Lords Sitting of 30 March 1916

Preamble
The LORD CHANCELLOR acquainted the House, That the Clerk of the Parliaments had laid upon the Table the Certificate from the Examiners that the further Standing Orders applicable to the following Bill have been complied with:
City of Dublin Steam Packet Company. The same was ordered to lie on the Table.

VAN DIEMEN'S LAND COMPANY BILL. [H.L.]
  CANADA COMPANY BILL. [H.L.]
    IMPERIAL CONTINENTAL GAS ASSOCIATION BILL. [H.L.]
    Reported, with Amendments.

RETURNS, REPORTS, ETC.
Government Insurances and Annuities—Account of all moneys received on account of contracts for the grant of deferred life annuities and for payments on death, and of the disposal thereof; and of the contracts made for the year ended 31st December 1915:
Shops Act, 1912—Closing Order made by the Urban District Council of Queenstown:
Laid before the House (pursuant to Act) and ordered to lie on the Table.

LARCENY BILL. [H.L.]
Referred to the Joint Committee on Consolidation Bills.
CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES.
The Lord STANMORE appointed to take the Chair in Committee of the Whole House this day.
ARMY (ANNUAL) BILL.
Brought from the Commons; read la; to be printed; and to be read 2a on Wednesday next (The Lord Sandhurst). (No. 13.)

NAVAL AND MILITARY WAR PENSIONS, ETC. (EXPENSES) BILL.
Order of the Day for the House to be put into Committee, read.
Moved, That the House do now resolve itself into Committee.—(Lord Hylton.)
MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: With your Lordships' permission, I should like upon this Motion to say a few words with regard to this Bill. I promised my noble friend Lord Salisbury last night that I would make inquiries in order to ascertain whether there was any degree of urgency attached to the measure. I have made these inquiries, and I am now able to give him the result of them. In the first place, it is obvious that unless there are strong reasons to the contrary it is desirable that this £1,000,000 should be placed as soon as possible at the disposal of the Statutory Committee. Those of your Lordships who noticed what passed in the House of Commons last night will have observed that new responsibilities are about to be thrown upon them, and this is an additional reason why they should be placed in funds without loss of time. But there is another reason. If your Lordships will look at the first clause of the Bill you will see that it requires that there shall be charged on and issued out of the Consolidated Fund of the United Kingdom in the year ending March 31, 1916, the sum of £1,000,000. Therefore that £1,000,000 has to be charged before the expiration of to-morrow. If it should not be so charged, I am advised that it would be necessary to go to the House of Commons again for a further Resolution; and I need not press upon noble Lords who have had experience of the House of Commons that that is not a matter to be lightly undertaken. But I readily admit that arguments of this kind, based upon the convenience of either House of Parliament or of Ministers, ought not to be allowed to prevail unless we are able to show not only that there is a substantial necessity for taking the step which we propose, but that its adoption will not deprive this House of opportunities to which it is entitled for criticising and examining the legislation proposed by the Government of the day.
I should like to examine very briefly what the case urged for delay in this instance amounts to. In the speeches to which we listened last night many arguments were used which were directed not so much at the Bill on the Table as at the Naval and Military Pensions Act of 1915. Some members of the House notoriously dislike that Act and believe that it proceeded upon an altogether wrong principle. But I would ask those noble Lords who have

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that feeling, and who, because they dislike the parent Act, dislike its offspring also, whether they have any hope of obtaining at this moment the repeal of the Act of 1915. Of course, such a thing is not to be thought of as a serious proposition. Nor again, I take it, do any of the noble Lords who criticise this Bill really desire that the Statutory Committee should be deprived of this £1,000,000 which we desire to put at their disposal. Questions are raised as to the manner in which this figure of £1,000,000 was arrived at, and they are perfectly fair questions for discussion. But again I ask, Do any members of your Lordships' House really desire that this Bill should be held up, still less that it should be thrown out, because you are not satisfied that the particular sum of 1,000,000 mentioned in it is an appropriate sum for the purpose? I think that no one in this House would venture to name any sum as one which could be considered as accurately and scientifically corresponding with the probable requirements of the case. As I tried to show last night, there are so many unknown factors in the calculation that it is absolutely impossible that any one should take upon himself to say that this or that sum will suffice.
Lord Devonport, who is not in the House to-night, told your Lordships yesterday that my noble friend the Leader of the House, when the Act of 1915 was being discussed, had assured your Lordships that it was our intention to propose the expenditure of what he called a lump sum and therefore a final sum for this purpose. I told the noble Lord that I was quite convinced that my noble friend had never said anything of the kind. Lord Devonport treated me very fairly. He sent me the Hansard reports of what had been said by my noble friend, and I will venture, in order to clear up the matter, to read to your Lordships what the actual words were. Speaking on September 29 my noble friend said—
"I shall be told that public money would be needed to carry out, in all probability, part of the work entrusted to this new body. That is undoubtedly true. But the intention of the framers and promoters of the Bill was that if a public grant had to be made it should be made in the form of a large single contribution from the Exchequer to the funds of the body entrusted with the distribution, and not by undertaking a regular annual payment for the purpose."
Then when the debate was renewed in October my noble friend said—
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"It was also recognised that, owing to the causes which the noble Viscount has mentioned and to others, it might happen that before the end of the war the sums voluntarily subscribed would not be sufficient to carry on the supplementary grants on the scale on which they have been contributed hitherto; and the Government therefore stated that they would be willing by way of grant—that is to say, by allocating from public funds a lump Sum to be handed over to this body and used in addition to its own resources—to do what they could to maintain those supplementary allowances on the scale of the past."
My noble friend went on to say—
"That, the noble Viscount will clearly see, is a totally different proposition from the Government saying, 'We will give each year from the Votes to a public departmental body such a sum as would be needed for continuing these supplementary allowances on precisely their present scale.'"
I think my noble friend could not have made more clear to his hearers that the antithesis which he desired to make was the antithesis between, on the one hand, the payment of a lump sum when required from the Exchequer, and on the other a constant steady flow of subventions intended to make good from month to month the deficiencies in the resources already at the disposal of the Statutory Committee. I apologise for taking up so much of your Lordships' time, but I was so distinctly challenged by Lord Devonport that it was impossible for me not to take notice of what he had said. Parting with this point, I will only say that I am going to assume that, whatever your Lordships' feelings may be as to the adequacy or inadequacy of the £1,000,000 which it is proposed to spend under this Bill, none of your Lordships would desire that so far as that clause is concerned the Bill should fail to pass and fail to pass at an early period of time.
I pass to a wholly different point, the point which was raised by my noble friend Lord Camperdown last night. The noble Earl and several other Peers who addressed the House took exception to the proposal that the local authorities should be allowed to provide out of the rates for the administration expenses of the local committees which are to be set up in different, parts of the country. Two objections were taken to that proposal. One was that it would be very difficult to draw a line between expenses which could properly be called expenses of administration and other expenses. The second objection was that it was a new and improper proceeding to allow money to be taken from the rates for

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purposes of this kind. First, as to the difficulty of deciding what is and what is not expense connected with administration, I am assured by people who have had more experience of these matters than I have that this difficulty need not be apprehended; and I should certainly be inclined to think that if as time went on any difficulty was found in distinguishing between what was properly chargeable to administration and what was not, the matter could be settled in the way in which these questions are usually dealt with—namely, by Circulars and Regulations issued from the Local Government Board. But it is not the case, that these boards will be, so to speak, turned loose to spend what money they please upon administration. I think my noble friend Lord Salisbury suggested that we might have a local authority spending needless sums upon sumptuous offices and things of that kind. I would remind my noble friend that in the case of county councils, urban councils, and rural district councils the accounts have to go before an auditor, who, I imagine, would very properly disallow wholly extravagant expenditure upon objects such as my noble friend indicated. But I really would ask your Lordships whether there is sufficient reason for assuming that local bodies are going to run riot and be extravagant in matters of this kind. I should think not. At this moment everyone is trying to save money and not to throw needless burdens upon the rates, and I feel no doubt that if a local council found that a local committee was running riot and spending money in profligate manner the local council would be the first to come down upon it and to raise a very proper objection. At any rate, of this I feel firmly convinced, that there is a better chance of frugal administration if these expenses are placed under the control of the local councils than if they are provided for from the funds at the disposal of the Statutory Committee or if they are found by means of Treasury grants.
One word more upon that point. We were told last night that this was a wholly unprecedented provision. I have here what seems to me a precedent upon which it is quite reasonable to rely. The National Insurance Act of 1911 contains a clause to this effect—
"It shall be lawful for any local authority, out of any fund or rate out of which the expenses of the authority are payable, to subscribe such sums as it may think fit towards the general purposes of the insurance committee."
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That is a much wider latitude than is given in this Bill, which only allows the rates to be drawn upon for purposes of administration. I therefore suggest to your Lordships that on this point, which is really the only point that is relevant so far as the Bill upon the Table is concerned—this question of the rates—there really is no chance whatever of the kind of abuse which some of my noble friends apprehend, and I trust that the presence of that clause in the Bill will not be considered as justifying the holding up of the measure by your Lordships' House.
My noble friend Lord Salisbury, at the close of the debate last night, asked me a number of questions with regard to such matters as, for example, the money paid to soldiers on their discharge from the Army; the medical examination of recruits; the treatment of cases of disease not wholly due to, but aggravated by, service. I recognise that those are all proper questions for discussion in this House, but I suggest to your Lordships that they can really be discussed, not only as well separately and on their own merits as in connection with a Bill of this kind, but a great deal better; because if any noble Lord will put upon the Paper Questions raising the specific points to which my noble friend Lord Salisbury called attention he will have a much better chance of getting the whole thing thoroughly threshed out than if the points are merely debated as more or less connected with the substance of a Bill on its way through your Lordships' House. I have troubled your Lordships with these observations because I am extremely anxious that you should not suppose that I am asking for the suspension of the Standing Order in connection with this Bill without a sufficient reason for taking a course which, I frankly admit, ought not to be taken except in cases of distinct necessity.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON: My Lords, nobody carries so much weight in your Lordships' House as the noble Marquess when he rises to make an appeal such as he has made on behalf of this Bill. It is an appeal which is the more difficult to resist because there is not a member of your Lordships' House who does not desire the distribution of this money accelerated, and who would not be sorry if it were put off for a single day. But I think that my noble friend will realise that never and he put a body of men into a more difficult position if our debates are to be worth anything at all, First of all, the necessity for this

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measure was recognised in the House of Commons as well as in this House as long ago as last September. The pledge on which the original Bill was passed in this House was a declaration in the House of Commons—I think made by Mr. Hayes Fisher—that at the earliest possible moment a comprehensive Bill would be brought in dealing with the whole question. That pledge has not yet been made good, and we are this afternoon asked to pass a sort of ad interim measure based on no calculation of probable expenditure but merely assigning £1,000,000 for the service of pensions. We might come back to the old point on which we discussed this matter last year—that once you give Government money private contributions are liable to be dried up. But whatever advantage there might be in our discussion, it is rendered quite fruitless by the circumstances in which we meet this Bill to-day. This Bill, although so simple, was not introduced into the House of Commons until March 8. I must enter a protest against the idea that it was only on March 8 that the Chancellor of the Exchequer realised that he would have £1,000,000 to spare in this financial year. When we are spending at the rate of £5,000,000 a day, it really becomes almost laughable. At all events, there being only from March 8 to March 31 available, the House of Commons usurped twenty-one days and left us a day and a-half before the end of the financial year. Therefore our discussion really might as well not take place at all.
We had two pledges from the Government on this matter. We had a pledge from the noble Marquess the Leader of the House at the beginning of the session that, so far as he could control it, we should not be asked again to pass with this precipitate haste measures of importance which we might desire to discuss. What use was it to bring in this measure at the tail end of the discussions last evening, and then to tell us that if we do not pass it through all its stages by half-past five or six o'clock to-night the money must be lost for this year? Is that treating the House fairly? I know that nobody regrets it more than my noble friend who has just spoken; but here is a concrete case. The second pledge was that, so far as they could, the Government would not allow unlimited powers either to Departments or to local authorities to get together staffs for the purpose of an Act of Parliament. Here
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we have a definite case. My noble friend found one instance which he read to the House in which local authorities had this power without any control from the Local Government Board or the Treasury. If that is so, I venture to say it is a very bad case and a very bad precedent. It is a precedent which requires to be arrested. I sat for six years on the London County Council, and I know the difficulty continually creeping into Acts of Parliament regarding the setting up of various administrative authorities to be paid for out of the rates. Even when under the control of the Local Government Board, the pressure to appoint fresh officials and to increase our staff was enormous. I do not see how you are to have any homogeneous action in this matter throughout the country except with control by the Local Government Board.
I am not going into the whole question of the Bill, but what I wish to ask the Government is this. Will they not agree in Clause 2, when the time comes, to insert the words "subject to the consent of the Local Government Board"? There is no difficulty whatever. The House of Commons is sitting, the Bill can go back there, the words can be agreed to, and the Royal Assent can be given this evening. The course which I venture humbly to suggest is preferable to the entire abandonment of the privileges of your Lordships' House on a subject which You have discussed to a great extent and on which your debates ranged over a considerable time last autumn. That is the only alternative I can see to the entire abandonment of our rights. I am not certain whether the Lord Chancellor would hold that such an Amendment was a breach of privilege. I hope not. It does not in any way alter the amount of the rate or charge, its duration, its mode of assessment, its levy or collection, or the limits within Which it is leviable; but it does give control by a Public Department, it is in consonance with past Acts of Parliament, and it affords what at the present time is a much needed limitation of a power of expenditure which is only too likely to be exceeded. I do not want to reiterate what I believe is felt by us all. We do not desire in the least to be obstructive. We wish to meet the appeal of my noble friend in the best possible spirit. At the same time we feel that, if this system is to be continuing, the sittings of your Lordships' House with

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regard to legislation are absolutely futile. For my part I would much rather that this were recognised and that we frankly put the whole matter into the hands of the Coalition Government than that we should be held responsible for legislation which we are quite unable to control.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: My Lords, my noble friend Lord Midleton has put to the Government a question conceived in a very conciliatory spirit, representing an effort on his part to do his best to come to an agreement in the very difficult circumstances in which we stand. I am most anxious to facilitate the business of the Government for every reason, but most of all because the appeal has been made by my noble friend Lord Lansdowne. I should be very sorry indeed to be instrumental in any way in thwarting the Government. But here is the proposal which has been made—that if we allow the whole of our privileges of discussion to be abandoned in deference to the Government, they in their turn should consent to three or four words being inserted to protect the ratepayers.
My noble friend Lord Lansdowne said he believed that if undue expenditure was incurred by the local authorities under this clause the auditor would surcharge the amount. I speak with great submission, but I am afraid that my noble friend is under a complete misapprehension as to the power of the auditor in this respect. An auditor can surcharge any illegal expenditure, but he cannot surcharge extravagant expenditure which is within the law. That is entirely under the control of the local authorities. They might spend any amount of money upon offices and secretaries, and all the rest of it, the kind of thing we are very familiar with in local administration, unless there are some words in some other Act controlling them. In this Bill there is nothing at all to control them.
My noble friend Lord Midleton has shown that the provision in the Bill is, if not unprecedented—Lord Lansdowne quoted one precedent—at any rate very nearly unprecedented. And these are the days of economy! These are the days when the Government urge us to save every penny of public and private money that we can. Every day we come down to your Lordships' House and urge that the Govern-
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ment should carry out this principle, but for some extraordinary reason night after night there are difficulties put in the way. I suggest that the Government should engage to insert the words suggested by Lord Midleton unless there are some other words in an existing Act which render them unnecessary. If they would agree to the insertion of these words we could come to an agreement on the matter.
LORD BALFOUR OF BURLEIGH: My Lords, I would point out the urgency of inserting the words suggested by Lord Midleton, for a particular reason. The noble Marquess urged that this expenditure would be audited and that the auditor could surcharge. This may be all very well as far as county councils, district councils, and parish councils are concerned; but if my information is not wrong there is a large number of municipal bodies who are not under audit at all, and unless some such words as those suggested were inserted in this Bill the local authorities might, if they choose, escape control altogether.
THE EARL OF CROMER: My Lords, we have had many cases in this House of hustling, but I think this is the worst case of all. When this matter was under discussion nearly a year ago the opinion was generally expressed that there should be some general control over expenditure and that it should not be left entirely to local authorities. I do not think a pledge was given at the time that this control would be exercised, but the proposal was somewhat favourably received. I cannot say, with every wish to get the Bill through soon, that I have the same confidence as that expressed by the noble Marquess as regards the control which will be exercised over this expenditure by the local authorities, and I should be glad to see Lord Midleton's proposal accepted. I hope, anyhow, that before we are asked to vote on the matter the noble Marquess or the Leader of the House will give us a definite assurance as to how this proposal is going to be received.
THE LORD PRESIDENT OF THE COUNCIL (THE MARQUESS OF CREWE): My Lords, two separate questions have been raised in the speeches of the noble Lords who have spoken from the Front Bench opposite—one the general question as to whether your Lordships' House has been fairly treated in being asked to take

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this Bill through its remaining stages to-day; the other the specific question relating to control of local authorities in the administration of the Bill. On the first matter I cannot help expressing the opinion that the noble Lords who have spoken have overstated the case in regarding this as an extreme attempt to pass a measure rapidly through your Lordships' House. It appears to me, on the contrary, to be a very mild attempt. This Bill contains practically two provisions only—one the voting of a sum of money, which was discussed, as I understand, at some length yesterday in connection with its adequacy; and the other the question of the body to whom the administration of the funds should be locally entrusted. I find it very hard to persuade myself that a great number of days or of hours are required for the sufficient discussion of these two simple propositions; and I confess I would urge noble Lords opposite when selecting a case—and there have been, we are all aware of it, cases when both Parties have been in power in the past where your Lordships have been cavalierly treated in being denied what we considered sufficient time to discuss questions—to choose a somewhat stronger case than this.
On the particular point of the control to be exercised over the local committees in respect, not of the grants they make, but of their administrative expenses, we shall be glad to do something to meet the complaints of noble Lords opposite. It is not, I fear, possible, if the Bill is to pass at all, to take the course which the noble viscount suggested of inserting an Amendment. I understand that the House of Commons is not likely to be sitting long enough to receive the measure so amended, and therefore the result would be for the time being the destruction of the Bill. But there is a measure, the Local Government (Emergency Provisions) Bill, in which a safeguard such as noble lords think necessary could be inserted, and we are prepared to see that some such provision is so inserted.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: Is that a Bill now before Parliament?
THE DUKE OF DEVONSHIRE: It was read a second time yesterday in other House.
THE MARQUESS OF CREWE: I am bound to say that I consider the fears of noble Lords on this particular point to be groundless. I believe that the local authorities are far more likely to adopt too low a scale than too high a one. It is precisely the kind of affair on which local authorities are inclined to be somewhat over careful about the expenditure of the rates, and therefore I do not think that on the merits the request of noble Lords opposite deserves the consideration we are prepared to show it. The point which my noble friend opposite mentioned regarding the audit is no doubt one of substance. It is quite true that, though certain local authorities are subject to Local Government Board audit, there are many which are not; and it may be argued that in the case of those authorities there is no such check as exists, not merely in the power of the Local Government Board to surcharge particular expenditure, but in the general moral pressure which is exercised on local authorities by the existence of that audit. However, we are, as I say, prepared to meet noble Lords opposite by inserting suitable words in the Bill which I have mentioned, and I trust that the noble Lords who have made this complaint will consider that course to be satisfactory.
THE EARL OF CAMPERDOWN: Could the noble Marquess give us any idea as to the sort of words which he proposes to introduce in the other Bill?
THE MARQUESS OF CREWE: I cannot, offer to do that offhand.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON: Might I ask the noble Marquess when the Bill in which he has promised to introduce this provision is likely to reach this House?
THE MARQUESS OF CREWE: The Bill was read a second time in another place yesterday, and therefore I conceive that it will not be very long before it reaches this House.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON: And we may count upon all these expenses being brought under the control of the Local Government Board?
THE MARQUESS OF CREWE: I am not prepared to say that those specific words will be used. I am afraid we must ask for a little time to consider the form in

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which the kind of control that the noble Lords desire will be exercised.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: The Government, I say it with great respect, are asking rather a strong thing of your Lordships' House at this moment; and so far as we are concerned we are quite willing to grant it to them, but they must be a little forthcoming about it, and must not ride off on general words. What we want to know specifically is whether they will undertake that no local authority will be allowed to incur administrative expenses under this Bill without the consent of the Local Government Board. We do not ask for specific words. If the noble Marquess who leads the House will say definitely that he will secure this in the other Bill, that will be quite sufficient. I am sure the noble Marquess will realise that we are not unreasonable. We want to have his assurance, which, of course, we should accept absolutely, that this will be achieved in the other Bill.
VISCOUNT PEEL: My Lords, I suppose there is no question that this can be done in the Bill to which the noble Marquess has referred. I understand that this other Bill is one conferring new powers in relation to other matters upon the Statutory Committee, and I think it was stated in another place that none of the money for these new purposes was to come out of the £1,000,000 voted under this Bill, but was to be separate altogether. I presume it is quite clear that the proposed restriction will apply to the money expended under this Bill.
THE MARQUESS OF CREWE: That is so.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: I think we must reserve the right of considering the precise language to be used, but as to the intention I do not think there is any difference of opinion between us. We desire that in this other measure words shall be inserted effectually limiting the expenditure of the local authorities to items of administration within the sanction of the Local Government Board.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: Not merely that they should be legal, but that they should not be excessive.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: That the whole thing should be subject to the Local Government Board. The Bill in question will come before your Lordships at an early date, and you will then have full opportunity of requiring us to make good our pledge.
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly.
[Lord STANMORE in the Chair.]
Bill reported without amendment: Then Standing Order No. XXXIX considered (according to Order), and dispensed with Bill read 3a, and passed.

CONSOLIDATED FUND (No. 2) BILL.
Read 3a (according to Order), and passed.

MUNITION WORKERS HOURS.
LORD SYDENHAM LORD SYDENHAM rose to ask the Paymaster-General what steps have been taken to fulfil the conditions laid down by the Committee on the Health of Munition Workers that "if the maximum output is to be secured and maintained for any length of time, a weekly period of rest must be allowed."
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I hope you will pardon me for bringing up this matter for, I think, the fourth time. My reason is that I believe that protection of munition workers from overstrain is a national question of first-class importance. When the Munitions Department was appointed it set up an Expert Committee to advise on the health of the workers, and that Committee has already issued many very valuable Reports. Those Reports deal with many aspects of the question and include a large number of valuable recommendations to which the Committee evidently attach great weight. Incidentally they prove that there is a large amount of over-work now going on, and that the hours of labour generally are far longer than they ought to be in the interests of the health of the workers. The First Report which the Committee issued was on Sunday Labour and contains the words which I cite in my Question on the Paper. Nothing could be more clear and definite than those words. After personal examination of the conditions of labour, the Committee state that—

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"if the maximum output is to be secured and maintained for any length of time, a weekly period of rest must be allowed."
That statement corresponds exactly with my own experience in a time of war pressure, and I am certain that, apart from injury to the health of the workers, the output is actually diminished by overstrain.
The Fifth Report of this Committee was issued on January 16, and it deals with questions of overtime, night work and shifts as they affect men, women, girls, and boys in the factories. That Report plainly indicates that there are some practices now going on which ought to be abandoned without delay. When one recalls all that was claimed by advocates of the forty-eight hour week one realises how very far munitions work has departed from what was regarded as a reasonable maximum limit of the hours of labour. The Committee point out that—
"At one time cases of men working as much as ninety hours were common; more recently there has been a tendency to reduce them, but, even so, weekly totals of from seventy to eighty hours are frequent."
Women in some cases are apparently working sixty-five hours a week, and the Report contains a strong recommendation that no woman should work more than sixty hours a week. That number of hours in the case of women who have never been in a factory before seems to me excessive. The Committee also demand that—
"Every effort should be made not to work boys under sixteen more than sixty hours."
I think that also is a maximum limit for boys of that age. As regards male adults, the Committee say—
"The average weekly hours (exclusive of meal time) should not exceed sixty-five to sixty-seven hours, including overtime."
And that means nineteen hours a week more than the forty-eight which used to be held as sufficient. A trade union official points out most justly to the Committee that—
"Where there is overtime beyond two hours daily there is evidence of fatigue, and men cannot be employed economically."
The Committee carefully enumerate the dangers from overtime, amongst which they note this—
"The fatigue entailed increases the temptation to men to indulge in the consumption of alcohol; they are too tired to eat, and seek a stimulant."
That sort of thing is going on, and it is a grave moral evil.
I will not weary your Lordships with any more quotations from this most significant Report. But it establishes the fact that a large number of men and women have been overworked for many months. Some injury must have occurred to them; and possibly in many cases, especially in the case of women, that injury may turn out to be of a permanent character. It may be taken as certain that the output of munitions cannot be increased and must be reduced in these circumstances. A man who works eighty hours and a woman or girl who works sixty-five hours must suffer and must be exerting far less than the normal effort which in itself is a demoralising condition. It is only by reasonably restricted hours that we can produce the best output without injury to the health of the workers.
When I last raised this question my noble friend Lord Newton said that I was "really asking more than the munitions workers asked for themselves," and he taxed me with believing that "the munitions worker was a helpless sort of individual incapable of protecting himself and looking after his own interests." I do not cherish that belief in the least, and I think my noble friend forgot the many inducement to long hours which now beset the munitions worker. Many men and perhaps most women are over-working from a sense of patriotism, and will break down rather than give in on the score of overstrain. In other cases, as a trade union official further told the Committee, "the possibility of getting more money has its effect." In one small factory of which I know a strike was threatened when the management proposed to abolish Sunday labour for a time. I believe that all employers would gladly welcome Sunday rest, and that it would increase output. But it would not be universally popular, and it would have to be made general; otherwise there would certainly he a tendency for the men to abandon factories where Sunday labour was stopped and go to those in which it was retained. After all the Reports and investigations which have been made, nothing of an effective character has yet been done as far as I can ascertain. Surely it is futile to call doctors into consultation and then to ignore their expert advice. These factories now, to a great extent, are controlled by the State, and I do think that a heavy responsibility rests upon the Ministry of Munitions for safeguarding the health of employees, and

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securing economic production. The health of the workers in these factories is, in my opinion, second only in importance to the health of our Armies in the field; and I earnestly hope that we shall be told to-day that steps will be taken to put an end to a state of things which is a growing danger and at the same time is diminishing the output of munitions and entailing a great waste of public money.
LORD ELPHINSTONE: My Lords, the noble Lord's Question is addressed to the Paymaster-General, but as it is one that closely concerns the Ministry of Munitions I have been asked to reply to it. Active steps have been and are being taken to give effect to the recommendation contained in the Report of the Health of Munition Workers Committee that all munition workers should have a weekly rest, preferably on Sunday. I think I may add that an increasing number of the manufacturers in this country now themselves realise that by instituting a weekly rest day they get in the six days a production equal to what they were getting formerly in a seven-days week.
Shortly after the issue of the Committee's First Report a conference was held at the Ministry at which the whole general question was carefully considered. The immediate result of this conference was the formation of a small Executive Committee to take all necessary steps to give effect to the recommendations contained in the Report. This Special Committee at once issued a circular-letter to all controlled establishments, pointing out the injurious effect upon production of working excessive overtime and engaging upon continuous labour involving Sunday work. This circular suggested (1) that a weekly rest period, preferably Sunday, should be secured to all workers; (2) that even in cases where the work was necessarily of a continuous character and no arrangement for a general rest on any particular day could be made, it was desirable that all munition workers should have a regular period of rest, even if on different days.
The Ministry did not let the matter rest there, but subsequently addressed an inquiry to all the factories concerned, in which the following questions were asked: (1) The number of persons ordinarily employed on Sunday labour; (2) the hours worked and the intervals allowed for food
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on each day of the week; (3) the procedure as to shifts; (4) the pre-war practice; and (5) the firm's views as to the effect of any change upon their output. As a result of this inquiry the following information has been obtained regarding Sunday labour. I do not propose to weary your Lordships with a mass of figures, but I may say that from the returns received and classified to date—and they number some 2,400—I see that no less than 60 per cent. do no Sunday labour at all. Of the remaining 40 per cent. many are employed on emergency work which must go on—namely, shipbuilding and repairs for the Admiralty, repairs to their own plant, keeping up furnaces, etc.; and, again, figuring in that 10 per cent. are a certain number of firms who are doing Sunday work with voluntary week-end workers. Your Lordships will have noted that a very large majority of the firms whose returns have now been classified employ no Sunday labour at all. Each of the comparatively few who do is being dealt with separately, sgradually all are being brought into line. It may be observed that the Committee has not confined itself merely to the issue of circular letters and making inquiries. Visits of inspection have been paid, and arrangements made for the provision of week-end labour. I hope the noble Lord will agree with me that the Ministry has not allowed this important question to be lost sight of, and I hope he will also agree that the results achieved so far have been satisfactory.

ENEMY ALIENS IN LONDON.
VISCOUNT TEMPLETOWN VISCOUNT TEMPLETOWN rose to move to resolve—"That in the opinion of this House London should be at once declared 'Prohibited Area.'"
The noble Viscount said: My Lords, before venturing to place before your Lordships a few of the reasons for moving the Resolution that stands in my name, I would like briefly to draw your attention to the objects of the Aliens Restriction Act. In the first place I had better at once mention that certain portions of London have been declared prohibited areas—namely, the St. Katherine's, London, Surrey Commercial, West India, Millwall, and the East India Docks. The Restriction Act gave power to His Majesty, in the event of imminent national danger or great emergency, to

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impose by Order in Council restrictions upon aliens and to make such provisions as might be necessary or expedient for carrying such restrictions into effect. The Aliens Restriction Consolidation Act includes in it all the various Acts and some seven or eight Orders in Council that have been passed since 1914, and it is a notable point in these Orders that they apply as much to allies or neutrals as to alien enemies.
The dock area to which I have referred has been very properly made a prohibited area, but I should like His Majesty's Government to be good enough to inform the House what steps have been taken since the promulgation of the Order to give effect to its provisions. Have all alien enemies in this area been removed? If not, how many are still left there and why are they allowed to remain? Sir John Simon is reported to have admitted in another place in June, 1915, that several hundred alien enemies of all ages and both sexes had been exempted from the restriction. He did not, so far as I know, state why such should be the case. At the time of his speech Sir John Simon said that in round figures the alien enemies of military age in the metropolitan area were: Germans 9,000; Austro-Hungarians, 4,000; and that: the exemptions in the area referred to ansounted to 592 men and 2,134 women.
I think your Lordships will agree that my motion is very understandable. If we take Eastbourne as an example of a prohibited area, we find that there is a group of influential alien enemies still residing there in comfort and affluence. Why is this? And how is it that the whole of London has not been declared a prohibited area? Surely if Eastbourne and towns on the East Coast and many seaside resorts on the South-east Coast have been declared prohibited areas, why should not the whole of London? London is the centre of the nerve and brain of the Empire, the centre of wireless communication throughout the world, the headquarters of all the Government Departments having in hand the conduct of the war, and yet it is left absolutely unprotected. In this very vital area, allowing for figures which may have transpired since Sir John Simon spoke, there must be between 8,000 and 9,000 alien enemies loose, and I know that they are allowed to go on with their commerce and their trade with very delicate restric-
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tions. I ask any member of your Lordships' House whether alien enemies would be allowed such licence in any other country in the world.
Another point. If these thousands of alien enemies are properly under Police supervision, I wonder how many Police officers are thereby absent from the other duties which they ought to perform. If the whole of the metropolis were proclaimed a prohibited area these dangerous cliques would be broken up automatically and scattered all over the country in detached groups who would not have the same facilities for consulting together, which would greatly tend to reduce their power for evil. Next month and the following month will be quite a nice time for Zeppelin raids. Ought these alien enemies to remain? They are worse when the Zeppelins arrive. These Germans meet night after night in this country, and it is well known to the proper authorities where they meet. They discuss their policy during the war and what it will be after the war, and I have no doubt whatever that their views are such as do not entitle them to live at large here.
There is one other remark I should like to make. If I rightly understood Lord Newton, he said in a recent debate that the Government were releasing as many of the poor interned aliens as they possibly could because then the Germans might perhaps release some of the British interned prisoners in Germany. Such a method seems to me to be futile. I suggest that the German prisoners in this country should be given the same poor fare that British prisoners receive in Germany. I understand that such a course has been followed in France with good effect. I beg to move.
Moved to resolve, That in the opinion of this House London should be at once declared a "prohibited area."—(Viscount Templetown.)
LORD BERESFORD: My Lords, I should like to support the noble Viscount in his effort to get London declared a prohibited area. I cannot understand the sympathy in this country for alien enemies, snore particularly with regard to the Germans. Once a German always a German, whether you naturalise him or not. It is only three years ago that. some of the

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most distinguished Germans in this country who were in the habit of going into our society and meeting all our people sent over a message of love and reverence for the Kaiser and their country. The real fact is that these people are either traitors to their own country or traitors to this, and we have no room for traitors of any sort in this country, more particularly during a war.
I would like to ask the representative of the Government who is going to reply to the noble Viscount whether he can tell us anything about the German Athenaeum Club, which was taken over by certain officers in the Service. I would remind the Government that though the Board of Trade were told continually who belonged to this club—mostly Germans—they took no action whatever to support the officers who took the club over from the Germans until those officers took the law into their own hands. I think it is a fatal thing in this country if once people take the law into their own hands. It has happened before with regard to the German aliens. The Board of Trade know perfectly well who paid off the mortgage for £15,000 when the German Athanamm people tried to get the club back from the officers at present there. I would also like to know as the Board of Trade has ordered that this club should be wound up, whether it is to be a voluntary or a compulsory winding-up. If it is to be a compulsory winding-up, we shall know all about the club; but if it is to be a voluntary winding-up, we shall not. Most of the Germans over here appear to be able to go on with their businesses. In the Dominions they cannot do so. They have been got rid of. What can be done in the Dominions we can do here, and I think we should.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: My Lords, my noble friend Lord Templetown gave the House a very clear sketch of the objects with which the Aliens Restriction Order was framed. Its general object was, as my noble friend is aware, to place restrictions on the liberties and movements of all aliens wherever resident, while further restrictions were placed upon alien enemies resident in certain areas which were specified as "prohibited areas." In these prohibited areas all aliens are obliged to register with the Police, and alien enemies are not allowed to reside within them with
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out special Police permission. The question of deciding what areas should be prohibited was very carefully considered by all the authorities—Naval and Military, the Home Office, and the Police. In the first place they were confined mainly to those parts of the East Coast in respect of which it was thought necessary to take special precautions, but the extent of these areas was kept constantly under consideration and from time to time additions were made to them, and at the present moment they constitute what is virtually a ring round the circumference of the coast line of Great Britain.
My noble friend asks why London has not been included in the prohibited areas, and no doubt my noble friend meant by London the Metropolitan Police area, which covers an extent of, I think, 700 square miles and has a population of 7,500,000 people. This matter was very carefully considered. It was decided in the first instance not to include London among the prohibited areas, and from time to time the question of including it has come up for consideration, but the decision has always been adverse to the proposal, for reasons which I will give to my noble friend. It was felt in the first place that to bring London within the prohibited areas would impose upon the Police, who are very much depleted in number and overburdened with work, an amount of clerical labour which would have been out of all proportion to the gain obtained in public safety. I mean by that that the Police would have been obliged to include and bring in under their surveillance a very large number of aliens, who, far from being enemy aliens, were friendly aliens. It was also thought that the effect of such a measure might be to drive away from London numbers of alien enemies, a great many of them women, into areas less efficiently police than London is, and from the point of view of the Police authorities that was considered to be distinctly an undesirable result. I am able to tell my noble friend that the Commissioner of Police has had this matter under his constant attention, and that he maintains to-day the opinion that to make London a prohibited area would add nothing to the public security.
It is pointed out to me that the conception of prohibited areas has lost a good deal

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of its importance since the policy, announced by the Government in May last, of the internment of aliens and their repatriation has been vigorously and exhaustively carried out. Only those alien enemies who, having passed under the review of the Advisory Committees, have been exempted from internment or repatriation, are now at liberty in any part of the country; and the Police supervision exercised over them, whether in prohibited areas or otherwise, affords, it is believed, adequate safequards against their constituting any danger to the country.
My noble friend gave some figures as to the number of alien enemies in London. I am not quite sure whether his figures agree with those with which I have been supplied. The number was, of course, very large indeed at the beginning of the war, but it has been greatly reduced by internments, deportations, and repatriations, I am told that at the present moment there are about 9,000 males and 7,500 females at large, but this total includes not only Germans, Austrians, Hungarians, Turks, and Bulgarians, but a large number of persons belonging to friendly races, such as Alsatians and Poles. All these persons are constantly passing under review, and can be interned or deported at any moment if occasion should arise.
To sum up the information which has been supplied to me, I would say that it is the considered and clear opinion of the responsible authorities that no advantage to administration or the public safety would be obtained by introducing into the system of control exercised in the Metropolitan Police District the complications involved in declaring that district a prohibited area under the Aliens Restriction Order, and that it would withdraw a number of Police officers for a considerable time, some of them permanently, from other and more important duties. That is the deliberate judgment of the responsible authorities, and we do not question its correctness.
My noble and gallant friend on the Back Bench opposite (Lord Beresford) asked me for information with regard to the German Athenæum Club. I confess my ignorance. I was not even aware of the existence of that institution, and I am afraid I am quite unable to give my noble friend any infor-
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mation as to the circumstances under which it was wound up. But if he will allow me I shall be pleased to make inquiries and inform him of the result.
LORD BERESFORD: Thank you.
VISCOUNT TEMPLETOWN: My Lords, with the leave of the House I beg to withdraw my Motion.
Motion (by leave) withdrawn.

THE CENSOR AND A NEWSPAPER ARTICLE.
LORD ST. DAVIDS: My Lords, I rise to ask His Majesty's Government whether their attention has been called to an article by the Military Correspondent of the Daily Telegraph, published on March 27, in which he wrote as follows:—
The German strategists are bold to rashness; they know that our best troops, and, what is even more important, our best Officers, are abroad, so that they probably reckon on easy victory if once they can put ashore sonic half a dozen Army Corps. What steps are incumbent on our War Office in the teeth of this menace, remote though it be?
The best precaution we can take is to confide the command of the troops told off for the defence of England to competent Generals, with competent Staff officers, and, at whatever cost to the Army in the Field, some such leaders should he reserved for this duty. To tell off large bodies of troops to fight a defensive campaign under incapable chiefs is a sheer waste of men;
and whether these statements have been approved by the Censor.
LORD SANDHURST: My Lords, my noble friend Lord Curzon would have replied to this Question on behalf of the Home Office, but, unhappily, he cannot be present, and I have been deputed to answer it. The reply is as follows. The Home Secretary has seen the article referred to and is informed that it passed the Press Bureau. The passing of an article does not, of course, indicate approval. The Censor has only to consider whether the article contravenes the principles by which his action is guided—namely, whether it is likely to hinder us in the prosecution of the war or, for other reasons, to be of value to the enemy, and

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if it is not the Censor passes it. In the instance mentioned in the Question nothing in the article appeared to him to contravene these principles, and he passed it.

THE CAMPAIGN IN MESOPOTAMIA.
LORD BERESFORD: My Lords, I rise to ask His Majesty's Government whether the General Officer Commanding the British Forces now besieged at Kut-el-Amara had recommended, or was responsible for, the decision to advance on Ctesiphon, or whether in carrying out that advance he was only acting under the direct orders of the General Officer Commanding the Forces in Mesopotamia.
It has been stated in another place that all the military authorities were consulted and approved the Expedition to Baghdad, including the General Officer Commanding in Mesopotamia. The public, as far as I have gathered, understood that the General Officer Commanding in Mesopotamia was General Townshend. We know here that he was not. But what I ask is whether General Townshend, who had to undertake the campaign, was asked as to his capability to do it with the number of men that were sent with him, whether he asked for more reinforcements, and what opinion he gave with regard to this campaign. I need not remind the House of the terrible result if we have an accident or a reverse at Kut. We shall lose our prestige and wake up the Moslem mind all over the world, and the Turks will be able to say that they have beaten us not only in Europe, but in Asia. From the Press I understand that General Townshend started with one Division; but he had nothing like a Division. Looking at the harmful results which would come about if he got defeated, he ought not to have started on that campaign without three Divisions; yet, as I say, he left with considerably less than one. The line of communication is 380 miles of the worst kind of line of communication possible in war time—a river—and any military man knows that in a circumstance like that it is necessary to have an army on each side. There was nothing thought out ahead; there were very few light-draught boats, although the water was known to be very shallow. The Government must have been aware of the requirements.
I should like to ask the Government why, in a campaign of this extreme interest and
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vital effects, either in defeat or victory, no Despatches have been made public in this country since April of last year. It is only fair to the relatives, to those who are interested, materially interested, and to the country that some further Despatches should have been published. Since April of last year there have been three battles. Two of them were of a tremendous character, each lasting over three days. The first battle took place in June at Amara; the second was at Kut-el-Amara at the end of September, and the third was at Ctesiphon on November 22, 23, and 24—a three days' desperate battle. Our men were short of water and were fighting under the most terrific weather conditions. They have added to the traditions of both the British and the Indian Armies by their heroic acts.
Then there was a retreat. I get my news principally from the Press. I believe there were five Turkish Divisions at Baghdad. As I say, there was a retreat. Nothing has been better done or more brilliantly carried out in this war than that retreat, because our men were pursued with enormously superior forces. The method of that retreat was of the very finest military character. We know that General Townshend succeeded in getting back to the river, a whole ninety miles, and never lost a gun or a prisoner; and since that date, December 3, he has been besieged. In another place the Secretary of State for India has stated that the question of the medical necessities has been"shocking"—I think that was the word he used. But we have not yet heard about the question of the military necessities, and I think the Government, without letting the enemy know anything that they do not know at present, should give some indication as to the whole state of affairs in regard to this gallant little Army at Kut which fought those actions and which is now besieged.
The Government's answers are merely that they are "anxiously considering the position." With that I quite agree. But I say it is caused by their own folly, their own want of knowledge of war, and, as I said here the other day, by the political and civilian element controlling a war instead of paying attention to their policy and then turning it over to the soldier and the sailor to dictate what forces are necessary to make it a success. In fact the whole of these auxiliary Expedition's

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have been a series of gambles. We have no right to gamble with the lives of our men or the safety of the Empire. The Prime Minister said he did not think that in the whole course of the war there had been serious operations more carefully contrived, more brilliantly conducted, with better prospects of final success. There is only one absolute fact in that—namely, that they were brilliantly conducted. The rest of those statements proved absolutely contrary to fact. They were very much like the statements made by the right hon. gentleman the Member for Dundee and by Lord Robert Cecil with regard to the Dardanelles. It is really like setting off one gamble against another, like a plunger—when he loses at one game, he tries another to win. All these auxiliary campaigns have been made out for political necessities and not for military necessities. If we wish to win the war, political necessities must rest with the Cabinet. The Cabinet should dictate what those are; but they should not undertake them until they are perfectly confident, from the opinion of their naval and military advisers, that those policies can be brought to a successful issue.
I hope my remarks will not be thought more or less mischievous. I do not desire to find fault with the Government; I want to help them. I want to make them govern. They certainly have not governed yet in any single question which appertains to the success of the war. Every one of the points that appertain to the success of the war has been forced on the Government by public opinion. We are now getting the recruiting muddle to add to all the other muddles. Personally I have done all I could to help the Government. I have not taken much part in public life since the war began, but I have written certain letters. I wrote one to the Prime Minister which I shall get his leave to publish by-and-by, and I can assure your Lordships that if my advice in that letter had been taken the "Lusitania" would not have been torpedoed and we should not have lost battleships in the Dardanelles. But that will be for a future occasion when I make that public.
The relief party which had been sent to Kut will itself have to be relieved. Evidently we had not thought out what that relief should have been. The Relief expedition was beaten back. The Government
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should realise bow much more fatal it is to the success of a war to be beaten back in the East than it is in the West. That relief party should not have started until it was absolutely ready and certain to be able to go straight to General Townshend and relieve him. Now I suppose General Aylmer's Relief Expedition is itself waiting for reinforcements, and the Government are perfectly aware that very shortly the Tigris will be over its banks again and the difficulties will increase twenty-fold. I would like to ask the Government whether General Townshend was responsible in any way for the advance to Baghdad? Was he, as the General who had to undertake the work, consulted as to the number and equipment of the force that he considered necessary? If that is not so, I ask who is responsible. I think your Lordships ought to take note of these continual reverses and retreats, which really amount to disasters, and that the Government should give more information, particularly with regard to Kut, than they have deigned to give to the public up to the present time.
THE UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA (LORD ISLINGTON): My Lords, the noble and gallant Lord who has just spoken has travelled wide of the specific Question which he addressed to the Government. In the course of his speech he dealt in outline with the whole of the Mesopotamian Expedition, and While I can take no exception to the speech because wide latitude is always allowed in this House in broadening out the subject of Questions into various ramifications, I hope he will pardon me if in the circumstances I have to be restricted in the reply that I make.
The main Question upon the Paper is whether General Townshend was in any way responsible himself for the advance on Ctesiphon. If any recommendation or representation was made by General Townshend prior to his attempted advance on Ctesiphon it would, of course, have been addressed to the General Officer Commanding the Expedition in Mesopotamia—at that time Sir John Nixon. I may say, in reply to that, that no such recommendation or representation has been reported home. As has already been said by my right hon. friend the Secretary of State for India in another place, the responsibility for the advance does not rest with General Townshend in any way. It was authorised by

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His Majesty's Government on the advice of the General Officer Commanding in Mesopotamia and the Government of India. As to whether General Townshend was consulted by the General Officer Commanding, I am not in a position to give any answer to the noble and gallant Lord. I have no information, neither has the Government, in regard to what may have taken place in consultation or conversation between General Townshend and Sir John Nixon prior to the advance.
The noble and gallant Lord, as I say, travelled away from his Question on the Paper, which I have attempted specifically to answer, and I must ask him to be content with a very imperfect reply on the other various points that he put forward in the course of his speech relating to the broad aspects of the general campaign in Mesopotamia. He asked why there had been no Despatches published in regard to the different operations of the campaign. I should require notice to give an answer to that question. From time to time, as the House is aware, communiqués have been published giving in their broad aspect events which have taken place in Mesopotamia. The question whether it would be in the public interest to publish detailed Despatches in regard to any of those operations which have taken place during the past year is one on which I should require to consult with my colleagues before I was in a position to give a definite answer to the noble and gallant Lord. Then as regards the general campaign and the lack of preparation, with which my noble and gallant friend has charged the Government; as regards the numbers of the force that General Townshend had in his Expedition; as regards the numbers of the force of the whole of the Army in Mesopotamia—there, again, it is impossible for me to give any specific answer. I should think the noble and gallant Lord himself will realise that at this particular juncture, when the campaign is actually proceeding, it would be in the highest degree injurious to the national welfare that anything of a detailed character in regard to either the past or the present should be made public.
As to the conduct of the operations from now onwards, I do not think it is necessary for me to go into any detail, because that matter was dealt with very fully the other day in another place by the Secretary of State for India. Since February 16 the
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whole conduct of the operations has been transferred to the War Office from the India Office, and the War Office is now, in conjunction with the Government of India and the Military Departments of that Government, conducting all branches of these operations. Therefore the responsibility which formerly rested with the India Office as the Department at home in authority has, from February 16, been transferred to the War Office.
I would like, in conclusion, to echo what the noble and gallant Lord said with regard to the forces in Mesopotamia that have been taking part in these most arduous and difficult operations. The forces, both British and Indian, have displayed qualities of courage and endurance which, when the history of this great war is unfolded to the world, will compare favourably with those which have been shown in any other field of operations. As to my reply to the noble and gallant Lord, I have been obliged to give this very imperfect answer by reason of the public interest. But the Government in no way wish to avoid responsibility for what has taken place, and at the proper time, and when the public interest will not suffer injury, they will be prepared to face the closest possible scrutiny and examination of all that led up to and has taken place in Mesopotamia.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON: My Lords, I think the noble and gallant Admiral will have anticipated the reticence of the noble Lord with regard to these operations, but I think we must ask for a pledge with regard to the publication of the Despatches as soon as possible. Your Lordships will recollect that so long as Lord Curzon sat upon this Bench he pressed upon the noble Marquess opposite the absolute necessity that these operations because they are carried out at a great distance should not be left altogether unrecorded while the war is going on, and up to last May, as my noble and gallant friend behind me pointed out, we obtained some information. But since then we have had no Despatches, and it is difficult to believe that it could not now be possible for the Government to publish a Despatch with regard to the earlier battles. Considering the immense importance of this matter to the friends and relatives of the officers and men engaged, I sincerely hope that we shall hear very shortly that some Despatches are to be published.
THE MARQUESS OF CREWE: My Lords, in reply to my noble friend opposite we will, of course, see that the India Office and the military authorities in India are asked how far it is possible in the public interest to publish any of the bare outlines of which my noble friend (Lord Islington) has spoken. Speaking personally, I do not know what has been received in the form of Despatches, and even if I felt it proper to do so I could not make any pledge that material exists for the sort of publication which I most fully appreciate is earnestly desired by noble Lords, not merely on account of the intrinsically interesting character of the operations themselves, but from the fact that so many of us have had friends, and some relatives, concerned in them.
There is only one observation I should like to make with regard to the general remarks which fell from my noble and gallant friend opposite, and that is to say quite categorically that there has been no instance in the war, on any of the fronts or in any place in which military operations have taken place, in which either a naval or a military commander has been asked by the civil power to undertake an operation of any kind with a force which he had declared to be insufficient for the purpose. That is a statement which I make without the smallest reserve, and I hope that my noble and gallant friend, when next he thinks it necessary to offer a general criticism against His Majesty's Government, will be so good as to bear that fact in mind.

CONSOLIDATION BILLS.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (LORD BUCKMASTER): My Lords, I beg to move the Motion that stands in my name. It will be within your Lordships' recollection that when you granted a Second Reading to a Bill to consolidate the law of larceny I pointed out that such a Committee as this would be necessary to deal with that amongst other Consolidation Bills.
Moved, That a Committee of Five Lords be appointed to join with a Committee of the House of Commons to consider all Consolidation Bills of the present Session—(The Lord Chancellor).
On Question, Motion agreed to.
The Lords following were named of the Committee:—

E. Loreburn.

L. Sanderson.

L. Parmoor.

L. Wrenbury.

L. Muir-Mackenzie.

Ordered, That such Committee have power to agree with the Committee of the House of Commons in the appointment of a Chairman.
Then a Message was ordered to be sent to the House of Commons to acquaint them therewith and to request them to appoint five members of that House to join with the said Committee; and to inform them that the Larceny Bill [H.L.] has been referred to the said Committee.

EXPORTATION OF SULPHATE OF AMMONIA.
LORD STRACHIE LORD STRACHIE had the following Question on the Paper—
To ask His Majesty's Government whether it is their intention to allow the free exportation of sulphate of ammonia unless there is immediately a much greater demand for sulphate in this country than there is at present.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, those of you who are members or chairmen of Agricultural War Committees will be aware, in reference to this question of sulphate of ammonia, that it was only due to recommendations made to the President of the Board of Agriculture that the Government decided to issue a Prohibition Order as regards the exportation of that artificial manure. As agriculturists we are greatly indebted to the noble Earl for the action he has taken in this matter, and I put this Question because we have reason to fear that this prohibition is going to he withdrawn by the Government. Farmers are at the moment very much dissatisfied. The present position of things is this, that though there is this prohibition of the exportation of sulphate of ammonia which under ordinary conditions would undoubtedly cause a reduction in the price, the price has risen and seems inclined to advance still further. At the present moment sulphate of ammonia fetches from to £16 a ton, and can only be procured at £15 a ton in special cases. The former

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price was from £11 to £12 per ton; and the cost of production, as I am informed, may be fairly put at something like £8 a ton. At the beginning of this month the Board of Agriculture wrote to the Royal Agricultural Society saying that the demands of the farmers were not sufficient up to the present to avoid serious accumulation of stocks, and that unless there was an immediate demand it was feared further prohibition of the export of this commodity would be impossible. What were the grounds upon which the Board of Agriculture made that statement? I understand they were that the Ministry of Munitions had pointed out to the Board of Agriculture that in their opinion the accumulations of sulphate of ammonia were serious at works—not controlled, I understand, by Mr. Lloyd George—which provided a certain amount of material for the manufacture of explosives. We are in this position, that we are threatened by Mr. Lloyd George that the sanction for prohibition will be withdrawn unless farmers immediately buy at this extortionate price of £16 a ton.
Not only is there this extortionate price, but there is every reason to believe that a "corner" has been made in sulphate of ammonia. I should like to point out to your Lordships that under the unfortunate climatic conditions from which we are suffering it is impossible to sow an enormous amount of corn, and the farmers, therefore, are doubtful whether they will want much sulphate of ammonia. That entirely depends on what may take place during the next six weeks or so. There is also the difficulty of labour, which is growing greater and greater owing to the calls that are being made upon the agricultural population. There, again, we have to thank the noble Earl (Lord Selborne) for the way in which he has fought the battles of the farmers, for speaking so freely on our behalf, and representing our views so truly. How can it be said that these accumulations of sulphate of ammonia are in any way hindering the manufacture of material for munitions? The Council of the Royal Agricultural Society only yesterday wrote to the Board of Agriculture asking that Department to represent on their behalf to the Minister of Munitions that prohibition should remain in force at least up to May, so as to give farmers time in this matter.
As regards the price being too high, I may, of course, be told that this is only a question of supply and demand. Undoubtedly in old days that was a very good and proper doctrine. But when it is being urged by a certain section of the Mouse of Commons who have not much interest in agricultural matters that if farmers put up the price of, say, meal, cheese, meat, or any other produce the Government must step in and regulate the price, surely in the case of those artificial manures which are so essential to farmers and agriculturists if they are to produce that amount of food which the Government are always urging as absolutely necessary, the manufacturers ought to be told that they will have to regulate their prices. I think I am making a perfectly reasonable appeal to the Government when I ask that they should maintain this prohibition at least a little while longer, and not, as it were, hold a pistol to the heads of the farmers and say, "If you do not buy this sulphate of ammonia even at its extravagant price it will be allowed to go out of the country and you will not have any at all, even at £16 a ton."
THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE AND FISHERIES (THE EARL OF SELBORNE): Lords, in answer to the noble Lord I have to say that the general prohibition of the issue of licences for the export of sulphate of ammonia has been in operation for two and a-half months, and farmers have had ample opportunities for purchasing their supplies. Considerable supplies have been secured for agricultural purposes, but as there is not sufficient agricultural demand there has been an unfortunate congestion of supplies with the risk of closing down works in some of the chief producing centres. It has been decided, therefore, to resume the issue of licences after the end of this month. Care, however, will be taken to see that sufficient supplies are retained in this country to meet all home needs.
The noble Lord asks what the meaning of this fear of congestion is. I will explain. The fear of the Ministry of Munitions is based not on the theory but on the fact that some of the places where the sulphate of ammonia is produced are absolutely congested, and it would not be possible for them to go on with the manufacture of other articles which are essential for the purposes of munitions, of which sulphate of

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ammonia is a by-product, unless they are able to dispose of the sulphate of ammonia. Therefore I have reluctantly come to the conclusion that the case is now made out upon the side of munitions rather than upon that of agriculture, and that I am justified—indeed compelled—by national requirements to agree to the renewal of licences for export. In so far as we have influence and power we are taking care, both for the purpose of munitions and of agriculture, that enough sulphate of ammonia is kept int his country.
What has been the effect of the prohibition on prices? I am not prepared to endorse all that the noble Lord said. He used rather strong language. He talked of £16 a ton as an "extortionate price" for sulphate of ammonia at the present moment. It may be so, but I have not the knowledge which enables me to say that it is so. What I do know is that last autumn I was able to make an agreement with the manufacturers that they would sell sulphate of ammonia to farmers at that time at £14 10s. a ton, but I am told that the cost of production has risen immensely since the end of last year, among other reasons because the cost of sulphuric acid has gone up so greatly. I am quite certain that this is true, and that whatever the cost of production may have been at the end of last year it is now considerably higher. When the noble Lord says that it only costs £8 to produce a ton of sulphate of ammonia, I do not know on what information he is relying. I am not in a position to contradict that or to accept it as a fair statement of the case. What I do know is that sulphate of ammonia is produced by many different processes, and whereas there may be one process which can produce it comparatively cheaply there are others in Which it is much more expensive. The noble Lord knows that it is a by-product of gasworks, of the shale works in Scotland, and of several other industries as well as the special product of certain processes.
I have no power to fix the price of sulphate of ammonia, and if I asked Parliament to fix the price, as the farmers have suggested I should do, the first thing that would be said would be, If we fix the price of sulphate of ammonia we must fix the price of wheat, oats, hay, and the other commodities of farmers' produce; and that would not be to their advantage or fair to them. At the time that the export of sulphate of ammonia was prohibited I believe the producers could get £17 a ton
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for every exported ton. The price to the agriculturist in England during the last two and a-half months has been considerably less than that, and I think it may be claimed that our action prevented a further riseoand quite possibly was responsible for a temporary reduction, in price. I would certainly express the hope in their own interests as well as in the interests of the industry for which I am responsible, that the producers of sulphate of ammonia will be content with the excellent profits which they surely are making now, and will not countenance the efforts on the part of any of the members of their body to force prices in this country up higher.
I should like to say this also. Farmers in this country have not been accustomed to use sulphate of ammonia to anything like the extent to which farmers in other countries and on the Continent have been. They have always preferred to use nitrate of soda. I do not say that one fertiliser can be used in exactly the same way as the other. Experience will show that certain differences are required in the method of application, but it may be generally stated that the results of the proper use of the two fertilisers ought to be very much the same. I am told on authority which cannot be disputed that the value of sulphate of ammonia at £16 a ton is equal to the value of nitrate of soda at £13. I do not think that farmers would hesitate in the least in buying nitrate of soda if they could get it at something like £13 at the present time, but they hesitate to buy sulphate of ammonia at £16, although the value to them would be exactly the same. At the present moment nitrate of soda, which, of course, is almost unobtainable, has come up almost to the price of sulphate of ammonia. Therefore there is no question whatever that the farmer is getting much better value for his money if he buys a ton of sulphate of ammonia than if lie buys a ton of nitrate of soda. The noble Lord will now understand why it is that we have agreed that licences for export shall be issued again after the end of this month. I have told him that we shall take care to keep enough sulphate of ammonia in the country for the needs of agriculture and of munitions, and I promise him that we shall watch closely both supplies and prices, and I hope, that producers will not attempt to push prices up any higher.
House adjourned during pleasure.
House resumed.

ROYAL COMMISSION.
The following Bills received the Royal Assent—
Consolidated Fund (No. 2).
Naval and Military War Pensions, &c. (Expenses)

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
THE EARL OF CHESTERFIELD: My Lords, I beg to move that the House to
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adjourn, except for Judicial business, until Wednesday next, April 5.
Moved accordingly, and, on Question, Motion agreed to.
House adjourned at a quarter before Seven o'clock, till To-morrow, half-past Ten o'clock.