Lords Sitting of 16 June 1920

Preamble
The House met at a quarter before four of the clock, The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
LAND DRAINAGE (OUSE) PROVISIONAL ORDER BILL.
Read 2a (according to Order).

THE WHEAT OUTPUT.
LORD BLEDISLOE LORD BLEDISLOE rose to ask the Minister of Agriculture whether he will state what are the eight counties in the United Kingdom which grew most wheat during the thirty years preceding the war, and what proportion their wheat output bore to the whole wheat output of the United Kingdom.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, in putting to the Minister for Agriculture the Question which appears in my name on the Paper, I desire, at the outset, to make no secret of my hope that the deduction to be drawn from his reply will be that in restarting what I may call the wheat campaign—Which the somewhat serious bread outlook would appear to justify, and which no doubt the new county agricultural committees will be called upon to prosecute—the task will be imposed preponderantly, but not exclusively, upon those parts of the United Kingdom whose climate and soil have shown them to be specially fitted for the production of wheat, in partial exoneration of those counties where the conditions are not so favourable to its production.
I have no knowledge of the figures for the United Kingdom, for which I am asking in this Question, but I believe I am correct in saying that about one-sixth of the fifty-two counties in England and Wales, under normal conditions, produce about one-half of the aggregate wheat crop. If that is so, I take it that the figures which the noble Lord will be in a position, no doubt, to give as regards the United Kingdom as a whole, will be much more significant in showing what very few counties produce the bulk of the wheat raised in this country. The noble Lord may wonder why I limit my Question to wheat, and do not extend it to other cereals. I do so because in the case

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of oats, apart from the very low potential milling extraction, the bulk of this crop is necessarily required for our live stock, and in the case of barley, admittedly more palatable when incorporated in the loaf, the brewers are bound to utilise the best malting samples, especially when sugar is so scarce and expensive. Even with regard to grinding barley, if pigs and other stock go short, baking difficulties are such in respect of barley that probably potatoes, which can be grown in every part of the kingdom, are in times of serious scarcity a sounder proposition in making good a shortage of edible starchy food.
Before I sit down may I be allowed to congratulate the noble Lord, both personally and on behalf of the Federation of County Agricultural Executive Committees, of which I am chairman, on the interesting and stimulating announcement which was made in another place yesterday, that farmers would in the year 1921 be permitted to receive for their wheat the c.i.f. price of that imported from abroad. While fully recognising the value—at least while a minimum wage policy exists—of a minimum guarantee against serious financial loss, so long as the shadow of the possible limitation of the maximum open-market price hangs over the industry, the full incentive to maximum production would not have been forthcoming. The announcement will produce, I venture to say, far more wheat than will the Agriculture Bill when it passes into law.
Let me add, that the suggestion made last night by a leading member of the other House, that the policy of the noble Lord was a preparation for, and indeed calculated to promote, another war was, in my judgment, the exact reverse of the truth. I have always regarded it as very doubtful if the late war would ever have occurred, had not our enemies been aware of our extreme vulnerability, arising out of our utter lack of self-containedness in the matter of food production. The more we are self-supporting, the more secure we shall be against such an eventuality.
THE MINISTER OF AGRICULTURE AND FISHERIES (LORD LEE OF FARE-HAM): My Lords, before I reply to the Question on the Paper I should like to express my acknowledgment of the very kind remarks with which my noble friend
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concluded his speech. I think, perhaps, this is not the occasion on which I ought to ask your Lordships to listen to any statement of mine with regard to the Agriculture Bill or its objects, and that my duty now is to reply to the Question on the Paper, while not only not dissenting from, but agreeing in the main with, every word that my noble friend has just said. With regard to the Question, the eight counties in the United Kingdom which grew the most wheat during the thirty years preceding the war were Lincoln, Norfolk, Essex, Suffolk, Cambridge, the East Riding of Yorkshire, Hampshire and Sussex. They grew between them an average of 43½6 per cent. of the average production of the United Kingdom. They have always been recognised as being the principal wheat-growing counties, although Kent and Wiltshire are practically equal to Sussex, and therefore, if my noble friend had said ten counties, he would have better covered the point.
LORD BLEDISLOE: Does that take into account the Lothians of Scotland?
LORD LEE or FAREHAM: I think so. I have already answered the second part of the Question, the proportion being, as I have said, 43½6 per cent. For the rest, I will only say that I do not want to pursue my noble friends argument with regard to whether it is or is not desirable to prosecute wheat-growing in other parts of the country. It is obviously a matter of immense importance, which will have to be fully debated when the Agriculture Bill comes before the House, and I think it right that I should reserve my arguments until then. I will merely say that if my noble friend suggests we should concentrate all our efforts upon these six counties with regard to the future, there is very little room for expansion there.
That they are already growing wheat almost up to the limit is shown by the fact that they have already a total arable area of four and a-half million acres as compared with an area under permanent grass of two millions, and even if the whole of that remaining permanent grass were ploughed up for further production, you could not devote more than one-quarter of it to wheat. Therefore, the total increase would be only half a million acres—obviously not a very large contribution. I can, however, reassure my noble friend by

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saying that neither the Government nor the reconstituted agricultural committees have any idea of proceeding upon an unwise or drastic ploughing campaign, such as was necessary during the height of the war, when we had to consider not good husbandry but the question of getting food by any means. There is no such suggestion for the future, and the special circumstances of the western counties will receive full weight in any directions that may be given.

ALBANIA.
LORD SYDENHAM: My Lords, on behalf of Lord Lamington, I rise to ask whether the Italian Government have recently imprisoned and deported Albanian notables from Valona; also why the Albanian Government are not allowed to issue passports to their own subjects.
THE CHANCELLOR OF THE DUCHY OF LANCASTER (THE EARL OF CRAW-FORD): My Lords, the occupation of parts of Albania by Italian troops was the natural corollary to the expulsion of the hostile armies of Austria and Bulgaria. It saved Albania from complete absorption by the enemy, but was itself a provisional arrangement until the fate of Albania could be decided by the Peace Conference. Hence it came about that all temporary arrangements for the administration or control of Albania's foreign relations, including such matters as the issuing of passports to Albanian subjects, were naturally left in the hands of the Italian authorities. The provisional exercise of this right was not intended in the least degree to prejudge the decisions still to be taken by the Supreme Council on the future of the country.
The noble Lord has also asked whether Albanian notables have been recently imprisoned and deported from Valona. In the absence of any British representative in Albania, I have no certain information on this subject. But it may very well be that such incidents have occurred; and, in the recent and present disturbed condition of the country, they are probably by no means the sole or most conspicuous instance of internal disorder.

JUDICIAL VACANCIES.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (LORD BIRKENHEAD)THE LORD CHANCELLOR (LORD BIRKENHEAD) rose to move—
That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty representing that the state of business in the King's Bench Division requires that vacancies (not exceeding two) should be filled in the number of puisne Judges of the King's Bench Division, notwithstanding that the number of those Judges amounts to fifteen or upwards, and praying that His Majesty will be graciously pleased to fill such vacancies accordingly in pursuance of the Supreme Court of Judicature Act, 1910.
The noble and learned Lord said: My Lords, I beg to move the Motion which stands in my name on the Paper. It is proper that I should explain with the necessary detail the circumstances which, in my judgment, afford justification for the Motion that I move to-day, and which is simultaneously being moved by the Attorney-General in another place. The present position of work in the High Courts, and indeed in all the Courts, is such as to cause the greatest anxiety to those who are responsible for the administration of the law. The falling off of litigation in the King's Bench Division of the High Court, which was marked during the progress of the war, has come to an end, and there is a very great increase in the number of actions to be tried, raising the total to a figure which not only greatly exceeds that which had to be dealt with during the war, but is also a large advance upon the corresponding figures in the years immediately preceding the war.
Furthermore, the work of the Divorce Court has sprung up by leaps and bounds, so that the number of causes now to be tried is, I think, five or six times that to which the Divorce Court was accustomed before the war. Probate actions remain at their previous level. The work of the Admiralty Court, as a direct result of the war, has largely increased, and, for the time being at any rate, the Judges in that Court have, in addition to their ordinary work, still to deal with an amount of Prize litigation.
When the Judicature Acts of 1873 and 1875 came into operation the number of Judges in the King's Bench Division was fifteen—namely, three Presidents of the three Divisions and twelve puisne Judges.

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After the consolidation of the three Divisions the Bench consisted of the Lord Chief Justice and fourteen Judges. To this number one Judge was added in the year 1907 in pursuance of Section 18 of the Act of 1876. In 1910 the Supreme Court of Judicature Act provided for the addition of two Judges to the King's Bench Division, subject to such power of transfer as is mentioned in the Supreme Court of Judicature Act of 1873, and two new Judges were accordingly appointed in that year, raising the number of King's Bench Judges to eighteen—that is to say, the Lord Chief Justice and seventeen puisne Judges. The Act gave power to appoint successors to the Judges created under its provisions, subject to the proviso that whenever the whole number amounted to fifteen or upwards the vacancy shall not be filled unless and until an Address is presented from both Houses of Parliament representing that the state of business in the King's Bench Division requires that such vacancy shall be filled.
Your Lordships will appreciate the effect of that provision. Parliament decided that the very grave arrears which existed in 1910 required a remedy, and they also took the view that the remedy which they decided to apply should be one which enabled the Legislature to intervene at every fresh vacancy. In other words, having increased the number of Judges to eighteen, what the Legislature said in effect was this, "We have granted these eighteen Judges in response to the case which is founded upon the existing arrears, but, whenever a vacancy occurs in the future, we will not allow it to be filled up unless you come back to us and satisfy us that the business in the Courts is such as to justify the existence of the staff, increased, as we have increased it, under the provisions of this Bill."
That is the position to-day, and if this Resolution is passed—and I shall hope abundantly to justify the Resolution—the result will be this. Two new Judges will be appointed, and the position will be restored to the 1910 position, as it was after the Act to which I have referred became law. If and when a vacancy occurs on the Bench—supposing for instance that in a month's time, or in three months' time, a vacancy occurs—it will not be possible for me on a mere Motion to fill up the vacancy, but I shall have to come back to your Lordships, and a Motion will have to be moved also in the
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House of Commons, asking leave for the creation of an additional Judge, and basing that request upon the state of business in the King's Bench Division.
The remedy which was resorted to in 1910 proved extremely effective, and the arrears, which at the moment the Bill became law were causing so much anxiety, were expeditiously and gradually removed, and in accordance with the provision to which I have drawn attention the number of puisne Judges was gradually allowed to return to the number which had existed before the, passing of the Act. This operation became complete in 1914, not very long before the outbreak of war Therefore, the strength of the Bench since 1914 has been on the 1910 basis. The state of business in the Courts did not require the Bench to be numerically stronger during the whole period of the war, for the King's Bench work naturally declined then for reasons that will be apparent to everybody. It was, however, only possible with very great difficulty to carry on such work as remained.
The Judges of the King's Bench Division have, throughout the war, constantly been withdrawn from the Bench for extra-judicial work. The circuit system, which has continued unaltered, has made a drain upon the strength of Judges required in London, and although during the war the work of the circuit, both civil and criminal, has fallen off, the relief obtained thereby has not been proportionate, because it has been necessary, as before, for the Judge to visit the circuit towns, though, of course, not to work at them so long as when there was more business. It should be noted that work on circuit has now returned to, and, so far as crime is concerned, has considerably exceeded, the pre-war level. Prisoners are at least as numerous as before the war; there has been a great and not unintelligible increase in the number of crimes of violence, and cases of fraud in connection with war contracts and taxation have involved very long and complicated inquiries into questions of accounts. I had hoped that the necessity to withdraw Judges from the Courts for extra-judicial duties had almost ceased, and that the services of those Judges who are still so engaged either wholly or partially might at an early date be completely restored to the Courts. I assure your Lordships that on many occasions I have successfully resisted the attempt to borrow Judges from the Law Courts for

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extra-judicial purposes, even when such claims and requests have been most strongly and authoritatively pressed upon me.
But I would in this connection most earnestly ask that some fair consideration should be given to the other side of the question. I start with the admission that an almost overwhelming case ought to be made before a Judge, especially at a time when the arrears of business are considerable, is taken away from the discharge of his proper duties. But, looking back on the years of the war, and concentrating, as is natural, my attention principally upon the period of four years in which, as a Law Officer, I had responsibility, I am not able to agree that there have been many cases in that period in which Judges have been unjustifiably withdrawn, and I cannot over-rate the public services which have been rendered by those members of the High Courts and of the superior Courts who have made contributions so great in the memorable days in which we have lived. The gravity of those days is still vividly within the memory of all of us, and it is indisputably true that the public as a whole, the business community and all those various sections whose affairs at moments of clash have engaged our attention during the last few years, have placed a degree of confidence in the judicial office which it would be hardly possible to exaggerate. Certainly this is true if you take the years of the war. However strongly in the abstract may be the bent of your mind against the employment of Judges in extra-judicial work it would be impossible to deny that the Judges have rendered admirable services—services the value of which it would be impossible to exaggerate; and, further, I am wholly unable to suggest to what other class of men, of functionaries, in this country the Government in the time of stress through which we have passed. could have gone for the assistance which they have received from the Judges.
Let me make an admission. This Bill is by no means likely to afford all the relief which I had hoped when I first made these proposals to the Cabinet. Indeed, two requests for judicial help, in entirely, extra-judicial work, have been presses upon me in the last few weeks, which, in spite of a bias against the employment of Judges in extra-judicial work, I found myself, after the best consideration that I could give to the matter, wholly unable to resist. As your Lordships know, in the present grave situation in Ireland it
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has been announced on behalf of the Government that where persons are arrested upon what is regarded as being a moral certainty of guilt for complicity in the conspiracy of murder and assassination which is now rampant in Ireland, the practice is to detain them. The situation is, of course, as unsatisfactory as any situation could be, but the conditions in Ireland to-day, as I pointed out in the debate not very long ago, are such as to make it impossible to obtain a conviction, with intimidated witnesses and prejudiced jurors; and therefore this sytem of detention on suspicion is, in our judgment, at present indispensable.
It has been represented to me by the Chief Secretary for Ireland, and most earnestly pressed upon me by my colleagues in the Cabinet, that it is desirable that a Committee should be set up comparable to the Committee which dealt with the cases of suspected aliens during the war, to examine into the value of this prima facie evidence against such persons in order to strengthen the hands of the authorities in dealing with them. I have been asked to afford the guarantee, which the presence of a Judge of the High Court as the President of such a Committee would afford, that these matters should be examined in a judicial spirit, and with the experience and the knowledge which is rendered certain by the appointment to this position of a Judge of the High Court. I was most unwilling, as may be supposed in the state of business in the Courts for which I am responsible to the public and to Parliament, to assent to this proposal, but I gave it the best consideration of which I was capable, and I decided that, difficult as it was, unpalatable to me as it was, disquieting as it was in the plans that I had laid for dealing with the arrears in the Law Courts, this was a request which I could not refuse, and which I ought not to refuse.
Simultaneously there was urged upon me a claim, hardly less imperative, for the services of a Judge in a different connection. Your Lordships will not have failed to follow the phases in another House of what is known as the Indemnity Bill. That is a Bill which, as this House probably knows, makes provision for dealing with the various claims which have accumulated against the Government in the last five years of the war, in the light of a number of decisions in the Law Courts,

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and particularly of a decision recently given by your Lordships' House in what is known as the De Keyser Hotel case. I naturally am not concerned here and now to argue the merits of the Indemnity Bill. I should be anticipating a difficult task which awaits me in the future if I did. It is sufficient that I should say that, in the view of the Government and in the public interest, it is highly desirable that the Legislature should sanction the hearing of this immense number of claims by what at one period was known as the Duke Commission.
As I have said, I do not argue the merits of that proposal here and now because I do not want to anticipate my future labours. I would state, however, that the case which we shall attempt to make, and which we hope successfully to make, is that, unless such a conclusion is adopted by the Legislature, it will be necessary for this over-burdened country to pay a stupendous sum of money—hundreds of millions I am informed by those who have gone into these matters—to persons who, in the opinion of most of us, have already been very adequately remunerated for their services in the war. If I succeed in satisfying your Lordships, and if another place is equally satisfied, that this arrangement ought to be made, it follows plainly that it is necessary to lend the highest possible authority and weight to the Commission to which will be remitted the treatment and the control of all these matters.
I am, accordingly, pressed to appoint a Judge of the High Court as President of this Commission on the contingency that this House and the Legislature are willing to pass the Indemnity Bill. Upon that hypothesis—and again giving the deepest consideration to the matter, and approaching it, as I have already said, with a deep feeling that Judges ought only to be used for judicial purposes—I reached the conclusion that in the interests of the community as a whole it would be impossible for me if your Lordships and another place pass the Indemnity Bill, to resist the request to strengthen what was formerly known as the Duke Commission by assigning to them a Judge as their permanent President. That was work very properly done by a Judge, and the knowledge that a Judge was presiding over the Court gave very great confidence to those who were invited to take claims,
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which are often very large, before that body for adjudication.
Therefore I start my argument with the somewhat melancholy admission that both these demands for Judges have been made to me since I first raised this question at the Cabinet, and, even if this Motion be agreed to and His Majesty is graciously pleased to assent to it when presented to him, I shall not be in a very much stronger position than I was before the last two demands were made upon me. I may be, however, in a somewhat better position because it is hoped that the services rendered by the Judge who would give advice in the Irish matter to which I have referred would not be whole-time services.
I need not remind your Lordships of the extent to which the Bench has been drawn upon during the years of the war. My noble and learned friend Lord Sumner was for long engaged in most important work in Paris on behalf of the Government, and I venture to express, on behalf of all your Lordships, our congratulations to the noble and learned Lord upon the recognition which has recently been accorded to his efforts. As your Lordships know, Lord Cave was in South Africa for a long time; Lord Moulton was engaged for years on invaluable work for the Board of Trade, and my noble friend Lord Wrenbury recently rendered great services to your Lordships by presiding over the Douglas-Pennant Committee. Mr. Justice Sargent was occupied on semi-judicial work for the Treasury. Mr. Justice Salter has been engaged in conducting an Inquiry under the Aliens Act, and Mr. Justice Younger, now Lord Justice Younger, was for years engaged in dealing with enemy aliens resident in this country.
It is quite true that these Judges by no means all belong to the King's Bench Division, but it is evident that the continual employment of so many judicial persons on non-judicial matters and the constant demands made in the course of last session, and resisted only with great difficulty, to place other Judges at the disposal of the Government for similar purposes show that the tendency to withdraw Judges persists, and is likely to do so. I can only tell your Lordships that I shall approach with hostility any demand to withdraw Judges for extra-judicial work. But I cannot and I do not pretend that I see my way clearly enough, in the anxious times which surround us to-day and may surround us for many years, to give any

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assurance to your Lordships upon that point. The extent to which the Judges have stamped themselves upon the confidence of their fellow-countrymen is illustrated by the invariable demand which is made in time of grave crisis, that a Judge shall be called in to give the assistance which the prestige and the reputation of the Bench enable him to afford. In normal times I think I could give a very clear and unambiguous assurance, but I think I should be unduly sanguine if I attempted to do so in the days in which we live.
The absence of these Judges, even where they were not of the King's Bench Division, has had a considerable indirect and detrimental effect upon the work of that Division. So far as they are members of the House of Lords it has weakened the judicial strength of that body, as well as of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, so that it has been found impossible to render help to the Court of Appeal and thereby set free members of that Court to give assistance, in their turn, to the Courts of first instance. It would be regrettable if any false impression prevailed on this point. In my experience there never has been a time in which those who sit in your Lordships' House for the purpose of dispensing justice were not willing to go into the Court of Appeal if their duties here made it possible for them to do so. Indeed, my noble and learned friend Lord Haldane, who daily renders the greatest possible service in the administration of justice, either in this House or at the Privy Council, quite recently and spontaneously offered his services to me to go and sit in the Court of Appeal. Equally, there is in the Court of Appeal the greatest readiness, when the state of business in that Court renders it possible, to give assistance in the King's Bench Division. It would have been quite impossible to have carried on the work of the Judicial Committee and of your Lordships' House if it had not been for the fact that Lord Haldane, Lord Buck-master, Lord Wrenbury, and Lord Phillimore have rendered ungrudging assistance to those on whom the responsibility for making arrangements in those Courts directly devolves.
A matter that is exercising as great an effect upon the work of the King's Bench Division as the absence of the Judges of that Division engaged on extra-judicial duties, has been the necessity of supplying
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Judges of the King's Bench for the work of the Probate, Divorce, and Admiralty Divisions. The number of Judges in that Division was fixed by the Act of 1873 at two, to which number there has been no addition in the forty-three years which have passed since that Act came into effective operation. During those years not only has the population increased enormously, but there has been both before and since the war a gradual, enormous, and incessant change in the attitude of a large section of the population towards the questions o marriage and divorce, which, sooner or later, will have its effect on the work of the Divorce Court. The beginning of the war happened to coincide with the passing of the Rules under which a regular system of increased facilities for litigation was extended to poor persons in that Division of the Court.
I need hardly remind your Lordships of the extraordinary changes which the war, and what I may call the war mood and aftermath, have wrought in all sections of society in matters of divorce. The situation, when analysed, is not really very surprising. There were young men home on short leave from the war invested, and rightly invested, with the attraction which valour ought always to possess in the eyes of young women and, of course, there were no doubt hundreds, if not thousands, of inconsiderate marriages. We are suffering, and the Courts will long suffer, from the reactions of those marriages; and the stupendous —I choose my language carefully—number of divorce actions which to-day are clogging and embarrassing the Probate, Divorce and Admiralty Division is principally explicable for this reason, Let me illustrate the extent of this change.
Let me illustrate the extent of this change to your Lordships. In October 1913, 528 divorce petitions were entered, for trial. The figures at the beginning of the Hilary Sittings, 1920, were 1,544; at the Easter Sittings, 1,388; at the Trinity Sittings, 1,471; and in the present week the number is 1,751. These figures include Probate actions. So that the comparable figure to that of October, 1913 –528–is 1,751. Apply a simple test. The number of divorce petitions filed in the nine months from January 1 to September 30, 1913, was 918; the number so filed in the nine months from January 1 to September 30, 1918, was 936; the number so filed in the corresponding nine

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months of 1919 was 4,201; and the figure to-day is even greater. These last figures —which include necessarily only a small proportion of cases which have already found their way into the lists for trial—give us an indication of the appalling task which lies before the Judges of the Probate, Divorce and Admiralty Division. It must be remembered that, if it is possible to choose in respect of urgency between different types of litigation, divorce cases ought to be disposed of quickly. This statement, which I imagine would be true as a generalisation, is especially true at present when the great bulk of the cases come from classes who are especially entitled to the protection of the law, and who, by their social circumstances, find it most difficult to order their lives when suffering from matrimonial anxieties. As I have already pointed out, many of them are the direct products of the war.
While the Probate, Divorce and Admiralty Division must contemplate an enormous addition to the task set it, the number of Judges allotted to it remaining the same, it has had during the war to provide one Judge for the trial of Prize cases. It may be supposed that this necessity will pass away, and that the time of the President, which has hitherto been almost exclusively devoted to this work, will be set free for the ordinary work of the Division. But there still remains a certain residue which will not be finally disposed of for some years, and it is probable that for some time to come the President's time will be requisitioned to sit on the Judicial Committee for the trial of Prize appeals from the Colonial Courts. It is difficult to estimate the amount of work involved under these two heads.
The Admiralty work of the Division has increased in a proportion hardly less striking than the divorce work. I need hardly point out to your Lordships that this was to be expected. If, in obedience to imperious war necessities, you mobilise the whole naval strength of this country, send it to all the four corners of the world, requisition the merchant tonnage and suspend many of the Regulations which the safety of vessels navigating the oceans recommended to the prudence of long generations of legislators—if you take those steps, it inevitably follows that there must be an immense addition to the melancholy roll of maritime casualties. So it is true that in 1913 only twenty-two cases stood
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for trial on the first day of the Michaelmas Sittings, but—I would especially direct your Lordships' attention to these figures—on the first day of the Michaelmas Sittings, 1918, that number had increased to 157. The figure at the commencement of the Hilary Sittings, 1920, was eighty-seven; at the Easter Sittings, sixty-three; at the Trinity Sittings, 105; and in the present week the figure is ninety-two. The increase—which is, of course, having regard to the length of Admiralty cases, of a most striking character—has had to be dealt with by the Probate, Divorce and Admiralty Division at a time when it has been embarrassed, as I have described, by the increase of divorce business and the judicial diversions occasioned by the necessities of Prize litigation.
It will be observed from what I have said that two Judges form a wholly inadequate staff for the Probate, Divorce and Admiralty Division in present circumstances, or in any circumstances which can reasonably be foreseen. It was the opinion expressed by that distinguished Judge, the late Sir Samuel Evans, to myself three years ago, that the time had come when a third Judge should be definitely appointed to this Division, and he anticipated that even with this increased strength it would be necessary for him to seek for frequent help from the Judges of the King's Bench Division. Since that date matters have grown steadily worse; and, while it may be difficult to fix the number of Judges who will be permanently required in that Division, it is quite clear that at least four Judges will have to be employed there for as long a period as it is possible for reasonable men to foresee in such matters. As a temporary measure two Judges have been lent by the King's Bench Division to the Probate, Divorce and Admiralty Division, but their services are urgently required for the King's Bench work. They have been lent in the expectation that relief would be given to the King's Bench Division at an early date, and, unless that expectation is fulfilled, it will be necessary for the matter to be determined in another way.
Only a week or two ago I received a letter from the President of the Probate, Divorce and Admiralty Division, pointing out that the state of his business was such that it was quite impossible that he could leave it before the Long Vacation without scandal, unless I was able to lend him a further Judge from the King's Bench Division. I sent the President's letter to

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the Lord Chief Justice and asked him whether it was possible to give such help. The Lord Chief Justice replied that the state of business on the King's Bench side was such that it was impossible to give to the President the help that he required. The King's Bench Division has been permanently short, during the period for which I have been responsible to Parliament for these matters, by reason of the Probate, Divorce and Admiralty work. It is thus reduced to a strength of 14. Of the 16 Judges of the King's Bench Division 14 go on circuit during the Summer Assizes, 1920, leaving only 2 in town during the whole Sittings. The inability of the Lord Chief Justice to lend a Judge to the Probate, Divorce and Admiralty Division needs no further illustration at this moment while 14 Judges are away on circuit and only two are left sitting in London.
It becomes necessary to consider how the work which these Judges have to face compares with that which had to be faced by 17 or 18 Judges between the years 1910 and 1914 and by 16 Judges before 1910. In the year 1909, when the state of work in the King's Bench Division was such as to require the passing of the Act of 1910 and the addition of two Judges, the number of cases entered for trial was 795, and the Parliament of that day, though very much adverse, so far as the majority were concerned, from sanctioning the creation of new Judges, regarded the arrears of 795 cases and the impracticability of dealing with them within a reasonable period, as so grave that they passed the Act to which I have referred.
The number of cases entered for trial to-day is very nearly 900; and a very important qualification must be borne in mind. To-day the lists would have been swollen to an extent even exceeding anything I have attempted to indicate were it not for the fact that under the Emergency War Legislation the rights of litigants to trial by jury have been very considerably impaired. The result is that, with very limited exceptions, the overwhelming majority of cases on the civil side are tried without juries, and any one who has any experience of these matters knows that a Judge trying a case alone without a jury takes, on an average, about half as long as he would if a jury sat with him. The time is coming when it will be necessary to consider whether we are to revert to
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the pre-war system in relation to juries in its entirety, or whether some inroad upon that system can be justified and would be accepted by the community as a whole. It is right I should make it plain that if it is the decision of Parliament that we shall revert to the jury system in its entirety the melancholy state of business in the Courts will be rendered even graver with every week that passes.
I think I have said enough to show that the position with which we are confronted to-day is one that imperatively requires that steps shall be taken to correct it. The Resolution I move asks your Lordships to do what, at a time when matters were incomparably less grave, Parliament was found willing to do in 1910. Your Lordships and the House of Commons are complete masters in this matter. I am not asking for authority to make a permanent addition to the Bench. Of course up to the limit of the existing numbers I am entitled to recommend to His Majesty on every vacancy in a Judgeship that he shall fill that vacancy, but if this Resolution is passed I am limited in the future. Whenever and wherever a vacancy occurs after this Motion is adopted, I must, on each occasion, ad hoc come to the House and ask for sanction, and justify my application by showing that the then state of business renders it necessary.
Let me deal with one or two points which have been put not exactly by way of opposition to the Bill but by the way of suggesting that every effort has not been made by those arc responsible to deal with the congestion. I am unable to agree with this view, and I will examine shortly the principal grounds upon which, as I understand the position, it is attempted to found it. It is said, in the first place, that although the Common Law Judges are necessarily hard-worked, the Chancery Judges are not so hard worked, and, in fact, that during the war there was not sufficient work for the Chancery Judges. It is undoubtedly true that during the war the volume of Chancery work greatly declined. It is equally true that the amount of that work has greatly increased since the war; that all the Chancery Judges are, and have been during the whole of the present term, fully employed on Chancery work; and that I have been unable to borrow any Chancery Judge for King's Bench work during the whole of the present Sittings.
During the period of the war when a restriction of work took place, the Chancery Judges invariably, whenever they were free, co-operated with their brethren of the King's Bench in doing King's Bench work, and the list of arrears would have been incomparably greater had it not been for the contribution of the Chancery Judges. There is a further reason why the existing number of Chancery Judges should be maintained; a reason which can be much more fully explained by Viscount Haldane, because he, unlike myself, is a Chancery man. All those who have experience in Chancery matters are, I believe, almost unanimous in the view that what is known as the "linked system" is indispensable to the efficient conduct of the Chancery Court. The "linked system" requires an equal number of Judges, and I confess that when I filled up a recent vacancy on the Chancery Bench I examined with the greatest care the whole position as to whether I might economise on that Chancery vacancy and make a Common Law appointment. I was convinced by the course adopted by Lord Buckmaster, my immediate predecessor as Lord Chancellor, who, on the occurrence of a vacancy under identical circumstances, did not hesitate to examine the whole situation and appoint Mr. Justice P. O. Lawrence, and I came to the conclusion that the prospect of work in that Division was such that it would be an injury to the public service if I were not to fill up that vacancy. I knew that in the intervening period I could rely, as I have successfully relied, upon the contribution of the Chancery Judges to deal with arrears in the King's Bench Division.
It is frequently said that the Judges do not sit on Saturday mornings. I am very unwilling that on this point there should be any misunderstanding. When it was proposed that Judges should sit on Saturday mornings, as the result of Parliamentary criticism, the Judges met and decided that Saturday morning was very important to them, but that they would make up the judicial time. They made the time up by sitting a little earlier in the morning and later in the afternoon on every day in the week, and, by this means, they gave the same amount of judicial time which they would have given had they sat on Saturday mornings. Now, My Lords, I myself am absolutely opposed to Judges being compelled to sit on Saturday morning. They work very hard
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during the week, and it is the only morning which those Judges employed in the Court of Criminal Appeal can give to the arduous task of reading through the lengthy papers contained in the weekly dossier, and it is the only day which they can give to the preparation of such judgments as are necessarily reserved.
After eighteen months' experience as a judge in your Lordships' House, may I point out that your Lordships who sit here have found it indispensably necessary that not only should they have Saturday mornings, but also Wednesdays, for the preparation of their judgments. It is true, and may reasonably be pointed out, that a far greater proportion of the judgments of this House deal with fundamental principles of law, and that a decision given by your Lordships here is binding upon every other Court in the British Empire, and that therefore its verbal expression must be scrutinised with meticulous precision. While that is true, I still maintain that Saturday morning is necessary to the Judges for the consideration of the matters which I have mentioned.
Then it may be said that it might be possible for reform to take place in two other ways. One is in relation to the less important assize towns, and the second is with regard to the Long Vacation. I should be very remiss if I sat down without having given some indication that I had not overlooked either of the recommendations of the Committee which examined this matter some years ago. First, as to the assizes. I am strongly of opinion that this reform ought to be made. I am strongly of opinion that it involves waste of judicial time that the Judges should visit small circuit towns, but I can tell your Lordships that the degree of resistance, and of passionate and resolute local resistance, which this proposal, whenever made, immediately evokes, is almost incredible, and the urgency in which I find myself most certainly does not allow me to delay this matter until I have carried through legislation which will enable me, if I obtain the sanction of my colleagues, to deal with the political opposition which may be counted upon. Therefore, that question of the assizes, without being necessarily abandoned, cannot be undertaken by me at a moment of such immediate necessity.
Now I will say a word as to the Long Vacation, and I hope that your Lordships will be good enough carefully to consider the

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very short consideration which I invite. It is said that the Long Vacation is ten or eleven weeks, that that period is too long, and that the Judges ought to work with a shorter vacation. I do not exclude from my ultimate policy which I shall recommend to Parliament a proposal to make a brief modification of the Long Vacation, but I exclude it at this moment, and I do not desire that it should be supposed that I have reached any clear conclusion upon it, because I am plainly of opinion that sufficient weight has not been given to opposite points of view. We ought to remember that those who become Judges are men who have reached the very top of their profession. In the ordinary course of events they are, even when they become judges, not very young men, and it may generally be found that at any given moment a large proportion of our Judges are between sixty and seventy years of age. There is hardly any other profession in the world where it can be found that those who are no longer young, no longer, in the main, even of middle age, who have reached the highest positions, are tied by an iron routine of daily and weekly duty, in the sense that the Judges are. A politician or statesman is not tied by Departmental or Cabinet or Parliamentary duty, and may take a day's holiday here and another day there; but not so the, Judges. They are tied by an iron routine, day by day, with no possibility of variation or change. They sit from 10.15 in the morning till 4.15 at night, from time beginning of the term to the end. If any men are entitled to the refreshment of the Long Vacation it is those who discharge judicial duties in our Courts of first instance and superior Courts.
There are other arguments which I think are not always completely understood. If you approach the solicitors I greatly doubt whether you would find that they were enamoured of the proposal to shorten the Long Vacation; the Long Vacation for the solicitors is the one period of the year in which, first of all, they obtain such holiday as circumstances offer them and, in the second place, in which they are able to prepare their cases and do their paper work for the year. I do not think that if you took the legal profession as a whole you would find that it was in favour of any considerable change in this direction. I only desire to repeat, because I do not want there to be any misunderstanding, that I do not exclude this question from further
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consideration. I have reached no decision upon it, and it may well be that the topic will be resumed and re-examined at a future date, but it forms no part of the emergency appeal which is made, and ought not to be made a relevant answer to the case which I have disclosed in the state of business in the Courts to-day.
We have heard in this House much talk of economy, and I once heard my noble friend Lord Buckmaster say that there is not one single Department which can show any sign of economy during the last five years. I might have interrupted him, and told him, because it is true, that by economies which have been effected in my Department, partly by my predecessors and partly by myself, in the last five years, with the exception of the amount of the war bonus—a matter of course for which no Lord Chancellor is responsible— the expenditure upon the Department for which I am now responsible is actually lower than it was in August, 1914. I, therefore, think that I do at least come before the House in the position of one who has inherited from his predecessors. traditions of economy and has attempted himself to subscribe to them to such an extent that it may be supposed that if I make, as I do most earnestly, this recommendation to-day, it is not made in the spirit, or with the record, of one who has lent himself to reckless or unnecessary or extravagant expenditures. When it is stated, as I observe it was stated in The Times to-day, that the result of creating these two Judges will be to impose a charge of £10,000 a year upon the public purse, I would point out that the statement has little correspondence with the facts. Your Lordships are well aware that the salary of every Judge on the Bench is covered, or very nearly so, by Court fees and so forth, and therefore he costs very little indeed. Certainly the total cost of each individual Judge is almost a minute proportion of the £5,000 which constitutes the salary of such a Judge.
The last melancholy announcement that I have to make to the House is that, should this proposal be adopted and in order that the public charge may be even smaller than I have indicated, it is my intention to introduce shortly a Bill into this House —an omnibus Bill—dealing with a variety of matters, and one of the consequences of that will be that your Lordships will be asked to consent to the raising of the Court fees. As a result of the raising of

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the fees there will be no real addition to the charge upon the public Exchequer involved in the creation of these two Judges.
I am making this proposal after deep and long consideration. It is many months since I mentioned upon a public occasion that I had come to the conclusion that it would be impossible to deal with public business unless two additional Judges were appointed. The Lord Chief Justice is in entire agreement with me, and he regrets that an engagement elsewhere makes it impossible for him to say so today. In conclusion, I apologise for the length of my remarks, but I ask your Lordships to recognise that it is only my duty as the Minister responsible to Parliament not only to recommend but to justify the course I have proposed.
Moved, That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty representing that the state of business in the King's Bench Division requires that vacancies (not exceeding two) should be filled in the number of puisne Judges of the King's Bench Division, notwithstanding that the number of those Judges amounts to fifteen or upwards, and praying that His Majesty will be graciously pleased to fill such vacancies accordingly in pursuance of the Supreme Court of Judicature Act, 1910.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
VISCOUNT HALDANE: My Lords, no one can speak upon the condition of judicial business in England and Wales with an authority comparable to that of the supreme head of the Judiciary. Under ordinary circumstances I should have accepted what has fallen from my noble and learned friend without observation, but there are two things in my mind. First of all, this situation or an analogous situation, has occurred before, and has been minutely investigated. Secondly, as the result of the investigation, certain remedies have been proposed which have not been carried into effect, and I think the fact that they have not been carried into effect has been the reason why the proposition, which was nearly if not altogether as pressing a one in all appearance before as it is to-day has not been proceeded with. When I occupied the Woolsack the situation which arises to-day presented itself with very nearly the same intensity, and Parliament, which in those days was more vigilant in its scrutiny
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than, I think, it always is to-day, asked, and very properly asked, for an inquiry. Inquiry was undertaken under the Presidency of no less acute a mind and distinguished a person than the late Lord St. Aldwyn.
The result of the investigations which he and his colleagues made was, shortly, this. Business does tend to increase as the population and volume of wealth of the country increases, but that business is carried on with machinery which has in some respects become antiquated, and in other respects is an improvement and ought to produce a greater output than the machinery of the old days. In the old days you had the Court of King's Bench, which is the one with which we are now mainly concerned, trying every kind of action even about twopence halfpenny. To-day that is not so. Nevertheless, a great deal of business is still tried in the King's Bench which relates to no more than twopence halfpenny and which ought not to be so tried. My noble and learned friend has recently passed a most valuable Act extending the jurisdiction of the County Courts, and everybody who is a Judge of Appeal, having experience of the cases that still are tried in the Court of King's Bench and that come up even to this House; knows that a considerable proportion of them are cases which ought to have gone to the County Courts. That is one point.
Experience has yet to show whether the congestion of to-day is a permanent one. But it is only one among a number of other points. There is a great deal of litigation which takes time, and some of it really ought never to have arisen. There is a question whether every action ought not to begin with a summons for direction on which the Judge should have the duty of saying whether the parties really must necessarily proceed at arm's length, or whether, at the very earliest stages, a settlement could not be reached. It might be that the parties were fighting about very little, and I have no doubt that, if there were a beneficial influence at work, a great deal of litigation would be diminished and the issues reduced.
Lord St. Aldwyn's Inquiry brought deadly figures from the Treasury. They investigated the judicial time, and they found that taking the year over the time which was allocated by the Judges to the transaction of their business was surprisingly small. That does not mean that the Judges do not

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work very hard. They do work very hard. They do all that the Lord Chancellor has said, and they do more, because they are public-spirited people who are always ready to do a great deal outside the duties which the law devolves upon them. But that does not mean that we have not to look into the question as to whether the judicial time may be more economised. There is the Long Vacation. My noble arid learned friend spoke of the possibility of shortening the judicial Long Vacation, which he said he should regret. The Judges have more than two months Long Vacation. They rise on, if not before, August 12, and they sit generally a little later than October 12. It is said that the solicitors would not like the Long Vacation shortened. But solicitors could have it shortened without really having their lives interfered with. The bulk of the business which would be taken could be done by their clerks, and, by arrangement, it would be easy to do what was proposed at the time of the inquiries to which I have referred—namely, provide that more business of pressing urgency should be despatched even in a shortened Long Vacation than is the case at the present moment.
Those are two things which ought to be considered. But they are not the only ones. My noble and learned friend referred to the circuit system and to the opposition to changing it. But my noble and learned friend represents a very powerful Government. The time must come when the ridiculous waste of time which is involved in an unreformed circuit system ought to be dealt with. In Liverpool and Manchester the time of the Judges is very fully taken up, but, as often as not, when the criminal Judge goes to a small town he is presented with a pair of white gloves because there is a ridiculously small amount of business to be dealt with. Then, as regards the civil business, it is now more and more usual to try civil cases in London. There are a great many civil cases coming from very small towns, where the Judge goes on circuit, to find, as a rule, that there is no substantial business to try, and it ought to be tried there if there is any business.
That is not all. There is a good deal of business which could be disposed of in the circuit with the assistance of Commissioners. That is done to some extent, but it might be done to a still greater extent. Moreover, there is a great deal of business which
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looks very formidable in the lists, but which is very unsubstantial. I say nothing about the divorce business, be, cause it has yet to be seen what is the effect on divorce cases of Bills which are under consideration, and of other things; but many of the divorce cases notoriously take a very short time to dispose of The Admiralty cases take longer and are much more substantial, but those are, to a considerable extent at least, temporary in character.
Then my noble and learned friend spoke of certain other things. He spoke of the Chancery Division. Now, I quite agree with him that it would not be expedient to diminish the number of Judges in the Chancery Division as it stands to-day, and the reason is the linked system, under which the Judges get through a great deal of administrative business in addition to the judicial business which they do; but that does not prevent the Chancery Judges from getting through their work comparatively easily, and a goodly number of the actions which are set down in the King's Bench Division might be, and ought to be, transferred to them for trial. It constantly happens in this House that we have appeals before us, coming from the King's Bench Division, which certainly with equal reason might have been tried out in the Chancery Division, where the Judges are not over-pressed. Very many cases now go under the Judicature Act to the King's Bench Division which never would have gone—
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: In case I did not make it clear may I say that, while technically there has not, I think, been a transfer, I do not think that for one single day any Chancery Judge in the last eighteen months has been idle in his own Division without his services being immediately, on that day, transferred to the King's Bench Division to try King's Bench work? It makes no difference, so far as the despatch of business is concerned, whether you transfer the case or whether you transfer the learned Judge.
VISCOUNT HALDANE: Excepting that it interferes with the Chancery work and to some extent with the linked system. I should prefer to see a greater saving of the cases which come before the King's Bench Division and what is properly Chancery work go to Chancery and be dealt with there. We used to hear a good deal of the pressure

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upon the Court of Appeal. My noble and learned friend has said nothing about that, for the reason that the Court of Appeal is pretty well addressed to its work. It is getting through it, anyhow. And it is really with the King's Bench Division that we are concerned here.
What makes me feel it necessary to draw your Lordships' attention thus to the situation is that the financial position is a very serious one. We ought to be putting every nerve, not merely into keeping expenditure on its present level, but into reducing expenditure. And if my noble friend had said something which he did not say, because it did not come within his individual province, I should have been happier. In Scotland and Ireland the Bench is very much over-manned for the volume of the work, if you adopt the standards which govern us in England. I should have liked to hear that, in order to provide for the temporary increase, if temporary increase is necessary, of the strength of the English Bench it was the intention of the Government for a time not to fill up unnecessary vacancies in Ireland and Scotland. A vacancy was filled in Scotland the other day, and I have yet to learn that there ever will be an Irish vacancy in which there will not be pressure to fill it up, whether there is buisness or not. These things go to the root of economy, and it is only vigilant supervision in such matters which enables economy to be made.
I did not rise for the purpose of expressing myself in any hostile fashion to my noble and learned friend on the Woolsack. He has made his case with great lucidity, and he is a most energetic Lord Chancellor in looking into all the details connected wth the administration of justice. But I have thought it right to draw your Lordships' attention to the fact that this question is not a new one, and that an analogous situation has had to be considered on previous occasions, when the demands made were not accepted, because it was pointed out by the representative of the Treasury that there were certain questions which had not been answered, and certain steps which had not been taken.
Those questions have not been answered, and those steps have not been taken to this day, and I think the time has come when practical consideration should be given to the question whether they cannot be taken now. In the way that I have indicated, and possibly in other ways,
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there seems to be room for a more searching consideration of this matter. And if the steps are taken by the Government which the Government propose to take, I hope they will be of a strictly temporary nature, and subject to some consideration of the conditions which I have ventured, to suggest.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: I would only add one word. I have already indicated that it was my intention to introduce, I hope at an early date, an omnibus Bill dealing with legal matters, and I think that Bill will be drafted in such a form as to enable and entitle my noble and learned friend to move, by way of amendment or addition, many of the matters to, which he has referred to-day. I am grateful to him for what he has said in other respects.
On Question, Motion agreed to and ordered accordingly: The said Address to be presented to His Majesty by the Lords with White Staves.

SEEDS BILL. [H.L.]
Amendment reported (according to Order).
LORD BLEDISLOE: My Lords, while acknowledging the effort made by the noble Lord to meet my criticisms of Clause 5 (2)—a subsection which I think your Lordships will agree was originally couched in drastic language calculated to give to the head of the Government quite unprecedented powers, extending in effect to scrapping the whole measure if so chosen—I am bound to say that the words introduced by him in rather a hurry by an Amendment yesterday do not quite meet the case which I put forward. I ask the Minister whether he will kindly consider the possibility of inserting, by way of amendment on Third Reading, other words to be moved either by myself, or, as I hope, by him. To my mind, even with the Amendment introduced yesterday, it is still left to the Minister for the time being to use his own discretion —or, indeed, his caprice—to tear up this measure or any part of it.
Under Clause 7 (2) the Minister may issue Regulations generally for the purpose of carrying the measure into effect, and those Regulations have to be laid before both Houses of Parliament before becoming

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operative. Yet, curiously enough, in the case of Regulations which could have the effect of scrapping the Act altogether there is no necessity for laying them before Parliament. It occurs to me that the right way to meet the case would be to make the subsection which renders it necessary to submit to Parliament the Regulations dealing with the carrying of the Bill into effect extend to all Regulations, including the offending Regulations to which I refer. That may or may not be the right method, but the noble Lord is satisfied that something further ought to be done, and I am confident to leave it in his hands to move something on Third Reading to meet the point.
THE MINISTER OF AGRICULTURE AND FISHERIES (Loan LEE OF FAREHAM): My Lords, as I said yesterday, I quite agree that the subsection as drafted is open to a good deal of criticism, and in endeavouring to meet the objections which were then put forward I suggested, as my noble friend has said, rather on the spur of the moment, certain words which are now incorporated in the subsection. But on looking at them, and having had the privilege of discussing the matter with him outside, I agree that the question probably requires a little further consideration. Therefore, I will certainly accede to his request and, between now and Third Reading, I will put a suggestion on the Paper for amending this particular subsection. I hope it will be in a form which will meet all the objections he has made. I do not propose to ask your Lordships to take the Third Reading of this Bill before Wednesday next, and I will endeavour to put the Amendment on t he Paper this week in order to give ample time for its consideration. I hope that will be a satisfactory arrangement.
LORD STRACHIE: Does the Minister of Agriculture mean that he intends to consider whether he can adopt the suggestion of my noble friend Lord Bledisloe that the provisions under Section 7, subsection (2) shall have effect as regards the Regulations made under Section 5. It seems to me to be very desirable that all Regulations, especially those regarding
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exemption, should come before both Houses of Parliament. Were that done there could be no possible objection to the clause as it stands. The noble Lord did not intimate whether he was inclined to follow those lines or to give any consideration to the suggestion which was made by the noble Lord.
LORD LEE OF FAREHAM: I hope to consider all relevant matters. But, as I said, I have not had time to consider the point now. I wish for an opportunity to do so. Obviously, I cannot commit myself as to the particular line I propose to follow.

CENSUS BILL. [H.L.]
Amendment reported (according to Order).
CRIMINAL LAW AMENDMENT BILL. [H.L.]

  CRIMINAL LAW AMENDMENT (No. 2) BILL. [H.L.]
  THE EARL OF ONSLOW: My Lords, in making the Motion which stands in my name on the Paper I would inform the House that there is a third Bill—the Sexual Offences Bill—to be referred to this Committee. We await a Message from another place with regard to it.
  Moved, That a Committee of five Lords be appointed to join with a Committee of the House of Commons to consider the said Bills; that the following Lords be named of such Committee—

  E. Pembroke,

  E. Onslow,

  E. Beauchamp,

  L. Wemyss (Wemyss),

  L. Muir Mackenzie;

  and that such Committee have power to agree with the Committee of the House of Commons in the appointment of a Chairman.—(The Earl of Onslow.)
  On Question, Motion agreed to.
  House adjourned at twenty- five minutes before six o'clock.