§ THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURYMy Lords, I venture to ask the noble Earl the Leader of the House whether he can give us any information as to the proposals of the Government regarding the course of business.
§ THE LORD PRESIDENT OF THE COUNCIL (EARL CURZON OF KEDLESTON)Your Lordships will be chiefly interested in the progress of the Corn Production Bill. The anticipations which I hinted at a few days ago as to the more rapid progress of that Bill in another place than was at one time expected have been fulfilled, and there is now every reason to believe that the Bill will leave the House of Commons on Tuesday next, the 7th instant. Your Lordships, I am sure, will be anxious to take the Bill with as little delay as possible, provided that you are secured reasonable opportunities both of considering it and of introducing into it such Amendments as you may desire. I have taken steps to ascertain the arrangements that would be most likely to suit the convenience of your Lordships, and I venture to suggest the following programme for your consideration. On the hypothesis that the Bill leaves the House of Commons on Tuesday next, I propose to ask your Lordships to take the Second Reading on Wednesday and Thursday, if necessary meeting at an earlier hour than half-past four on the second of those two days, or, if your Lordships should so desire it, on both days. There would then be the interval between Thursday and the early days of the succeeding week for the consideration of such Amendments as you might desire to put down for Committee. We might then take the Committee stage on the Tuesday of the week following—August 14—and I imagine that certainly not less than two days will be required for the consideration of the Bill at that stage. That would be Tuesday and Wednesday. We then might have an interval of a day for the consideration of any further subjects to be brought up on the Report stage. I would then ask you to take the Report stage and Third Reading, subject to your Lordships' approval, on the Friday. The Bill would then go back to another place, and would, I imagine, be taken by the House of Commons on the Monday of the week following—that is, on August 20. This is only a sketch which I submit to your Lordships, and it is, of course, open to revision. It may be that your Lordships will have other feelings about the Bill and about the length of time required to discuss it than those which I have indicated. But in reply to the noble Marquess, that is the programme which, after consultation with those interested, I venture to suggest to you.
§ THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURYI am sure your Lordships will feel that the Government have met us in no niggardly spirit in the matter of time, and we are grateful to my noble friend. I was glad, though, to hear his closing words, that this must not be looked upon as absolutely fixed, because it might appear in the course of the proceedings on the Corn Production Bill that they could not be brought to a final issue quite so rapidly as is proposed. But so far as I am aware, the arrangements which were sketched by the noble Earl will be quite satisfactory. My noble friend, however, mentioned no other measure except the Corn Production Bill. Am I right then in understanding that no other Bill of first-class importance—such as, for instance, the Bill setting up the Reconstruction Ministry—will reach us before the recess?
§ EARL CURZON OF KEDLESTONI should not like to give a reply without notice, because I am not quite certain what stages the Bills have reached in the House of Commons. But my noble friend beside me tells me that the Bill for the institution of the Ministry of Reconstruction is likely to reach your Lordships' House before the recess.