HL Deb 06 August 1925 vol 62 cc771-94

EARL BEAUCHAMP had given Notice to ask what are the terms of the subsidy which His Majesty's Government are giving to the coal industry; and to move for Papers. The noble Earl said: My Lords, I offer no apology to your Lordships for raising the question of the coal subsidy because I always think that when an important statement is made in regard to Government policy in another place it is only due to your Lordships that a similar statement should be made in this House at the same time; and as I understand that in another place there is to be an important discussion it seems right that your Lordships should be able to ask His Majesty's Government for such information as they are able to give. Your Lordships will realise, of course, that the Question which stands on the Paper really includes two things, not only the subsidy itself but the negotiations which led up to that subsidy.

Perhaps I might take the question of the subsidy first and ask His Majesty's Government if they will be good enough to give me any additional information or explanation they can. I confess that for those of us who have not been au courant with the negotiations which have taken place in the past even this lucid memorandum presents a considerable number of difficulties. It is not easy in the course of a few hours to understand all its implications. I think I may fairly say that, although this subsidy has been described as a subsidy in aid of wages, it is also a subsidy in aid of profits. It is meant to assist both the one side and the other. I think we may say also that it gives to both sides really that for which they were asking.

When there is a dispute of this kind and two parties come together, both of them asking a good deal, I am not at all sure that it is not possible to get them to accept rather less than that for which they both ask, and I wish I could feel more certain in my own mind that in making this very large subsidy which is outlined in the White Paper His Majesty's Government were not giving more than was really necessary. I cannot help having at the back of my mind the idea that both sides might have been willing to accept rather less than they asked for. His Majesty's Government in this matter have really accepted the proposals and figures which were submitted by the mine owners in their memorandum of July 1. Those figures have been subjected to a good deal of criticism both at the Court of Inquiry and in the Press since that time. But, as I understand the result, His Majesty's Government propose during the next nine months to fill up the gap which may exist both in profits and wages between the minimum which was arrived at under the Agreement of 1924 and what will actually be earned daring those nine months.

For my own part, I confess that I have a very considerable prejudice against a subsidy of any kind whatsoever. The noble Viscount may fairly retort that a right hon. friend of mine gave a subsidy on a previous occasion. I admit it. That subsidy, however, was different to this one. It was strictly limited in amount: while this one is entirely unlimited. I confess that it seems to me that there is a very real danger that other trades which are suffering from depression may feel that they have an equal right to come to his Majesty's Government, and that they will also ask for a subsidy and hope that they may be able to get it from the Government, if there is a real crisis in their industry such as that with which the Government were faced last week. If that be so it seems to me that here we have a very dangerous precedent upon which his Majesty's Government have embarked. I hope they will be able to give us reasons why they put this industry upon a pedestal—why they put this trade wholly apart and are prepared to deal with it in a different way from that in which they would deal with any other trade or any other request which may come to them in similar circumstances.

There are one or two other criticisms which I may venture to make upon this subvention. One realises, of course, that the Government, in the circumstances of which I shall say something in a moment, were obliged to come to a conclusion in a very short time indeed. They were probably unable to elaborate the conditions under which they gave this subsidy as they would have liked to elaborate them had they had more time in which to think them over. They make, for instance, no distinction between the good management of a pit and the bad management of a pit. They make no difference between a good pit and a bad pit, between a pit in which all the profits have been divided up to the hilt of late years and one in which a good deal of money has been set apart for the purposes of renewing the machinery and bringing it all up to date. There, I think, there is a very real ground for criticism. We know there are pits of both kinds. Some pits are admirably equipped. The owners have put by large sums of money to keep them up to date; but they are to be no better treated than those pits in which every penny earned has been returned to the owners and in which every penny secured from the mine has been spent at once and nothing has been put back again to improve the mines or to improve the housing of the people who live around them.

There is one point upon which I hope that the noble Viscount may be able to give me a little more information. It is in regard to the question of the pits which are closed and which may be reopened. It seems to me that there is sonic little inconsistency, which, perhaps, the noble Viscount will be able to explain, on page 3 of the White Paper. In the bottom paragraph the noble Viscount will see that His Majesty's Government contemplate the reopening of a certain number of pits, and they say:— The assistance given will, of course, enable more pits to work and more men to be employed. I quite see that and it seems to me reasonable. I think that probably will be the result, but later in the White Paper the noble Viscount will see that this subvention "provides no guarantee that all pits will work, or that pits already closed will be reopened." It may be that there is no guarantee given; that may explain the apparent inconsistency; but I should be very glad if the noble Viscount could give us any information in his possession as to any estimate which the Government have been able to make as to the number of pits which are likely to be opened again as a result of this subvention being given, and whether there will be a large number of pits or a small number of pits reopened.

May I further call the attention of the noble Viscount to the paragraph on page 4 in which your Lordships will see that there is a provision that if the course of trade deteriorates, and coal prices are low, the number of pits which will cease to pay, and will consequently be closed, will be larger, and the subvention though at a higher rate, will be protected from indefinite increase by being restricted to a smaller number of pits. I cannot feel perfectly sure that that is a consequence which will follow and that the pits will therefore necessarily be closed. After all, it seems to me to be one of the difficulties in connection with this subsidy as it is going to be given, that the matter is going to be considered by the State in districts and not by individual collieries. Therefore we have the curious state of affairs that, ignoring the conditions of each colliery, prosperous mines in areas which are unprosperous will get the subvention and mines which are not prosperous, but which happen to be in prosperous areas, will not get any subsidy at all. That seems to me to be something of an inconsistency, but, perhaps, the noble Viscount will be able to explain or to justify it.

In the circumstances of which I have already spoken I understand that it would have been difficult for His Majesty's Government to consider the whole of the circumstances which may arise in the coal trade. They had not the time in which to do it, but I should have liked to have seen some provisions made for a reduction in the price of coal to the consumer, if such a thing could become possible during the next nine months. But if it becomes possible there is no guarantee that the consumer will get any benefit at all from this possible reduction in the price. There is, I think, a further difficulty. It may be necessary, especially towards the end of this nine months, that there should be a very considerable reduction in the price for the export trade. We all realise and understand that what the coal trade needs is a larger export trade, and in order to get that it may be necessary to reduce their price for the export trade, but I am not quite sure how this subsidy will assist them in doing that, or whether it will make it very difficult for them to do it and to secure more trade outside. In view of the condition of the coal trade, I suppose there are few things which are more desirable for that trade than an expansion of their export of coal.

Before I sit down I turn from these somewhat exploratory questions on the white Paper to say a few words on the question of the negotiations. We all knew, I think, as long ago as February last, that a crisis was impending in the coal trade, but from February till July little or nothing seems to have been done, either by His Majesty's Government or by the Departments which they administer, to prepare for the crisis as it came nearer and nearer, and although the negotiations were in the end taken in hand, they were taken in hand, not by the Minister of Mines, not even by the Minister of Labour, but by the First Lord of the Admiralty, and, finally, by the Prime Minister, who declared one day that under no circumstances would a subsidy be granted, and yet only a few hours passed before we were told that a subsidy was to be granted. Any light which the noble Viscount can throw upon that change of position would be, I think, very illuminating and interesting. But the point which I wish to make is that it seems to me most unfortunate that during all these long months, when something might have been done by negotiation, and especially by the Departments concerned, to try to bring the two sides together to avert a crisis such as that with which we were faced last week, nothing was done by them.

May I make a suggestion to the Government? Before the War the Ministry of Mines was a Department of the Home Office, and the Ministry of Labour was a Department of the Board of Trade. Have they really justified their existence during the past few months? Have they justified the large sums of money which they cost, the offices which they occupy, their highly-paid officials? Might it not have been better if, instead of paying all these people, whose success has been far from obvious to the public, their salaries had been available in order to do something towards making up this subsidy. I do venture to suggest to the noble Viscount that those of us who are anxious for economy will find a fresh argument for the abolition of those offices in the inaction which appears to have characterised these Departments during the last few months.

This really is, I think, the most serious criticism which I shall venture to make upon this point. All the time that we knew that the crisis was coming so little was done by His Majesty's Government that, at the last moment, they were faced with a position so serious that they were obliged to adopt the policy which they had declared they would not adopt, and, having adopted it, they present it now to the country as their best solution of the difficulty. I hope the noble Viscount will be good enough to give us information not only upon the points which I have ventured to make, but upon any other point in connection with this matter which he is able to give. I beg to move.

THE CHANCELLOR OF THE DUCHY OF LANCASTER (VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD)

My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Earl for the tone and the attitude which he has adopted in the observations which he has made, and I will endeavour to satisfy him as far as I can do so on the points that he has raised. I will even take advantage of his invitation to go rather farther than his Question went in trying to explain to your Lordships the policy which the Government have pursued on this occasion. I think, perhaps, it might be convenient if, in the first instance, I were to try to explain exactly how the subsidy is to be paid. I do not know why it is, but all the finance connected with coal mining appears to be extraordinarily complicated. Those of your Lordships who have had any experience of mining leases will know the extraordinary complications even of those, and when you come to wages the complications are prodigious. I am not going to attempt to explain, even if I were capable of doing so, the full complications and elaborations by which wages in the coal mining industry are estimated. My object is a much simpler one—to try to state to your Lordships exactly what is proposed to be done in this particular case.

May I say, as a preliminary—I shall probably have to return to it later—that the object of this subvention was merely to stabilise conditions pending inquiry. That is the fundamental conception at the basis of the whole of this proposal, and therefore your Lordships will realise that it is perfectly true, as the noble Earl said, that the men will get under this proposal, pending inquiry, at least the minimum wage to which they would have been entitled under the Agreement of 1924. Conversely, the owners will be bound to pay only what they would have paid under the proposals which they submitted. The object is to keep the two sides exactly in the position in which they were.

Your Lordships will pardon me if I venture to explain by way of example, a purely fictitious example, necessarily, exactly what will happen. It is done by reference to the district wages, as all these wages are. Let us suppose that in a particular district the net proceeds, that is, the proceeds after deducting everything except wages, amount to £1,000,000. Then under the proposal made by the owners 87 per cent. will be available for wages and 13 per cent. for profits, or £870,000 for wages, and £130,000 for profits. It is quite simple for those who are conversant with the machinery to calculate exactly what will be the wage payable to the men in respect of that £870,000. It is done by adding such and such percentage to the basis wage, as it is called.

Take the case of a colliery with a 4,000 men shift per month, a very small colliery, and let us suppose that under the 1924 Agreement, that is to say the minimum wage, there was 2,000 payable. Under the proposal made by the owners £1,200 would be payable, and there would then be £800 to be found by the Government. That is the proposal—so that the two sides will remain exactly as they were when the negotiations for an agreement broke down. There is one further complication to which I desire to call your attention and it bears on a question which the noble Earl has put to me. In my assumed example I have assumed that £130,000 was divisible in respect of profits. If the result of that division is to show a greater profit than 1s. 3d. per ton, then that is to be paid in relief of wages. Let us assume that a profit of 1s. 3d. per ton would mean £110,000, then there would be £20,000 which would be payable to the £870,000, and it would therefore raise the rate of wages which would be paid under the owners' proposals, they being modified to that extent, and in consequence the amount to be found out of the subvention would be proportionately diminished.

The importance of that, from the point of view of the Question put by the noble Earl is this, that it does prevent any attempt to utilise these payments in order to enable the mine owners to obtain undue profits. If that happens the profits go back to the wages and reduce the subvention. I cannot hope that I have made the thing very clear, but I trust I have done something to assist in interpreting the White Paper which is now before your Lordships and which sets out the matter as clearly as it can be set out in view of the complicated nature of the proposal.

The noble Earl put another Question to me with regard to the re-opening of pits. I do not think there is any inconsistency in the White Paper, which says that this may probably enable some pits which have actually closed, or are on the point of closing, to continue work. That is true, but it does not give any guarantee on the subject at all. It leaves that to the operation of economic causes, subject, of course, to the assistance that is being given. I do not think there is really any contradiction. The noble Earl also asked whether I could give him any estimate as to the number of pits which would be reopened under this proposal. I am afraid I am not able to give him any estimate at all. As he justly said, the matter has been necessarily conducted with great speed and I do not know yet whether that estimate has been arrived at. At any rate it is not in my possession.

Beyond this I do not know that there is any further explanation of the actual document itself for which the noble Earl asked. He was very good in making practically no serious criticism, except on one point to which I will come later, on the policy of the Government. But I think your Lordships will forgive me if I refer to certain criticisms which have been made outside this House and on which it is important that the position of the Government should be made perfectly clear. One of the most formidable criticisms is that this settlement was a surrender to violence, a surrender to a threat to hold up the trade of the country. As a matter of actual fact I can assure your Lordships that this is not so. I do not think there was any single member of the Government who doubted that if it came to a definite issue as to whether one section of the, population were to be allowed to hold up the essential national services of the country or not the Government of the day would be able to see that those services continued. The idea that any section, however powerful, can hold up the country to ransom as it were, demand from the country its money or its life, is not a practical danger in the opinion of any member of the Government.

I do not propose to deny that the course which the Government has pursued has led a certain number of people to believe that some such surrender has been made, and, however unjust that suspicion may be, the fact that it exists is a matter of great importance and one which no doubt weighed with the Government and which they had to weigh against other considerations in arriving at the decision they did. As to that, I desire to point out that not only was this not dictated by a fear of what would happen, in the sense that the Government had any doubt that it would be able to remain master of the situation, but that, as a matter of fact, neither the demand of the masters nor the demand of the men has been conceded. Neither contention has been accepted. The whole point is that, pending a public inquiry, a stabilisation of conditions has been secured by the use of public funds. That is all that has been done. Neither the men nor the masters have obtained that which they desired, or that for which they asked, but the situation has been held up pending full inquiry into the position. That is the answer that I make to the noble Earl when he asks why no distinction has been made between this colliery and that, between the colliery that is prosperous and the colliery that is not prosperous. That is not the real point. This is not a subsidy in aid of profits or, indeed, of wages. It is a means of securing an opportunity for a full inquiry into the conditions of the industry.

The noble Earl said very truly that to make any grant of this kind is a precedent which, in certain circumstances, may become a dangerous one. I do not wish to underrate the seriousness of the decision to which the Government came, but when the noble Earl talks of a precedent I think he should remember the very special circumstances which existed in this case, and which, so far as I can see, are very unlikely to recur. There had been a very lengthy dispute, going on, as the noble Earl pointed out, for some months, and for a long period the Government stood aside. The noble. Earl criticises them very severely for having done so—indeed, that is the only serious criticism that, as I understand him, he desires to make.

In the first place, may I say that I do not think that it is just for him to criticise the Ministry of Labour or the Department of Mines in this respect? The action or inaction of the Government is the action or inaction of the Government as a whole. I do not desire for my part, and I am sure that none of my colleagues who sit on this Bench desire for their part, to shirk any part of their responsibility in respect of the failure to take action, if failure there were, during the months that have elapsed. As for the noble Earl's suggestion that these events cast a doubt upon the ability of the Ministry of Labour and the Department of Mines, and that the salaries of those Departments should be used towards the payment of this subsidy, I imagine that this was rather a rhetorical observation than one that was intended to be taken as a serious suggestion. I am afraid that the salaries of both the Departments, taken together, would not go very far towards paying the subsidy that is proposed in this case.

The Government stood aside for this reason. They hoped and believed that there was a good chance that a settlement would he arrived at between the masters and the men. They believed—and surely they were right in that belief—that a settlement arrived at by agreement would be infinitely better, and infinitely more likely to be permanent, than any settlement that they could impose by their influence or by greater pressure. Whether they were right or wrong, as things have turned out, may well be a matter of controversy, but it was right for them to believe as long as they could that a real settlement could be arrived at, though I think it exceedingly doubtful whether, after this experience, any Government will think it worth while to stand aside and allow owners and men to try to arrive at a settlement for themselves. Whether they will do so in the future, after this experience, I am bound to say seems to me to be doubtful, but that they were right to do so up to a certain point on the facts before them I do not believe that any of your Lordships, with those facts before you, would have doubted, taking the circumstances as they then appeared.

When the Government did intervene they took a course which I think was the right course—namely, they desired to have an inquiry into the dispute to see whether there really was an irreconcilable difference between the parties, and accordingly they appointed a Commission an Inquiry, or call it what you will, over which Mr. Macmillan presided. I do not believe that any one who has the honour of that gentleman's acquaintance will differ from me when I say that they could not have selected a man of greater integrity, or greater impartiality or greater ability to conduct the Inquiry. In those circumstances Mr. Macmillan and his colleagues carried through an inquiry under very great difficulties and made a certain Report, which is before your Lordships. Two broad conclusions emerged from that Report, whether they were right or wrong. The first was that the men were right in their demand that some minimum wage, unascertained and undescribed—at least the principle of a minimum wage—should be granted to them. That was a very important finding from many points of view, but particularly because it would necessarily and rightly guide to a very large extent the great force upon which in this matter, as in so many other matters, we all have to rely—namely, the force of public opinion. I do not say that it would have made it impossible—I do not think it would—hut it would have added greatly to the difficulty of allowing the dispute to proceed to its bitter end that this finding should be before the public as the finding of an impartial tribunal.

The other finding was, in my view, even more important. It was that no conclusion as to the proper settlement which ought to be arrived at could be reached without a further and more complete inquiry. That really is, to my mind, the most important conclusion of the Macmillan Inquiry. They said in so many words that they were quite clear that an inquiry into a number of matters ought to be made. The Government have no hesitation whatever in expressing their complete agreement with that opinion. They believe—and this is, indeed, the foundation of their policy—that a comprehensive and impartial inquiry into this matter is absolutely essential, and it is in order to secure That impartial and comprehensive inquiry, and to secure a breathing space during which that inquiry can be made, that they have arrived at the conclusion that this temporary subvention ought to be given. Indeed, I think that, even if they had not taken that view, it would have been extremely difficult for any Government to disregard so express a finding as that, coming from an impartial body.

The result was that the moment that this decision became known to the Government they approached both sides with a view to obtaining some kind of means by which the inquiry could be carried out. I need not say that I am not going to express any opinion as to the rights and wrongs of the action which either side took, but, as a matter of fact, neither side was prepared to have what might be called an armistice for the purpose of this inquiry, except on the terms that their claims should be, in substance, granted. I am not speaking of any concessions that may have been made on one side or the other, but in substance the men insisted on the maintenance of the minimum wage, as granted under the 1924 Agreement, and the owners said quite definitely that it was impossible to carry on the industry on any such terms. Therefore there was a complete deadlock, and when my noble friend says: "Could you not have made them yield a little" I can assure the noble Earl that nobody would have been better pleased than the Government if they could have persuaded the parties to take a view which would have made it easier to have a full and impartial inquiry. Therefore, in that state of things, and with that very special condition of affairs which had arisen, the Government did feel that they were justified in taking this course, which seemed to them the only course open to Them, in order to secure the breathing space necessary for the inquiry.

I do not disagree at all with the noble Earl when he says that the precedent, so set, is a dangerous one. I agree that if you once start on the line that subsidies in aid of wages or profits may be granted to industries which are in difficulties, you are starting on, at any rate, a very serious course, and, as far as the Government are concerned, I think I am justified in saying that they remain of opinion that there are the very gravest objections to sub sidies in aid of either profits or wages, and that when the Prime Minister expressed, in the course of the conversations which took place just before the final decision was reached, his view that subsidies ought not to be granted, he only said what the Government believed then and what the Government believe now. Then it became clear that in order to obtain an inquiry under the special circumstances which had arisen, a special subvention, or subsidy, must be made, of a purely temporary character, not with a view of setting the industry on its legs, or with a view of granting permanent maintenance of wages, or still less a rise of wages, but merely in order to obtain this armistice and breathing space to which I have referred. Therefore, it is an absolutely vital part of the Government's policy that this is a temporary subsidy, granted only during emergency, until an inquiry has taken place, and so far as other industries are concerned I have no hesitation in saying that no other subsidy is in contemplation by the Government.

I have dealt with two, at any rate, of the main objections urged against the policy of the Government. I have said that there certainly were very strong reasons in its favour. There was, at any rate, a chance that this coal stoppage would have developed into a general industrial strife, perhaps more than an industrial strife. That must have inflicted great loss on the country, and very large expenditure, certainly many times the value of the subsidy granted.

THE EARL OF BALFOUR

Hear, hear!

VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD

I have heard it put as high as five times, and I should not he surprised if it were even higher than that. It would have inflicted the gravest hardship, not perhaps so much upon the rich, but unquestionably upon the poorest classes in this country, because, let it be well understood, in every dispute and difficulty of this kind it is the poorest of the poor who suffer most. That was a very important consideration for the Government. They had also to consider that public opinion was undoubtedly confused and ill-informed on this subject—at least, so the Government think—and it was very desirable that the whole of the facts and circumstances of the dispute, and the difficulties that had arisen, and of the industry itself, should be laid before Parliament and the public in the most authoritative and impartial way that could be secured. From that point of view an inquiry was really essential, because I am sure of the assent of-every noble Lord that in these matters it is only public opinion that counts in the last resort.

Finally, they do feel—it may turn out that they were too sanguine—that a delay, a period for passions to cool, and a period when both sides may consider fully the importance of the issues involved, may possibly lead, as they hope, to an agreement between the parties which shall lay the foundation of real peace and settlement in this industry which has been for so long disturbed. I am satisfied that it is only ultimately by such an agreement that you can get real peace and prosperity in the industry, and I do think it was well worth taking very considerable risks in order to give an opportunity for such a peace to be finally established.

Those, at any rate, are the reasons, so far as I can give them, for the action which the Government have taken, and the justification which they think they have for that action. I think it right to add two notes of caution. I see that the Leader of the Opposition in another place, Mr. Ramsay MacDonald, in a speech which he made, I think, last Monday, charged the Government with having yielded to the forces of disorder. That is a very grave charge and the gravest that can be brought against any Government. As I have explained to your Lordships, I do not admit it. On the contrary I wish to state, as earnestly and emphatically as I can, that the Government recognise to the full that it is their first duty to preserve the essential life of the community. They think that that is the most important of all the functions of government, and they certainly are prepared to say that nothing will prevent them from discharging that duty if, and when. It becomes necessary. Indeed in that matter, if there is a real threat made to the life of the community, any Government—I am not speaking of this Government—wherever drawn and as long as it is a Government, must succeed or perish.

I see that in his speech Mr. MacDonald said that he had very little doubt—I think he went even further and said he felt perfectly certain—that if the matter had gone on the industry of the country would have been paralysed. I ask your Lordships to consider the full meaning of that statement. I do not say that the right hon. gentleman welcomed it—indeed, I understand that he has made some explanations of his speech—but he declared it as his conviction that it would have been so. It is a claim, if not of the right at any rate of the power of a section of the community—in this case the Trade Union Congress, though it might he any other body—to hold up the country, and strictly and literally, without using any language of exaggeration, a claim of that kind is a revolutionary claim. It is a claim to substitute for the Government of the country another, unconstitutional, illegal government, which would have the right to dictate the policy of the country in defiance of all our Parliamentary and constitutional institutions.

I observe that at the same meeting a gentleman, with the appropriate name of Cole, made a speech. I believe Mr. Cole is an Oxford don. There is no more bloodthirsty class in the world than that of professors. We saw something of that in the German variety of the species during the late War. This is what Mr. Cole thought it right to say. He urged a more militant spirit on the part of Labour. He said:— The next Labour Government ought not to strive for industrial peace so that the Government might get on with the job. From the point of view of carrying through Socialism the trade union movement was indispensable, not so much for any clearly formulated policy, as because it should be master. It should have an ugly mood, and a readiness to fight. I am quite sure that there is not any one of your Lordships who would applaud or approve of that declaration of Mr. Cole, although I understand he is high in the intelligentia of the Labour Party. But I venture very respectfully to make my appeal, for what it is worth, to the Labour Party, and to its responsible leaders. This policy which Mr. Cole apparently favours, that the trade unions are to combine to hold up the country, so as to force upon it Socialism or some other political object, is a policy which can only, obviously and literally, lead to one of two consequences, either the complete defeat of the policy, or revolution; because, if such a policy succeeded, that would be revolution, it would be the substitution of an illegal Government for a legal Government. It would be revolution in every possible sense of the word, and I myself have not the slightest doubt that it would be accompanied by many of the characteristics with which revolution has been accompanied in other countries.

Therefore I venture very respectfully to say this to the Labour Party: Let them be very careful where they are going. The moment it is realised in the country that the policy they are advocating, or that their leaders, those who really, I am afraid, direct their policy, are advocating, is a policy which can only lead to revolution or defeat, it will certainly lead to defeat, because I am satisfied that the moment my fellow-countrymen realise what is intended they will have nothing to do with such a policy, and that policy must be a complete failure. Therefore all I will say is that, as far as this, or, indeed, any Government, are concerned, if any such policy is attempted to be put into force, if the is the real issue that they have to meet, then it is their duty to strive with every nerve, to use every effort, to exhaust every resource in order to secure the complete and final defeat of any such attempt.

That is one observation that I desire to make, and the other is this on the other side. It is the duty of the Government to maintain the law and order of this country, and the constitutional functions of its administration. But that is not their only duty. Their duty is also to promote to the very utmost of their power the happiness and prosperity of the people of this country. It is not enough to have a merely negative policy, to resist this or that attempt; they must have a constructive policy. If they are going to resist revolution successfully, as I am sure they can, they will not be fulfilling their duty completely unless they present to the country an alternative to revolution. In this matter the policy of the Government is clear enough. The principles for which they strive have been laid down in more than one eloquent speech by the Prime Minister. He has told the country more than once, and has, if I may venture to say so, deeply impressed the country by so doing, that the policy of the Government is to unite all classes, and to put an end to all class division. That is the central object for which this Government in industrial matters ought to exist, and, for my part, I do not hesitate to say that the Government will be rightly criticised, and even condemned, if we do not produce a definite and practical policy in order to carry these principles into effect. I will only add that in that course the Government will be pursuing a task than which none can be more worthy or more congenial to any Conservative administration.

VISCOUNT HALDANE

My Lords, I think it will be agreed that the speech of the noble Viscount has been a very interesting one, as well as a very important one, particularly that latter part of it in which he laid down principles. My quarrel with his speech is not over the principles—I agree with them—bun over the view which he has presented to the House of the way in which the Government have handled and applied them. I will come to that presently. I will only touch for the moment on the first part of the speech in which he dealt with the criticism of my noble friend Lord Beauchamp on the White Paper. It may be that there are still some obscurities latent in that document. I have had too much to do with mining leases in my time not to have doubts on the subject. But that is not an important matter, because the noble Viscount made it quite clear that the intention of the Government was merely to make a temporary arrangement, which would give time for negotiation and for the settlement of this great question. I think that is, on the face of it, what the document aims at, and I am not going to quarrel with the details in it.

But the noble Viscount used an expression earlier in his speech which I thought a very striking one. He said that this was, perhaps, the last time that any Government would think it wise to leave it to the mine owners and the miners to settle, between themselves their disputes in the hope that they would do so. I do not criticise that, either. I only say that I wonder, if that be the view of the Government, that they did not realise earlier that there were deep-lying differences of principle which were the root of this controversy. Some people have talked as though the origin of the dispute into which the country was threatened to be plunged was the influence of Bolshevism; others say it was the influence of Communism; a third lot of people say that it was the influence of young and unreasonable people who will not listen to reason. All these causes may have something to contribute, but I doubt whether any of them have had very much to contribute. They really can operate only on a soil that is fertile, and my charge against the Government is that the soil has been rendered fertile by their neglect of what was staring them in the face, and by their unreadiness, when the time came, to cope with the situation which had come upon them.

I remember very well a debate in which I took part in this House six years ago, a debate in 1919 after the Sankey Committee had reported. But I remember, still more vividly than any intervention of my own the intervention of the late Lord Milner, who was then Secretary of State, on behalf of the Government. He said, and he said it explicitly—I have the report by me if it is necessary to refer to it—not committing the Government, but speaking his own considered opinion, that it was no use any longer trying to think that this was a dispute between the miners and the mine owners. It lay deeper. The whole thing had become too big to be so treated; and he indicated his own opinion, that unification or nationalisation (he said he did not shrink from the phrase, although he did not like it very much) was inevitable if there was to be a permanent settlement of this question. That was the view that Lord Milner put before your Lordships' House six years ago.

What happened afterwards? At that time, and soon afterwards, the Miners' Federation was in difficult circumstances. There was a strike which had exhausted the funds of the Federation. It was not in a position to fight and yet it was extremely irritated because the Government did not take action on the Sankey Report. They gave some pledges which looked as if, in some parts of them at all events, they meant to take action. In the next year they did take action in this form. They brought in and passed the Coal Mines Regulation Act. 1920, a good enough Act in its way, which, among other things, contained Part II; and Part II contained proposals for dividing the country into districts and appointing representative committees of em- ployers, of workmen and of other persons interested, who should survey the conditions in the districts and give advice to, and bring together, miners and men and conciliate them. But the miners' representatives, in my opinion rather foolishly, did not assent to Part II and the result was, under a clause which the Government had put in enabling them to do it, that the Government withdrew it. I thought that was a very short-sighted policy, not only on the part of the miners, but on the part, of the Government.

It was to me inevitable, after what had emerged in the evidence before the Sankey Inquiry and in the discussions in Parliament, that this question would come up again and that it would come up again with greater force than it had before and at a time when the miners were more able to fight. It is true to-day that the Miners' Federation have not much money to spend; but they have a new element. The constitution never stands still, either industrially or in any other respect, and there have emerged organisations of the transport workers and the railwaymen, which recognise in this fight matters which vitally concern their own interests and for the first time they have intimated their intention of taking a hand in this matter. They may do it justly or they may do it unjustly. If they do it unjustly or oppressively, I agree with what the noble Viscount said, that it is the duty of the State to preserve law and order to the full extent of its resources, even as it would have to do in the case of the invasion of the country. Put that is a disastrous situation to allow to grow up.

I do not think it is possible to overestimate the seriousness of such a disaster. Its seriousness is much greater than it was six years ago at the time of the Sankey Report, and much greater than in 1911, when I sat in the Cabinet which had to deal with a coal strike, serious enough as it appeared to us in those days. It is now a matter so large and so far-reaching that all I could wish is that I could think that the Government had been applying their minds to the question of how to deal with it even on that limited basis of opposing force to force. I am one of those who have always believed in foreseeing possible conflicts and preparing for them. At one time there were some preparations for these things, and there may be now; but they require constant preparation and adaptation.

That brings me at once to the charge which the noble Viscount brought against Mr. Ramsay MacDonald's speech in Wales. I have referred to the words of that speech; I have them here and will hand them to the noble Viscount. What Mr. Ramsay MacDonald said was not that the Government had given victory to the forces of disorder, but had given the appearance of victory. He said, in effect: "You have given the appearance of victory because you did not foresee these things, because you did not prepare for them, because you have allowed a state of things to grow up in which you are not ready, in which you have no ideas, in which you have, been thinking of other things and have let the whole matter slide." That was his charge against the Government and I am compelled to repeat it in your Lordships' House. When I recall what happened in 1919, when I recall the consideration that was given then, I recall also a state of things in which the coal-owners said: "We Will have nothing to do with any of your new arrangements, with your Part II's or anything else. We will make proposals of our own." They did that in a Bill which was brought in by my noble friend Lord Gainford, which passed through this House, which was at the time in a somewhat defence-of-law-and-order frame of mind and did not look too closely at things; but it came to an end in another place, where the interests of Labour were represented.

I say emphatically that it is not the desire of Labour or Labour organisations to enter into conflict with law and order. It is not the desire of the vast, bulk of our working men to proceed forcibly or without regard to decency. There are, no doubt, hot-heads; but they count for very little in a country like ours, except, that they are very vocal. As for Mr. Cole, I have never agreed with his views on syndicalism or upon the various forms in which he proposes to organise production; but unquestionably he is one of the most intelligent and acute investigators of these subjects we have to-day, and we owe a great deal to him for bringing forward certain views and facts which otherwise we should not have. Therefore, I deprecate criticism of Mr. Cole merely on the ground of language which he may have used in saying that trade unionism must fight if it is going to get anything at all. Trade unionism has to fight if it is going to get anything. If it remained inert it would leave the field to the coal-owners. I do not want to leave the field either to trade unionism or the coal-owners. I want to see the facts ascertained and the Government furnished with the full knowledge which is required before they can come to a decision upon this subject.

That brings me to the crucial point. The Government may manage this. I only wish they had been thinking of it two or three years earlier and preparing their minds for what was looming up.

THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY

This was in your year of office.

VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD

That would have been in your year of office.

VISCOUNT HALDANE

My Lords, we have all been in office backwards and forwards and, if you like, I will take plenty of discredit to the Labour Party for not having thought of these things more closely than they did; but we were only in office a very short time and it was not possible for us to carry anything which required a majority. I am not for a moment saying that the Labour Party has not its own portion of this lapse. But you were in office years before that. Your Government, or part of your Government, we s in office at the time of the issue of the Sankey Report. Your Government was the Government Which ought to have applied its mind at that, time and to have been looking into the future instead of leaving it to chance.

Very well; we have now a condition of things in which the Government says that it is going to act. I am very glad to hear that it is going to act. I am also glad to hear that it proposes to act in what seems to me to be the right way—to ascertain the facts. If this Commission is to do any good it will have to be appointed at once. It will have to survey the whole field. It will have to hear the views of coal-owners and miners alike. It will have to go and examine things on the spot and to take into account other trades and industries which may be affected. Then, it must be free—I hope this is distinctly understood—to express its views untrammelled and with no hesitation, even if it should feel itself driven to adopt the large point of view which the late Lord Milner put forward in the year 1919. It must be free. I am not agitating for nationalisation. It may be an impossibility. I do not know. What I want to see is what this Commission, doing its work properly, says upon the subject, and to hear what it says after it has done what has never been done before, after it has gone into the miners' case upon the subject—because the miners tell you they do not agree with the coal-owners that the best has been clone with the pits or with production; the miners tell you that there are arrangements by which economy might be secured and the pits be better administered. I have suspected that for a very long time. I have formed no opinion upon it, because I do not know, but I am trusting to this Commission to enable me to know, and I hope that this Commission means to go to work as freely and with as open a mind as was done by the Macmillan Committee of Inquiry the other day.

Everything, therefore, does not depend on what the noble Viscount has told us to-day. What he told us to-day was very good and I agree with him; but what he has not told us is how we are to make up for this long period of neglect in which this great question has not been observed or looked to. The retribution for that neglect is now upon us. If the Government do—I hope they can—evolve in these few days which are still impending a really good Commission, with a Chairman of large and impartial view, not either in favour of the coal-owners or in favour of the miners, but in favour of getting the truth in the largest sense, then I shall have some hope, but that work will have to be very thoroughly done, and then we shall have to see whether we have been able to bring the miners and the coal-owners together upon the subject. I am not wholly without hope that if the miners were put in possession of full knowledge, if they were satisfied that some things for which they are asking are things which cannot be given, or if, on the other hand, they were satisfied that the coal-owners had either been doing their best or that there were better things which the coal-owners were ready to undertake to do, there might be a possibility of that agreement of which the noble Viscount spoke. But until we have that information, and until the working classes have it before them, do not let your Lordships deceive yourselves: you are in for a period of recurring and increased disturbance between Labour and Capital because your old-fashioned organisation has got out of date.

LORD EMMOTT

My Lords, I do not rise to make any extended observations in regard to this very important matter. I should like, however, to be allowed in the first place to say that the Government were exceedingly fortunate in choosing the noble Viscount opposite to state their case upon this matter. He gave us a speech of extraordinary interest, couched in a tone of high seriousness, fitted to the great importance of the question. I am quite sure that all your Lordships listened to what he said with the greatest interest and, I can imagine, with a very large measure of approval. The question that I desire to ask is this. A good deal of reference has naturally been made by my noble friend Lord Haldane to the Sankey Report. I do not suppose that the Government are yet in a position to say anything about the nature or the personnel of the Commission which is to be appointed. I do not ask for that, but I do ask this. I do most sincerely hope that the Commission when it is appointed will be different in every way from the Sankey Commission, that it will not be a Commission composed mainly of partisans, but, so far as possible, of a few people—I do not care how small it is—to whose opinion the country is likely to attach importance, and who are themselves, if possible, unconnected with the coal trade in every way, and impartial men. I do hope it will be a Commission of that kind, and that we shall not have a repetition of the Sankey Commission, otherwise I think disaster will ensue.

VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD

My Lords, by your Lordships' leave I may perhaps be allowed to reply to that question as far as I can, and in doing so to thank the noble Lord for his kindly references to myself. The Government have heard the noble Lord's observations with a great deal of sympathy, but I do not think it would be right of me to express any opinion on the subject until the matter has been further considered. I can, however, assure the noble Lord that his views will be very carefully weighed.

EARL BEAUCHAMP

My Lords, in asking leave to withdraw the Motion for Papers, may I make two remarks: first, to thank the noble Viscount for the very sympathetic and full reply he was good enough to make to the Questions I asked him, and, in the second place, to express my regret that in spite of his eloquence I find myself as entirely opposed to the policy of the subvention on this occasion as I was before he made his remarks. I said before that I regarded it with alarm, and I am sorry to think that that alarm has been in no way diminished by what I was able to hear from the noble Viscount.

Motion, by leave, withdrawn.