HL Deb 02 November 1915 vol 20 cc78-96

Order of the Day read for the consideration of Commons Amendments to Lords Amendments and Commons consequential Amendments, and Commons Reasons for disagreeing to certain of the Lords Amendments.

THE LORD PRESIDENT OF THE COUNCIL (THE MARQUESS OF CREWE)

My Lords, since the main question at issue is raised upon the first Amendment which has to be considered, I think it will be more expedient to postpone to the consideration of that Amendment all observations on the general question. I will therefore now simply make the Motion that stands in my name.

Moved, That the Commons reasons for disagreeing to certain of the Lords Amendments be now considered.—(The Marquess of Crewe.)

VISCOUNT MIDLETON

My Lords, this Motion raises the whole question of the differences which have occurred between your Lordships' House and the House of Commons with regard to this Bill, and some of my noble friends on this side have asked me to state what in their opinion is the best course for us to take. I think we shall all agree that the position is an unfortunate one. This Bill was much more closely examined in this House in the month of July last than it was in the Lower House. It was again exhaustively considered here in the month of September, and Amendments were inserted carrying out the views held practically unanimously by all private members on both sides of this House. The Bill, as amended by your Lordships, then went down to the House of Commons.

I think we have reason to complain of our treatment with regard to this Bill. In July last we were pressed most earnestly to agree at once to the Second Reading on the ground that some benefits probably would not accrue to those whom the Bill was intended to benefit if we did not immediately come to terms and agree to the Bill in the form in which it had been hurriedly passed through the House of Commons. A few days later, when the question was raised in the House of Commons of adjourning Parliament until September, the Prime Minister threw over that contention. He said he had satisfied himself that there was not likely to be any inconvenience from the delay, and the Government left over until September the settlement of the whole question; and I noticed that on the 21st of last month Mr. Goldstone, a Labour Member of Parliament, entirely unrebuked, asserted that what had been said in this respect had no foundation in fact.

There is a clear difference of opinion between ourselves and the Government in this matter. In the first place we held, and still hold, that the Royal Patriotic Fund Corporation is an altogether insecure and improper foundation on which to build a business of this magnitude, which must be in the main, if not entirely, a Government business. Secondly, we hold that while this should be a Government undertaking a Committee of nearly thirty is far too large. Shine of us have protested recently, with a good deal of public support, that a Cabinet of twenty-two is likely to be less concentrated and less effective than a much smaller body. We feel the same with regard to this portentous Committee which it is proposed should enter on the business of this Bill, which must involve millions of money. Whoever heard of asking a Committee of twenty-seven or twenty-nine members to control the distribution of many millions of public money? Thirdly, we complained that those who had been doing this work and doing it admirably had been excluded from action under the Bill. That is, I believe, now to be remedied by adding two members to this already unwieldy central body, though I am not sure even now whether those two members are to be selected by the Soldiers' and Sailors' Families Association or nominated by the Government. Fourthly, the Bill was absolutely useless as it stood, for it provided no financial support whatever by the Government. Lastly, it delegated financial responsibility to local bodies. Yet when this House proposed a short time ago to charge these local bodies with the distribution of old-age pensions in the metropolis, where there are the very best organised local bodies, the House of Commons declined to allow that to be done, saying that you should not delegate financial responsibility to local bodies, and insisted on leaving it in the hands of the London County Council. Every one of those arguments has been practically admitted.

It is not now contended, and it was not contended on October 21 by the spokesman of the Government in another place, that this is a good Bill. We say that as it came up to us from the House of Commons it was a bad Bill. The Government say it is a partial Bill, a temporary Bill, and one which ought to be replaced by a more extended Bill which they have not the time now to prepare. The Chancellor of the Exchequer was quoted as saying that he was for a big Bill, but he refused to bring it in. Mr. Hayes Fisher, who speaks with great knowledge of this subject, said he was for one Pension Board and one pension building. Your Lordships have proposed one Pension Board and one pension building, only it is to be a Government Board and Mr. Hayes Fisher prefers that it should be a voluntary Board. Mr. McKenna said— The Lords Amendments practically set up another Government Department looking solely to State money. And Mr. Hayes Fisher added— If you set up a body of that kind, you will get not a single penny. How much will the Royal Patriotic Fund Corporation get of private money to carry out this public service? They are to be used as decoy ducks. The one chance you had of getting private money to take the place of public money was by continuing the great organisation of the Soldiers' and Sailors' Families Association, which had the confidence of those amongst whom they worked and the financial support of those who have provided the money up to now. Do the Government think that, having cut away that body from administering and distributing the funds, they are going to tap the same resources and save the Chancellor of the Exchequer from making grants? If they do, they will find themselves greatly mistaken.

There is this difference in principle between us. The Government want a voluntary body which is not to be under Parliamentary control as the central body; then they want elective bodies to distribute the funds. We stand for a Government body under Parliamentary control, and we ask that they should be allowed to distribute the funds either through the elective bodies or through the voluntary agencies which they can control and which have the sympathy of the people. I ask the Government to remember that it is not only in this House that they find themselves without support on this question. In the House of Commons on October 21 Mr. Goldstone said— It must be quite obvious to the whole House of Commons that not a speaker has stood up in his place to say that he approved of the constitution of the statutory body as outlined in the Bill when it left this House; and it is obvious, further, that the whole House if judged by the speeches made, is against the Government in this matter. That is not contradicted. If the whole House of Commons and the whole House of Lords are at one, surely a great opportunity has been lost of bringing the two Houses together and allowing, by consultation, some arrangement to be made which would be satisfactory not merely to both Houses but to the public, who, through the Press, have left no stone unturned to show their dissatisfaction with the Bill as drafted by the Government.

I do not want to make a personal attack on any member of the Government, but, so far as I can see, in his conception of the present position the Chancellor of the Exchequer has stood alone. He is, of course, an autocrat in this matter. He knows that we cannot get on without public funds, and he says that he will only give public funds if the body set up is not a public body and if he is allowed to go back to the vicious and exploded principle, which successive Chancellors of the Exchequer have denounced of calling on bodies elected by the ratepayers to administer taxes when they are not making any contribution to them from the rates. I take my stand on that. The proposal is absolutely against all democratic principle, and I am not surprised that a member of the House of Commons went out of his way a few days ago to point out that "for the second time since the war broke out the House of Lords has suggested to us that liberty, either personal or Parliamentary, is fully worth retention."

Some people think that the debates in this House are futile. We may very often feel that the Government rely too much on our patriotism not to press difficulties under present conditions. At this moment we are asked to give up all the principles for which we have contended with regard to this important measure. We are asked to sacrifice them, to put them aside, and to allow a Bill which we know cannot work to pass into law. The alternative is that we shall be hold up to the public as having obstructed a reform which can only be made effective by means of Government money, and Government money, we are told, will not be forthcoming if we insist on our Amendments. I think we have every reason to complain that this alternative is put upon us. We are standing for Parliamentary control; we have been standing for retrenchment; yet we have had no support from the Government. We have been standing in this case for organisation. In the three months which have elapsed since July it would have been easily possible for the Government to have drawn up a Bill which would have established to their satisfaction whatever body they desired. We are asked to-day to accept a measure which is faulty and which the Government admit to be partial and incomplete, requiring to be at some future date amended. We are asked to accept that measure and to condone what seems to us the want of organisation and forethought on the part of the Government in not seriously taking this matter up since July last. That, I venture to say, is putting us in a most invidious position.

So far as I am personally concerned, and so far as those of my friends whom I have been able to consult on this question are concerned, we feel that we must leave with the Government the whole responsibility of carrying through the measure in its unamended form. They will have elbowed out a large number of voluntary workers who have deserved well of the country. They will have replaced them by representatives whom successive financial authorities have declared to be improper representatives to administer taxes when they are not supplementing them from the rates. They will have established a central authority with large Government responsibilities and without Parliamentary control. Lastly, they will have acted against the protests and against the arguments, not merely of members of this House, but of nearly the whole of the independent Members of Parliament who have spoken on this subject.

I cannot help feeling that to press us to agree to what is practically the rejection of all the Amendments which we inserted in order to make this a workable Bill is hardly just, and I am certain that this course cannot be agreeable either to the noble Marquess who leads the House or to his colleagues here. But so far as we are concerned, we feel that if the Government, as an alternative to the loss of the Bill, press us to agree to the sacrifice of our Amendments, we have no alternative but to subordinate our views of what would be right, proper, and most useful to the country to the immediate necessities of the case, and to the fear which may be entertained in some quarters that if we insist on our just Amendments those who have deserved well of the country may be sufferers for many months to come.

THE EARL OF CROMER

My Lords, I wish to associate myself very fully with the eloquent and, I think, unanswerable protest which has just been delivered by my noble friend behind me. I think the majority of your Lordships will be greatly disappointed at the manner in which our Amendments have been treated by the House of Commons, and I am convinced that this disappointment will be shared by a very large and influential body of public opinion outside Parliament. Especially do I think that, apart from the merits of the Bill, a golden opportunity has, as my noble friend pointed out, been lost to improve the relations between the two Houses of Parliament which have certainly, for the last two or three years, not been all that we could wish. The tension between the two Houses has for a long while past been regarded by many thoughtful people outside Parliament with an ever-growing sense of misgiving and apprehension, and I believe there is a large and influential body of public opinion which would have welcomed any opportunity of putting matters on an improved basis. There could not have been a better opportunity of accomplishing this than that which has recently occurred. The whole country is knit together in the presence of the greatest national crisis through which we have ever had to pass. The Amendments proposed by your Lordships' House were, as has been acknowledged by those who opposed them, dictated purely by regard for the public interest and were not in any case tainted with Party animosity. And, curiously enough, your Lordships' Amendments were supported by that section of the House of Commons which up to the present has been specially credited with hostility to any legislative interference on the part of the House of Lords. There could not, therefore, have been a better opportunity for acting, and I think if the whole question had been regarded in a broader and more statesmanlike spirit a great deal of permanent good might have been done outside the four corners of this Bill. These advantages have, unfortunately, been lost.

Turning to the merits of the Bill itself, I doubt whether of recent years any legislative measure has ever met with such a chorus of reprobation as that which has been showered on this luckless Bill. It has been absolutely riddled with criticisms in this House; it has been criticised also in the House of Commons, and even those members of that House who supported it did so with such evident reluctance and with so many qualifications as to make their support almost equivalent to a qualified condemnation. Further, all those who have been interested in this measure and have taken it up are opposed to the Bill in the form in which it came up to this House, and the Press, I think I may say, are absolutely unanimous, both Liberal and Conservative newspapers having joined in condemning the measure. It may be asked, that being the case, Where has it any friends? I believe it has only one friend, and that is the Chancellor of the Exchequer. In fact the whole of this contest has been McKenna contra mundum, and unfortunately the world has been worsted in the contest. In spite of all this I agree with my noble friend that, having done our best to amend the measure, we cannot do more, and that we must now pass it without our Amendments and derive whatever consolation we can from the knowledge that the Government themselves own that it is a bad measure and will shortly have to be superseded by something else; and the sooner that takes place the better.

I should like, before I sit down, to say a few words about the Amendment which I myself moved. That Amendment was the insertion of a new clause which enabled the local committees to delegate their powers to the Soldiers' and Sailors' Families Association or other similar organisation. The Commons have rejected that Amendment on the ground that "they do not think it right that the local committees should have power to delegate to other bodies." That is a very interesting statement of fact, but it is not an argument. We are not told why it is wrong to delegate to other bodies, and are left to conjecture the reasons. The debate which ensued in the other House does, however, throw some light on the reasons which induced the Commons to reject this particular Amendment. Mr. Hayes Fisher, who was in charge of the Bill, said that he approved of the Amendment and thought it would be a great improvement in the Bill; but apparently under the pressure of the omnipotent Chancellor of the Exchequer he voted contrary to what were his convictions. I am not quite sure how far I am in order in quoting what happened in the House of Commons, but if I am out of order I would ask the noble Marquess the Leader of the House to tell me so. There was only one voice raised in opposition to my Amendment—I refer to Sir Ryland Adkins. Sir Ryland Adkins said the reason why he objected to this Amendment was that if the powers of the local committees were handed over to any other organisation great opposition would be aroused amongst other sections of the community who were not represented. In other words, here was an association Which it was universally acknowledged had done admirable work but which happened to have aroused a certain amount of somewhat unworthy jealousy on the part of other sections of the community because they thought they belonged to a different social class.

Sir Ryland Adkins went on to say— It would not be practicable for them" [the Soldiers' and Sailors' Families Association] "to be allowed to be the exclusive carriers out of this policy in many parts of England where, through no fault of theirs but owing to the circumstances of the case, they cannot express the views of various sections of the community in the way in which the ordinary local committees can. The hon. Member appears to have forgotten the optional character of my Amendment. If there had been anything in the way of compulsion, if the local committees had been obliged to hand over their powers to the Soldiers' and Sailors' Families Association, or if that association would have been, as he said, the only carriers out of the policy, I should admit that there was something in his objection. But nothing of the kind was contemplated. It is well known that the Soldiers' and Sailors' Families Association has met with very varied success in different parts of the country. In some places it has worked in full harmony with the various local bodies, and has inspired confidence; in other places that has not been the case, and there has been a good deal of friction and jealousy. What Sir Ryland Adkins has done—and this is an argument to which the Chancellor of the Exchequer has yielded—is this. He has taken the unsuccessful cases and the arguments applicable to those cases and has applied them, without any reason whatever, to all the other cases where the Soldiers' and Sailors' Families Association has been perfectly successful. That appears to me a most illogical process of reasoning. I do not suggest to your Lordships that we should insist on this Amendment, and I am less inclined to do so because, even without it, it will be possible under the Bill to move in some cases in the same direction. Under the Amendment inserted on the motion of the noble Marquess, Lord Lansdowne, the local committees will have power to appoint sub-committees. Therefore, if I read the provision rightly, the local committees will be able, if they choose, to avail themselves of the services of the Soldiers' and Sailors' Families Association or other bodies to the full extent that they require.

THE MARQUESS OF CREWE

Hear, hear.

THE EARL OF CROMER

For that reason I do not think it necessary to press this Amendment, though I regret its loss, for it would have been a good finger-post for the local authorities and would have shown them what they might have done. But I quite admit that it is not absolutely necessary. I only wish to add that the whole of the proceedings in connection with this Bill confirm me in the belief, which I expressed the other day in dealing with the Postal and Telegraph Rates (Statutory Limits) Bill, that the Chancellor of the Exchequer in dealing with matters of this sort does not look so much to the merits of the case as to the amount of opposition he is likely to incur in Parliament, and the moment he encounters the least opposition he gives way. In this case the opposition has not been by any means strong. We are constantly being told that the Democracy will not stand this or the other. I wonder whether the leaders of the Democracy will ever learn that what the Democracy really want is that they should show a little moral courage. The Democracy cannot be driven, but I am perfectly certain that they can be persuaded if only valid and cogent arguments are brought forward urging them to adopt a particular course. In this case no effort has been made in this direction, and we are asked to put on the Statute Book a measure which represents a feeble compromise between conflicting views and one which I thoroughly believe will not accomplish the object which it is intended to serve.

LORD DEVONPORT

My Lords, the two speeches to which we have just listened have drawn our attention to the fact that we have behind our action the support of public opinion, not only as regards public men themselves but as regards the Press throughout the country. Lord Midleton stated that in your Lordships' House this Bill had been riddled with criticism, and that our Amendments had put it into a shape which made it what it was not when it came here. It came to us from the House of Commons an ill-considered measure, and we succeeded in converting it into a measure which, if the Government would adopt it, would serve a good purpose. In spite of the speeches which we have heard I understand that the recommendation is that we should ground our arms and allow the Bill to go through in its original form; that we should agree to accept it in that form in spite of our criticisms; that we should, in fact, adopt it under protest. The noble Earl said something about moral courage. I am not sure that this course is a good exemplification of moral courage. We are copartners, at all events, in the administration of this country as a Parliament. We have our experience and our judgment, and we have utilised them to the greatest possible public advantage in dealing with this measure. Yet because one man, as the noble Earl described it, places himself in opposition to the action we have taken we are to surrender at discretion! That is the situation. Although I emphatically object to it and protest against it, I know perfectly well that I have no power to alter it. I doubt very much in spite of all that has happened whether, if I were to stand out obstinately and say that I would not be a party to this, I should get two noble Lords to go with me into the Division Lobby. That is a parlous condition of affairs.

The noble Earl mentioned that for the last three years the relations between this House and another place have not been all that they might be. Does anybody suppose that they are likely to be improved by the lack of courage we are displaying on this occasion? Hitherto the House of Lords, whatever may have been its failings or its virtues, has always shown itself independent. But now we are going to take a certain course because the Government threaten. That is what it is; it is a threat. The Government say to the House of Commons—and to us indirectly—"If you support the Lords Amendments we will not finance the Bill." To that threat we are going to surrender. All I can say is that I am profoundly disappointed and surprised. Take the action of this House in relation to this Bill. First of all we realised that to rely on charitable funds to carry out all the important responsibilities contained in the Bill would be folly. We knew perfectly well—in fact, Lord St. Aldwyn pointed it out, and his experience in a matter of this kind is a unique one—that the public purse would have to be behind this Bill in order to give it validity, and that once the public knew that the public purse was behind the measure it would be no use looking to them for charitable contributions. We realised that to the full, in the same way as everybody realised it—the Press and the House of Commons itself—and we stood up for what my noble friend Lord Midleton calls a democratic principle. We were not going to convey the control of vast sums of public money—estimated by Mr. Hayes Fisher to amount to £5,000,000 to give this Bill its proper foundation—to a private organisation. That is a sound position, surely, for us to take up. That is the position we have taken up, and that is the position, I am sorry to say, we are going to abandon.

We have not only the support of the public and the Press behind us, but we have the support of the House of Commons itself. Those noble Lords who have read the debate which took place there the other day must have been struck by the fact, already referred to, that every Member who spoke, without a single exception, applauded the action we had taken here. Sir Ryland Adkins, the Member referred to by Lord Cromer, made a statement which I will quote in support of my assertion that the House of Commons is in favour of the action that was taken by your Lordships' House. This is what Sir Ryland Adkins said— Many of us who are sympathetic to the Lords Amendments have to undergo strategical movements of our consciences to-night in entirely agreeing with the Government. That was practically what every member of the House of Commons did—he under-went a strategical movement of his conscience in supporting the Government. We never were on such firm ground; we never have had such an opportunity. I have been a member of your Lordships' House for only a few years, but I am fully acquainted with the history of its proceedings for a quarter of a century at all events, and I say there never has been such an opportunity as we have at this moment of carrying public opinion with us. That is the way to establish the reputation of this House, not by surrendering our position when it is practically impregnable. Therefore it is that I regret so much the step that is going to be acquiesced in to-night.

The Government hang on tenaciously to the idea that voluntary money, somehow, coming from somewhere, at some time not specified, is going to find the wherewithal to work this Bill. During the recent debate Lord Lansdowne chided me because I gave in an emphatic way my view that this would not prove to be the case. He asked what justification I had for assuming that private funds would not be forthcoming. I abstained from interrupting him during his speech, but if he will allow me I will now give my reasons. In the first place I submit that I am justified on the ground of experience in believing that private money will not be forthcoming; and, in the second place, on the ground of some knowledge of human nature. Let me first take the question of experience, and it is experience in connection with this very body to whom is to be entrusted the control of this organisation. During the year in which the South African War broke out an appeal was made by the Lord Mayor for funds. A considerable sum was collected, and of it about £500,000 was entrusted to the Royal Patriotic Fund Corporation for administration. That was the old body. When the new body came into existence in 1904 one of the things they did was to consider the amount of money entrusted to them for dealing with claims from widows and orphans arising out of the South African War, and they came to the conclusion that the sum was inadequate in amount to discharge the obligations that would be cast upon them. They held a consultation among their influential men, and decided to make an appeal to the Lord Mayor to reopen the South African War Fund—that was, to reopen it two or three years after the Fund had been originally closed. The Lord Mayor agreed, and the appeal was issued. It had upon it a most influential group of names. In the first place the late King, His Majesty King Edward, wrote a letter with the idea of giving the appeal a good push off, if I may use that term, accompanied by a handsome donation. The other names attached to the appeal included those of the Duke of Connaught, the late Lord Derby, the late Lord Spencer, the late Lord Rothschild, the late Lord Strathcona, the Governor of the Bank of England, Lord Balfour of Burleigh, and several others equally as important but whose names I cannot recall at the moment. They appealed for £250,000. What was the result? The public response did not amount to more than £5,000. That is my first reply to the noble Marquess as to my justification for assuming that private funds would not be forthcoming. But there happened to be unexpended balances from several funds that had been collected by counties, by newspapers, and so on, and the bulk of those unexpended balances were contributed; but the total contribution in response to this most influential appeal, including these unexpended balances, amounted to only £12,000.

I said that my second ground for assuming that private money would not be forthcoming was based upon my knowledge of human nature. We know perfectly well that when an event comes along that awakens the sympathy of the people public bounty flows in a strong stream, but when a fund is started that does not appeal very strongly to the sympathies of the people the response is very small. Even in a case like this great and terrible war, where money has been poured out in an almost unending stream up to the present moment, the day will come—it is not very far distant—when that stream of benevolence will dry up. And I am confident that if you were to attempt to appeal to the people for supplementations of pensions in respect of the wastage and the devastation of war to human beings you would not get a response under any circumstances whatever. The people would tell you that this is a Government responsibility; and I agree.

I would like to say a word on the change of attitude, or change of ground, on the part of the Government in the last few days. First of all it was urged in this House, and repeated in another place, that the reason the Government could not accept the Bill as we had amended it was that their scheme proceeded on the basis of a voluntary organisation. But now we know that they do not believe in their own Bill. In the debate in another place Mr. Hayes Fisher, who was the spokesman of the Government, said— This is only a temporary measure; it will be treated as only a temporary measure; it falls far short of the recommendations that I made to the Select Committee. Mr. Hayes Fisher propounded before the Select Committee a State Pensions Board, with which should be co-ordinated all the various departments of the State—such as Greenwich and Chelsea—which deal with pensions. He admitted that this Bill fell far short of his expectations, but he said that the Government had decided that in the spring of next year they would bring in a new Bill founded on the basis of a State Pensions Board. We are asked to-night to be parties—and we are going to be parties—to passing a Bill which the Government have within the last ten days told us is a temporary expedient and is to be supplemented next spring by quite another thing, eliminating altogether the voluntary element. Therefore in effect we are consenting to the establishment of a machinery and organisation for, and the appointment of individuals to, a body which is going to be scrapped within the next six months.

I say again that I am sorry. I do not think our action will enhance the reputation of the House of Lords, which has had in this regard the best opportunity of putting itself en rapport with public opinion, yet it is throwing away that chance. If it is a satisfaction to us—it is a poor satisfaction in the circumstances—that we have public opinion behind us, we are entitled to take advantage of it for what it is worth. The Government have succeeded in forcing our action by threatening to wash their hands of the whole affair if we persist in our Amendments. This is my first experience of your Lordships' House in this humour. I have stood behind the Bar many a time when great events have been taking place here, and if I did not approve of what was going on I always admired your absolute fearlessness and independence. Now I find myself driven to taking part in this surrender. I regret it profoundly. I think it is a great blunder.

LORD HARRIS

My Lords, I must offer one word of remonstrance regarding the diatribe which the noble Lord has passed upon the action which we are advised to take to-day. I feel as strongly as the noble Lord does that we have been placed in a position which to me is absolutely incomprehensible. If anybody but the noble Marquess, Lord Lansdowne, was in joint charge of this Bill I should have said it could be nothing but a matter of temper which had induced the Government to disregard every financial principle that has been laid down for years past by Chancellors of the Exchequer. All this has been thrown overboard in the first place simply to suit what seems to be a fancy for a particular body—a very useful body, no doubt; and, in the second place, to suit the whim of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. I protest against the criticism which the noble Lord passed on the independence of this House on this particular occasion, because I do not think he completed the story. If we disregard the advice of the two noble Lords sitting on the Front Opposition Bench and insist on our Amendments, what is going to be the result? We have the authoritative statement of the Chancellor of the Exchequer that he will grant no funds except for a Bill that pleases him. We must assume that the Government have approved of that dictum of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Then who is going to suffer if we throw out this Bill? Not we—except in reputation, the noble Lord thinks; not the Government—their consciences are satisfied; not the general public; not these various charitable bodies which are now working so admirably throughout the country. No; the unfortunate people who would suffer are the pensioners, the people whom this Bill was going to help. That is the reason why I am prepared, feeling quite as strongly as the noble Lord does that we have been put in a false position by the Government, to adopt the course suggested. It is because I feel that there is an enormous number of men who will suffer if this Bill, even in its present poor shape, is not passed, that I am ready to run the risk of the reputation of this House suffering in the opinion of the public. I would much rather that the reputation of this House suffered than that these men should have to go without supplementary pensions.

LORD TENTERDEN

My Lords, I am greatly obliged to Lord Devonport for having brought us back to the rock on which the House split with regard to the question of State control. It seems to me somewhat belated to now take up an attitude similar to the one which I myself adopted when the Bill was first introduced into your Lordships' House, when I advocated State control and the supply of public funds only. If it was intended by noble Lords to have debated the measure upon those lines, I fail to understand why so much time has been given to discussing the Bill as produced by His Majesty's Government—a Bill which certainly aroused a great deal of opposition principally on the ground of its apparent financial weakness. But in that respect I may claim to have cleared the air to some extent when I put what the Standard newspaper called, in legal language, a "leading question" to His Majesty's Ministers. I asked whether, in the event of its being necessary, they were prepared to back the Bill financially. On that occasion I was privileged to have the support of the noble Earls, Lord Camperdown and Lord Lichfield, both of whom addressed themselves to the point that if State control was not to be given we should at any rate have an assurance from His Majesty's Government that, in the event of its being necessary, the required money would be forthcoming from public funds for these supplementary allowances. I think it is only just to His Majesty's Government to say that the answer which I received to my question, both from the noble Marquess the Leader of the House and from Lord Lansdowne, made it clear that in the event of the voluntary contributions not being sufficient the Chancellor of the Exchequer would come to the rescue. It seems to me that that should have largely satisfied the House upon the main point at issue, and that His Majesty's Government should not be expected to go further having regard to the composition of the Bill being that of voluntary contributions aided by public funds.

It does not seem to me altogether fair to accuse the Government of not having acted rightly by this House. I take a different view. I say that His Majesty's Government have given the fairest answers to the criticisms that have been delivered against this Bill. It is impossible for any one to say now what the allowances will be. The noble Marquess the Leader of the House told us that the scale would necessarily have to be revised on account probably of the increased size of the Army, and everybody understands that that must be so. It is therefore obviously impossible to say what given sum will be required. In my opinion the Bill, drawn as it is for the purpose of combining voluntary contributions with public funds, is a perfectly straightforward and honest Bill. These allowances must necessarily be varied from what they have been in the past, when voluntary contributions in large amounts were flowing in. For noble Lords to say, because they do not know what the Chancellor of the Exchequer is going to give, that they have been badly treated is to my mind unfair; for if that attitude had been adopted in the first place the Bill might have been thrown out right away at the beginning, or might have been discussed on other lines. But the Bill as it stands seems to me a perfectly sound measure if you are going to try and combine private contributions with public funds. Personally I approve of resort to public funds only, in a case of this kind; but that has this disadvantage, that you would then have to set up a new organisation at considerable expense to the country, whereas you already have an existing organisation in the voluntary societies, which are not only prepared to continue, but have hitherto well executed their work. The principal reason for the discord between the two Houses is, I think, State control, and it seems to me that if you have an assurance from the Government that the money will be forthcoming it does not much signify whether there is State control or not. The principal thing is to know that you have financial strength which will carry you through to the end.

LORD SYDEN HAM

My Lords, I think it is conceded on all hands that this Bill has no friends, and that if the principle of majority opinions were to apply in this case the Bill could not be passed. Lord Harris has said that he will vote for this Bill without the Lords Amendments because he feels that if it is not passed the dependants of the men whom the country delights and wishes to honour will not have what is due to them in the way of supplementary pensions. Is that the case? Is it conceivable, supposing this Bill were not passed, that either House of Parliament or the public of this country would permit of the dependants of these men being deprived of the supplementary pensions to which everybody feels they are entitled? It seems to me that neither House of Parliament nor the public would tolerate such a thing. Therefore I cannot see why this Bill in its unamended form should be allowed to pass.

There is one other point. There is nothing very certain about this Bill. Mr. Hayes Fisher said that it was an experimental measure, which means that he did not know—probably nobody knows—how the Bill will operate. It is not right to try an experiment upon the dependants of the men who have fought gallantly for their country. The Bill deals with two quite distinct subjects, the first being the supplementary pensions to the men who have fallen and the second the great question of separation allowances. We have no idea of how many cases would fall into the first category, but we do know from some figures given on July 21 by the noble Lord the Paymaster-General that the men drawing separation allowances at that time numbered 843,000. Therefore at the present time the number will probably amount to something like 1,000,000. If any figures could be given showing how many cases would come under the supplementary pension branch of the Bill it would be found that the number was very small in that connection, and that the great mass of the work under the Bill would be devoted to separation allowances. When the Amendment of the noble Earl which would have enabled the present agencies to continue the work they are carrying on was refused, it to my mind destroyed all hope of the separation allowances being managed as they have been. Therefore it seems to me that one effect when this Bill is passed will be that the whole machinery which for fifteen months has administered these separation allowances, and which, as I say, will touch the interests of something like 1,000,000 people before long, will be broken up, and that a long time must elapse before fresh machinery can be set up. Possibly it can- not be set up before a new Bill has been passed. I think those considerations ought to be borne in mind. If it can be said that the real interests of the dependants of the men we want to honour will not suffer by waiting for the new Bill which is promised in the spring, then I say we ought to pass the present Bill. But if that point is not made quite clear, I think that this House ought to refuse the Bill.

On Question, Motion agreed to.