put across over and over again—the fact that control is

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the cause of shortages and that if we restrict consumption we restrict production? Therefore, with fewer controls we shall have increased production. The reason for the bad quality of the meat is bulk purchase from abroad and restriction at home. In the old days if one was not satisfied with one's butcher one could go to another. That caused healthy competition and there was a better quality of meat.
Mr. Willey: Though I am not completely satisfied with what the Parliamentary Secretary has said, as he has not revealed any hitherto unknown stocks which would justify the revocation of this Order and the restoration of the higher ration, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Motion.
Motion, by leave, withdrawn.

SCHOOL DENTAL SERVICE
Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn."—[Mr. Kaberry.]
9.24 p.m.
Mr. John Baird: It was rumoured that the debate on the Prayers would finish between 6 p.m. and 10 p.m., and I have had to deny myself sustenance while waiting here. Someone suggested that as I proposed to discuss dentistry; I might have taken part in the general discussion on butchery. I do not know whether that is relevant.
I wish to deal briefly with the question of the school dental service. We all know that this has been one of the major headaches within the Health Service during the last five or six years. I think I can say that, on both sides of the House, very considerable interest has been shown in this problem, but that there has been the fundamental difference between us that we on this side have never believed or suggested that there was a quick solution to the problem of the priority dental services, and especially the children's service.
I have always argued that, while we have dentists in general practice paid on an itemised scale of fees and dentists in the public service paid by salary, there would be more attraction outside the public service than within it, and that the
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best way to have solved the problem, from my point of view, would have been to have introduced a fully salaried service in 1946. At that time, the opposition to a fully salaried service came from hon. and right hon. Gentlemen on that side of the House, and not from those on this side.
The supporters of the present Government, who were then in Opposition, were making speeches, month after month and year after year, about this problem, and they really led the people up the garden. They seemed to suggest that, if they were in power, they would have some method of solving this problem or of getting dentists to treat school children. I remember the present Minister of Health suggesting that it was the introduction of the National Health Service in 1946 which had made the biggest contribution to the withering away of the school dental service.
I also remember the claims made by hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite that, by imposing charges on the Health Service, they would institute a kind of social priority that would encourage dentists to go back into the school dental service. Indeed, the Minister justified the recent charges for dental treatment by saying that they were socially and ethically justified for that very reason. That was only a short time ago—six or 12 months.
Let us examine the position today. There can no longer be the argument that the Government have not had time to do anything, because, when they were in opposition, they then said that they had a solution. What is the position today? It is true, as I think will be admitted, that there have been some improvement in the school dental service, and I am not going to deny it at all. In December, 1938, we had the full-time equivalent of 783 dental officers. On 1st January, 1952, we had 712, and that was when it reached its lowest ebb. In October, 1952, the figure had risen to 827. I had these figures from the Ministry of Education this morning. Therefore, there has been a rise of nearly 100 in the number of dentists in the school dental service over the last 12 months.
I should like to point out that the main increase was between January and May, 1952, when the figures rose from 712 to 793, and that was before the

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charges imposed by the present Minister had come into effect. Therefore, the main increase came before the present charges became effective, and, if anyone wants to claim the justice of this matter, then it must be said that the Labour Government were more responsible for this increase than right hon. Gentlemen and the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health.
Secondly, the major point which I have tried to emphasise time and again, but which the Government have not faced, is that, as a result of these charges, we have scraped the barrel in regard to getting more dentists into the school service and have increased the number of dental officers by something like 100. We now have 827 school dental officers, and the present Minister of Health and all dental authorities have admitted that we cannot run an efficient school dental service until we have between 2,000 and 3,000 full-time dental officers. At that rate it will take at least 50 years to get an efficient dental service. That will be by imposing further and further charges each year to force more and more dentists into the school dental service.
The Parliamentary Secretary may say that there is still a likelihood of more dentists coming into the service. I do not think she has any grounds for that optimism at all. As I say, she has already scraped the barrel. It is true that at the present time there is considerable under employment of dentists in industrial areas, but the dentists underemployed are, first of all, the older dentists, and second, those dentists who have concentrated most of their practice on industrial dentistry and are not a suitable—I do not want to offend any professional men when I say this—type likely to become good recruits to the school dental service. I do not think there is any possibility of our getting any further recruits, unless the hon. Lady imposes further charges on dentists in private practice. I think she dare not do that. If she did, she would destroy the whole basis of the Health Service.
The main point of my argument is this. The dental profession are very worried about this situation. I am speaking here with the full authority of the dental profession as a whole—the British Dental Association. They are
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not putting forward any long-term solution, but they believe they have a short-term solution while plans for development of a new priority dental service are built up. I think the Minister should pay more attention to the British Dental Associations' suggestions.
This question of the long-term solution of the priority dental service has still got to be tackled. I have been pointing out in this House for seven years now that we shall not get an efficient priority dental service for school children until we take it away from the Ministry of Education and base it on the Ministry of Health. At present it depends on the amount of money available to local authorities and varies very greatly between, for instance, London and Cambridge, where it is efficient, to other areas of the country where there is almost no dental service existing at all, apart from inspection.
I have emphasised this time and time again, and to my right hon. Friend the Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Bevan) as well as to the present Minister of Health. We have to face up to redirecting the school dental service under the Minister of Health. Apart from that, I say again that as long as we have the great bulk of dentists working under itemised scales of fees outside the public service we shall not get an efficient school dental service. We have to face up to the question of having a fully salaried service for all dental practitioners as being the only ultimate solution.
However, we are now talking about a temporary solution. There is no one who can argue that we have an efficient school dental service today. There is no one who can argue that there is any possibility of getting an efficient dental service within the next five years, unless we do something drastic, and therefore all talk of treating school children within the clinics is simply pie in the sky.
The British Dental Association have put a memorandum to the Minister, and this memorandum is based on a questionnaire sent to every dentist in the country. I want to quote figures. The British Dental Association circularised every local dental committee set up under the Minister of Health to administer the National Health Service dental service. They sent out a questionnaire, asking dental practitioners to treat children in

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their own surgeries, to 165 local dental committees, of whom 102 agreed to carry out the scheme and circularised the dentists in their areas. The questionnaire was sent to 6,768 practitioners, of whom some 2,230 replied; the number willing to set aside a given amount of time each day to treat school children in their own surgeries was 1,743, and the total number of hours available for treating those school children in the dentists' own surgeries each week was over 10,000.
This was a genuine offer by the dentists to get a temporary amelioration on this matter of the priority dental service for school children. I cannot understand why the Ministry of Health should have adopted the attitude they did. The Ministry simply turned down this offer completely, and I believe it was one of the most scandalous and shameful decisions that Ministry has ever taken on this problem.
A Press statement issued the other day by the British Dental Association sums up the position very fairly, and I will read only one quotation from it:
"The British Dental Association, as a result of nation-wide inquiries, found that nearly 2,500 dentists"—
that does not quite agree with the figure I quoted earlier, because other figures have since come in—
"were ready immediately to treat 20,000 children a week in their own surgeries as a first step, with a possibility of many more in the future. The reply by the Minister of Health and the Secretary of State for Scotland is, 'No, thank you.' The attitude of the Ministries is that school children should only be treated in school clinics by salaried dental officers. They try to justify this attitude by claiming that clinic treatment is more effective and uses less manpower, and is cheaper. Clearly they would rather save cash than children's teeth."
Then this is the important point:
"They ignore the fact that under present conditions there is no hope of getting enough dentists into the clinics to do all the necessary work. Dentists have offered to do the work in their own surgeries, and this is the only way that an immediate service can be secured. Any alternative scheme would take years to establish, and in the meantime the teeth of another generation will be ruined."
Mr. Frederic Harris: Could the hon. Gentleman tell us what basis of charging was proposed for that scheme? What were the charges to be under the scheme?
Mr. Baird: The charges which would be imposed were the charges already in existence under the National Health Service for the treatment of children. Perhaps I might digress here to say that this is a point which should be given more publicity. The fees at present paid to a dentist for treating children's teeth under the National Health Service are quite inadequate. If a grown-up person comes to a dentist's surgery for a filling, the fees range from 15s. to 22s. 6d. per filling. As a professional man I argue that to treat children properly takes longer; it is much harder work to get a child at its ease in the dentist's surgery and to treat it properly than an adult. Yet the fee we get at present for filling a child's tooth is 10s. 6d., less 10 per cent.—something like 7s. per tooth.
Therefore, when dentists offer to set aside a considerable amount of time each week to treat children they are not doing it because they will get any financial gain. They would lose considerably under this offer, and it is scandalous that the Ministry should turn it down in the way they have done. Let us examine why the Ministry turned this down. The Ministry have given reasons in a letter. I believe that the real reasons the Ministry have turned down this offer are narrow and doctrinaire reasons. Why do I say that? The present Minister of Health—and I am sorry that he is not here tonight—climbed into power a few months ago because of one or two clever speeches which he made. He is one of the few men on the opposite side of the House who know anything about the Health Service.
The basis of his arguments over the last few years in this House—and they seemed to be acceptable to hon. Members opposite—was that if only we imposed charges on the Health Service we could then build up a priority dental service. We all remember one argument which he put forward then to the House. He said that if only we made charges on the general Health Service, the dentists would be encouraged to go into the school dental service because there would not be so much money in private dentistry.
If it is now true that that argument was a fallacy and that the charges made under the Health Service have not built up an efficient school dental service, where is his argument? It is washed completely away, and as a result

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of all these charges we have a paltry increase of 100 dentists in the school dental service, and today we have 900 when we want 2,000. His argument has been blasted sky high, and he dare not admit it.
The Minister has turned down the genuine offer of the dental profession of this country to provide fixed dental hours each week in their own surgeries. I am quite certain that it is only to save his own political face that he has taken this decision. What arguments are used in the Minister's reply to the dentists? I should like to quote some of them. Remember that I am not arguing on behalf of a lot of doctrinaire Socialists; I am arguing on behalf of the dental profession which I have attacked in this House often enough, the majority of whom, I should think, are Tory. They made this offer, and the Minister has turned it down in the following terms:
"It has been shown by experience that the most effective way of providing treatment for school children is in clinics closely associated with school routine, so as both to ensure the attendance of children in need of it and to cause the least interruption of their education. Treatment for younger children can be most effectively provided by a clinic service forming part of the local health authorities' general arrangements for the care of mothers and children.…"
Very few people would deny that. For the last 20 years it has been argued that the best way to treat children is in the school dental service where they are under a certain amount of authority from the teachers, and where we can encourage them to have their dental treatment carried out. No one can deny that.
But the hard fact of the matter is that we have not the clinics in this country which can efficiently treat the school children. Why use this argument that we must not treat the children in private dental practitioners' surgeries and that we must treat them in school clinics, when the school clinics are not there? It is simply hypocrisy to put forward that argument, and we know that it is only to cover up the other real truth.
I should think that I am one of the few people who disagree with the majority view held in Ministerial and professional circles. It is true that in the old days when the majority of the working class in this country could not afford dental treatment
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and were ignorant of the value of dental treatment, we could not expect them to encourage their children to go to the dentist, and therefore, by encouraging them to go through the school service, we were doing some good.
Today, under the National Health Service, the great majority of people are receiving dental treatment, and as a practising dentist, who should have declared his interest, I should say that one of the most gratifying feelings of a professional man is to see these working-class people coming in week after week and bringing their children with them.
Rather than have the children marched in by the school teacher, it would be far better to encourage them to come along with their parents and gradually develop their treatment in the way the parent is treated by the family dentist. The National Health Service has killed the argument that we must have a comprehensive school dental service. I am a heretic to put that point of view, but as time develops we shall find that, while we should still have a school dental service for inspection, the larger part of the treatment of children will be carried out in the general practitioner service.
The second, and main, argument in the Minister's reply to the British Dental Association must be treated very seriously indeed, for it raises a fundamental point. The letter says:
"Secondly, it is imperative, particularly in present economic circumstances, to achieve the utmost economy in expenditure and here again experience has shown that children can be treated in clinics at a substantially lower cost than when treated by private dentists remunerated for each item of treatment on the scale of fees in operation under the general dental service."
What does that mean? The school dental service cannot treat all the children and many can only be treated in the general dental service, but the Minister argues that the children cannot be treated in the general dental service because it would cost too much. We are arguing not about the ultimate solution, which is a fully salaried service, but about how we can treat school children who require dental treatment, not in 10 years' time, but tomorrow and next week. The clinics are not available, and yet the letter says that the children cannot be allowed to go to the general dental service because it would cost more to have the treatment carried out in that way.

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Will the hon. Lady the Parliamentary Secretary allow the children's teeth to rot simply because that method would cost a little more? It appears to me that she would. But I doubt very much if the cost would be so much more. The hon. Lady is apt to forget that dentists in general practice are receiving a very low fee for the treatment which they give children at present. Even if it would cost more as a temporary measure, there was no justification for turning down the offer which was made in the manner in which it has been turned down.
The truth of the matter—as my right hon. Friend the Member for Ebbw Vale has so often argued in the House—is that too much of the planning of this country is done by the Treasury. This is a struggle between the local authorities and the Treasury about who shall pay for the school dental service. Children's teeth are allowed to decay while the Treasury and the local authorities argue who shall set up an efficient school dental service. It is ridiculous.
I appeal again to the hon. Lady. It is not too late to reconsider the matter. This is not a party political issue. This is an issue in which the whole of an honourable profession is trying to make a contribution towards the solution of a problem which is worrying all of us. Yet the Ministry, for narrow doctrinaire reasons, has simply shut its eyes to the offer, and said, "No, we cannot do anything about it."
I cannot do any more than I am doing tonight. I appeal to the hon. Lady and to the House to look at the matter again. We all have our political differences. The Minister made some very clever speeches in this House which have been proved completely hollow. Never have more crocodile tears been shed in this House than by the Minister and the hon. Member for Luton (Dr. Hill) about the neglect of children's teeth. Here is an opportunity to do something about it. But the Government say, "No, let the children's teeth rot because we have not enough money to pay for the proper treatment."
9.50 p.m.
Mrs. Eveline Hill: I should be much more impressed by the remarks of the hon. Member for Wolverhampton, North-East (Mr. Baird) if they had been made about 1948 or just after it. They are being uttered
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now at a time when dental practitioners are not so busy as they were. In fact, it is only a week or so ago since we read a case in the paper of a dentist losing about £4,800 of his income because of a decrease in the number of patients. He put this down to the fact that there were now these dental charges.
We in the local authorities have been most anxious about this service and still are. We are looking to the Minister to help us in that direction, and I think he can. It is true that in the local authority service we feel that having the children dealt with in the school clinics is a surer way of ensuring that their teeth are treated, but we cannot always rely upon parents taking them to the clinics.
I want to emphasise that we are being urged, under a scheme propounded by the British Dental Association—again I say, at a very late date—to take this matter in hand, and I sincerely hope that the Minister will adhere to his idea that the school dental service is the best means of securing that attention for the children that we desire. I hope he will be able to help the local authorities in that direction.
9.52 p.m.
Mr. A. Blenkinsop: This debate provides an opportunity to say a word or two about some of the very real problems in the dental service, not necessarily those created during recent months but the problems which have always been in that service and which today, no doubt, the Ministry are having to face.
It would be unfair to the dental profession, although I hold no brief for many of the things that they have done in the past, to suggest that this particular proposal is a wholly new one. It is, indeed, one we have heard of in the past, and I think it would be right to say that both my right hon. Friend the Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Bevan) and I took the view, unlike that of the heretic behind me, that the clinic service was, in this particular case, likely to be more valuable and that we were anxious to see it developed.
We were not altogether happy about the way in which treatment might be given in a private dental surgery. It is true, of course, that if there is no alternative

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and no way of ensuring proper treatment for the children, then we must look again at the problem.
I wish to raise one or two particular issues, and I will not necessarily expect an immediate answer this evening, because I have not given notice of them. They are quite valid points that arise from the discussion we have already had. The Parliamentary Secretary would agree that the first fundamental problem in the dental service which we have is that of far too few dentists in the profession. A professional committee that was set up earlier examined this problem and estimated that we were many thousands of dentists short for a fully effective service.
Mr. Baird: A free service.
Mr. Blenkinsop: Yes, a fully effective, free service.
It is true that many dentists are not operating full time, not because the need is not there—that is obvious—but because of the fact of the dental charges that have been imposed. That is one of the dangers today. The effect of the dental charges is to cloak the real demand for treatment that still exists. The matter is likely to become worse rather than better. I understand that already the effect of the charges, and the depression in the dental profession as a whole, has been to cut down the number of new entrants into the profession. That is a very serious matter indeed, from the long-term point of view.
Another serious factor is the falling away in conservation work. That is the very point that many of us raised from this side of the House when the new, additional dental charges were imposed by right hon. Gentlemen opposite, and it has been fully proved by events. There has been a falling away in the early treatment, and a tendency to pile up much more serious dental decay later; and figures have been given which show this to be true. We fully admit that the figures cover only the simple treatment given under the Health Service.
Nowadays, the full charge is very often imposed for all treatments costing up to the maximum figure. Many people are said to be taking their treatment privately for the less expensive items. That may be true; nevertheless, all the contacts that
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I have with the dental profession suggest that there is a very serious falling away of the most vital part of dental treatment because of the charges that have been imposed.
An effect of the rather peculiar system of charges has been to bring to light a number of very serious criticisms about the way in which some dentists are tackling the problem. It is alleged, in many cases which have been sent in, that if patients come in for relatively small items of treatment the dentists are charging the full £1. Some patients say that they cannot get any treatment today from a dentist for under £1. This is a matter that needs investigation.
I am not expecting the hon. Lady to be able to reply to this point tonight, but I hope she will be willing to say she will investigate any cases that may be sent to her. There is no hold over a dentist, who is completely at liberty to make what charges he wishes up to the £1 maximum. I do not know that we can do anything—[Interruption]—except to withdraw the charges.
Mr. Baird: The hon. Member for Croydon, North (Mr. F. Harris) interjected a remark into my hon. Friend's speech. I hope he is not suggesting that I am carrying out the unethical practice of charging up to the £1. I do not know any dentists who do it. It is true that dentists may charge anything up to £1, but I do not think there are many dentists who carry out that practice. Certainly, I do not.
Mr. F. Harris: I was only encouraging my hon. Friend to find out who the complaints were aimed at.
Mr. Blenkinsop: My hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, North-East (Mr. Baird) is absolved, but there is no doubt that these complaints are made, and I shall send in those of which I have information, illustrating what fees can be charged under the £1 maximum.
I will briefly mention one or two other points. I fully agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, North-East that the only solution to the problem is a long-term one.
It being Ten o'Clock, the Motion for the Adjournment of the House lapsed, without Question put.
Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn."—[Mr. Kaberry.]
Mr. Blenkinsop: The only long-term solution of this problem is the institution and development of a full salaried dental service, with the addition possibly of some sessional work. In that field I believe we could make a start by developing the existing service plus possibly the utilisation of some efficient private dental surgeries again on a salaried or sessional basis. I agree with my hon. Friend that many of the problems in the dental service have arisen because of the fee basis.
In our long-term consideration of this problem we should seriously think about whether we cannot gradually replace that itemised fee service by a salaried or sessional service which would not only protect the general public, but the dental profession itself, against the abuses we have come across in the past and which we find even today within the dental profession.
10.1 p.m.
The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health (Miss Patricia Hornsby-Smith): We have had an interesting debate on a subject which, as the hon. Member for Wolverhampton, North-East (Mr. Baird) has said, is of great concern to both sides of the House. In principle, there is no difference between us in that the greatest possible priority should be put upon dental treatment for children. We are on common ground that any time the dentists have available can best be devoted to the treatment of the teeth of children.
However, I think the hon. Gentleman was a little unfair in his criticism of the result of the charges. Although they may not have been effective until half-way through the year, many dentists knew that they were impending, and the rise from 713 to 827 is a substantial one in view of the manner in which the number of dentists in the school dental service dropped during the years from the appointed day until January this year.
Where we differ is on the best method of using the spare time which some dentists admit they have, and the most efficient method of using their skill for the betterment of the teeth of the children. The treatment of children under the general dental services since the appointed day, has always been available in private
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practice for parents who accepted the responsibility of taking their children to the dentist and seeing that their teeth were properly seen to. It is true that there is more readiness to accept children now than there has been by some dentists in the past.
So far as the local authority service is concerned, which includes the school dental service, my right hon. Friends the Ministers of Health and Education firmly believe that by far the best method is to arrange with dentists to treat children in school or in local authority clinics on a full-time or part-time basis.
For this, there are four main reasons. First, we believe that the dental treatment of children can most effectively be provided in the clinics closely associated with school routine. A class or a section can be sent with the minimum loss of school time to one approved centre and with the least possible interruption of their education. The alternative offered is that a group of children should be sent to several surgeries of varying dentists in the general practitioners service.
So far as the younger children are concerned, they are provided for in the local health authority dental service arrangements for the care of mothers and young children. There, attendance is encouraged and provision for treatment is made to meet the convenience of the mothers.
Mr. Baird: The hon. Lady is talking as though the services were there, but they are not there; that is the big problem.
Miss Hornsby-Smith: I will deal with that point.
The difficulty, which has been admitted on both sides of the House, is a shortage of dentists in the local authorities' dental service. If the time of skilled dentists is available we believe that the most efficient use of that dental manpower and skill will be in school clinics rather than in the dentist's own surgery.
The British Dental Association recognise that the public dental officer, working in a clinic, can make the best possible use of ancillary help, chair-side assistants and oral hygienists, as is being done in many school dental clinics today. In such a system the dental officer can play his full part and can achieve a most useful and satisfying position with responsibility for the full care of the children's teeth and for ensuring the children's attendance.

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What are we offered in the British Dental Association's proposals? The responsibility will be divided. The volume of treatment which the public dental officer will do will be materially reduced. In the Association's own words, he becomes a co-ordinator. He will inspect and decide the treatment and will then tell the child or the parent to go along to a certain dentist. He will provide the child with a chit. From then on, his responsibility ends. The responsibility for seeing that the child goes to the dentist is that of the parent.
But if a parent wants his child to go to the dentist, there is nothing to prevent him from taking the child along now—and it is one of our regrets that more parents do not do so. Under these proposals, the public dental officer in the education or health authorities' service will be a co-ordinator, a glorified appointments officer. There is no doubt that the suggestion contained in this alternative scheme would seriously undermine the present local authority dental service. The children would go not to one centre, but to many dental surgeons. The times would have to be arranged not to suit one class or one group of children, but to suit the various times of the sessions offered by a host of individual dentists. This would involve many breaks in school hours and in the educational system.
Worse than that, the onus for keeping an appointment with a general dental practitioner would not be on the school authority, who, under the present system, can see that the whole of the treatment is completed. Once the child had been directed to a general dental practitioner, responsibility would rest with the parent. Surely such a plan is administratively cumbersome. It will increase the administrative work and dislocate far more the education of the child than does the present system. Indeed, it would go a long way towards wrecking what we admit is by no means a perfect system, but which we are taking determined steps to build up—the local authorities' priority dental services.
Mr. Baird: Does the hon. Lady realise that while she has had an increase of 100 school dentists over last year—she will not get any more—this offer by the dentists amounts, in man-hours, to the equivalent of 300 full-time school dentists?
Miss Hornsby-Smith: I have not forgotten that point.
The fourth point with which I should like to deal in considering the question of the local authority dental service is that of the necessity for reasonable economy. If the most efficient means of using dental skill is in one centre or in a school; if that makes the minimum inroad into the child's education; and if the skill of the dentist—which is just as great when he is practising in a clinic as when he is practising on his own—can be more efficiently applied in the school dental clinic then, obviously, there will be greater economy in the service by using that method.
The treatment of children in clinics provided by dentists remunerated on the basis of the time they devote to the work costs substantially less, as the hon. Member pointed out, than would the treatment carried out in their own surgeries. I think the hon. Member was a little unfair when he laboured the point of the 7s. 6d. charge which, he knows, applies to milk teeth, since those for permanent teeth—which apply to a great many school children and adolescents—are the normal charges in the adult service.
The B.D.A. are asking the Ministries of Education and of Health to pay more for an outside service than they need pay for the same, or I believe a more efficient, service which could be conducted in the clinics. The hon. Member himself has suggested that the only reason why dentists will not go into the school dental service is a financial one. He said that at the start of his speech and twice reiterated it. If that is the case and there is this available time, is it asking too much that dentists should give part-time service, even one session a week, to the school dental service if it is their aim and intention to build up the teeth of future generations?
My right hon. Friends the Minister of Health and the Minister of Education feel that an improvement in the special priority services for children must be sought on the lines of expanding local authority clinic services rather than transferring part of those services to private surgeries. To this end, there are two Clauses which affect this project in the Education (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill, now before the House. I believe that by the terms of those two

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Clauses, making the provision of local authority clinics compulsory rather than permissive—
Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Mr. Hopkin Morris): The hon. Lady is now referring to legislation, is she not?
Miss Hornsby-Smith: Perhaps I might at least say, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, that it is the intention of my right hon. Friends the Minister of Education and the Minister of Health to take steps to ensure that there are increasing facilities for the treatment of children through the local authority clinics. My right hon. Friends the Ministers of Health and of Education put out a very strong recommendation to local health and education authorities to invite dentists to work in their clinics, either full-time or part-time. In some areas there has been a very welcome response, even to the extent of asking dentists if they will do one session a week.
With regard to the questionnaire which the British Dental Association have sent out, they informed us that a total of 583 practitioners were willing to work part-time not in their own surgeries, but to work for school dental clinics. I believe that the service would be more efficient if the provision of that skill could be made in a clinic. Surely, in the interests of the children, in the interests of the most efficient use of dental skill available, in the interests of the maximum return for public expenditure, those dentists could give that part-time service in the school dental clinics and best serve the children of this nation by seeing that they made their contribution—one session a week if they like—to build up the local authority clinics.
To that end, on 17th October, the Minister of Health invited the British Dental Association to supply the names and addresses of the high-minded gentlemen who are ready to help us solve the problem of the care of children's teeth. We could certainly absorb in existing clinics that number and the time which has been offered us, and we would probably soon require more. So far, our request to be supplied with the 583 names of the gentlemen who were prepared to help has been met with a cold silence.
Mr. Baird: That is a little dishonest. The British Dental Association offered a co-ordinated scheme—some of the dentists
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to work in clinics, some in their own surgeries. It was a co-ordinated scheme, and I do not think it is fair of the hon. Lady to ask some dentists to accept unless she accepts the whole scheme which was worked out. A questionnaire went to every dentist.
Miss Hornsby-Smith: I am not challenging what the hon. Gentleman has said. I am merely suggesting that if the first concern of these 583 volunteers was the health of the children of this nation, if they were so anxious that the children's teeth should not rot in their heads, as the hon. Member suggested we wished them to do, their first concern would be to make a contribution to that service.
My right hon. Friend would have been remiss had he not seized the opportunity of asking for the names of those gentlemen in order that an approach can be made to them to see if they will carry their desire to see the children's teeth preserved to the extent of giving even only one session per week to the school dental service. If the first principle of the dentists is the future dental health of the nation, I believe that these names will be forthcoming. If—and I do not believe it is so—financial advantage ranks higher than child care we shall not get the names. I am content to leave the decision to the British Dental Association.
The public, rightly concerned about the deterioration in the school dental service from the appointed day until the beginning of this year, feel with us that the best service can be provided—I stress again with the least dislocation to the education of the child and with a maximum use of the dental skill available—in the local authority clinics. One paragraph in the memorandum sent out by the British Dental Association states:
"The first charge upon the resources of the profession for a service providing full and comprehensive treatment should be directed to the children, adolescents and expectant and nursing mothers."
No one on either side of the House will quarrel with that. I believe that the public will judge the claims of the British Dental Association by their willingness to co-operate in the tried and proven method of the local authority service, where there will be a ready welcome for the service of any qualified dentist prepared to give, as I have already

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said, as little as one session a week to the care of children's teeth and the future well-being of the nation.
Other points were raised by the hon. Member for Newcastle-upon-Tyne, East (Mr. Blenkinsop). The first point he raised was that of dentists who were charging more than the normal set fee for fillings when that fee should be under £1. There is this power of redress in such matters: we would be very ready to investigate but, as the hon. Member knows, the procedure is that the patient should make a complaint to his or her appropriate executive—
Mr. Blenkinsop: There is, as far as I can see, the difficulty that there is nothing illegal about this practice because the work can be done outside the Health Service.
Mr. Baird: I said that in the debate.
Miss Hornsby-Smith: Yes, I appreciate the hon. Member's point, but I believe that patients, knowing the charges—these are becoming more widely known—can point out what the appropriate charges are, and if they find that they are being heavily overcharged, they can, if they so desire, change their dentist. I believe most dentists are maintaining the fees which have been laid down, and which apply to the general dental services. I am trying now to think of the other points which the hon. Gentleman raised—
Mr. Blenkinsop: One point was the shortage of dentists and the training of dentists.
Miss Hornsby-Smith: Yes. There were two other points which were raised by the hon. Gentleman. The first was, as he claimed, the cutting down of conservative work. One result which already has been seen as a result of the changes in the priority given to the children and adolescents this year, is an increase in the work in private surgeries on the under 21's. This is now in a greater proportion than hitherto when there was a general free service. We are achieving the result that more adolescents are obtaining treatment than did previously.
Mr. Baird: Can the hon. Lady tell me what is the figure?
Miss Hornsby-Smith: No, Sir. Except that it is a greater proportion.
Mr. Baird: Surely, if the hon. Lady is making the statement, she should know the figure.
Miss Hornsby-Smith: No. I can only tell the hon. Gentleman that there is a greater proportion being treated now than hitherto, and from his own experience the hon. Gentleman knows that to be true.
So far as new entrants into the profession are concerned it is not wholly a matter of them being put off. As the hon. Gentleman will know, a high standard and a high calibre of entrants is required. It is not so much a question of applicants not coming forward as not all of them being suitable or able to qualify and take the training. There is no very substantial falling off in the number of people seeking to enter the profession, as was suggested by the hon. Gentleman.
Mr. Blenkinsop: Would the hon. Lady agree that it is still one of our urgent needs to recruit more dentists into the profession and that there is still an enormous demand?
Miss Hornsby-Smith: I do not deny that for one moment. I fully agree that we need far more dentists in the profession, but not at the expense of dropping the standard of entry.
I find it a little surprising that the hon. Gentleman should be so fully in support of a salaried service now when, presumably, from his experience and that of his right hon. Friend the Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Bevan) he must know that it must have been impossible so to persuade the profession. Or perhaps they themselves did not then believe in that principle and for this reason did not initiate that method when they introduced the Act in 1946.
I believe that the local authority service is expanding, despite the criticism of the hon. Gentleman, and can still further expand and that with the co-operation of the dentists we can meet the needs of the school dental service and preserve the teeth of the children in the coming generations.
What, in our view, is essential is that the children should have a chance to have their teeth attended to under the ægis and authority of their school dentists, as

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we believe that this is the surest way of seeing that treatment is adequately and properly carried out.
Mr. Blenkinsop: Would the hon. Lady agree that while it is true that at the time of the introduction of the service, because of the attitude of the dental profession, and so on, it was not possible to introduce it on a salaried basis, all experience seems to suggest it would have been far preferable if it could have been done? Indeed, it might now be
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possible, with some change in the climate of opinion at least to make some start on it.
Miss Hornsby-Smith Miss Hornsby-Smith rose—
Mr. Speaker: I think that would involve legislation.
Adjourned accordingly at Twenty-five Minutes past Ten o'Clock.