Lords Sitting of 8 December 1926

Preamble
The House met at a quarter before four of the clock, The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
INDIAN AND COLONIAL DIVORCE JURISDICTION BILL. [H.L.]
Returned from the Commons, agreed to.
FORTH AND CLYDE NAVIGATION (CASTLECARY AND KIRKINTILLOCH ROAD BRIDGES) ORDER CONFIRMATION BILL. [H.L.]
Returned from the Commons, agreed to.
FERTILISERS AND FEEDING STUFFS BILL. [H.L.]
Returned from the Commons, agreed to, with Amendments.
UNIVERSITY OF LONDON BILL. [H.L.]
Returned from the Commons, agreed to, with Amendments.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
LORD PARMOOR: My Lords, perhaps the noble Earl who leads the House can give us some information as to the course of business.
THE LORD PRESIDENT OF THE COUNCIL (THE EARL OF BALFOUR): My Lords, as I understand the matter, if we are to wind up the Session as early as we hope to do we shall have to make on some days an exceptional effort. It may be necessary for us to sit after dinner both to-day and to-morrow. Your Lordships will see on the Order Paper all the business which it is proposed to take and I do not feel in a position to prophesy as to how long the necessary discussions will take; but I think we ought on each occasion to fulfil the programme which is on the Paper and if we are unable to do it before dinner I am afraid it will

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be necessary for your Lordships to meet after dinner in order to complete the business. On Friday I do not think the business need be very long, but I believe it will be for the general convenience if we meet at 12 o'clock.

MILK AND DAIRIES ORDER.
LORD STRACHIE LORD STRACHIE had given Notice to move, That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty praying that the Milk and Dairies Order, 1926, dated 6th July, 1926, be annulled. The noble Lord said: My Lords, the Act of 1915 which I had the honour of piloting through this House on behalf of the Liberal Government contemplated that the Regulations made under this Act might be very stringent and that it might be necessary for both Houses of Parliament to have considerable time in which to consider whether they desired them to have the force of law or not. I say that because, unlike many other Orders which have to lie on the table of both Houses, this Order has to lie on the table for forty days, instead of the usual twenty or twenty-one. I remember very well that this period of forty days was forced on the then Government by the Conservative Opposition in the House of Commons who thought it desirable that very considerable time should be given for full consideration by the country and by agriculturists.
As regards my Notice on the Paper I should like to say at once that I am not objecting to this Order en bloc, quite the contrary. I think many of the thirty-three articles are most excellent, necessary and desirable. I am taking serious objection only to three. Why do I say this? Your Lordships will agree that it is absolutely necessary that we should do everything in our power to see that clean milk is provided for the consumption of our people and that there should be the utmost cleanliness, as the Order provides, observed by the milkers, that the cows should be kept clean and their udders free from dirt before they are milked, and also that the milk churns should be thoroughly and properly cleansed before use after being sent back from the districts. It is interesting to note that in the Royal Society's research report the other day there was a statement
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as regards this question of cleanliness of milk churns and utensils—namely, that the American view is that 80 per cent of the impurities in milk can be attributed to the handling of the milk, that is to say, handling in the milking of the cows and also the putting of it into utensils.
I am confirmed in that by a statement made by my noble friend the Parliamentary Secretary of the Ministry of Agriculture, for, writing in The Times on November 26, Lord Bledisloe stated:
"What I especially stressed at yesterday's gathering at the Middlesex Guildhall was that clean milk is to the extent of 80 per cent a human problem (depending upon the actual milking of the cows and subsequent handling of the milk) and to a relatively small extent one of buildings and equipment."
I entirely agree with my noble friend in that and what I am objecting to is the enormous expense which is put on owners, large and small, by certain provisions of the Order. I see that my noble friend says that very little impurity is attributable to the buildings. I hope that I shall be able to convince the House that as regards the three articles I refer to they have very little bearing on the question of impurity.
My noble friend will be rather surprised when I say that there are two Articles, Numbers 27 and 29, about which it is very doubtful what reason there can be for putting off their coming into force for one year and nine months. I would urge if this Order is modified or withdrawn that that period of delay should be less. Article 27 is as follows:
"A person shall not use, or cause to be used, for the reception, measurement, storage or delivery of milk any churn, vessel or other receptacle, the interior surface of which is incapable of being readily cleansed."
If we are to have pure milk surely that article should be put into force after a shorter period of delay than one year and nine months. The expense would be very little indeed of seeing that these churns are put into proper condition. I cannot help thinking that in this case and in the case of Article 29 the manufacturers have had a great deal more influence with the Ministry of Health than the agriculturists have.
As regards Article 29, that is much on the same lines:
"Every person shall cause every churn, vessel or other receptacle, other than

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bottles, in which he despatches milk by rail or road to comply with the following requirements, viz.:—

"(1) The name and address of the owner shall be permanently marked on the churn, vessel or other receptacle, or on a plate or plates of metal properly soldered or otherwise securely affixed thereto

"(2) The churn, vessel or other receptacle shall be provided with a lid without openings, which shall be so constructed and fitted as effectively to prevent the access to the milk of dirt, dust, or rain water, or the return to the interior of the receptacle of any milk which may have been splashed above the lid."

I cannot see why that particular article, which would not present serious difficulties, should be put off for a year and nine months, as the Order proposes. Surely it is most important that these churns and other receptacles should have a proper lid, and it should be quite clear that nothing of a contaminating nature should enter those churns during transport.
I will now deal with Article 8, which runs as follows:—
"Every county council and county borough shall cause to be made such inspections of cattle as may be necessary and proper for the purposes of this Act and of this Order."
Why should it be necessary for every county council and county borough to make an inspection of the whole of the cattle in their area? I understand that my noble friend Lord Bledisloe is going to reply on behalf of the Ministry of Health, but he can only speak as their mouthpiece. He is not speaking for the Ministry of Agriculture on this occasion, because this Order comes from the Ministry of Health, and it only has the concurrence of the Ministry of Agriculture. It will be entirely enforced by the Ministry of Health, and that Ministry may say in the future that it desires the cattle in the country to be inspected monthly, quarterly, half-yearly or yearly, and that might be enforced upon any county council. I venture to think there are some Ministers, if not now certainly in the future, who are very anxious to have an army of officials, and there will have to be an army of officials in every county to go about inspecting cattle to see whether they are diseased or not.
Let the onus remain as it is now upon the owners of the cattle of reporting to the county council or the local authority if and when they know that any of their cattle are diseased. We know there are cases in which such reports are necessary; for instance, in the case of tuberculosis. But why is it necessary to have these general inspections and to throw the whole of the onus upon the officials of the county council? As I say, why should not the onus be upon the owners of the cattle? And if they do not report, by all means let them be prosecuted. That seems to me to be much the more reasonable procedure and the more reasonable way of dealing with the matter.
Then Article 12 provides that
"Every cowshed and every building used for keeping milk, other than a cold store, shall be provided with a sufficient number of windows or other openings suitably placed and communicating with the external air. The windows or permanent openings shall be such as to secure that the building is sufficiently lighted during the hours of daylight and the openings provided for ventilation shall be kept in proper order and so used as to secure that the air in the building is kept in a fresh and wholesome condition."
I do not for one moment object to buildings being properly lighted and they ought certainly to be properly ventilated. But here is an Order which may be used very unfairly and drastically in the part of the county from which I come, where, for all practical purposes, cowsheds are used very little indeed unless it is for milking night and morning. In some parts of my own county the cattle, for all practical purposes, are never tied up or housed at all during the winter except in very severe weather. There may be, and no doubt is, a difference in some parts of the country, where cows are kept the whole year round in cowsheds. But here is an Order which on the face of it looks as though, in the hands of officials who wish to magnify their office, it might put landowners to trouble. Such an official will say: "Here is an Order of the Ministry of Health and you must carry it out. It is necessary for you to have windows with shutters to them in every cowshed you have."
Then you may say that Article 13 will lead to exactly the same thing. It says:—
"All registered premises shall be provided with a supply of water suitable and sufficient for the requirements of this Order."

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That sounds very nice, but it may be a very difficult thing indeed to supply water suitable and sufficient for the requirements of the Order. Who is going to be the judge of what is suitable and sufficient to the conditions under which the cows are kept? It is very different if the cows are kept entirely out of doors or not altogether in the cowshed. It all depends on the circumstances of the particular district. But there are people who are fanatics in this matter and who say that you must have water laid on in every cowshed. Officials of that sort will cause great difficulty.
Now I come to what to my mind is the most serious part of the Order, and I think the noble Lord will be of that opinion also. I refer to Article 25. It is rather long, but I am afraid I must read it to your Lordships because it is so very important. It says:—
"Every cowkeeper shall cause the floor of every cowshed in his occupation to be constructed of such material and in such manner as to render it practicable to remove all liquid matter which may fall thereon, and he shall cause such cowshed to be provided with channels of rendered concrete or other durable and impervious material so constructed as to prevent as far as reasonably practicable the soiling of the cows and so as to receive all such liquid matter and to convey it to a suitable drain or other place of disposal outside such cowshed."
The question naturally arises: What is this going to cost? There are various estimates as to what the cost of it will be. I am now dealing merely with the question of floors, and what I am saying has nothing to do with windows or the water supply. I notice it is suggested in the Journal of the Ministry of Agriculture that the average expenditure will be about £2 per cow in order to comply with Article 25. On the other hand, I have received information from my own County of Somerset that the County Council consider that the cost to the County Council on their small holdings will be £5 per cow in order to comply with Article 25. The County Council of Somerset are the largest land owners in the County, owning as they do over 20,000 acres. As there is an enormous number of cows on the small holdings there it will be seen how very serious a matter it is and how much it will hamper the efforts of the County Council in extending small holdings and
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providing them in the future if compliance with this Article is to cost£5 per cow.
I cannot see why there should be this great necessity for having concrete floors in all cases. In the ordinary conditions now there are bricks or cobble-stones, and it is very easy indeed with a supply of water to keep brick or cobble-stone floors perfectly clean and sweet. And certainly that is all that is necessary where cows spend only a short time in the cow sheds. I doubt whether concrete floors are altogether desirable. I may say that I have had to replace the concrete floors in some of the cowsheds on my property where they have been laid down and have put in cobble-stones, the reason being that if a cow is going to calve she is very liable to slip on the concrete, and if she goes down it injures her. Unless enormous expense is incurred in laying down these concrete floors they are very likely to crack, and in my experience and in the experience, no doubt, of some of your Lordships, if these floors crack a very serious state of things ensues, because if there are cracks which you cannot wash out the droppings and the water get into them. I would like now to draw your Lordships' attention to what has been said on this subject by the Central Chamber of Agriculture, who protested against the cost, as I am doing to-day, and also asked for a right of appeal to the Minister of Agriculture.
THE PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY OF THE MINISTRY OF AGRICULTURE AND FISHERIES (LORD BLEDISLOE): May I ask the noble Lord how long ago that was?
LORD STRACHIE: I think it was in the annual report that it was referred to. I have it and the noble Lord, who was present at the meeting yesterday, no doubt has it, and when he gets home and reads the report he will see it there.
LORD BLEDISLOE: I asked the noble Lord because the original draft has been considerably revised.
LORD STRACHIE: If the noble Lord says that the Central Chamber of Agriculture has repudiated that I will not pursue it, but I understood that was the view of the Chamber.
LORD BLEDISLOE: I was only at the meeting yesterday for five minutes and I do not know what took place there.
LORD STRACHIE: Then I venture to think that it is rather out of place for the noble Lord to contradict me on a matter about which he knows nothing.
LORD BLEDISLOE: I hope that the very last thing I should do is to be discourteous to the noble Lord or to any member of your Lordships' House. I only asked the date when this protest was made, because protests came from several organisations and as the draft Order has been considerably modified since as the result of their representations, I naturally wanted to know whether this was the original protest or another.
LORD STRACHIE: All the information is in the report I mentioned, which, so far as I know, was adopted without alteration. The noble Lord will forgive me for adding that as he was at the meeting for five minutes only I do not think he is able to give any better opinion than I am. The report was passed by the Business Committee and was accepted. Still, it is a small matter and I will put it entirely aside for the moment. Now I should like to refer to the question of the appeal. I understand there is no real appeal in the ordinary sense of the word. The only kind of appeal would be this. If the landowner was prosecuted for not carrying out any of these articles, he would be called before a court of summary jurisdiction and the probability is that under the Order he would be convicted. All he could then do would be to appeal on points of law to Quarter Sessions. That seems a cumbersome and expensive way of dealing with the matter. It would have been very much better if there had been some appeal to the Ministry of Agriculture in cases where the local authorities were exceeding what is really their proper duty, although not exceeding the strict letter of this particular Order.
I have referred to the heavy expenditure which will be incurred by county councils in this matter. In my County of Somerset the cost is estimated at £5 per cow. It is interesting to note that when the arrangement was made, as your Lordships know, the full cost and liability was referred from the Government
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to the county councils and certain sums have been paid to each county in order to compensate them for the losses that used to be paid for by the Ministry of Agriculture. Under that arrangement the Ministry of Agriculture are willing to allow to the Somerset County Council—and I suppose to other county councils in the same proportion—an amount of £100 a year for making the necessary changes on small holdings under Article 25 and the other articles of which I have complained. That £100 has been capitalised at a sum of £2,000. The information that I already have shows that instead of spending £100 a year it will be much more like thousands of pounds a year. I have a statement referring to what has already been done on some of the small holdings in my County. On one, which is only three acres in extent, we have to make an expenditure of £23 10 s. for the purpose of breaking up a stone floor and laying it with concrete. In another case, that of a small holding of 17 acres, we have to spend £32 in order to carry out concreting. Your Lordships will, therefore, see that a large amount has already to be spent and that the £100 will go no way towards compensating us in the future.
The expenditure, as I have already stated, will be very serious indeed and owner-occupiers generally in the country believe that they are going to be very hardly hit. I was speaking the other day to the chairman of the Somerset branch of the National Farmers' Union of which I am a member and he told me that, as an owner-occupier, it would be a very serious thing indeed for him to have to carry out all these Regulations. The feeling among members of the National Farmers' Union in regard to this is that it is a very serious thing indeed for them. I have had a resolution sent to me on the subject from the Milk Committee of the Somerset branch of the National Farmers' Union and I would like to read it to your Lordships to show how members of that Union view this matter. They have passed the following resolution:—
"That in cases where a landlord refuses to carry out any constructional alterations to premises which may be ordered under the Milk and Dairies Order and the tenant, in order to carry on his business, has undertaken the alteration, then he shall on quitting the holding be able to recover such expenditure from his landlord."

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This shows that it is going to mean a heavy expenditure indeed for them.
It has been said, and may be said here to-day, that as regards Article 25 the precaution has been taken that no landlord or owner-occupier or farmer will have to pay anything in respect of his cowsheds for three years. That may be all very well. The noble Lord will at once say: "I shall be in office, and the present Minister of Health will be in office, and everything will be quite all right and you will not be prejudiced." But we know that Governments come and go, and there may be in power some Minister of Health who would make this Order, and in three years would say: "We are going to enforce it very strictly indeed." Therefore to put it off for three years is really no advantage at all. It is very strong and very drastic, and it is certainly something that the Government do not at all care to put into force. One ought also to remember this. The dairy farmers of this country have to encounter competition from the farmers of other countries who will send their dairy produce here to compete with us, and will not have try meet any of the heavy expenditure that our farmers have to meet in respect of this Order.
One other very interesting matter arises. As I have already said, I am not complaining of the Order except as regards the expenditure it will entail. I think that in many cases an unreasonable expenditure will be called for, not perhaps by the Minister of Agriculture and not perhaps by the Minister of Health, because he will only issue the Orders and will not be the authority to carry them out. But we shall be at the mercy of every urban and rural district council and every municipality. One can already foresee fanatics getting up in those councils and making all sorts of allegations about the sources of the milk supply and insisting upon all kinds of unreasonable things being done. As a result of such agitation, the inspector when he comes down will say: "This must be carried out; expense must not stand in the way." The councils on their part will say: "We have the Order of the Ministry of Health and we must see that that Order is carried out."
Members in another place did not seem to have awakened to this because they did not take the trouble to question the
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Milk and Dairies Order. But they have now awakened to the very serious results which may flow from it. No doubt very great complaints have come from the farmers in the various constituencies to members of the other House. I know that they have come from my own County. The feeling was so strong in the House of Commons that the Minister of Agriculture and the Minister of Health had to meet the Agricultural Committee of the House of Commons the other day. I am going to read from a report of what took place headed: "Milk and Dairies Order: Position of the Small Producer":—
"The uneasiness and irritation in the agricultural districts caused by the Milk and Dairies Order found expression last night at a largely attended meeting at the House of Commons of the Unionist Parliamentary Agricultural Committee, presided over by Sir George Courthope, M.P. Mr. Neville Chamberlain (Minister of Health) and Mr. Walter Guinness (Minister of Agriculture) were present."
What did Mr. Guinness say? Addressing the members after a good deal of discussion and criticism of the Order, the report states that
"He announced that local sanitary officials throughout the country were to be given the opportunity of a course of instruction by agricultural centres with a view to making them acquainted with the desirability of mitigating the necessary instructions on the farming community."
Mr. Chamberlain goes even further, The report from which I have already quoted stated:
"Mr. Neville Chamberlain stated that he would issue a circular to local authorities emphasising the need of the reasonable administration of the Order, having regard to the difficulties attaching to milk production. Stress was laid on the importance of cleanliness in cowkeeping methods rather than the need for large expenditure on structural alterations."
Does it not seem rather strange to your Lordships, when the Minister of Health has made an Order and the Minister of Agriculture has concurred in it, that when it comes to the light of day and it is discussed by those interested in it the Minister should find it necessary to assure the House of Commons that his Order is so drastic and so unreasonable that he is going to send a circular to rural district councils and urban district councils telling them he hopes they will administer it reasonably? Would it not be common sense to withdraw an Order which the Minister himself admits is

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unreasonable, which he finds it necessary to explain and about which he says that it is not to be put in force in its entirety? Does not that seem to be the most businesslike way in which to deal with the matter?
Certainly it would be appreciated by those interested if the Minister would say that he did not consider the document infallible and that it was right to withdraw the Order in order to modify the objectionable part of it, and if he would say that he will reconsider it, instead of issuing this circular telling district councils that they ought to work it reasonably because the Order itself is not reasonable. It stands to common sense that that would be the much better way of dealing with the matter. Although the circular is issued any district council could say: "We don't care for Minister's circulars" and put it aside. We know that sometimes circulars are thrown into the wastepaper basket. I yield to no one in my desire that the country should have the purest milk, produced under the best sanitary conditions, and out of the thirty-three articles there are only three to which I object. There is one Article, No. 25, which throws this enormous expenditure upon the industry at a time which all agricultural landlords will agree is difficult and likely to become more difficult. This is not a time when they can afford this very heavy expenditure. All I ask is that this circular should be withdrawn and that the articles in respect of which they are going to issue this circular should be dropped. I beg to move.
Moved, That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty praying that the Milk and Dairies Order, 1926, dated 6th July, 1926, be annulled.—(Lord Strachie.)
LORD CLINTON: My Lords, like my noble friend who has just spoken I am not in any sense antagonistic to the general tenor of these Regulations which have been issued. They are generally much less severe and much less drastic than many by-laws that have been enforced in the past and I am grateful to see that they have omitted some recent very absurd orders, such as laying down the actual number of cubic feet required for each cow, regardless of the circumstances
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in which the cow is housed. But at the same time these Regulations have caused an enormous amount of resentment in country districts. The resentment, so far as I know, is not found among the large dairy farmers. The large dairy farmer rightly recognises, I think, that under the conditions under which he supplies milk, where a long period elapses from the time the milk leaves the farm until it reaches the consumer and where there is every opportunity for the rapid spread of these baccilli which are the cause of most of the dangers of milk, he must carry on his trade under conditions which have been found to be essential for the purity of the milk.
But the large dairy farmer is not found in all parts of the country. We know quite well that in many of the agricultural districts the real dairy farmer scarcely exists, and where he does exist his milk goes, not to his neighbours or to those living in the district, but to the larger towns. The people living in the district are dependent for their supply of milk, not upon the dairy farmer, but upon those others who carry on a quite different agricultural business, who have cows to supply milk mainly for their own consumption and who sell daily a certain amount of surplus milk to their neighbours. In the aggregate that is a very large supply in agricultural districts, but from each individual farm it is very small, and it will be impossible to expect either the owner or the occupier of that class of farm to spend that very considerable amount of money which my noble friend has suggested in order that there may be continued the supply of perhaps a few pints of milk a day from each of those places. I am confident that if the Orders are applied to that class of farmer there will be a very serious shortage of milk in many agricultural parts of the Kingdom.
Perhaps I am not expressing the opinion of experts, but I do think the purity of the milk supplied is not the only thing which should be considered. The actual supply itself is really of equal importance. Disaster will occur if milk cannot be produced for the use of people in country districts. Arrangements for the purity of the milk on these farms are not nearly so important as upon the larger dairy farms because the milk is consumed almost at the moment

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of production. Frequently people are actually waiting with their jugs at the doors of the farm for the milking to be over. There is not, therefore, the same danger of the spread of poisonous bacilli in that very short period between production and consumption. We know—I think it has been stated—that in the opinion of the Ministry the Regulations ought not to be applied to these smaller farms. The Regulations are meant for the men who are really carrying on the trade of dairy farmers. Those words appear in the Regulations, and these men to whom I refer, who are really concerned in quite a different trade, ought not to come in that category.
Lord Strachie has suggested that the Minister has already expressed the hope that these Regulations will be carried out with some discretion. What I should like my noble friend, the Parliamentary Secretary of the Ministry of Agriculture, to do—I know it is not in his Department—is to suggest to the Minister of Health that in the circular which he is going to address to district councils he should definitely state his view as to the position of these small farms which sell their surplus milk. There is a very great need for enjoining discretion upon the district councils at the present moment. My noble friend suggested that at some future date some Minister of Health might do away with the postponement part of Article 25 and might instruct the immediate application of this reconstruction of premises. But you need not wait for a new Minister of Health. The thing is going on now. Last Monday morning I went into my office and found, I think, seventeen orders for the alteration of pebble floors into concrete floors to be carried out forthwith under the most severe pains and penalties. Of course these orders went into the natural receptable for that class of communication, because, although it may be that this is justified—I do not know if it is—yet it is totally illegal to issue these instructions. The restriction on premises is clearly put off for eighteen months under these Regulations, and it cannot be enforced without a further eighteen months' notice. I hope that my noble friend will inform the Minister of Health that these instructions are being issued, not only to me but to many others, and are causing a resentment against the
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whole of the Orders of the Ministry which is most unfortunate.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM: My Lords, I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary will bear in mind the case of my noble friend Lord Clinton, who has already had seventeen orders served on him. The Regulations read out by the noble Lord, Lord Strachie, are very drastic. They will be administered by various officials in different parts of the country. These officials will not have to spend a shilling of their own money in carrying out these restrictions and, human nature being what it is, it is absolutely certain that a great number of them will be in favour of the utmost straining of the Regulations and will require you to spend a very considerable sum of money to create conditions which may be ideal but which it is quite impossible to fulfil at the present time and which are also, I believe, in many cases quite unnecessary.
I think my noble friend the Parliamentary Secretary will agree with me that at the present moment agriculture is in a very serious position. Sheep are down to pre-War prices, cattle are very nearly at pre-War prices, and, though there has been a considerable amount of straw in wheat and oats, they are threshing out extremely badly. Accordingly conditions on an ordinary farm are practically as bad as they were before the War. But wages have doubled. How on earth can a man produce an article and get a profit out of it when the cost of producing it is double what it was before the War, when there was hardly any profit to be made? There is one bright spot in agriculture at the present moment. I believe that the milk industry is holding its own—I do not think it is doing more than that—and, this being the case, the Government, who were returned to assist agriculture, come down and impose upon the only part of agriculture that is doing well restrictions which, if carried out to the letter, will undoubtedly throw a large number or milk farmers out of business.
I do not for a moment venture to contradict that which my noble friend Lord Clinton said about the large dairy farmer. No doubt he has very many model buildings which will not need much money expended upon them, but

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to my own knowledge, extending perhaps over not more than two counties, there are large numbers of farmers doing dairy business, farming from 250 to 300 acres, with buildings which were never designed for dairy farming but for ordinary agricultural farming. Those buildings have been more or less adapted to carry out dairy farming, but in no way do they approach the requirements read out by the noble Lord opposite. I do not wish to go into the whole of the Regulations, but I would ask my noble friend Lord Bledisloe one question. We are told that water is to be laid on continuously. There are very many places where it is extremely difficult to get water except out of a pond or by pumping. Does it mean that there is to be a cistern placed at a certain elevation and that the water is to be pumped up into that cistern every day in order that it may be continuously supplied to the cows? If that is to be done it will entail very considerable expense upon the landlord. And what about the tenant? How is he going to find either a man to pump at double pre-War wages or an engine to be run by somebody who understands engines?
These things are all very well if you are sitting in an office in Whitehall, and it is very nice to walk down into a beautiful cowshed with smooth floors which, as the noble Lord said, are also very slippery. I have made concrete myself with grooves about half an inch in depth, and the cows did not slip on that, but I do not know whether that would satisfy my noble friend below me. I suppose you could not sweep it quite as clean as if it were absolutely smooth, and you are left with the difficulty that you must have something that can be swilled down without any trouble. If you put grooves, it cannot be swilled, and the official will say: "I want a slippery concrete; they are not my cows and I do not care whether they fall down or not." I do earnestly hope that at the present moment, when everything is as bad as it can possibly be—trade, agriculture and all the rest—you will leave alone the only bright spot in agriculture. What is the use of putting it off for eighteen months? The bad things will have to be done then and money will have to be spent. For goodness sake leave it alone. A great statesman not many years ago said: "Why on earth cannot
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you leave it alone?" I ask the Government to remember that saying and to carry it out.
LORD OLIVIER: My Lords, this Order is, I think, probably a continuation of the venerable plan that was in the Ministry of Agriculture fourteen years ago when I joined it and which has now come to maturity. I should like to reinforce some of Lord Clinton's observations. In our small villages we have people with three or four acres supplying the village with milk and it is quite impossible for them to put their bartons into the condition which this Order would require. If it is to be done, His Majesty's Government will have to provide for the doing of it, just as they are going to provide, in the Bill that they have in hand, for improving rural cottages. If they like to do that, they can bring the milk supply of the country upon a proper basis. But that does not dispose of the necessity for these Orders. I am quite sure that rural district councils are not going to be too drastic in enforcing this Order, if I know them at all. But, apart from those large farmers referred to by Lord Clinton, who can and do put their dairies in proper order, there are a great many farmers supplying milk from thirty, forty and fifty acres and using bartons that are in a most disgraceful and dangerous state. Their milk goes up daily to London and we cannot tell what amount of infection and disease may be conveyed from those dairies. Those are the dairies to which the rural district council must pay attention, and it should have the power to do so.
As to the noble Lord's remarks concerning concrete, when I took over a small piece of land I had a tenant farmer and, having a certain amount of conscience and having come from the Board of Agriculture, I put my cowshed into excellent order, with slanting concrete, with windows and shutters and so on, and made a very nice light cow-house. Unfortunately my tenant, who milks about four or five cows, thought the concrete was cold and that the cows would slip on it, and he persistently keeps his cows in the old cowshed with a hard gravel floor and about ten inches of dung on top. The local authority have taken no action. When he kills pigs my tenant finds the

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new cowshed very useful because the concrete floor makes it a nice clean butcher's shop.
LORD HINDLIP: My Lords, I have very little to add to what has already been said by previous speakers, but I would ask my noble friend Lord Bledisloe to pay particular attention to what Lord Clinton said about small people in village areas. In my own part of the country, when one wants an additional gallon of milk one cannot get it at all. As regards the orders which have already been given out, I can confirm what previous speakers have said. I heard only the other day of an estate of something like 10,000 acres where orders had already been issued, and it had been estimated that the cost of carrying them out would amount to something like£28,000. I am also told that the land agent in charge of the property expressed the opinion that it would be quite unjustifiable, on his part, to sanction the expenditure of anything like that sum. There is one small matter—perhaps it is not so very small—with regard to Clause 25, where the buildings are not liable to be altered for three years. I am not at all sure if a man is milking in one of these buildings which have to be altered whether a registration licence would be issued to him until the buildings are altered. Perhaps my noble friend would tell us that.
As regards these concrete buildings and cowsheds, it is really very difficult to know where one stands. May I give your Lordships a small experience of my own? In 1915, at the commencement of the War, I renovated a fair-sized cowshed—concrete floors, Young's fittings, gas, and water in three or four places. I had nothing to do with the construction myself, or the plans. The whole thing was carried out by persons supposed to be experts in this line of business. The whole of the plans were passed, and had to be passed, by the Ministry of Agriculture's own inspector before the building was begun, and had to be passed again by the Ministry's own inspector when the buildings were finished, before the money could be obtained from the Land Improvement Company. I understand that during the last fortnight that building has been condemned. The local district council, when they heard of this—they all knew the building—were
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naturally rather alarmed themselves, because they thought that if a building approved by the Ministry of Agriculture during the last ten years was now condemned, there would not be very much chance for anybody else's buildings.
LORD BLEDISLOE: My Lords, I should imagine, after listening to this debate, that I had not a friend in the House, but for the fact that I am able to credit your Lordships with some sense of proportion, and I feel confident that, after a short explanation of the actual position and the intention of the Ministry of Health, your Lordships will agree with me, or most of you will agree with me, that the picture has been somewhat too glaringly painted. As regards this debate, I venture to say, with some little knowledge of the conditions prevailing in most other civilised countries, that such a, debate could not have taken place in a legislative chamber in any other civilised country of the world. For this reason, that in these matters most civilised countries are, unfortunately, very far ahead of us, because they have paid greater attention to the fact that the health of the community is undoubtedly affected injuriously by the consumption or ingestion of polluted milk and taken more drastic action in consequence.
I am not going to quote countries—because I should have to quote almost every country which was likely to carry any sort of conviction to your minds—as being far more drastic in these matters than we are as yet, but what I should like to call attention to is this, and whether the case is post hoc or propter hoc I leave your Lordships to decide, that the consumption per capita of milk in this country is disgracefully small—in fact smaller, so far as we know, per head of the population, than in any other highly civilised country in the world; and all the Health authorities, so far as I know, are prepared to admit that the health of the nation, and particularly of its children, is suffering in consequence of the inadequate consumption of milk. You may say that that does not affect the question under discussion, but I think it affects it very materially, because if there is an opinion abroad—and there has been an opinion abroad, and I go so far as to say that I think it has been exaggerated by the enthusiasts and extremists in this

1307
matter—that there is what is sometimes called "poison in the milk pail," it does act as a serious deterrent to the consumption of milk among the poorer population, who seek to find some alternative, when there is no alternative so far as the infantile population is concerned, to milk as a food.
Lord Banbury, I think, pointed out with considerable truth the difficulty of making a living out of any part of farming at the present time, except, I think he said, dairy farming. I am not sure that all farmers would agree to that qualification. We are told, however, on the best authority, that the reason why farmers have not been able to make a sufficiently good milk contract is that there is, in fact, a surplus of milk at the present time in this country; or, in other words, that there is insufficient demand on the part of the population generally for the available supply. Is it not fair to assume that to some extent this is due to the fact that the milk supply is not all that the most enlightened people would like to see it in this country. Medical officers of health in certain cities, to my knowledge, have given public advice against the consumption of liquid milk by infants in their administrative areas, and have gone so far as to advocate in preference the consumption of milk powder or dried milk coming from other countries. That is not good for the dairy farmer, or the dairying industry, and if we do make some reasonable concession to enlightened public opinion and medical demands, it is more than possible that the demand for milk will increase and the dairy farmer in consequence be more prosperous.
And I have an illustration which I hope your Lordships will bear in mind, the case of New Zealand. It was only a few years ago that the Government of New Zealand rendered themselves extremely unpopular with the farmers of that country by insisting upon far more drastic Regulations than had previously been in force in the production and handling of milk, nearly all of which comes in the form of various dairy products to this country. What has been the result? Within four years that Government became the most popular Government among the agricultural community that New Zealand has ever seen for the very good reason that the demand
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in this country for agricultural produce from New Zealand went up enormously as a result of the improved quality of New Zealand dairy products.
I am here to-day speaking, as I am asked to do, for the Ministry of Health as well as for the Ministry of Agriculture. This is an Order of the Ministry of Health, and I want to say quite frankly I am very glad to have the opportunity, although generally representing the Ministry of Agriculture in this House, to speak on this occasion on behalf of the Ministry of Health, because there has in the past been an idea, not wholly without foundation, that on this subject of Regulations relating to milk and cowsheds and the like there has not been complete unanimity between the two Departments. I quite frankly say that the Ministry of Agriculture hold the view to-day, based upon the reasons which I have already submitted to your Lordships, that it is not in the best interests of the farmers themselves to stand in the way of reasonable improvement of the methods of milking cattle and handling milk. For that reason we have been in quite amicable conference with the Ministry of Health in arriving at the final form of this Milk and Dairies Order.
If I may turn straight away to the remarks of my noble friend Lord Clinton, I should like to say that if orders have already been made by certain local authorities in Devon of the drastic character that he describes, requiring immediate alteration of farm buildings or equipment, such action is wholly ultra vires and of course would be discountenanced by the Ministry of Health. I hope that when that circular, to which reference has been made from both sides of the House, is issued, as it will be issued shortly, there will be no recurrence of such drastic and uncalled for action on the part of local authorities. But my noble friend Lord Clinton has said, in almost exactly the same words as those used by Lord Strachie, that there is an immense amount of resentment arising out of this Order. I would humbly suggest to your Lordships that if there is it is founded almost entirely upon lack of knowledge of what the Order contains and of what are the intentions in relation thereto of the Ministry of Health.

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Let me take the case which the noble Lord, Lord Strachie, has most emphasised, that of Article 25, which deals with the floors and drains of cowsheds. The whole of the debate, as far as I have been able to understand, on that particular topic has been based upon the idea that the floors of cowsheds, of whatever material they are made now, must in future be made of concrete. There is nothing of the sort in the Order. All that is provided for in that article is that the channels by which liquid is conveyed from the cowstand to the drain shall be of concrete. I cannot believe that that is going to involve the immense expenditure which has been anticipated. But as this is regarded as the article which is most seriously called into question perhaps your Lordships will allow me to read it—because I really cannot believe that, if you knew its exact terms, you could say it is unreasonable:
"Every cowkeeper shall cause the floor of every cowshed in his occupation to be constructed of such material and in such manner as to render it practicable to remove all liquid matter which may fall thereon, and he shall cause such cowshed to be provided with channels of rendered concrete or other durable and impervious material—
so that it includes all sorts of other materials which can be used and will be used—
"so constructed as to prevent as far as reasonably practicable the soiling of the cows, and so as to receive all such liquid matter and to convey it to a suitable drain or other place of disposal outside such cowshed."
That is the most drastic provision which this Order is supposed to contain.
If there is one thing more certain than another with regard to clean milk it is that you cannot get clean milk if the cows continually lie down in their own manure, and every enlightened cowkeeper at the present time is making his cowstands shorter, so that the cows may lie on clean beds and not have their udders resting upon manure. The other article which, I think, has been mostly impugned is that relating to the water supply. Now, is there any noble Lord in this House who would suggest that raw, uncooked milk supplied to the children of this nation should come from buildings where there is no proper water supply?
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM: The children have done very well in the past.
LORD BLEDISLOE: It is at least open to question whether they could not have done a great deal better. I think it was Lord Banbury who suggested that it would be necessary to put in special apparatus for supplying the cowsheds with water under Article 13, but I am asked to inform the House that the requirements of this article would not be interpreted as involving the laying on of a supply from any public source where this is not readily available, and would commonly be satisfied by such arrangements as would be made in that particular case for domestic purposes. That seems not unreasonable. At any rate, I am sure your Lordships would agree that there is nothing more important than that there should be reasonably clean water brought into contact either with a cow's udder or with the receptacles which contain the milk.
The other article to which reference has been made is Article 12. Your Lordships have already been told, even by our critics, that three years will be allowed to elapse before any structural alterations in connection with floors and drains need be carried out, which surely does allow a more than reasonable latitude for execution of the Order. As regards the other two points raised on Articles 12 and 13, it is true that only eighteen months are allowed, but here again I would suggest that it is a reasonable period, considering the work that is contemplated. Article 12 refers to light and ventilation. I should like to read the article:—
"Every cowshed and every building used for keeping milk, other than a cold store, shall be provided with a sufficient number of windows or other openings suitably placed and communicating directly with the external air. The windows or permanent openings shall be such as to secure that the building is sufficiently lighted during the hours of daylight and the openings provided for ventilation shall be kept in proper order and so used as to secure that the air in the building is kept in a fresh and wholesome condition."
Considering that you are dealing with a raw animal product which is to be consumed by children in this country, surely there is nothing very exacting in demanding that there should be a reasonable amount of light to enable the cowman to see what he is doing, and in order to

1311
obtain that sunshine which is known to destroy germs and sufficient ventilation to enable the cattle to be kept in a healthy state. So far as the particular articles that have been commented on are concerned, I really do not think there can be any cause for complaint unless these articles are carried out in an unreasonable manner.
I should like to refer to one other article, Article 8, to which I think my noble friend Lord Strachie referred. It provides:
"Every county council and county borough council shall cause to be made such inspection of cattle as may be necessary and proper for the purposes of the Act and of this Order."
My noble friend Lord Strachie asked:
"Why should the local authority do this? Why not leave it to the owners?" Supposing the owner does not do it if it is left to him—
LORD STRACHIE: I distinctly said that it should be made the duty of the owner to do it, and that he ought to be prosecuted if he did not do it. The county councils ought not to be put to the expense of looking after the owners, who ought to be responsible for their own acts.
LORD BLEDISLOE: That is exactly the point I was going to make. If the owner does not do it he should be made responsible. But how is the local authority or any one else to discover whether the owner is doing it or not unless that owner's premises are visited from time to time by an officer of the local authority? That is all that this provides for. In that connection my noble friend Lord Strachie obviously regards not merely the Ministry of Health but all local authorities with the most consummate distrust. But in carrying out, the Public Health Act the local authorities have been on the whole extraordinarily efficient, and in this connection I should like to remind the House and the noble Lord that under the Act which the noble Lord himself says he piloted through the House—drastic though it was he piloted it through the House!—such inspection can only be made by a veterinary inspector who is either qualified as a member of the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons or has such similar qualifications as are
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approved by the Ministry of Agriculture. It may confidently be assumed that only efficient officers will carry out these inspections.
There is one point raised by my noble friend Lord Clinton and also I think by my noble friend Lord Olivier, in relation to the people who carry on a small business mainly for their own domestic requirements but occasionally sell the surplus milk outside. Frankly, this Order deals with this case for the first time and the justification for it is that persons who buy milk even from the small people are just as much entitled to protection against disease as those who buy it from the larger dealer or producer. Moreover, contrary to the view already put forward in this House, we hold that the presence of an undetected tuberculous animal in small herds such as this—often very small herds consisting, perhaps, of two cattle—is a far more serious danger to the public than where you have a large herd the milk from which may be a different milk, so far as the individual cow is concerned, reaching the individual consumer every day. If you have, say, one or two cattle which happen to be diseased the consumer is having, so to speak, a strong and continuous dose of tuberculosis every day.
LORD OLIVIER: The noble Lord will forgive the interruption, but my criticism and I think the criticism of Lord Clinton did not refer to the inspection of tuberculous cattle but only to the improvement of cow-houses.
LORD CLINTON: Hear, hear.
LORD BLEDISLOE: Yes, I think I can reassure both noble Lords on that. That deals with registration, in fact?
LORD CLINTON: Hear, hear.
LORD BLEDISLOE: As regards registration, the Ministry of Health, although having no jurisdiction which would enable them to give a final decision, have already suggested that in these cases where a person keeping a few cows sells a certain amount of milk and butter outside, that may properly be regarded as not carrying on the trade of a dairyman within the meaning of these Regulations or the Act, and that is the view which will be conveyed to the local authorities.

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I do not know whether I have touched on all the points that my noble friend Lord Strachie raised; but I want to impress upon your Lordships that the Ministry of Health have not the smallest intention of being drastic in administering this Order. They do, however, want to keep reasonable pace with the public demand so far as the purity of the milk supply is concerned and, if possible, although somewhat behind other civilised countries, to show to the public generally that both the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Agriculture want to do all that lies in their power to secure to the public a reasonably pure milk supply.
LORD HINDLIP: May I ask my noble friend to say whether the licence to sell or registration would be refused in the case where a building was condemned before the three years expires?
LORD BLEDISLOE: I beg my noble friend's pardon for not referring to that. I understand that registration will take place in spite of the fact that the structural alterations have not been carried out, and that the registration will continue until such period as the end of the time during which the structural alterations will have to be made.
LORD STRACHIE: My Lords, I regret to say that the noble Lord has not at all satisfied me in what he has said. He admitted, of course, that I am just as anxious as he is that the milk supply of the country should be entirely pure. But he has not dealt with what I said about the great amount of impurity that comes from the handling of the milk and from the condition of the utensils used owing to their not being properly cleaned He also bore out the medical view about the percentage of impure milk, and that seems to me to be a very good reason why this Order should not be so drastic as it is as regards structural alterations, especially as he admitted that in this and other countries the structures are not the cause of 80 per cent. of impure milk.
I noticed that he said that concrete floors were not necessary under this Order. But the provision is so vague that local authorities consider that they are necessary. I have lists of cases in my County in which the county Council has been called upon to replace paved or cobbled floors with concrete, and that is also the view taken by other local authorities in regard to this matter. He also said that there was no intention to be drastic in administering the Order. If there is no intention to be drastic, why not modify the Order? The Ministry of Health is likely to take the doctors' point of view; indeed, a doctor was once at the head of it. The Ministry of Agriculture is much more likely to look at it from the point of view of the farmer and the agriculturist. Why cannot the noble Lord, or why cannot the Ministry of Health, say: "As we do not want to be drastic in administering the Order, we will withdraw it and issue another which will contain an alteration of this particular drastic power." That would seem to be a more businesslike way of dealing with the matter than saying: "We are going to stick to the Order although we admit it is much too drastic and will be misunderstood by the local authorities."
I pointed out that it has already been misunderstood by them; but it is said that a circular is going to be issued explaining what is meant. Some of us know that in some areas it is not only misunderstood but is carried out strictly and the Ministry of Health, we are told, has no jurisdiction to give a final decision. Yet the local authority would have a perfect right to throw this heavy expenditure on a farmer or estate owner who was not at the moment in a position to carry out these requirements. I very much regret, after the answer of the noble Lord, that I must press my Motion to a Division.
On Question, Whether the Motion shall be agreed to?
Their Lordships divided:—Contents, 21; Not-Contents, 63.

CONTENTS.

Lincolnshire, M. (L. Great Chamberlain.)

Allendale, V.

Clwyd, L.

Bertie of Thame, V. [Teller.]

Emmott, L.

Fairfax of Cameron, L.

Beauchamp, E.

Armstrong, L.

Gainford, L.

Macclesfield, E.

Banbury of Southam, L.

Hemphill, L.

Strafford, E.

Clifford of Chudleigh, L.

Illingworth, L.

Meston, L.

Shandon, L.

Strachie, L. [Teller.]

Redesdale, L.

Stanley of Alderley, L. (L. Sheffield.)

Sudley, L. (E. Arran.)

NOT-CONTENTS.

Cave, V. (L. Chancellor.)

Chaplin, V.

Fitz Walter, L.

Devonport, V.

Gage, L. (V. Gage.)

Balfour, E. (L. President.)

Finlay, V.

Hampton, L.

FitzAlan of Derwent, V.

Hardinge of Penshurst, L.

Sutherland, D.

Haldane, V.

Harris, L.

Wellington, D.

Hampden, V.

Hindlip, L.

Leverhulme, V.

Howard of Glossop, L.

Ailesbury, M.

Kenmare, L. (E. Kenmare.)

Sheffield, L. Bp.

Kenyon, L.

Airlie, E.

Worcester, L. Bp.

Knaresborough, L.

Birkenhead, E.

Lawrence, L.

Clarendon, E.

Abinger, L.

Muir Mackenzie, L.

De La Warr, E.

Arnold, L.

Newton, L.

Graham, E. (D. Montrose.)

Askwith, L.

Olivier, L.

Grey, E.

Atkinson, L.

Ormonde, L. (M. Ormonde.)

Lovelace, E.

Balfour of Burleigh. L.

Parmoor, L.

Lucan, E. [Teller.]

Biddulph, L.

Roundway, L.

Onslow, E.

Bledisloe, L.

St. John of Bletso, L.

Plymouth, E. [Teller.]

Charnwood, L.

Suffield, L.

Russell, E.

Clinton, L.

Templemore, L.

Scarbrough, E.

Cottesloe, L.

Wittenham, L.

Spencer, E.

Darling, L.

Wyfold.

Cecil of Chelwood, V.

Desbrough, L.

Wynford, L.

On Question, Amendment agreed to.

THE IMPERIAL CONFERENCE.
LORD PARMOOR LORD PARMOOR rose to call attention to the work of the Imperial Conference, and to move for Papers. The noble and learned Lord said: My Lords, I have indicated to the noble Earl who will answer me on behalf of the Government that I intend to refer only to a certain portion of the Report of the Conference, and also only to particular matters in that portion of the Report of the Conference upon which I wish to ask him questions or to have information from him. There are comparatively few matters, though to my mind they are of great importance, to which I shall direct my observations.
I should like to say at the outset that I believe all persons and all Parties in this country rejoice in the friendly spirit which was present apparently at all the meetings of the Imperial Conference and rejoice, too, that there was a ring of sincerity, quite outside the mere formal stage of conference, in the expressions of gratitude on both sides for the assistance which the Premiers from abroad and the Government of this country had given upon the very serious matters which came under the consideration of the Conference. In the long run I think
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everyone must agree—at any rate I have heard no substantial opposition of any kind—that anything in the nature of coercion in these matters is quite out of the question, and if we are to have a combination of loyalty and unity, unity must be founded on loyalty. Then we go a very long way, at any rate, towards what is called in the Report autonomy and independence. I want to make it quite clear that what are called the underlying principles as regards these two matters are not intended to be in any way questioned as the ultimate goal for the solution of the inter-Imperial relations.
I want on the two points to which I have told the noble Earl I intend to call his attention to point out certain matters which appear to me to be not stated with great accuracy and on which, so far from any ultimate solution being indicated, the whole matter is really put off to some subsequent occasion. So, although I am entirely in favour of the principles laid down, I doubt whether much advance has really been made in any direction beyond what has already been acted upon and what had already been accepted really at the Imperial Conference in 1923. Now, on page 14 of the Report I find the statement that the relationship between the self-governing communities and Great Britain—that is the Dominions and Great Britain—"may be readily defined." I doubt very much

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the accuracy of this definition. Then the Report goes on:
"They are autonomous communities within the British Empire."
I think it is quite clear as matters now stand, that whatever may be the aim in the future, the Dominions are not "autonomous communities within the British Empire," and they are not for two reasons.
First of all, their own powers are circumscribed and restricted under their own Constitutions granted by this country, under the operation of the Colonial Laws Validity Act, 1865, and under the well-known principle, which is not only true in theory but has been acted upon frequently, that as regards matters essentially affecting the Mother Country the British Parliament at Westminster has a supreme authority over all Dominions and Colonial Possessions. I will come in a moment to the particular point on which I want to ask the attention of the noble Earl opposite, but surely no one can say that this statement is accurate and no one can say that the Dominions, for instance, are in no way subordinate to the British Parliament in any aspect of their domestic or external affairs. They are subordinate, not only in theory but in practice, in constitutional practice, in many directions both as regards their domestic and their external affairs.
It is true, and one welcomes it, that they are all united by a common allegiance to the Crown and are freely associated as members of the British Commonwealth of Nations; but I should like to ask the noble Earl whether freedom of association means freedom of separation. I hope it does not in one sense, but I want to know, granted that you have the principle of autonomy, granted that you have the principle of independence, granted that you have freedom of association, does he also say that without any protection either of time or opportunity or conditions, simply of their own free will, any one of these Dominions might be separated from and no longer be a part of the commonwealth of nations of which the Empire will no doubt in the future consist? I am all in favour of autonomy and independence, but as I see the noble Viscount in his place opposite, I should
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like to take the analogy of the League of Nations. There you have a free association of nations, but a country cannot dissociate itself in a less period than two years. I think a much longer period would be required in the case of the British Empire, because possibly if you had that longer period it might be found that the desire for dissociation might be a passing phase, and with the chance of conference and conciliation it is more than probable that any difficulty or friction would be overcome and that the free association would be continued—I hope permanently continued—in all cases of the future relationships of these two bodies.
Upon this point I will not read from the Colonial Laws Validity Act, 1865, but I will quote one passage from the leading decision which for a long time has decided what is the relationship under that Act between Colonial jurisdiction and legislation. It has been authoritatively laid down that the obvious purpose and meaning of the Colonial Laws Validity Act are to reserve the right of the Imperial Legislature to legislate for the Colonies to which a Local Legislature has been given and to make it impossible for the Colonial Legislature to enact anything repugnant to the Imperial Legislature, but not otherwise to derogate from its general legislative authority. As a matter of fact, under the Colonial Laws Validity Act and what is known as the principle of reservation, a series of matters has been reserved or kept under the jurisdiction of the British Parliament at Westminster. For this reason: although you may lay down a principle of this kind in very wide language, yet when you come to its operation you will find that in a considerable number of cases what may appear to be a mere act of the Local Legislature of a Dominion is of a character that may substantially—I use that word purposely because it is a word which has been applied in legal language—affect the interests of the Mother Country.
Surely in a case of that kind you will have to have reservations, you will have to have special provisions, and just as on the one hand I would have the general principle in the widest possible terms, yet on the other it is only just and right, in order to preserve a system in which all Englishmen take a pride, that separation

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should not be possible without the lapse of a certain period of time and a chance for conciliation and arrangement as between the parties. It is not that I am insisting on these points any more than the Report itself insists upon them, but the Report gives no solution except suggesting that in the future a Commission or Committee might be appointed in order to deal with these difficulties. Let me read a passage from page 15 of the Report. They say:
"Existing administrative, legislative and judicial forms are admittedly not wholly in accord with the position as described in Section II of this Report."
That is the position that I have quoted. That is a very strong statement. The Report goes on to say that, as regards those matters, there should be some form of Committee appointed in the future in order that they might be determined and considered. I do not object to that in the least, but what I do object to is the stating of a general principle which is untrue as it stands, and can only be brought into conformity with the facts after these difficult questions, as they are called, have been settled and considered. I do not know that I can put my hand upon the place, but I recollect a statement that these matters to which I have called attention are matters of real difficulty which require real consideration, and cannot be settled in an off-hand manner or merely by the statement of a general formula.
If the noble Earl will look at page 18, he will see three matters of crucial importance, as they appear to me, upon which no immediate solution is possible. It is said in the body of the Report that the difficulties are such that it is unwise to make any immediate pronouncement. I agree with that, but you do not solve these difficulties merely by putting them off, and I should have hoped that it would be thought, before any general statement in the wide terms that I have quoted was made, either that these matters should have been themselves considered or, if they were not considered, that the statement itself should have been postponed until it could be made in a more complete form. There are two or three well-known points that I think we have to consider. I regard this question, I will not call it of the future Constitution, because the noble Earl does not like that word, but, to use his own word, of the future flexible connection between the Dominions and the
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Motherland, as one which ought not to be left in its present indeterminate condition. If progress is to be made it ought to be determined and considered as a primary condition, and a most important condition, as regards the future connection between the Dominions and Great Britain.
Let me give two illustrations. Take the question of the Prerogative. That goes very deeply into the question of the relations between the Dominions and the Mother Country and, indeed, not only is it laid down in the Report that the King, in relation to the Dominions, is to be advised by the Legislature of the Dominions, but it is stated negatively that he is not to be advised by the Government of Great Britain itself. What position the King will be in I am sure I do not know, if he is to decide matters of that kind without advice and, more than that, matters which in their essence may be important not only to the Dominion concerned but to great Britain as well. I do not want to go further into the details of a point of this kind—it would be quite out of place in a discussion here—but every word of this Report has to be discussed and considered. It is a most important State document. It suggests conclusions of a most drastic character, but surely, at the same time that these statements are made, it would have been wise to consider with much greater detail and accuracy what the difficulties are instead of merely acknowledging that they exist and suggesting that they will be solved in some way or other in the future. I hope so, but I think that their importance is so great as regards the whole future of this country and of the Empire that we ought to have had a statement concerning these underlying difficulties.
The next point upon which I want to say a word concerns relations with foreign countries. Hitherto I have merely dealt with the relations of the various Dominions to one another and to Great Britain. I do not propose to go into the point in any detail because the matter seems to me to be summarised on page 26 of the Report. I am quite aware that you can deal with this matter only by communication and that, so far as the system laid down in 1923 is concerned, it has not been laid down with sufficient precision or adaptability to be really capable of being used in matters

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of foreign policy where, admittedly, you often have to take a decision quickly and where it is very difficult indeed to enter into effective communication with any of the Dominions that may be specially concerned. On page 26 this statement is made—I entirely agree with it and I will make my criticism upon it a little later—
"We felt that the governing consideration underlying all discussions of this problem must be that neither Great Britain nor the Dominions could be committed to the acceptance of active obligations except with the definite assent of their own Governments."
That is a matter for regulation.
There is a far more difficult point which, as the noble Earl knows, has arisen and been discussed particularly in connection with the Locarno Treaty, and which, I presume, must have been discussed and considered at the meeting of the Imperial Conference. The point is that although, as between Great Britain and a Dominion, you may have regulations or legislation making the position that of autonomy and independence, yet you do not make the Dominion or Great Britain, as the case may be, a sovereign unit within the understanding of International Law. It is the understanding of International Law that a sovereignty cannot be divided in the sense that part of it should be at peace while the other part should be at war, and the point requires most careful consideration.
Would the noble Earl, for instance, suggest that a Dominion, in its independent and autonomous position but still under the King as a unit, should be able against our will to place Great Britain in the position of a belligerent? If that is in fact the position—of course the question arose in the case of Locarno as regards what are called "active obligations"—it is quite easy as between two Dominions, or between Great Britain and any Dominion, to provide that a Dominion not immediately interested should not be called upon to perform active obligations. That is the very basis of the Locarno Treaty, but you cannot in that way prevent Dominions becoming belligerents. You cannot prevent their being liable for all the chances and risks of a belligerent position, because under International Law it is impossible, as every jurist will admit, you have a sovereignty—the sovereignty
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of the King in this case—that you can allow the sovereign power to select, as it were, portions of the whole sovereignty which would be at war while other portions of it would be maintained in a condition of peace.
I want to ask the noble Earl this. I assume that that matter was present to the minds of the members of the Imperial Conference. More than once in this House I have asked that we should have the Papers which have passed, on this head, between the Dominions and Great Britain. The noble Earl, Lord Clarendon, has answered more than once on that question, and therefore it was a living issue. So far as the Report is concerned, however, I can find no reference to it whatever. It is, however, one of the most important matters which can come up for consideration, on the question of Imperial unity combined with Imperial independence, and I want to know, if the noble Earl will tell me, whether this matter came up for consideration, whether, the matter having come up for consideration, any determination was reached, and whether on this most important factor the Imperial Conference came to any common conclusion. It is so important that in my view, at any rate, the question of the relationship between the Dominions and foreign countries cannot be settled until this matter is finally considered and determined.
That is the chief point which I want to raise as regards foreign relations. I do not say that the point is not capable of settlement. It is not my desire to create difficulties, but we have to face difficulties in order to arrive at a satisfactory conclusion. No doubt as regards communications and so forth there will be difficulties, but they can be overcome and ought to be overcome, and I for one, so far as that point is concerned, welcome the view that nothing should be done which would put active obligations upon a Dominion without its full assent, and indeed, constitutionally, you cannot do that effectively unless the Government of that Dominion is supported in the policy by its own Parliament and people.
The next point arises on page 28, under the heading of "Compulsory Arbitration in International Disputes." I do not know exactly what is meant by compulsory arbitration in international disputes. There are no compulsory

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arbitrations under the provisions of the Covenant of the League, for this reason, that no one becomes subject to the provisions of the League except freely, and of his own voluntary choice. If any one enters into arbitration under the terms of the League he only does so because he has freely joined the League and has therefore voluntarily agreed to be subject to the arbitration principles of the League. I do not know of any case, though I have been interested in some of the most extended forms, in which it has ever been suggested that as between nations, and as regards international arbitrations, there should be anything in the form of what is called "compulsory arbitration in international disputes." What has been dealt with is entirely a different matter. What has been dealt with is how far the arbitration principle should be extended; in other words, should there be what is known as "all-inclusive arbitration."
Having made that statement, let me see what is said on page 28, because it is the most important issue at the present time in international matters:
"….whilst the members of the Committee were unanimous in favouring the widest possible extension of the method of arbitration for the settlement of international disputes"—
I will come to the proviso afterwards. What is the widest possible extension of the method of arbitration? It is the all-inclusive method. That is the only question in dispute at the present time; the question of whether all matters in dispute should be referred to arbitration or not. I do not want to take any advantage of words, but I do want to know what this means. Does it really mean what it says: that the Committee favour the widest possible extension of the method of arbitration for the settlement of international disputes? If that is the meaning it is an extremely important pronouncement.
I know that in the same section the question is dealt with of Article 36 of the Statute of the Permanent Court, but there again there is no question of compulsion but a question of voluntary action. Section 36 places compulsion an no nation, but only leaves it to nations voluntarily to adopt its terms, in order that certain closely specified matters should be referred to the International Court for its decision, and I regret, I
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admit, that the opinion of the Conference appears to have been against signing what is known as the optional clause of the International Court. Let me read the words to see if I appreciate what they mean:
"….the feeling was that it was at present premature to accept the obligations under the Article in question."
There, again, it is not a very strong statement against the principle of getting a judicial decision upon these points. Therefore, from reading this I should gather, first of all, that the Conference was prepared to let arbitration have the widest possible extension, and that as regards the Court the Conference thought it was premature, at the present time, to accept the obligations under the Article in question.
We know that more than twenty of the nations have now accepted that arbitration, amongst them France, and if that is the real meaning—I do not want in the least to suggest any meaning, or read any meaning into the words—but if the real meaning is that acceptance of the Court is premature, but so far as arbitration is concerned it should have the widest possible extension of the method, then I personally should not find much objection to the statement as made. But I think it has been quoted as though it were opposed to the principle not only of the signing of the Article in question, but of what is well known to be the real point in dispute—an all-inclusive arbitration treaty.
Surely light is thrown upon the passage that I have read by the reference to the policy of Locarno. I rejoice to see that the Imperial Conference recognised the value of Locarno and forecast to some extent the future results which it was hoped to secure:—
"It then became clear that, from the standpoint of all the Dominions and of India, there was complete approval of the manner in which the negotiations had been conducted and brought to so successful a conclusion."
Locarno is a case of all-inclusive arbitration, and that is the basis on which Locarno has been so effective—that all disputes are referred to friendly decision. That, of course, is right if you really desire to apply the principles of the League of Nations. All questions of right are referred to judicial decision. "Questions of right"—they are wider terms really than we find in the particular

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article of the International Court. That is absolutely right in principle. If you really want peace, which we all want—I know that the noble Earl (Lord Balfour) is in the foremost rank in the desire to stabilise peace under the œgis of the League of Nations: I recognise that and the splendid work which he has done—if you really want peace, follow the principle of Locarno and send all mattes to arbitration. As regards outstanding questions of right, refer them to the best judicial decision that you can obtain. I have no doubt myself that the best decision obtainable now is that of the International Court at The Hague, where we are represented by the noble and learned Viscount, Lord Finlay.
There is one other matter, as regards the League of Nations, which I must say is very unsatisfactory—namely, questions connected with the work of the Permanent Mandates Commission of the League. What is the effect of this? It is to say to the Mandates Commission: "You are wrong in seeking to obtain the information you require, either under the form of the questionnaire, which you are suggesting should be circulated, or in the form of examining a particular petition." Surely, a body of this kind, which is appointed under the terms of the Covenant itself, of which the only object is to see, by reporting to the Council, that the principle of trusteeship in these mandated territories, as against the principle of sovereignty, is carried out, and which consists of men the majority, is not all, of whom are skilled in Colonial administration, such as, for instance, our representative, Sir Frederick Lugardsurely in a case of that kind, which requires delicate handling and an infinite amount of trouble, the Commission ought to be encouraged by all reasonable means to obtain the information without which they cannot perform the duties they have undertaken.
I will not go back to the feeling aroused at Geneva by the attack on the Mandates Commission. But what I do regret is that all the persons who have signed the Memorandum referred to on page 33 are themselves persons whose treatment of the mandated countries is to be supervised by the advice of the Permanent Mandates Commission. It is a very difficult position. The Permanent Mandates Commission have to report to the Council. The Council consists largely
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of mandatory countries, and if there is one condition in which we ought to insist on the most judicial attitude possible it is the condition in which we are in a double position, partly as Mandatories and partly as Members of the Council; and it is upon us that these obligations fall which, to use the words of the Covenant itself, are undertaken as a sacred trust to civilisation. I think it is deeply to be regretted that this matter really was dealt with at the Imperial Conference at all, because we know quite well that at Geneva our Dominions have an independent position equal to our own, and it should not be sought to settle these difficulties at what is, after all, a secret conclave in London. They should be settled at an open meeting before the Council and the Assembly at Geneva.
There are two other points. One is the question of defence. If I understand the recommendation aright it is that so far as defence is concerned it is left to each Dominion really to regulate its own conduct in its own way, because the conditions are infinitely different as between Canada, for instance, and Australia and New Zealand. But I hope that the passage I am going to read really represents the opinion of the Conference. It is quoted from the recommendations of the Imperial Conference of 1923, but is again adopted:—
"The Conference, while deeply concerned for the paramount importance of providing for the safety and integrity of all parts of the Empire—"
on that I feel as strongly as anyone—
"earnestly desires, so far as is consistent with this consideration, the further limitation of armaments, and trusts that no opportunity may be lost to promote this object."
I know I shall have the sympathy of the noble Viscount [Lord Cecil] in saying that I rejoice to find a statement of that kind, which it is most important to make effective and to carry through at the present time, when the whole question of disarmament is being considered by various Commissions and Committees.
May I also refer to the speech which was made the other day by the Prime Minister of Australia? He said:—
"While I have dwelt at some length on the defence expenditure we are making—"
that is, in Australia—
"I want it to be clearly understood that Australia still subscribes to the principle

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that every effort should be made to bring about a limitation of armaments, and we will be prepared to support every effort which will assist to bring about the removal of the terrific burden which falls upon all countries,"
and so on. It is a terrific burden.
I do not think I need refer to it, but the last passage I have a note of is also a statement made by Mr. Bruce, the Prime Minister of Australia, in which he points out his disappointment that we are not a larger market for the growing products of the Dominion of Australia. He also points out that, in spite of some statistics which I think have been unduly used to the contrary, he regrets to find that proportionately we are losing our position as regards Australian trade in the face of other countries. That brings me back again to the same point. Quite apart from any moral feeling or anything of the kind, we have to face the fact that we cannot maintain our industrial position in the world if we are to remain under the terrific burden of taxation which we carry at the present moment, and that there is really no other practical direction in which that terrific burden can be eased than that of reducing our expenditure on armaments.
To follow that a little further, it is for that purpose all-important that other countries should pursue the same policy. Individual disarmament is really not possible, and I am glad to hear what the noble Viscount says about that. No one has worked more splendidly than he in this cause. There are enormous difficulties in the way. I have always put the chief means of providing against war as being the extension of arbitration. The noble Viscount has not held the same view, but I do not want to argue it. At any rate, we are both agreed upon this—that industrialism and militarism are inconsistent and that the burden which now lies upon the industries of this country cannot be borne permanently without loss, unemployment, industrial unrest and all those troubles to which we have been subject in this country since the period of the War. I say now, as I have said before, that we want settlement and peace all round and that to obtain settlement and peace in this country we must get rid of unemployment. I have always attributed the troubles in the mining industry not so much to the fault of the mine owners and miners, as to the
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unfortunate conditions and the heavy burden of taxation we have had to submit to since the close of the War.
Those are all the Questions I desire to put to the noble Earl. I do not profess that they are exhaustive. It would take an enormous amount of time to deal exhaustively with a Report of this character. I propose to move formally for Papers not because I am really wanting them but in order, if necessary, that I might say a final word to the noble Earl.
THE EARL OF BALFOUR: My Lords, the speech to which we have just listened falls into two parts. The first part, with which I shall deal last, really had a very close reference to some of the most important work done by the Conference. The last part, on which I shall make a few brief comments, had really nothing to do with the Conference except that it dealt with subjects on which some opinion was expressed by the Conference. The noble Lord was desirous of giving vent to his own in many respects admirable views upon an International Court, upon—
LORD PARMOOR: I said, "No compulsory arbitration."
THE EARL OF BALFOUR: —the Mandates Commission and so forth—the Mandates Commission, I admit, was more closely connected with the Report—and upon unemployment and taxation. In fact, towards the end of his speech, he made the Report a peg on which to hang a general survey of all our industrial troubles at home and our international relations abroad. I cannot believe that that was a very useful or convenient way of discussing the Report of the Conference. I imagine it was in order.
LORD PARMOOR: It is all referred to in the Report.
THE EARL OF BALFOUR: It is all referred to, and I have not the least doubt that had the noble Lord desired it he would have made—in fact, he half contemplated it and was surprised at his own moderation, if I may judge by the last sentence of his speech, because he wholly apologised to himself and half apologised to your Lordships' House for not having made—an even wider survey

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of all that is going on in this globe than he did in the last part of his speech. He really must not expect me to follow him in these vast and complicated subjects. I have nothing to say on this occasion with regard to taxation; I have nothing whatever to say with regard to industrial unrest. I feel that all those things are outside anything that could with advantage be discussed in your Lordships' House when the subject before us is the Imperial Conference. In such observations as I have to make to your Lordships I shall try to keep to the Conference itself.
I admitted just now that when the noble Lord discussed the question of Mandates and the Mandates Commission he was more strictly within what I should venture respectfully to say was the proper subject of his Motion, and although I bad no idea that he was going to discuss it I will just say this. He seems to think that this is a proper opportunity for suggesting blame to anybody who ventures to say that the questionnaire, the paper embodying the questions by the Mandates Commission might, perhaps, be simplified, shortened and made more convenient for those who have to answer the questions. I have no opinion upon that point; but as I understand it no Power, none of the Powers who are Mandatory Powers and whose action in their Mandated Territory has been the subject of criticism or commentary by the Mandates Commission, makes any serious complaint of that Commission. I understand that they answered all the questions they were required to answer. That is so, is it not?
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: Hear, hear.
THE EARL OF BALFOUR: My noble friend knows much more than I do about this matter and he tells me I am right and that the Powers concerned answered all the questions put to them by the Commission and expressed great confidence in the ability and procedure of the Mandates Commission. What more could be asked than that they should admire the procedure of the Commission even when they thought it should be simplified and improved without in any way impairing the usefulness of that Commission? And to drag into a speech nominally devoted to the Imperial Conference
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a topic so very alien to the essence of the Motion as the one to which I refer—
LORD PARMOOR: There is a misunderstanding. The reference that I read to the Mandates is in the Report of the Conference itself. The matter was before the Conference and in the Report and the letter of approval, as I should call it, is also published as part of the Conference proceedings.
THE EARL OF BALFOUR: I do not dissent from that. But exactly what the noble Lord's ground of complaint was either against the Conference or against His Majesty's Government or against the rights of the Mandatory Powers—what his ground of criticism or commentary was I do not really at this moment understand. I do not know why he brought it in and I do not know what moral he desires to point.
LORD PARMOOR: I am sorry to interrupt the noble Earl. What the Conference dealt with and what His Majesty's Government did was to express their views that the right of petition asked for and the questionnaire sent up by the Mandates Commission are of themselves improper and wrong. That is what has been done.
THE EARL OF BALFOUR: My noble friend [Viscount Cecil of Chelwood] informs me that it was not asked for, but that is a small matter. I do not know whether the noble Lord differs. Does he want every complainant in each of the mandated territories to have the right of coming before the Conference?
LORD PARMOOR: There is no question of that. It was said there were race cases in which the Mandates Commission would have the right, if they thought it necessary in their duty, to see the particular petitioner.
THE EARL OF BALFOUR: In very rare cases I should imagine no one would deny them the right, but I am quite clear that if the noble Lord is of opinion that it should be a regular part of the procedure of the Mandates Commission, except in the rarest of cases, themselves to see the witnesses, I venture to think he has formed an erroneous judgment of what is best for the mandated territories. It is

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not a subject with which I am intimately acquainted, and I do not think I can instruct the House upon it.
I come to the more fundamental parts of the noble Lord's speech. I must honestly say that to this part of the speech I have the most fundamental objection. He seems to me to have approached the subject entirely in the wrong spirit. I do not think I ever heard a speech from any member of your Lordships' House which seemed to me to approach a very important, a very difficult and in some respects a very complicated question so precisely from the wrong point of view. What is the noble Lord's point of view? He says: "You have made declarations with regard to the status of the Dominions." He does not deny that he sympathises with those; declarations; he does not deny that that is the sort of idea that he himself cherishes; but he says: "What folly to lay down the general principles on which this Empire is now constructed. I think you should first settle all the preliminary details, and smooth away all the technical difficulties which have their origin in the long history of our oversea Dominions."
I cannot imagine any policy from which I more profoundly differ. You are to set yourself every kind of problem, every sort of difficulty which may conceivably arise in the course of applying the broad principles of equality of status before you dare to announce that equality of status exists. Can anything be more legal or less statesmanlike? I cannot even put myself in the frame of mind of the noble Lord on that subject. He asks, for instance, if the Dominions want to separate from us what exactly would happen then, what sort of notice ought to be given, by what procedure would it be done. You might as well consider all the causes of divorce before you decide upon the problems of matrimony.
Does not the noble Lord see that it would be impracticable for the Conference of the Dominions and the Mother Country to meet at Westminster to say: "Well, on the whole we are inclined to think the idea of Empire is one to which we may all look forward and which will embody equality of status, but just think of how many questions we must decide before we get to that point. Here is this difficulty and there is another difficulty arising out of the
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Act of 1865. There are all these problems with regard to the Merchant Shipping Act. We must settle all those before we decide on what principle this collection of self-governing States is to work together." I boldly say to your Lordships' House that that is from beginning to end the wrong way of going to work. We have gone on exactly the opposite way. I believe we have done nothing new.
I was reminded to-day of a speech which, frankly, I had quite forgotten, that I myself made in your Lordships' House on the subject earlier in the Session, and which appears to me to put the whole case. I do not know whether it would bore your Lordships but it does put the whole case. I said in reference to the relations between the Mother Country and the Dominions:
"My own personal view is that the relations are those necessarily of equality. None of us conceive that of this conglomeration of free States one is above the other. One may have more responsibility than another, one may be in more dangers than another, one may be closer to the centre of international complications than another, but all are on an equality. That is the very essence, as I understand it, of the British Empire. As to exactly what that equality involves, as to exactly what degree of responsibility each has for the other, on that I personally think very little is gained by refining, discussing, or defining."
May I read what follows, because it deals with another point about which the noble Lord spoke:
"I should say that so far as this country is concerned we are bound to go to war to defend any part of this Empire which is in danger. Personally I think the duties of all the other members of the Empire to us are not less than our duties to them, but, as to the particular conditions under which that great duty is to be exercised, I do not believe anything is gained by inventing hard cases beforehand."
That is what I said a month before the Conference met. It is what, equally strongly, at the moment I believe. Nothing is gained and much may be lost by the kind of argumentation in which the noble Lord has indulged this evening.
Remember exactly what the position is. In this country we are all familiar with the idea of equality between the self-governing portions of the Empire. I will not give the quotations, but it has been stated by various high authorities for the last quarter of a century and has

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never, I think, been formally contradicted within these shores. But that is not the position in all the Dominions. In many of the Dominions there is a minority—in most cases, I dare say, a very small minority—who are always following the train of thought which recommends itself so much to the noble Lord. They are always looking at these survivals of an earlier past and saying: "How can you consider that we in this or in that Dominion are on an equality with the Mother Country when we find still unrepealed this or that Statute?" If you are to allow that kind of statement to go uncontradicted, unqualified by the broad considerations of equality with which you ought to begin, of course you can get in an audience mixed up in local controversy a certain amount of opinion in favour of the assertion that, whatever talk may go on in England, in this or that Dominion things are far otherwise and the boasted equality between the various self-governing parts of our Empire does not, in fact, exist. It does, in fact, exist.
What is contrary to the fact are these survivals of a previous condition of things, survivals which have no practical effect, which have no practical interference with that equality which each part of the self-governing parts of the Empire may justly claim for itself, but which no doubt can be set out in a formal document which, if you choose to treat the whole thing as purely a question of law, might have an effect, and as I believe has had an effect, in local controversies overseas. There is but one way of getting rid of that difficulty, and getting rid of it for ever, and that is to take advantage of the presence within our shores of the Prime Ministers, who are representative each of his own Dominion, meeting round a table discussing this question in all its aspects and coming unanimously to the conclusion which I have ventured to Say represents British opinion, and to agree that it may be desirable to consider this or that difficulty in the future, but that the broad principle—never interfered with on any important point—stands, that no control is exercised by any single one of the self-governing parts of the Empire over any other part of the Empire.
We stand on an equality, and if some foreign critics are disposed to say that
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standing on an equality means that we are bound to separate in a short time my view is precisely the contrary. My view most strongly is that the British Empire is now a more united organism than it has ever been before, that that organism is held together far more effectually by the broad loyalties, by the common feelings and interests—in many cases, of history—and by devotion to great world ideals of peace and freedom. A common interest in loyalty, in freedom, in ideals—that is the bond of Empire. If that is not enough, nothing else is enough. If that is not enough, what is the use of this shadowy pre-eminence to which the noble Lord referred in the earlier part of his speech and which he seemed to think ought to be considered by a Commission and dealt with according to its desires? That is not the way you are going to have unanimity, that is not the way you are going to have a solid bond of Empire.
I can perfectly understand any political theorist saving ten years ago I that the British Empire was of all political fabrics the feeblest and the least efficient for any purpose of offence or defence or mutual support. But how anybody can think that after the War seems to me perfectly amazing. It may well be that after the War people may have said to themselves here and there: "Well one result of the War is that a great many communities have been dragged into it who might have been kept out of it." But that is not the prevailing feeling that has been left. Nothing, as I believe, can increase the feeling of solidarity more than the sense that that solidarity depends on the complete sense of free equality. There cannot be, of course, equality of function in this Empire. That must depend on the circumstances of the moment. At the moment and for many years to come—many, many years to come—the main burden of defence must necessarily fall upon this country. For many years to come—perhaps for an indefinite period—owing to our geographical position the leading part, and at present by far the most important part, of the conduct of our foreign affairs must also fall on this country. But these are questions of function varying with the conditions of the time, varying with the actual practical necessities that have to be met. They in no way conflict, at least in my

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view, and I am sure in the view of those who took part in the Imperial Conference, with that fundamental equality of status which can be the only permanent bond between these self-governing portions of the Empire.
I am sure that the procedure suggested by the noble Lord, the procedure of having a committee of lawyers to look into the exact relations which now exist between the Mother Country and the Dominions, to see exactly what degree of pre-eminence the letter of the law gives to the Mother Country, to see exactly what difficulties might in conceivable circumstances arise if International Law put its fingers in our domestic affairs, can only end in disaster. The course that has actually been pursued by the representatives of the Dominions here, among whom absolute unanimity prevailed, the friendliest feelings were manifested, the sense of unity and co-operation grew day by day as the discussion went on—that is the true course of statesmanship, and I hope that your Lordships will never be diverted, from pursuing that course with inflexible resolution by any number of hard cases and ingenious riddles which the most accomplished lawyer can bring to your notice, but which, in fact, have never arisen in any definite or effective form, need never arise in any definite or effective form, and certainly would not be limited by any amount of discussion or any amount of refining or defining. I do not, of course, deny that the position of the Dominions in relation, for example, to the League of Nations carries with it anomalies. That had nothing to do with the Conference. That had to do with the obvious facts of the case, with the War, with the Peace, with the signing of the Treaty, with all those great events which have hastened the movement that reached a culmination in the Resolutions of the Conference that has just separated. But the Conference did not create those difficulties, the laws of England did not create them and, if International Law has not the sense to get over them, we must manage as best we can.
The fact remains and will, I hope, always remain that these self-governing States of which the Empire is composed have each a separate identity which, I think could not but be recognised after
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the events of 1918, and that the difficulties of that separate identity, in which we are all equal, in which this country has no superiority over any one of the Dominions, will be got over in practice. It is got over at every meeting in Geneva. I am sure that my noble friend and I could have invented any number of hard cases when we had these co-equal, self-governing communities all represented on the League of Nations and all able by their separate veto to stop the League of Nations doing anything. You would say a priori that this was a system that would not work at all. I am not prepared to say that it will never produce a difficulty, but I do say that it has worked perfectly up to the present moment and that my belief is that the common sense of other nations and the patriotism and the feeling of unity of the separate members of the Empire will enable it to work successfully in the future as it has so far successfully worked in the past.
In these circumstances I fear that I have to admit that I have not done much to answer the particular difficulties which the noble and learned Lord has placed before your Lordships, but I hope that I have done something to convince your Lordships that those difficulties, as they arise and if they arise, can be got over by the statesmanship of ourselves or our children, and that meanwhile to approach the problem of the British Empire from the point of view of these small points is entirely to misunderstand both the greatness of the opportunity and the proper way in which that opportunity should be taken advantage of.
LORD PARMOOR: My Lords, I am so much in agreement with a great deal that the noble Earl has said that I regret that he entirely misunderstood—it must have been my fault—a great part of my argument. Also he seems to have forgotten a great part of his own Report. On page 18 the Report speaks of these matters in detail and gives the recommendation to which I have referred. The Report speaks of "general principles which will require detailed examination," and it goes on to say:—
".… and we accordingly recommend that steps should be taken by Great Britain and the Dominions to set up a Committee with terms of reference on the following lines.…"
THE EARL OF BALFOUR: Quite so. If the noble Lord will forgive me—I do not want to interrupt him—the question is that, of the order of events. We say: "Have this declaration of equality before the Commission"; the noble Lord says: "Have the Commission before the declaration of equality."
LORD PARMOOR: What I said was that the declaration should be accurate in reference to conditions as they stand. No one is more anxious than I am—probably I should go beyond almost everything that the noble Earl has said—to secure that the Constitution, if I may use that word, of the Empire should be autonomous and equal as between the Dominions and Great Britain. I entirely agree with the noble Earl that you cannot have any greater safeguard for mutual loyalty, which is what you want, than the system of equality and independence. But I must say that I do not think that the noble Earl ought to attack me for calling the attention of the House to this matter and asking how it was to be operated. The Report actually contains in terms a reference to the point with which I was dealing. I did not suggest the Committee; it was suggested by the Report. I only called attention to some of the difficulties with which that Committee would have to contend and I suggested then, as I suggest now, that it is not wise to make a wide general statement unless you make it accurately, because if you make it inaccurately you give an opportunity to these minor groups to which the noble Earl has referred. There is not a, word in that which I have said that would suggest anything regarding a detailed inquiry that is not suggested in more than one passage in the Report of the Imperial Conference itself.
There is one other matter which I do not think the noble Earl ought to have treated quite as he did, if I may put it in that way. I do not in any way wish to attack him upon the point. The matters to which I refer as regards foreign policy and the League of Nations are matters comprised in terms within the Report of the Committee of which the noble Earl was Chairman. These are questions which are actually referred to, and referred to, as I think, unfortunately. Nevertheless, they have been referred to, and I presume that we may take it that
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what we find in the Report accurately represents the fact. Whatever opinion may be held as regards questions of Mandates, of arbitration and so on, I quoted textually from the Report itself. I did not introduce any outside consideration at all, but I stated quite frankly where I agreed with them and where I did not.
Let me say on behalf of myself and those with whom I act, in the frankest manner, that we were delighted to hear the admirable way in which the noble Earl laid down, as he has done before, his conception of the true understanding between the Dominions themselves and between the Dominions and Great Britain. I am entirely in accord with him, and I agree with the admirable way in which he expressed it. I go further, and I think that any other view is not only unwise but would lead to the breaking up of this organisation, this community, which I regard as one of the great safeguards for peace and quiet in the future of the world.
Motion for Papers, by leave, withdrawn.

ROAD IMPROVEMENT.
THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIREhad the following Notice on the Paper:—
To ask His Majesty's Government—

(1) What is the amount of land purchase up to the present time under the provision of Section 11 (2) of the Development and Road Improvement Funds Act, 1909?

(2) Whether the Minister of Transport has considered the advisability of promoting a Bill to give local authorities general powers comparable with the powers of the Minister under this Act?

The noble Marquess said: My Lords, would ask the indulgence of the House for four or five minutes, while I ask the Government the Questions which I have put upon the Paper, which I think are of some interest and of some importance. It is some thirteen years since the third instalment of the Campbell-Bannerman land and agricultural policy was presented to the two Houses of Parliament, in the shape of the Development and Road Improvement Bill of 1909. The Bill was divided into two parts, one dealing with the development of agriculture,

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with which I need not trouble your Lordships now, and the second part, which was the more important one, led to the formation of the Road Board.
There was a good deal of difficulty in getting the Bill, as it was, through the House of Commons, but eventually it was passed and came up to this House. It was here read a second time without a Division, but there was a little difficulty about Clause 11, to which Viscount Galway drew attention and which he denounced in pretty vigorous terms. The object of Clause 11 was to enable the Government, when they made the great arterial roads through England, which roads were then in their infancy, to take 220 feet of land on each side of the road, at an agricultural value, and then to re-sell it when the road was made, of course at an increased price, and in that way to save the ratepayers and taxpayers some little portion of the money spent on the road. That, as everybody knows, is the system on which the great American railways were built, and it seemed a fair and legitimate proposition, but Viscount Galway took great exception to it and moved an Amendment that Clause 11 should be deleted. It was my duty to get the Bill through, and I did the very best I could, but I was not successful and the clause was deleted by a three-to-one majority. The Bill was then returned to the other House, and the Commons disagreed with the Lords Amendment. The Bill was sent back to this House, where, somehow or other, the atmosphere seemed to have changed, as your Lordships did not insist upon your Amendment deleting Clause 11. There was no debate at all, so far as I remember, and the Commons Amendments were agreed to and the Bill went through without any further difficulty.
That occurred seventeen years ago. The Question I have put on the Paper is to ask in respect of these great arterial roads—London to Rochester, London to Maidstone, and that Great Western road from Kew Bridge, all magnificent roads—whether the Government have availed themselves of the powers under the Act, and, if so, how much land they have got and what price has been obtained for the land when sold again. And if not, why not? If your Lordships will go down the Great Western Road you will see cottages and
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houses, I will not say springing up like mushrooms but cropping up in great rows—a sort of township growing up—and there seems to have been a great opportunity of relieving the taxpayers of a considerable portion of the expense. That is the first Question I wish to ask.
The second Question is like unto it. We were very anxious not to interfere with the existing arrangement of the county councils, and so the Government of that day only took over the great arterial roads. All the existing main roads went into the hands of the county councils, and money was voted by the Government to help them, on the principle that those who used the roads should pay for the roads. Your Lordships will know the beginning of the Great Western Road. If you go a little further down the road you find two narrow streets at Longford and Colnbrook, shaped like the neck of a bottle, and owing to the traffic which goes through they are very dangerous. Therefore the Bucks County Council have taken circuitous routes round those two villages, and for that purpose they go through two separate properties. The owners of those properties—they are friends of mine—have naturally taken advantage of these roads, and these agricultural properties have developed into building estates. It seems a bit hard that the whole of this unearned increment should go into the pockets of these worthy friends of mine, but it must be so, because as the law stands now the county councils have not got the powers which the State possesses. Therefore my second Question is whether the Government have ever considered or have any intention of making the law go a little bit further, as I suggest it should and as is much desired, by giving the county councils the same right as is possessed by the Government at present. Those are the two Questions which I have to ask.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: My Lords, perhaps it would save time if I said a few words before the Government replies. I think it would be interesting for your Lordships to know that this question of the taking of land on each side of a road had been before the Road Board all the time, nearly ten years, during which I was a member of the Board. Some of us, including myself, were always

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in favour of the land being bought before the road was made, on the ground that the money employed in making the road belonged either to the heavily taxed motorist, or to the community in general, and that any profit arising from that transaction should go either towards the Road Fund or to some other purpose. That was a perfectly fair principle. If you take the Great West Road from Chiswick up to a point ten miles to the west, most of that district is ripe for building purposes. Even taking 25 acres to each mile of frontage you will find that there has been a very considerable increment of value since that road was made. In 1921 the land was worth from£30 to£50 an acre. I have made some inquiries, and I find it is now worth from£300 to£500 an acre, and it would be quite fair to say that there has been an increment in value of something like£300 an acre. That means an increase of value on the first line of frontage alone of£150,000. That is a considerable sum, which would at any rate help to pay back some of the money spent in making this road, or alternatively in providing byroads off the main road, or making roads in other places.
It always seems to me perfectly reasonable that when the community builds a road, whether it is built out of the Road Fund or by the general public, represented by the taxpayer, some portion of that money should come back to the people who put up the money to create that value. I am not a follower of Henry George, or of the land taxing associations, with whom I think the noble Marquess has some sympathy, but I look at it purely from a practical point of view. Those of us who own land or make roads, as I and many of your Lordships have done, know that when we make a road we get our money back eventually in the increased price of the frontage. When a road is built, not by an individual but by the community, it is only fair that the increase in value should go to the community, and not to the individual who happens to own the land on both sides of the road.
I remember two or three definite occasions when I was on the Road Board when I asked the then Chairman, Sir George Gibb, why he did not put this into operation in regard to the Great West Road, about which we were engaged at that moment with various
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owners of land in the West of London, from Chiswick westward, and I never really could get a satisfactory answer from him. It was not a political question. There were various Governments in power in the period since 1909, when that Act came into operation, but I could never get a satisfactory explanation. On one occasion I was told that the Treasury disliked the Road Board speculating in land, and that they put their foot down. Whether that was so or not I do not know. But I do urge on the Government and on the noble Viscount who represents the Ministry of Transport tonight that when these great trunk roads are built it would be a distinct advantage to the Road Fund, and incidentally to the taxpayers of the country, if the land was bought ahead to the depth of a furlong on each side of the road. It is quite clear that they have powers to do that under the Act of 1909, so that there would be no difficulty in doing this. There are sections of that Act which could quote which not only give power to buy the land but the power to lease it or to sell it. If that is so, I am sure the noble Marquess would be glad to know from the noble Viscount why these powers are not exercised.
THE FIRST COMMISSIONER OF WORKS (VISCOUNT PEEL): My Lords, I should like to say that, as regards the principle, both the noble Lords who have spoken are pushing an open door. The Act is based on the idea of getting recoupment. No question of principle, therefore, arises at all; it is merely a matter of practice. The Development and Road Improvement Funds Act provides that the Minister, when he proposes to consider a new road under Part II of the Act, may acquire land for the purpose, and in addition may acquire land on either side of the proposed road, within 220 yards from the middle of the road. The Minister has purchased land in connection with the construction of certain arterial roads in the neighbourhood of London, and, although it has occasionally been necessary to purchase surplus land in order to avoid claims for severance, the Minister has not in any case invoked his powers under Section 11 (1) for purchasing land within the 220 yards limit for the purpose of recoupment. In recent cases when the construction of a new

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arterial road has been under consideration it has been the practice of the Minister to obtain the views of the chief valuer on the desirability of exercising the powers under Section 11 (1), and in each case up to the present the chief valuer has advised either that there was no prospect of recoupment or that the prospect was too remote and speculative to justify the Minister in taking action. So that it was on the advice of the chief valuer that this has not been done, and not upon any advice from the Treasury, as suggested by the noble Lord, Lord Montagu.
As regards the second part of the Question, the Middlesex Act of 1925 confers on the Middlesex Council powers somewhat similar to those contained in Section 11 (1), but those powers can only be exercised with the consent of the Minister, and are confined to road improvements as distinct from new construction. On certain occasions representations have been received from the local authority as to the desirability of obtaining powers to acquire additional land for recoupment purposes, but in the main these representations have related to specific schemes which the local authority were then considering. If the Minister were satisfied that there was any general desire on the part of local authorities for powers of this nature he would consider sympathetically any measure promoted by them with this end in view, but he is doubtful whether it would be desirable to confer general powers upon local authorities which would enable them to engage in highly speculative operations in land values.
EARL RUSSELL: My Lords, the principle involved of recoupment from the new frontage is, of course, not a new one. It was applied a very long time ago by the London County Council in the case of the construction of Kingsway. I am very much interested to hear the noble Viscount say to-night that the principle is fully accepted, that we are pushing an open door, and the principle need not be argued. But I should like to dwell upon it for a moment, because there does appear to be a sort of feeling that there is something in this principle which is of a dangerous or Socialistic character. The noble Lord, Lord Montagu, in advocating it, found it necessary to say that he was not a
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follower of Henry George. What is the principle? The principle is that when you are spending a great deal of public money, and thereby creating very largely improved values, you should get back for the public, who have spent that money, some portion of that improved value. The only ground on which that principle could be objected to as Socialistic would be that you were robbing the owner of the land of something that was justly his; but if you have bought his land at a fair price in an arbitration, and paid him the full price for it, I should think even the most anti-Socialist person would hardly maintain that you were robbing that landowner, or doing him an injustice.
But now what are you doing to the community if you do not take these steps? You are robbing the community, because these roads cost an enormous sum to build. They are very expensive operations indeed, but where these roads have been created the frontages have acquired a building value. The values that you have lost are enormous. The answer made by the noble Viscount is a perfectly good one, if we are to accept it fully at its face value. He says that in the cases where the question has arisen the chief valuer has been consulted, and the chief valuer has advised that the recoupment to be obtained was either so doubtful or so speculative that it should not be entered upon. Chief valuers are wonderful people, but I very much doubt whether the noble Viscount would get any committee of laymen, or people interested in land, to agree with him. It seems to me to be a matter almost essentially without argument to a person who is not a valuer but is a person of ordinary common sense, that when you run a large main road through agricultural land to carry a large traffic you improve the value of the land on each side of that road. I have the greatest difficulty in understanding how the Minister can be advised otherwise.
If that is the reason for his action, and if that is the advice which has been given to him, it certainly seems almost worth while that in future he should appoint some Committee or a larger number of persons to consider these questions and see whether better advice could not be given him. It is quite impossible for us who are laymen to challenge the opinion

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of the valuer. I am merely saying that in the view of the ordinary layman it seems an impossible piece of advice to have been given. Consider upon whom this extra cost falls. It falls partly upon the Road. Fund and it falls as to the rest of it upon the ratepayers of the county who contribute to the making of the road. Your Lordships know well enough that rates are quite heavy and burdensome enough already without adding to them when there is a perfectly simple way of reducing them. I hope this subject may be raised again by the noble Marquess if necessary at some future date and that something may be done to see that it is not overlooked in future road schemes; because, whatever the valuer may have advised, I think that we have lost a great deal of money that might properly have gone to public funds by the neglect of this in the past.
LORD HARRIS: My Lords, I am in perfect agreement with the principles that have been mentioned by various noble Lords, but I think that one point has been overlooked. The great object was to get these roads made through the country. There is only a certain amount of money available to spend upon these roads and much less could have been spent upon them if the depths from the centre had also been bought. There would have been far less money left for the roads. The noble Lord opposite shakes his head, but it is obvious that if you are going to buy double the amount of land there must be so much less money left for the roads unless you can persuade the purchaser to give you double the amount.

EXPERIMENTS ON STOLEN DOGS.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM asked His Majesty's Government whether their attention has been drawn to the case at Clerkenwell Police Court on the first of this month where a man was charged with stealing a dog which he had sold to the University College School of Physiology; whether they are aware that a men was convicted at Bow Street on November the 20th for receiving two stolen dogs which he was taking to the University College School, and what steps they intend to take to stop this practice.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I desire to ask the Question which stands
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in my name on the Paper, the facts in regard to which I will briefly state. About a fortnight ago a man was charged at Bow Street Police Court with stealing a dog and Mr. Fry, the magistrate, made certain remarks after a detective had said that the prisoner had been supplying dogs to the London University College School of Physiology for six shillings each. Sentencing Henry William Hewett, 48, dealer, of Copenhagen Street, Caledonian Road, to six months hard labour for feloniously receiving two Irish terriers, valued at £7, and one month's imprisonment for cruelly ill-treating the dogs, Mr. Fry said:
"You are no doubt a cruel and unscrupulous man, and anything I can do to stop this sort of thing I will. I must not say too much because the people who employ you are not here and are not represented. Anyone who has heard this case must have a feeling of considerable uneasiness as to what is taking place. I have been told that a dog-stealer is employed by this school to supply them with dogs for physiological experiments.…I am informed that a number of valuable cats and dogs have been missed from this neighbourhood, and that a cruel and unscrupulous person is employed to supply animals to this school. That is the evidence. It has been often said in these Courts that if there were no receivers there would be no thieves. At 8 a.m. two valuable pedigree dogs are missed from outside a house. At 9 o'clock they are taken to this school in a sack under circumstances of great cruelty, and in twenty-four hours they would have been dead. No questions would have been asked. It must raise a feeling of considerable alarm among animal lovers to find that this has been going on for some time."
Those were the statements made by Mr. Fry in convicting the man at Bow Street on November 20, I think it was.
Then on December 1 the College issued an explanation in which they said:
"That the man Hewett has never been an employèof the college; that Hewett is a live-stock dealer from whom the professor of physiology had bought animal's food for some time, and dogs since October 11 last; that Hewett's connection with the college was the same as that of any other outside tradesman.
"That the professor of physiology had no means of ascertaining that Hewett, as stated in the Police Court, had been convicted in 1914 of dog stealing. That the professor had always taken special precautions to prevent the delivery of stolen dogs, in that he required a written guarantee that all the animals so delivered by Hewett and by the other dealer with whom he traded were legitimately obtained."

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When any of your Lordships buys an article in a shop do you say to the shopkeeper: "I require a written guarantee that this article you are selling me has been legitimately obtained"? I venture to say that no one, unless he is of opinion that in all probability the article has been stolen, would put that question to any assistant in any shop to which he went.
Then I would draw your Lordships attention to the fact that these two dogs were stated to be of the value of,£7 each and were to be bought by the school for 6s each. If a diamond ring worth£50 is offered to you for a couple of sovereigns you generally have some suspicion that something is wrong somewhere. Apparently, however, this gentleman had no suspicion of that sort. Then the statement goes on to say:—
"That for some of these experiments dogs are essential.
"That the price paid, being a reasonable one for the kind of dog required, is not calculated to lead to abuse.
"That the dogs found in the possession of Hewett at the time of his arrest were so far as is known, not of the type required by the college; they were never offered to and were consequently not seen by, anyone at the college."
They were not seen by any one at the college because the detective had stopped the man at the door of the college from taking them in. It was proved in evidence that he was going to take them to the college and that he would have received 6s. each for them.
Then the report of a further case appeared in The Times of December 2. It is headed: "University College again mentioned," and it is as follows—
"At the Clerkenwell Police Court yesterday George Phipps, 29, labourer, of Albert Street, Kilburn, was charged on a warrant with stealing a wolfhound mongrel, the property of Frederick Smythe, at Doughty Street, on November 19"
When this particular man was charged he pleaded not guilty and elected to go for trial. The trial, I think, has so far not taken place and, therefore, I do not propose to say a word as to whether George Phipps was or was not guilty of stealing the dog. But on the arrest of this man a Mr. Smythe appeared. Mr. Smythe was the owner of the dog anti he said that
"the dog was last seen on his doorstep. After it had disappeared the witness made
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inquiries, and on Monday went to University College, Gower Street. He saw Dr. Verney, who asked him to call again. He then saw the Provost, Dr. Verney, and another professor, and the dog was given up."
According to the report, this question was asked and this answer given:—
"Mr. Dummett [the Magistrate]: None the worse for his adventure, I hope.
"The Witness: Well, the dog was suffering from a bruise at the base of the skull. It is recovering.
"A boy of fourteen, who said he was 'animal attendant' at University College, said he had known the defendant for about four weeks. He helped a man named Jackson to fetch clogs to the college.
"Counsel: Mr. Jackson often supplies dogs for the college?—Yes.
"He brought two on November 19?—Yes."
I would remark here that it is curious that a boy of fourteen should be employed to look after animals. I do not suppose any of your Lordships would give the charge of your animals solely into the hands of a boy of fourteen. But this is what emerges from those two statements, that within a fortnight two cases of stolen dogs are brought forward and in both of those cases these dogs were going to University College.
The first two dogs fortunately were not delivered, because a detective, being opposite the College, stopped the man who was taking them. That man got six months' hard labour for receiving the stolen dogs, and he also got another month's imprisonment for cruelty to those dogs. Here is a case of another man doing this within a fortnight, notwithstanding the care which, according to the University College, they take of asking everybody they buy a dog from to sign a written guarantee that he has not stolen it. Within two weeks these two cases occur. When I was bringing in my Bill in the House of Commons to prevent dogs being vivisected Dr. Chapple, then a member of the House of Commons, gave as a reason against the Bill that dogs were cheap. These are his words—
"If we examine this question of cheapness, we find that the difference is not between 5s. and 7s. 6d., but between 5s. and £5.… It is a matter of getting animals for experiment at a price which can be paid, as compared with a price that cannot be paid."

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Of course if you steal the dogs you do not pay much for them. Dr. Chapple went onߞ
"It would cost £5 to get a suitable monkey."
It is evident, therefore, that one of the reasons why it is necessary to have dogs is that they can be obtained cheaply. And now we know how it is they are obtained.
I will trouble your Lordships for a few moments with the evidence of Mr. Swan, M.B., M.R.C.S., L.R.C.P., before the Royal Commission. He was asked—
"In addition to that, is it not the case that dogs are more expensive than other animals, so that the very lowest motive, the motive of pocket alone, would cause them to prefer other animals?"
Mark his answer—
"You can steal a dog anywhere."
He was then asked—
"You do not mean to imply, do you, that the dogs used in physiological laboratories are stolen and not paid for?"
He replied—
"I have stolen dogs in my early days."
On the 24th January, 1914, the Edinburgh Evening Dispatch had an article to this effect—
"With drooping head he trotted in on three legs, a picture of misery and dejection. On making an examination of the right foreleg, which was the one disabled, his master noticed a scar several inches long stretching from the paw to the first joint, evidence of a healed wound. He also saw that a new collar had been put on the animal's neck. He inspected this as well and observed written on the inside the words 'Surgical Department.' This set him thinking. What could it mean? His first thought was that the dog had met with an accident and had been kindly treated at the surgery, but he had his suspicions aroused when his attention was called to an advertisement in an evening paper offering a reward for the recovery of a lost Irish terrier dog slightly lame in the right foreleg and bearing, along with initials, the words 'Surgical Laboratory, New University.' A visit to the University elicited the information that the dog had been operated upon, bones being separated in his leg and a metal plate inserted and fixed with screws. After being confined for about five weeks the dog escaped and straightway sped home."
The newspaper goes on to say—
"It appears the animal was purchased for a small sum in the belief that it was ownerless. A handsome apology was made for the mistake and the treatment the dog had received. The assurance was given that the dog would be all right again, but more
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than a week has now elapsed since the terrier returned home and still it is far from being its old self. It is dull and tired-looking and altogether different looking from the dog that was stolen."
I think it is clear that the habit of receiving stolen dogs is somewhat prevalent at these institutions. It is a matter which is very difficult to trace, but two cases have been brought to light in the last fortnight. There can be no doubt whatever that these dogs were stolen and would have been operated on and that a very small price was paid for them. Then we have the fact that in 1914 there was another similar case and the further fact that an admission was made before the Royal Commission on Vivisection that dogs were stolen, one witness having the honesty to say he had stolen them himself in his early days. I do not want to go into the question of the sufferings inflicted upon man's best friend, but what I want to say is that nowadays, with all the changes in human sentiments (about which we are always talking) and the desire to make this an improved world, at any rate if you have the misfortune to lose your dog you should be able to be certain it will not be sold to the Physiological School.
I do not know what steps the Government propose to take but it is quite clear, apart from any question of humanity, that the habit of buying dogs for a small price from an impecunious gentleman who calls himself a dog dealer should be stopped. Every one in your Lordships' House has probably said at times: "If there were no receivers there would be no thieves." It is not only that I object to the chance of my dog being stolen from me and operated upon, but it is that I object to people being encouraged to steal by the knowledge that when they have stolen something they will be able to dispose of it. I beg to ask the Question.
EARL RUSSELL: My Lords, I am sorry to intervene again so soon. My excuse must be my very strong feeling about this matter, and also the fact that I want to suggest to your Lordships one or two measures which I think may be of a remedial character. I lost a dog several years ago from my doorstep in London. Every one of your Lordships will realise the great distress which that causes to anybody, not merely because of the loss of a beloved companion, but also from

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the natural fear—I confess having this particular terror before me—as to what may be happening to an animal that has always been well treated. That is a thing that no owner or lover of a dog can contemplate with calmness.
What method can be devised to prevent this? So far two methods have occurred to me. If the supply of dogs for vivisection is legal, as the noble Lord opposite said—I am not going to discuss that, I am not myself an anti-vivisectionist—there is one method by which dogs might be supplied for this purpose and that is to take stray dogs which would otherwise be destroyed It seems to me that it would be far simpler and a most reasonable method that dogs which are going to be destroyed anyhow, which are the property of no one, should be used. That I understand is forbidden by law at present, but personally I should be glad to see that law repealed. If it cannot be repealed I suggest that it might be provided by Statute that dogs should not be used by physiological laboratories unless they have been bred by the laboratories themselves, that the laboratories should set up their own breeding establishments—one establishment for several laboratories, if you like—so that they might know the origin of the dogs and where they came from. They might then be prohibited from using any dog of which they could not trace the history from birth. That would prevent this particular evil. Speaking not only for myself but for all lovers of dogs I believe the public conscience has been roused by what has happened and is entirely in sympathy with the remarks both of Mr. Fry, the magistrate, and of the noble Lord opposite, and that it will not rest until something has been done to make it impossible in the future.
LORD DESBOROUGH: My Lords, I will reply very briefly with regard to these two cases. As regards the first case it is still sub judice, but I understand it is not disputed that a dog was stolen from its owner and after passing through a great many hands was sold to University College who restored it to the owner as soon as it was identified. The case is not yet finished, but I think those are the outstanding facts. With regard to the second case, the case of the man Hewett—who seems a rather simple man if he
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stole a dog worth £7 and was willing to sell it for six shillings—the remarks made by the magistrate were made before he had heard what the authorities of University College had to say about the matter. My noble friend has read so much about the case that he has saved me the trouble of doing so. A great deal of this is an absolute reply to the indictment that University College encouraged the stealing of dogs. I do not believe it did that for a single moment. The University College authorities buy dogs for physiological purposes—I cannot go into the question now whether that is a wise thing to do or not—from recognised dealers, and not only that but they say they ask for a written guarantee that the dog has been honestly come by.
I think that in this particular case, that of the man Hewett, my noble friend rather tried to make out that he was generally engaged in stealing dogs worth£7 and selling them for six shillings. It is true that twelve years before he had been convicted of dog stealing, but the University College School did not know anything about that. Since then the police give him a very good character and the College had no reason to believe he was not an honest dealer in dogs, though an ill-advised one, I admit, from his own point of view. I fully join in the sympathy which has been aroused in this case. I should take any strong measures I could if I thought my own dogs were going to be stolen and experimented with. But these two instances do not make out a very strong case for the suggestion that this is a very prevalent thing, and the imputation that University College encourages it seems to me to be absolutely unfounded. I really do believe they have taken every precaution they possibly could to ascertain that dogs which are used for purposes of experiment are dogs which are not wanted and are honestly come by.
The noble Earl opposite has made two suggestions. I do not know whether my noble friend behind me agrees with them. He made one suggestion that dogs whose lives are in any case going to be put an end to, which are homeless and masterless and going to be sacrificed, might be used for these purposes in preference to dogs whose masters probably love them or which at any rate have not been condemned. I am told that in a year in

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London 25,000 dogs are destroyed. I fully agree with the noble Earl opposite that these are the dogs which should be used for this purpose, always admitting that dogs should be so used, and I have defended that in this House before. I have no right on this new suggestion to speak for the Home Office, but as far as I know they do not think it was a very wise provision in the Act of 1906, which absolutely prevented dogs that were going to be destroyed from being used for a useful purpose before they were painlessly destroyed. I do not know whether the noble Earl opposite saw the other day that in destroying dogs they were burned and subsequently poisoned.
EARL RUSSELL: Subsequently poisoned?
LORD DESBOROUGH: I read in the paper that an accident happened to the asphyxiating chamber, the top was blown off and the dogs were injured and subsequently poisoned. I would to more make an accusation against the Battersea Dogs' Home on that account than I should against the London School of Physiology that they were in the habit of buying stolen dogs or wishing people to steal dogs. I do not know what my noble friend wants. We cannot to-night alter the law relating to vivisection and he has not made any suggestion. But as to the suggestion of the noble Earl opposite I personally—and I believe the Home Office will agree—think it is a most excellent one and I hope something may be done in that direction.
LORD DANESFORT: My Lords, I desire to ask my noble friend if he can tell us whether the Home Office intend to take any steps to stop the practice which has been going on of buying dogs for vivisection at very cheap prices from dog stealers. The case, as has been said, is all the more remarkable because here we have a dog valued at £7 sold for six shillings. I should have thought that mere fact was enough to put the purchasers on inquiry and to induce them to take steps to find out whether dogs were stolen. We are told they ask if the dogs am stolen, but surely if any mart is criminal enough to steal dogs he would be criminal enough to say they were not stolen.
LORD DESBOROUGH: There was a written guarantee.
LORD DANESFORT: A written guarantee! Probably the man would never be found out and the written guarantee would never be proved false. The idea that you can slop crime by asking a man if he is a criminal appears to me to be childish. I would ask my noble friend, if he cannot answer the question this evening, whether he will find out whether there is any method at all which the Home Office can adopt by which this practice, whether it is large or small, can be stopped.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM: My Lords, my noble friend has asked me if I could suggest any method by which this could be stopped. I would suggest that the Home Office should give instructions to the police to investigate the approaches to these different schools extremely carefully and to prosecute in any case in which they can find that a dog has been stolen or has been received knowing that it has been stolen, because the receiver is just as had as the thief. I will not go into the question raised by the noble Earl opposite about stray dogs, because that is really rather foreign to the Question which is now before your Lordships' House and which really only relates to stolen dogs. The question of stray dogs really comes more or less under the consideration of whether dogs ought to be vivisected or not. I would only say in regard to stray dogs that they may and probably in many cases do, belong to an owner, and are unfortunately lost; and in the second place, that stray dogs have just as much feeling as any other dogs.

CHURCH MEASURES.
LORD PHILLIMORE LORD PHILLIMORE moved for a Return of the number and titles of the Measures submitted by the Legislative Committee of the Church Assembly to the Ecclesiastical Committee under the provisions of the Church of England Assembly (Powers) Act, 1919, specifying which of those Measures were not proceeded with, inasmuch as the Legislative Committee, after receiving the Reports of the Ecclesiastical Committee thereon, did not signify its desire that those Reports should be presented to Parliament, and further specifying which Measures were proceeded with but failed to secure the assent of both Houses to a Motion for presentation for the Royal Assent.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, in the course of the little debate that we had last week with regard to the proceedings of the Church Assembly and the Ecclesiastical Committee it occurred to me that there was something deficient in the working of the Parliamentary proceedings in connection with the Enabling Act, and that the want of confidence that a noble Earl expressed in the Ecclesiastical Committee might be owing to the fact that the Ecclesiastical Committee have no means of making all their procedure clear. Your Lordships may remember that under the Act it is the duty of the executive committee of the National Assembly, which is called the Legislative Committee, to forward to the Ecclesiastical Committee of Lords and Commons, consisting of fifteen Peers and fifteen members of the House of Commons, each Measure for consideration. The Ecclesiastical Committee considers the Measure and sometimes asks for a further Report, for the Legislative Committee always sends a Report with the Measure similar to that analysis which we often see of Bills presented to Parliament. The Ecclesiastical Committee may have a conference with the other Committee and, at the end of its examination, it prepares a draft Report.
The Act requires that it should send that draft Report to the Committee of the National Assembly, and it will depend on the Committee of the National Assembly whether that Report is presented to Parliament or not. If the Report is condemnatory, or even if it is highly critical, as I have known happen in one or two instances, it may well be that the Committee of the Assembly will say: "Please do not present that Report. It is no good trying to go over your heads (though we can do so) and asking the consent of Parliament notwithstanding an unfavourable Report. We shall not do that if you are going to report against us. We shall withdraw the Measure." The result is that, wherever the Ecclesiastical Committee has exercised its sifting powers and its powers of criticism, nobody officially knows what it has done. Parliament does not see, nor is it intended to see, the draft of the Report. All it would know would be that the Assembly had
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sent forward a Measure and that, for some reason or other, no Report was presented.
That being the case, I think that it may be desirable, now that we have had three or four years' experience of the working of this procedure, that there should be such a Return as I have suggested. I cannot tie myself to the actual figures, nor indeed should I desire to do so, because I want to get them from this Return, but I have an impression that somewhere about thirty Measures have been submitted to the Ecclesiastical Committee. I know of four that were withdrawn, some in consequence of actual condemnation and others in consequence of criticism by the Ecclesiastical Committee. There may have been more than four, but, whatever the number was, those that the Ecclesiastical Committee passed have all received the assent of Parliament except two—one, the Bishopric of Shrewsbury Measure, which had a favourable reception from the House of Commons but was rejected by one vote, I think, in your Lordships' House; and one which had a favourable reception in your Lordships' House and of which I am prompted by the recent debate to say that the old proverb applied: "Give a dog a bad name and hang him." That Measure was popularly given what Jeremy Bentham would call the very question begging title of the City Churches Measure, which led to its being rejected in the House of Commons. So far as I know, those are the only two which have passed the sieve of the Ecclesiastical Committee and have not received the Royal Assent. What I want your Lordships to be officially informed of, either by a Return, if a Return can be granted, or in some other manner, is the number of Measures and the proportion of Measures which, owing to the action of the Ecclesiastical Committee, did not go forward. I beg to move.
Moved, That a Return be presented to this House of the number and titles of the Measures submitted by the Legislative Committee of the Church Assembly to the Ecclesiastical Committee under the provisions of the Church of England Assembly (Powers) Act, 1919, specifying which of those Measures were not proceeded with, inasmuch as the Legislative Committee, after receiving the Reports of

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the Ecclesiastical Committee thereon, did not signify its desire that those Reports should be presented to Parliament, and further specifying which Measures were proceeded with but failed to secure the assent of both Houses to a Motion for presentation for the Royal Assent.—(Lord Phillimore.)
EARL BEAUCHAMP: My Lords, I am much obliged to the noble and learned Lord for giving me an opportunity of expatiating upon the criticism that I made of the Ecclesiastical Committee on the occasion to which he refers. My distrust of the Ecclesiastical Committee, which remains in spite of the defence which has just been made by the noble and learned Lord, is based upon wholly different grounds. It is based upon the ground that, in the particular case which I am about to mention to your Lordships, the Committee did not communicate to your Lordships, as I think they should have done, an important matter of fact. One of the Measures which was presented by the Church Assembly to your Lordships' House and to the other place for confirmation dealt amongst other things with repair of the chancels of the country. Your Lordships will know that in places where there is a Rector he is in charge and has the responsibility for the maintenance, care and repair of chancels. Without a word being said to this House this was transferred to the parish councils, and it is quite clear that in that way a very heavy charge was put upon those councils which certainly, in my opinion, should have received some notice from the Ecclesiastical Committee.
I forget the year in which this happened, but it is quite obvious that a vast change of that kind should not have passed sub silentio either in this House or in another place, and it, is because the Ecclesiastical Committee failed to draw your Lordships' attention to it that, for my own part, I confess that I am still unable to accord them my complete confidence. The noble and learned Lord below me [Lord Muir Mackenzie], who is now, I think, Chairman of that Committee, told us the other day that every Measure that comes before them is carefully examined. That being so, it is obvious that the Committee itself knew what was effected by this Measure and, knowing all that was being done—I will not say that they concealed it from this
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House, but they did not communicate to your Lordships a fact of this great importance. It is in those circumstances that I venture to say that it will be difficult for us to have that confidence in the Ecclesiastical Committee which we should like to have until we feel quite certain that they do communicate to your Lordships' House all matters of importance that come before them.
LORD MUIR MACKENZIE: My Lords, it is the case that I have the honour just now to be Chairman of the Ecclesiastical Committee. I was not Chairman at the time when the particular Measure passed to which the noble Earl has referred, but I recollect that we had considerable debate upon it and that great care was taken upon the subject. Members of the Committee included very high authorities in the law, and one of them, who, I am sorry to see, is not here to-night, was the noble and learned Lord, Lord Wrenbury, who lately made a communication to the Press stating his view as to the scope of the Measures that come before the Ecclesiastical Committee. Personally I do not take so strict a view of the functions of the Committee as my noble and learned friend does, but he certainly was present, and I actually do happen to remember, though I was only an ordinary member of the Committee, that he took part in the discussion on that day. It is perhaps unnecessary to say that, because everybody who knows the noble and learned Lord knows the kind of attention he gives to any work with which he is concerned, and he has always taken very close interest in the Measures that come before the Ecclesiastical Committee.
I do not propose, because I do not think it is any duty of mine, to make any remarks in answer to what the noble Earl has said, with regard to whether that particular provision to which he refers went beyond the proper scope of the Committee's business, or whether it was a point that ought to have been mentioned in the Report. The noble Earl says that it was not mentioned in our Report. I have not looked up the Report and I take it from him that it was not mentioned. I do not think that the matter is of anything like the importance that he gives it, and I have not the least doubt that the view of the Committee was that, although it was a

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matter which concerned others besides the Church and the Church Assembly, it was not of such a kind that they, who have no power of amendment, should have thrown back the Measure altogether because it contained that provision. That is all that I think it necessary to say upon that subject.
With regard to what has been said by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Phillimore, I do not suppose there could be any objection to the Return, but as I happen, in my position with regard to the Committee, to be possessed of the information, with the assistance of the gentleman who acts as secretary of the Commission, I can give the information now. It will only take a few minutes and it will appear upon the Records of this House, and be available to anybody. It seems to me the shortest and simplest thing to be done, and I will read the memorandum which I have had prepared, which contains the specific answers to the questions of the noble and learned Lord.
The information is as follows:—The number of Measures that have been submitted by the Legislative Committee to the Ecclesiastical Committee since the passing of the Church of England Assembly (Powers) Act, 1919, is thirty. Of these Measures twenty-two have already received the Royal Assent, and two have been approved by Resolution in both Houses and are at present waiting for Royal Assent. Of the remaining six, the Bishopric of Shrewsbury Measure, 1925, was rejected owing to an adverse Resolution in the House of Lords. I think the noble and learned Lord has already stated that the views of the Ecclesiastical Committee were adopted by a large number of your Lordships though an adverse view was supported by a majority of one. The Union of Benefices and Disposal of Churches (Metropolis) Measure, 1925, was similarly rejected in the House of Commons. Four Measures—namely: the Parochial Church Councils (Further Powers) Measure, 1921, the Clergy Pensions Measure, 1923, the Interpretation Measure, 1924, and the Episcopal Incomes and Pensions Measure, 1926, were submitted by the Legislative Committee to the Ecclesiastical Committee, but after communications between the two Committees they were dropped and were not submitted to Parliament for approval.
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Of these four Measures, three—namely, the Clergy Pensions Measure, 1923, the Interpretation Measure, 1924, and the Episcopal Incomes and Pensions Measure, 1926—were afterwards re-submitted to the Ecclesiastical Committee in an amended form, and have been confirmed by Resolutions of both Houses.
LORD PHILLIMORE: After what has been said I think we have got all the information, and with the leave of the House I will withdraw my Motion.
Motion, by leave, withdrawn.

EMERGENCY REGULATIONS.
THE EARL OF BALFOUR: My Lords, I beg to move the Motion which stands in my name, That the Regulations made by His Majesty in Council under the Emergency Powers Act, 1920, by Order dated the 2nd inst., shall continue in force subject, however, to the provisions of Section 2 (4) of the said Act. If the Motion requires debate and explanation I think we had better defer that until we have dined, but if nobody desires to discuss the Motion I think we may pass it and then separate until half-past nine.
Moved, That the Regulations made by His Majesty in Council under the Emergency Powers Act, 1920, by Order dated the 2nd instant, shall continue in force, subject, however, to the provisions of Section 2 (4) of the said Act.—(The Earl of Balfour.)
[The sitting was suspended at eight o'clock and resumed at half-past nine o'clock.]

IMPORTATION OF CATTLE REGULATIONS.
LORD DANESFORT LORD DANESFORT rose to call attention to the statement made by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Agriculture in this House 21st April last, to the effect that the Minister of Agriculture was in favour of some structural improvement being made in cattle ships where cattle are carried on the upper deck, and undertook to make inquiries with the Departments

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mainly concerned to see what could be done in this direction, and to ask His Majesty's Government what steps have been taken to give effect to this undertaking.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, the way in which this matter arose was this. On April 21 of this year my noble friend Lord Lambourne called attention to the appalling sufferings which had been caused to a cargo of cattle from Canada which had been carried over to this country in a steamship called the "Manchester Producer," and it appeared from the reports which were furnished then that of 428 cattle which were on beard no less than thirty-two were washed overboard and drowned and 133 had to be thrown overboard alive and were drowned. In the course of the debate strong comments were made upon the practice of carrying animals on the upper deck with totally insufficient accommodation and it appeared that in that case large numbers of cattle were housed on the upper deck of that ship in ordinary cattle pens which were boarded on one side and had some miserable tarpaulin covering the top.
In replying for the Government my noble friend Lord Bledisloe said this:—
"It is extremely difficult, without permanent structures upon the upper deck of very different character from the coverings usually employed and those employed on this occasion, effectively to protect animals against accident under such conditions as those which prevailed in this case."
And, a little later, the noble Lord also said:—
"The Minister of Agriculture is entirely in favour of some structural improvement being made in these cattle ships where cattle are carried on the upper deck, and we realise, the importance, of this."
He went on:—
"The Department is at the present time in communication with the persons who are mainly concerned, first of all the Dominions Office and the Board of Trade, and also very particularly those who are interested in the Canadian shipping trade."
The noble Lord said he was not in a position to say anything definite then as to the result of these negotiations, but he gave a promise that those negotiations world be carried on with a view to improving the conditions under which cattle are carried in trans-Atlantic steamers—and I presume it would apply to steamers crossing the Channel as well—with a view
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to removing these sufferings. That is the state of the facts and in these circumstances I beg to ask the noble Lord what steps the Government have taken to give effect to the undertaking which he gave on that occasion.
LORD BLEDISLOE: My Lords, I am sorry that my noble friend Lord Lambourne, who raised this question in your Lordships' House in April last, is unable to be here to-night owing to illness, but I am very glad that my noble friend Lord Danesfort has given me an opportunity of telling your Lordships what, in fact, has been done in this matter. I gave a certain undertaking then on behalf of the Ministry of Agriculture which—I think your Lordships will agree when have made my short statement—has been faithfully carried out. Speaking on April 21 I said that the Minister of Agriculture was entirely in favour of some structural improvement being carried out on these ships for the benefit of these unfortunate animals which were quite unduly exposed to the weather in mid-Atlantic. I also mentioned that we were in consultation with the Board of Trade and the Dominions Office as to the best means to adopt in order to firing about the desired improvement. Unfortunately the discussion with these other Departments has been prolonged and has revealed quite considerable difficulties in arriving at a thoroughly satisfactory method of protecting the animals on the upper decks of the existing vessels.
In the meantime, however, feeling that winter was once more upon us with all the risks it involved to animals crossing the seas, the Ministry considered it essential in order to allay possible public anxiety to issue an Order, which they did on November 5, prohibiting the carriage of animals on the weather deck of any vessel of what is described as the flush or spar deck type. By "the flush or spar clock type" I mean vessels with a forecastle and without a poop: that is to say, there would be practically a flat surface which could be washed by the waves. This Order was to operate as from November 8 to March 31. It is an interim Order and it has been issued. The Order affects eleven vessels only out of a total of forty engaged in the trans-Atlantic trade. In the meantime progress is being made in arriving at a satisfactory solution of this general

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question of the carriage of animals without cruelty on the upper deck and it is expected that the new Regulations will be ready for issue before March 31.
My noble friend incidentally mentioned the carriage of animals across the Channel, by which I presume he means St. George's Channel, coming from Ireland. The proposals that I have mentioned refer, of course, only to the trans-Atlantic trade. The position regarding the Irish cattle trade is analogous, but involves a very much larger number of vessels. The vessels carrying cattle from Ireland, although the voyage is shorter, are undoubtedly at times exposed to equally rough weather and consequently the cattle to equal risk. To show the dimensions of this trade from Ireland, I may say that the annual shipping of animals from Ireland to our shores amounts at present to about 1,000,000 cattle—as compared with 100,000 all told from Canada—and half a million sheep and half a million pigs; so it is quite a considerable trade as the noble Lord will see. The Ministry, therefore, have been engaged for some time past in drawing up revised Regulations applying to the Irish trade, and have done so in consultation with the Board of Trade and with the two Irish Governments, all of whom have quite fully concurred in the action which the Ministry proposes to take. The result of these deliberations is to lay it down as one of the basic principles that no animal shall henceforward be carried on the forward part of the open main deck during the winter months and that sheep only should be allowed to be carried on the bridge and the sheltered decks during the winter.
The Ministry also proposes to lay down a definite specification for the fittings on every vessel constructed or fitted for animals for the first time after the date of the new Order. There are certain other improvements which it is proposed to make, which include better ventilation and light, more stringent provisions regarding the tying of cattle and the provision that every vessel must carry an experienced cattle foreman, which, if your Lordships remember, we found was not the case in the "Manchester Producer," as well as a sufficient number of additional attendants. It will also be laid down that vessels must carry a humane killer, the beating of animals with sticks during embarkation and debarkation
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will be prohibited and the use of a goad of a pattern approved by the Ministry will be substituted.
The Ministry is just now discussing all these matters with the shipping companies concerned, and it is hoped that as a result every practicable means will be taken to protect the animals from avoidable suffering with no undue cost to the shipping companies. But I should like to take this opportunity of making an appeal to the shipping companies to help the Ministry in ensuring that no avoidable suffering is caused to animals during the sea voyage, whether it be across the Atlantic or even across the St. George's Channel, where the shipments are much more considerable than they are from Canada. I hope that statement will prove satisfactory to my noble friend and your Lordships.
LORD DANESFORT: I am much obliged to the noble Lord for his reply.

SMALL HOLDINGS AND ALLOTMENTS BILL.
Order of the Day for the House to be put into Committee read.
Moved, That the House do now resolve itself into Committee.—(Lord Bledisloe.)
House in Committee accordingly:
[The EARL OF DONOUGHMORE in the Chair.]
Clause 1 agreed to.
Clause 2:
Power of Minister to contribute towards losses.
2.—(1) Where it appears to a county council that the provision of any small holdings will entail a loss, the council shall submit their proposals to the Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries (hereinafter referred to as the Minister), together with estimates in the prescribed form of the expenses (whether on capital or income account) in relation thereto likely to be incurred by the council and of the sums likely to be received by the council either by way of rent or purchase money or otherwise.
(4) The Minister may, subject to the approval of the Treasury, make Regulations for carrying this section into effect:
Provided that every Regulation so made shall be laid before both Houses of Parliament as soon as may be after it is made, and if an address is presented by either

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House within twenty-one days during which that House has sat next, after any Regulation is laid before it praying that the Regulation may be annulled, His Majesty in Council may annul the Regulation without prejudice to the validity of anything previously done thereunder.
LORD STRACHIE LORD STRACHIE moved, after subsection (1), to insert the following proviso:—
"Provided that this subsection shall not be deemed to impose upon county councils any obligation to provide small holdings where a loss would be entailed."
The noble Lord said: On the Second Reading of this Bill I explained the Amendment that I intended to move in order that the noble Lord might be in a position when we came to the Committee stage to give reasons against it. I then stated that I had been told by a very high legal authority that there was a great deal of doubt whether county councils would be under an obligation to provide small holdings where a loss would be entailed. If the noble Lord assures me that that is not the case and that he has taken higher legal authority than mine, I shall be content. The Parliamentary Secretary, no doubt, can give a legal opinion on this question and I will therefore ask him if he will do that. He knows my point.
I explained that I thought it was very possible, unless the proviso which I have put on the Paper was inserted, that it might be that a future Minister—I do not say the present Minister, but some Labour Minister, for instance, and we are told that within the next three years we shall have a Labour Government—might interpret this Bill as giving him a right to say that county councils must introduce schemes and lay them before the Ministry, although they would incur a loss. I beg to move—
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 4, at end insert the said proviso—(Lord Strachie.)
LORD CLINTON: I should like to ask a question which is germane to this Amendment. This clause provides for a case where the county council, having estimated for a loss on the scheme, submit their proposals to the Minister. If he approves then certain grants may be made out of public funds to meet that loss. So far as I can understand there is no intimation in the Bill as to
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what happens if there is not a loss. Can the county council then go on with the scheme at their own risk or must the scheme drop? There are several instances later in which it is stated what is to happen without the consent of the Minister. That may of course only apply to cases where the consent of the Minister is not required, but it seems to me that it may also apply to a case where the consent of the Minister has been asked for and has not been given. I do not know whether the question has been raised before, bet I think it would clear up matters if the noble Lord had at his command the information to enable him to answer that question.
LORD BLEDISLOE: I will first take the point put to me by my noble friend Lord Clinton. I think the simple answer is this. A council cannot go on at its own risk if it fails to receive the imprimatur of the Minister, and for a reason which is made perfectly clear, I think, in the second paragraph of Clause 4. If my noble friend will read the proviso he will see that it says:
"….the county council shall not acquire land for such purpose as aforesaid without the consent of the Minister unless the council are satisfied that the transaction will not involve any loss to the council."
So the noble Lord will see that the council is tied in the matter of the acquisition of land in any case in which the Minister has turned down the original application.
As regards the Amendment of my noble friend Lord Strachie, I must confess to him that with such legal training as I may myself possess and with the assistance of considerable and expert legal opinion from outside, I have most carefully studied this Amendment, and I am just as much at a loss to-day as I was yesterday to understand what the noble Lord desires to be effected by his Amendment. So far as I can see the Amendment really dims nothing that the Bill does not already do. If the noble Lord will carefully study Clause 1 he will notice that them is a definite duty thereby laid upon a county council to provide small holdings if they are of opinion that they can do so without incurring loss, and then the clause goes on to say:
"and, subject to the provisions of this part of this Act.…"

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which, of course, means Clause 2 and that part of Clause 4 which I have just read—
"it shall be lawful for them.…"
it is not mandatory, it is permissive…
"to do so notwithstanding that it appears to them that a loss may thereby be incurred."
It is, therefore, quite obvious that there is no compulsion upon any county council to provide small holdings at a loss to themselves or their ratepayers.
Then, as I have already pointed out in answer to my noble friend Lord Clinton, the proviso in Clause 4 makes it perfectly clear that an attempt by a county council to acquire land if a loss is to be incurred, without the consent of the Minister, will have the result of preventing any public contribution being made, and in fact would land the council in the long run in the risk of having a mandamus executed against it. The whole point, if it requires repetition, is that no obligation whatever is imposed by the Bill upon county councils to provide small holdings at a loss, and I venture to submit to your Lordships' House that that is perfectly clear from the text of the Bill.
LORD OLIVIER: I desire to say that, having read the Bill as one might who had the desire to use the Bill with the utmost lack of scruple in the public interest, I examined the clause to see whether there was any possibility that any kind of limitation would be imposed by the Amendment of the noble Lord. I cannot see that the Amendment adds anything to the Bill. Consequently I am prepared to support the Government in opposing it.
LORD STRACHIE: After what has been said by the noble Lord in charge of the Bill I cannot press my Amendment and I ask leave to withdraw.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
LORD STRACHIE LORD STRACHIE moved, in the proviso in subsection (4), to omit all words after "Provided that every regulation so made," and to insert:
"shall be laid before Parliament as soon as may be after it is made, and if either House of Parliament, within the next subsequent twenty-one days on which that House has sat next after the Regulation is laid before them, presents an address to His Majesty praying that the Regulation or any part of it may be annulled, it shall thenceforth be void but without prejudice
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to the validity of anything previously done thereunder or to the making of new Regulations."
The noble Lord said: This is an Amendment which I also indicated on Second Reading that I should move on the ground that it has been the custom of the House for a great many years. Owing to the large number of Regulations and Orders now laid upon the Table of the House, instead of having them set out in Acts of Parliament, it is a safeguard that both Houses may have the right to express their opinion whether these Orders should have the effect of law or not. In this particular case I am simply following the precedent of another Bill which has left your Lordships' House and gone to another place, but I understand that the Parliamentary Secretary of the Ministry of Agriculture is going to say this is a perfectly different matter.
He is going to plead the point of privilege, and to suggest that, if we put this Amendment into the Bill, we shall be interfering with the rights of the House of Commons. I hope that he will be able to tell us against what Standing Order of the House of Commons we shall be transgressing. The Parliament Act certainly does not account for it. I am interested to find a member of a Conservative Government trying to restrict the powers of the House of Lords. Generally speaking, the Party to which I belong is accused of taking that course. I am surprised to find the noble Lord objecting to this Amendment, which gives this House the same power over the Regulation as that possessed by the House of Commons, and, if he is going to suggest that his objection is based on the fact that this is a financial matter, I should like him to tell us under what Standing Order of the House of Commons it would come.
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 39, leave out from ("made") to end of line 4 on page 3, and insert the said words.—(Lord Strachie.)
LORD BLEDISLOE: I am bound to say that I have had every sympathy with the alternative form, if may so call it, which the noble Lord has suggested to me on more than one occasion, and I have adopted it, I think, in two other Bills during the last two Sessions. But the purport of this Amendment, if I understand

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it aright, is that no discretion should be left to the Government, but that the Regulations should become ipso facto void after being laid before the two Houses.
LORD STRACHIE: That is not quite right, if the noble Lord will excuse me. They become void if either House objects to them, but not merely by being laid.
LORD BLEDISLOE: I beg the noble Lord's pardon. I meant to add: "if either House objects." I have consulted experts on this subject—I do not speak as an expert myself—and I understand that, desirable though the noble Lord's form of 'Words would be in most cases, there is in this case the technical objection that the Regulations under this particular clause deal with financial matters only, and it is suggested to me that you cannot properly vest in the House of Lords an absolute right to annul them. Your Lordships will see that under this Amendment either House of Parliament—not both Houses of Parliament acting together—would have the right to object to the Regulations, and in consequence they would become null and void. I am advised that this would be contrary to the privileges of another place, and would undoubtedly be objected to there. I hone that in the circumstances the noble Lord will be good enough to withdraw his Amendment.
EARL BEAUCHAMP: The noble Lord who has just sat down will, I hope, allow me to point out to him that he has not explained under which regulation it is that the Amendment proposed by my noble friend is a violation of the traditional regulations of this House with regard to finance. This is obviously a difficult point that none of us would wish to settle at once and, if it were generally agreeable, I think it might be brought up again on Report. I am bound to say that it looks to me as if it were stretching the privileges of the House of Commons to the most extreme point to say that, in regard to an Address to His Majesty the King, your Lordships' House should not be allowed to proceed. Certainly, as my noble friend said, there is nothing to be found within the limits of the Parliament Act which would prevent, it.
I have just looked at the famous Resolution of the House of Commons in 1678 and I am bound to say that I really
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do not see under which clause of that it can be brought in. I do not, however, want to make an argument of it now, but with the consent of the House we might adjourn this matter until the Report stage, and then consider whether anything can be done. As the noble Lord apparently wants to reduce the privileges of your Lordships' House perhaps he might agree to the House of Commons being given this power. I repeat that I do not want to argue the matter now, and I suggest that the noble Lord should allow the matter to be put off to the Report stage, which would give us an opportunity of seeing whether this does infringe the general financial regulation.
LORD BLEDISLOE: I am sorry that have not made myself clear on one point. I have no desire to reduce the privileges of your Lordship' House. I think I said that I have been very anxious to accept this Amendment, but in face of expert opinion I have found it difficult to do so. I would like to draw the noble Earl's attention to one point. He will notice from the marginal note of this clause on page 1 that this clause relates solely to the "Power of Minister to contribute towards losses." Then he will notice that subsection (4), which deals with this matter of Regulations, says:—
"The Minister may, subject to the approval of the Treasury, make Regulations for carrying this section into effect."
The section admittedly deals only with the power of the Minister to make contributions towards losses. I cannot, however, resist the appeal of the noble Earl, particularly as there is a possibility of reducing the already scanty privileges of this House, and I certainly accept his suggestion that the matter should be reconsidered before Report.
LORD STRACHIE: I will in the circumstances ask leave to withdraw my Amendment.
Amendment by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 2 agreed to.
Clause 3 agreed to.
Clause 4 [Power to acquire land for small holdings]:
LORD CLINTON LORD CLINTON moved to insert at the end of the clause:—
"Provided further that where any land acquired for small holdings has not within

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two years thereafter been used or prepared for that purpose, the land shall be offered to the person from whom it was acquired or his successor in title at the price at which it was acquired by the county council; and where a portion only of the land has not been so used or prepared, that portion shall be offered to such person at the proportionate price paid by the council for the land acquired from that person or at his option, and in default of agreement at a price to be determined by arbitration."
The noble Lord said: The object of this Amendment is to restore to owners of land sold to county councils for small holding purposes the rights of preemption, given to them under the Act of 1908 and withdrawn under the Act of 1919. The Act of 1908 lays down that where a county council, having acquired land for small holdings, desires afterward to sell it at any time before buildings are erected or works entered upon, the provisions of the Lands Clauses Act, giving the original owner of the land or his successors in title a right of preemption, will apply. The position, I think, is a very plain one. An owner sells land to the county council for a certain purpose—namely, small holdings. That is the purpose for which the county council buys the land, but there may be, and have been, very many cases where a county council has endeavoured without success to dispose of the whole or part of the land and has put up the remainder for sale. It may sell to a speculative builder, which may be a great detriment to the locality or to the original owner's remaining estate, and we think it is fair before that is done that a chance should be given to the original owner who, finding that the land is not sold for the purpose for which he parted with it, should be able to get it back at something like the original price.
In my Amendment I have suggested, first of all, that he should be allowed to repurchase it at the proportionate price per acre, but obviously it will very frequently be impossible that he should buy at that price because the part of the land which the council have not been able to dispose of will generally be the worst part, and, of course, will be worth less per acre. In those circumstances it seems reasonable that the owner should be allowed to have a price fixed, not according to proportionate value, but according to the view of an arbitrator, of course appointed jointly by the
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parties. I have limited the time in which this pre-emption may be allowed to take place to two years. I think that is probably sufficient time, but I am not very particular about the period, only I must have a limit to avoid this right of pre-emption interfering with Clause 8 of this Bill.
I think it would be unfair to give an owner a right there because that clause deals with cases where a small holder to whom land has been sold has for some cause or another failed; the county council will then resume possession, and will pay over to the small holder the result of the sale, if the county council sells. Obviously the county council in the interests of the small holder must have the full right to sell at the highest price in those cases, and I do not want at all to interfere with that; but I think that in the case which I have originally stated, where within the course of a year or two it has become clear that the county council do not require the land for the purpose for which they have bought it, the original owner should have the right of pre-emption.
Amendment moved—
Page 4, line 12, at end insert the said proviso.—(Lord Clinton.)
LORD BLEDISLOE: My Lords, this proviso purports to deal with land acquired for small holdings, whether sold voluntarily or obtained compulsorily. I imagine that my noble friend, in suggesting this Amendment, has in mind the Land Clauses Act of 1845.
LORD CLINTON: As applied to the Act of 1908.
LORD BLEDISLOE: As applied to the Act of 1908. That Act required that if land was taken compulsorily, and it was subsequently found that the whole, or part of it, was not required for the purpose for which it had been taken, the part not required should be offered by the local authority, first to the person from whom it was taken or his heirs title, and subsequently to other owners in the neighbourhood. It will be seen that the provisions of the 1845 Act were very much the same as the suggestion contained in the Amendment moved hl my noble friend, except that his Amendment

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goes further than the 1845 Act, and extends the arrangement to all land, even if it has been sold voluntarily by the owner.
The provisions of the Land Clauses Act of 1845 were found in practice to be so hampering that the requirement was repealed on the deliberate judgment of Parliament. They were repealed at as recent a date as 1919 by the Land Settlement (Facilities) Act. It is impossible at this date to go back on the decision on a matter of principle which was then arrived at. After all, when an owner sells land, whether voluntarily or compulsorily, he receives the full value of such land, together with compensation for severance. There is no reason, therefore, why he should be given some special pre-emption in the event of the council selling such land because it is surplus to their requirements. The normal course in such cases is for the council to sell land by auction, and the original owner, if he desires to re-purchase, can attend the auction and bid for it. In this way all question as to price and the necessity of employing an arbitrator is avoided. It is for these reasons that I do not find it possible to accept this Amendment of my noble friend.
LORD CLINTON: I do not want to press the argument really upon this question, but my noble friend laid considerable stress upon the fact that in my Amendment I dealt with voluntary sale while in the original Act it was always sale on compulsion. I did that for what believe to be a perfectly good reason—that I do not want, supposing the Amendment was agreed to, any idea of this kind to make owners always resort to compulsion. It does not seem to me to matter very much whether you sell voluntarily or compulsorily; the land is sold and it is bought for a definite purpose, that of small holdings, and if it is used for any other purpose I do not see why the original owner should not have a chance of buying it again. I shall not press this Amendment because I feel as strongly as your Lordships do that those who have successfully got rid of their land are not very keen on buying it back again.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 4 agreed to.
Clause 5 agreed to.
Clause 6:
Conditions affecting small holdings.
6.—(1) A small holding sold by a county council under this Act, shall for a term of forty years from the date of the sale, and thereafter so long as the holding remains charged with the terminable annuity, be held subject to the following conditions:—
(c) The holding shall be cultivated by the owner or occupier as the case may be, in accordance with the rules of good husbandry as defined in the Agricultural Holdings Act, 1923, and shall not be used for any purpose other than agriculture:
(4) A small holding let by a county council shall be held subject to the conditions on which it would under this section be held if it were sold, except; so far as those conditions relate to the terminable annuity and to repairs and insurance against fire; and, if any such condition or any term of the letting is broken, the council may, after giving the tenant an opportunity of remedying the breach (if it is capable of remedy), determine the tenancy.
THE DUKE OF MONTROSE THE DUKE OF MONTROSE moved a manuscript. Amendment to leave out, in paragraph (c) of subsection (1), all words after "1923." The noble Duke said: I rise to move an Amendment of which I have given private notice and which has the object of leaving out all the words after "1923" to the end of paragraph (c); that is to say, it seeks to remove the restriction on the small holder who has bought or leased his holding from utilising it for any other purpose besides agriculture for forty years. The clause as it stands will prevent a small holder from going in for any side lines for forty years after he has completed his negotiations for the holding.
I have lived for thirty years surrounded by small holdings and I know it is exceptionally difficult for any small holder to make a living if he is confined strictly to agriculture. In fact, in the case of all the successful small holdings I know of the small holders have gone in for side lines. The principle is recognised by the Forestry Commission, who plant their forests adjacent to small holdings, if possible, so that small holders may find additional work and additional remuneration at such times as they are not following agriculture open their holdings. I think it is a mistake to restrict the small holder to what is called agriculture. It is difficult to know what agriculture is.

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It is not defined in this Act, nor is defined in the Agricultural Holdings Act of 1923. The dictionary says that agriculture is husbandry and that husbandry is agriculture.
The Inland Revenue authorities have decided that poultry farming is not agriculture, and that decision has been upheld in the Courts. It has been held that tomato growing is not agriculture and that willow growing for basket-making is not agriculture. It has been held also that a blacksmith who took a small holding and engaged in smith's work was not occupying a small holding for agricultural purposes. Yet all those are perfectly legitimate side lines suitable for small holders in a rural district. My object in moving this Amendment is to allow small holders to have freedom to indulge in all sorts of side lines that are legitimate to rural occupations. I think we should be pleased to do that because by giving the small holder an additional side line whereby he can snake extra money the county council are really increasing their security for the money which they have advanced to the small holder. In order, therefore, to give more freedom and to strengthen the financial position of the county council I beg to move the Amendment.
Amendment moved—
Page 5, lines 11 to 13, leave out ("and shall not be used for any purpose other than agriculture")—(The Duke of Montrose.)
LORD BLEDISLOE: I was not quite sure when the noble Duke rose to move his Amendment exactly what interpretation he himself was going to put upon the word "agriculture" and in the course of his remarks I began to wonder whether agriculture had a more restricted meaning north of the Border than it has south of it. But what I can assure the noble Duke of quite clearly is this, whatever may be the interpretation of agriculture under the Inland Revenue law—and apparently, according to him, it would cut out such occupations as poultry farming and tomato growing—for the purposes of this Act there is no doubt whatever that agriculture as defined in the principal Act, the Small Holdings and Allotments Act, 1908, would include those particular enterprises. The definition is as follows:
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"The expressions 'agriculture' and 'cultivation' shall include horticulture—"
that would cover the tomatoes—
"and the use of land for any purposes of husbandry, inclusive of the keeping or breeding of live stock, poultry or bees, and the growth of fruit, vegetables and the like—"
the like being, I suppose, a general term to include everything ejusdem generis, what might be described as ordinary rural pursuits in the nature of husbandry.
I think your Lordships will probably agree that a Small Holdings and Allotments Act ought to relate at any rate to the processes of agriculture and ought not to extend to various industries of a more urban character. I hope that this will meet the noble Duke. I can assure him that agriculture as defined in the principal Act will cover the two occupations he mentioned. This Bill provides for the first time for the provision of what are called cottage holdings, and it is expressly laid down in the Bill that these cottage holdings shall be available, not merely for persons engaged in agriculture, but for persons engaged in ancillary pursuits. Undoubtedly those pursuits the noble Duke has referred to would be ancillary to agriculture.
LORD DANESFORT: May I ask whether the keeping of poultry or bees would be in accordance with the first part of subsection (c) where it says, "the holding shall be cultivated by the owner or occupier.… in accordance with the rules of good husbandry."
LORD BLEDISLOE: I can only assure my noble friend that I have kept both bees and poultry and have never yet been accused of bad husbandry in consequence.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
LORD CLINTON LORD CLINTON moved, at the end of the clause, to insert:—
"Provided that where the tenant of a small holding let by a county council acquires the tenancy of additional land without the previous consent of the council so that he holds more land than comes within the definition of a small holding, his tenancy of the small holding let to him by the county council shall be thereby determined without the giving of any notice to quit."
The noble Lord said: This is an Amendment which has been suggested by the County of Devon and is, I expect, applicable

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to a good many other counties. There have been in Devon quite a considerable number of instances where a statutory small holder has done well, who has been able to take additional land and not infrequently a whole additional farm. The County Council of that County object on the ground that if a man is able to take an additional farm with his own capital he ought to give up his existing small holding and leave it to other applicants who may be approved for the purpose.
Now, to show how the matter is worked, I would like to give your Lordships a couple of instances in a letter from the surveyor to a small holdings committee in Devon. He writes:
"I have, a case in mind at present where a tenant has 19 acres of ours—"
that is of the County Council's—
"and is, in addition to our land, farming 100 acres. Our only method of obtaining possession of the 19 acres is to serve notice, and pay compensation for disturbance, ender Section 12 of the Agricultural Holdings Act, 1923, of a sum approximately £40, a thing we cannot afford to do."
I have another case which only cropped up a day or two ago. A man came to me and offered for a small farm a rent of about £90 a year. He was in every respect a suitable tenant that anybody would like to accept, but he was in addition a holder of 30 acres or so under the County Council. I was perfectly willing to accept him, but I said in the first instance that in fairness to other people he ought to give up the county council land. I believe that is the right practice. I do not believe it is wise in this country to add farm to farm if it can be avoided, although it is very often very greatly in the interest of the landowner to do so. But I regard it as a bad system of estate management. It is very unpopular in the locality to do so and it is quite contrary to the real object of the Small Holdings Act, which is to get on the land as many occupiers as possible.
There is, of course I recognise, an answer which may readily be given to my Amendment and that is that when a man really has done well with a holding when he has got his footing on the first rung of the ladder—and many, thanks to the Small Holdings Act, have done so—it may be a very great hardship to prevent him rising further. But I do not think that is a real reply to the whole
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question. He has been able frequently—he would be in that position under this Bill at all events—by State assistance to make his start. He has done well enough to take advantage of that start and he has actually been able to acquire another place. In fairness, ought he to be allowed to take that place and at the same time occupy the original statutory small holding which may prevent some other approved applicant making his start also? That is the case which the County of Devon puts forward and I should like to hear from my noble friend what is the view of the Department on that particular matter.
Amendment moved—
Page 6, line 29, at end insert the said proviso.—(Lord Clinton.)
LORD BLEDISLOE: The inevitable result of the acceptance of this Amendment would be to deny to the statutory small holder compensation under the Agricultural Holdings Act which every other agricultural occupier is entitled to in this country. I am going to appeal to my noble friend not to press an Amendment which would really dig a very big hole in the much debated question of what is called security of tenure and ample compensation to a dispossessed tenant. I am inclined to think myself that there is a great deal to be said in favour of the ambitious small holder who, starting with a holding of 40 or 50 acres, finds it possible, by taking some land outside his statutory holding, to develop his business and gradually become a farmer on a larger scale. That is the sort of enterprising person of whom we should like to see a great deal more in this country. But, if any county council desires to dispossess such a person, they are perfectly entitled to give him notice in the ordinary way, just as any landowner can give notice to his tenant. The Agricultural Holdings Acts would operate, and compensation amounting to at least twelve months gross rent would come to be payable to the present possessor.
I would suggest to your Lordships that it would be rather a large order to alter by a side wind the existing law relating to existing holdings, the law of landlord and tenant, in order to put a statutory occupier in a less favourable position than a non-statutory agricultural tenant. This was a matter about which the Minister

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had some doubt in his mind when it was brought to his notice some months ago, and he referred it to the County Councils Association. That body, after a very full and careful deliberation, came to the conclusion that, although there were a few cases, particularly of the kind mentioned by Lord Clinton, their number was not sufficient to justify the Association in asking for so important an alteration to be made in the existing law of landlord and tenant. I hope that in those circumstances my noble friend will not press his Amendment.
LORD CLINTON: I am not going to admit for a moment that the noble Lord has the best of the argument, but I will not press my Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 6 agreed to.
Clauses 7 and 8 agreed to.
Clause 9 [Delegation of powers to councils of boroughs or urban or rural districts]:
LORD STRACHIE LORD STRACHIE had given Notice to move, immediately before the proviso, to leave out the words "in the execution of the Public Health Acts." The noble Lord said: On the Second Reading I asked the noble Lord if he would look into this matter. It did not seem to me to be fair that, when there was a loss in providing these holdings through an urban district council, three-quarters of that loss should fall on the house property in its area, as would be the case under the Public Health Acts. I have been reminded, however, that this case will fall under the Rating and Valuation Act, 1925, which comes into force on April 1 next, and the unfairness and injustice will be removed. Accordingly I do not move this Amendment but I thought it better to explain my reasons for not doing so.
Clause 9 agreed to.
Clauses 10 and 11 agreed to.
THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIRE THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIRE moved to insert the following new clause after Clause 11:—
Power of Minister on complaint to enforce exercise of powers.
".—(1) Where a complaint is made to the Minister (by any person or persons in respect of whom a county council have failed to provide a small holding) that the county council in question have failed to exercise their powers under the provisions of this Part of this Act (in a case or cases
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where those powers ought to have been exercised) the Minister may cause a public local inquiry to be held.
(2) If after holding such an inquiry the Minister is satisfied that there has been such a failure on the part of the county council, the Minister may declare the council to be in default and may make an Order directing the council to do such things as may be mentioned in the Order for the purpose of remedying the default.
(3) An Order made by the Minister under this section shall be laid before both Houses of Parliament as soon as may be alter it is made.
(4) An Order made by the Minister under this section shall be enforced by mandamus.
The noble Marquess said: The noble Lord, Lord Bledisloe, has been so cordial and generous in meeting us that I venture very respectfully to make to him the proposal contained in this Amendment. We attribute a great deal of importance to it, because it brings the Bill back into its original shape, and I think your Lordships will admit on consideration that there is a great deal to be said for it. What does this Amendment ask you to do? When a complaint has been made about the action of a county council—it may have been right or wrong—it is referred to the Minister, who may order an inquiry to be made and, if he is then satisfied that the county council have not done the best that they could, he has the right if he thinks fit to declare that the county council is in default.
I earnestly wish to say that we do not bring any charge against the county councils in any shape or form. Some of the county councils have done marvellously well. As I think Lord Clinton said, the county councils in some parts of England are the largest owners of land in the counties, and they have done their duty in Cambridgeshire, Devonshire, Somersetshire, Norfolk and other counties most nobly and well. Some of them, however, have not been as active in getting land for the men as others, and therefore we ask permission to be able to ride some of these county councils in spurs. Spurs are a very good finish to a cavalryman or hunting man, if properly put on, but they are not necessary to use except in certain circumstances. Nobody would think of using spurs to any of the horses which your Lordships are accustomed to ride in the hunting field, but there are such things as slugs, to which the effective application of the spur has an extremely good result.
The House might reasonably ask which are the county councils to which we wish to apply the spur. That is a perfectly fair question to ask, but we are rather in a hurry at this time of the year, and as the Second Reading of the Bill was as recent as Monday last, and this is only Wednesday, I really have not had time to be in a position to supply your Lordships with that information. There is, however, one instance which recalls itself to my mind. It occurred when I was in office, and was in connection with hospital land in a certain county which need not name. The hospital trustees refused to allow their land to be taken, although it was proper land for small holdings. The matter was referred to me as the Minister, and I at once said that the law must be put in force. The result was that the chairman of the hospital, who was the Lord Lieutenant of the county, being a prudent man, said: "The game is up; they insist upon taking the land." We got the land. The House knows that there is no desire to press this Amendment in any vindictive spirit. We look upon the county councils as our friends, and yon never know when you may want your friends. It is a small point which is in question, but it is of great importance for the protection of the men with whom, I am sure, your Lordships have so much sympathy.
Amendment moved—
Page 9, line 4, at end insert the said new clause.—(The Marquess of Lincolnshire.)
LORD BLEDISLOE: I do not know whether your Lordships have perused this Amendment, but it is to this effect, that where a complaint is made to the Minister by any person—it does not matter how unreasonable, how tiresome, how mad or otherwise abnormal he may be—to the effect that a county council has in his judgment failed to provide a small holding—and I think a good many people who are denied would entertain that feeling—he can cause the Minister to hold a public inquiry with all this resultant expense.
THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIRE THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIRE dissented.
LORD BLEDISLOE: Well I will read it in full:
"(1) Where a complaint is made to the Minister (by any persons in respect of whom a county council have failed
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to provide a small holding) that the county council in question have failed to exercise their powers under the provisions of this Part of this Act (in a case or cases where those powers ought to have been exercised) the Minister may cause a public local inquiry to be held.
(2) If after holding such an inquiry the Minister is satisfied that there has been such a failure on the part of the county council, the Minister may declare the council to be in default and may make an Order directing the council to do such things as may be mentioned in the Order for the purpose of remedying the default.
(3) An Order made by the Minister under this section shall be laid before both Houses of Parliament as soon as may be after it is made.
(4) An Order made by the Minister under this section shall be enforced by mandamus."
Quite frankly I hesitate to refuse any appeal made by the noble Marquess, to whom the country owes so much in the matter of small holdings, but a good deal of water has flowed under the bridges since he entered upon his small holdings campaign eighteen years or more ago, and we do feel that the time has arrived when there is no serious complaint about county councils failing to provide small holdings within the area to the best of their capacity. That being so, we think that the spur which he has advocated, culminating eventually in the drastic process on mandamus, is not the best way to maintain the friendship between the Ministry and the county councils which the noble Marquess desires. We do not dig spurs into our friends. The county councils have been friendly to the Ministry and the Ministry have been friendly to the county councils.
At the outset, when this was largely a political question, there may have been some powers vested in the Minister in order to impel reluctant county councils to do their statutory duty, but there is no such necessity for it now. Small holdings are no longer a question of controversy, but are accepted as a necessary part of the duty of county councils by all Parties in the State. I cannot believe that it is either wise or necessary to threaten councils with default powers. In other matters the Ministry has found that the offer of a financial partnership is at least as effective as the use of "ginger."
Let me illustrate what I mean by I mean by grants made in connection with agricultural

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education. Two-thirds of the whole of the work in that sphere, which is carried out by county councils, is paid for by the State through the Ministry of Agriculture. There has never been any necessity to apply the spur. The financial inducement was quite sufficient, and we feel that similarly, nowadays at any rate, in regard to small holdings the spur is not required and if it was applied might have an exactly contrary effect to that which the noble Marquess anticipated.
EARL BEAUCHAMP: The noble Lord will forgive me when I say that he is neither fair nor accurate regarding this Amendment. He spoke of it as if a complaint from a mad correspondent forced the Minister immediately to hold a public inquiry and that after that inquiry there were various processes which would culminate in a mandamus. There is nothing of the sort in the Amendment.
LORD BLEDISLOE: I read it out.
EARL BEAUCHAMP: The noble Lord read it out, but took good care not to lay emphasis on the important point. If he will kindly look at it he will see what it does. Perhaps he will let me read it. I will not trouble your Lordships with the whole of it; I will content myself with the last sentence of subsection (1). The noble Lord tried to induce your Lordships to believe that a mad person sending an application to the Minister forced the Minister to hold an inquiry. Will the noble Lord give attention, perhaps for the first time, to the last sentence of that subsection—
".…the Minister may cause a public local inquiry to be held."
It does not force the Minister to do it; it only gives him power to do it. And I say it is perfectly ridiculous to suggest to your Lordships' House that in those circumstances a mad person forces the Minister to hold an inquiry. There is nothing of the kind. All that is suggested is that the Minister shall have the power to do it if he thinks fit. And I am sure that nobody is more likely to exercise that authority fittingly than the noble Lord himself if an application is made.
I realise that the exact wording of the Amendment might not be entirely correct and any suggestion which would remove
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the fears of the noble Lord regarding a mad person or someone without judgment making application to the Minister we would willingly consider. But I do not think it is fair to suggest to your Lordships' House that it is a necessary consequence of the adoption of this Amendment that the Minister would be forced to hold a public inquiry. My noble friend Lord Lincolnshire took great care to prevent the Minister being forced to do this, and I should have thought that the noble Lord in charge of the Bill might have found some other argument against the Amendment than that the Minister would be forced to do it. The noble Marquess is not seeking to place upon the Ministry any public burden beyond what it can bear, and if the Ministry does not think fit to exercise the proposed power, it need not do it.
I should have thought that the noble Lord would have been only too glad to accept an Amendment which would give the Ministry more power than it has already and enable the Bill to be properly carried out. It is quite likely that the noble Lord will see that some Amendments are necessary, and perhaps my noble friend might be willing to withdraw his Amendment now and bring it up again on the Report stage in order to consult with the noble Lord in the meantime as to whether it is necessary to give any further latitude, because we are anxious to give him as much latitude as is necessary to deal adequately with this matter.
LORD BLEDISLOE: I am prepared to stand in a white sheet in face of the stern rebuke which has been I have no doubt quite properly administered to me. If I used words of exaggeration in explaining the first paragraph of the Amendment of the noble Marquess I was immediately checked by the noble Marquess and I offered to read out the whole of the subsection so that it would speak for itself. I do not desire to put the case any stronger, in view especially of the criticism he has quite properly addressed to me, than to suggest that it is the case that any person—as the noble Marquess put it rightly or wrongly—can initiate the procedure which is contemplated by this Amendment. But my main argument remains exactly as it was. Whether I put too much stress upon this particular individual's initiative or not we do not consider that these

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drastic powers are any longer necessary. They may only tend to cause friction in the working of the small holdings, which is now most peaceful, thoroughly progressive and very efficient. I hope the House will not show any real sympathy with such an Amendment because I am quite sure it will not advance the cause of small holdings in this country.
THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIRE: On consideration perhaps I might leave it open. I will think it over and see if I can bring forward words which it may be possible for the noble Lord to accept on Report.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIRE THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIRE moved, after Clause 11, to insert the following new clause:—
Appointment of Small Holdings Commissioners.
.—(1) With a view to extending the provision of small holdings there shall continue to be Small Holdings Commissioners (hereinafter referred to as 'the Commissioners'), and the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries (hereinafter referred to as 'the Ministry') may appoint two or more persons possessed of a knowledge of agriculture to be Commissioners, and may appoint such other officers for the purposes of this Act as the Ministry may, with the consent of the Treasury, determine.
(2) There shall continue to be paid out of money provided by Parliament to the Commissioners and officers so appointed such salaries or remuneration as the Treasury may from time to time determine, and all expenses incurred by those Commissioners and officers in the execution of their duties under this Act, to such amount as may be sanctioned by the Treasury, shall (except as otherwise expressly provided by this Act) continue to be defrayed out of money provided by Parliament."
The noble Marquess said: I need not detain your Lordships upon this. You all know what the Commissioners were and what good work they have done. They were not only of great assistance to the men that we wished to put on the land, but to the county councils themselves and especially to the Minister. They used to meet on the first Tuesday of each month and report what was done during the month, and that kept the whole thing alive. Without doing anything antagonistic to the county councils or any one else, they did very good work and gave great satisfaction to the men, who looked upon them as a protection. I suppose, however, after the reception
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of my first Amendment there is not much chance of my noble friend accepting this one. I will content myself by merely moving it.
Amendment moved—
After Clause 11, insert the said new clause.—(The Marquess of Lincolnshire.)
LORD BLEDISLOE: I very much regret that I find it impossible to accept this Amendment, as the noble Marquess anticipated. I rather fail to see what particular virtue there is in making use of officers who are described as Small Holdings Commissioners, bearing in mind that the same duties are now vested in a large number of persons scattered about the country known as district land commissioners to carry out duties in relation to small holdings as well as in relation to a large number of other matters with which the Ministry has to deal. The Ministry does not limit those officers to work in connection with small holdings, but they undertake many other duties for which they are professionally qualified. It would, therefore, not be convenient to continue the title "Small Holdings Commissioners."
It is not necessary to mention these officers in this Bill, which places upon the Minister himself the responsibilty of considering councils' proposals and estimates and approving them with or without modification. For this purpose he will need to employ qualified officers, but no specific authority is necessary in this Bill for this purpose. I hope after that explanation the noble Marquess will not press his Amendment.
THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIRE: In the circumstances I will not press the Amendment but will content myself with thanking the noble Lord for the information with which I was not previously acquainted. Half a loaf is better than no bread and I will be content with that.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 12 [Provision of cottage holdings]:
LORD CLINTON LORD CLINTON moved, at the end of subsection (1), to insert:—
"(c) A county council shall not acquire compulsorily a cottage occupied by or retained for the use of a bona fide agricultural labourer or a person employed for the purposes of the maintenance of an agricultural property."
The noble Lord said: This Amendment is in connection with the provision of cottage holdings, which we hope are going to be among the most useful parts of this Bill. Under the clause county councils may acquire any house for the purposes of this new class of cottage holdings. I am going to suggest that it would be extremely inconvenient, and I think contrary to the public advantage, that they should be allowed to acquire houses which are already in the occupation of the same class of man for whom the cottage holdings are to be provided.
I think it is matter of common knowledge—at all events in your Lordships' House—that owners of agricultural land are really the only employers of labour who have systematically provided houses for those whom they employ. We have every one of us, probably, provided houses in suitable positions for our farms and in suitable positions for those whom we employ as woodmen, masons, carpenters or in any other capacity on the estate staff. I do not think a council should be allowed to take those houses away and give them to other people. It is no argument, I think, to say, as was said in another place, that if they are taken away the owner would get full compensation. Of course he would, but he has placed these houses where he wants them and it would be terribly poor encouragement to any owner in the future to build houses for his own people if he knows that there is a possibility of their being taken away for other purposes. I do not want to prolong my statement as I think the matter is very clear, and I hope my noble friend will give it his full consideration.
Amendment moved—
Page 9, line 30, at end insert the said paragraph.—(Lord Clinton.)
LORD BLEDISLOE: I find considerable difficulty in accepting this Amendment. As the noble Lord is no doubt aware, the conditions under which county councils can acquire land—including, of course, a cottage if there is one on the land—for small holdings are set out in great detail in Section 41 of the 1908 Act. It will be seen there that a number of conditions are given which a council is required to bear in mind when making, and the Ministry when confirming, a compulsory Order. If noble Lords will read this section they will see that it is very
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carefully balanced. It was a matter which was threshed out in very great detail when the 1908 Act was passing through Parliament. The section referred to deals fully with the interests of land owners, farmers and labourers. If the present Bill is passed as at present drafted, Section 41 will apply equally to land acquired for cottage holdings. There does not appear on the face of it any reason for upsetting the careful balance of Section 41, which, speaking generally, has worked smoothly and well since 1908.
Let me remind the House exactly what would happen under the existing law. If a cottage is required for the cultivation of an agricultural holding, no county council would be likely to endeavour to purchase it by the exercise of compulsory powers; but if they do make a compulsory Order, such Order is inoperative until the Minister has held a public local inquiry, and as a result of such inquiry confirms the Order. That, as has already been pointed out by the noble Earl opposite, is a most effectual safeguard against anything foolish or unjust being done. Even then, the owner and the tenant farmer have the right to appeal to an arbitrator to award compensation. If the arbitrator comes to the conclusion that the cottage was necessary for the cultivation of land that is not being taken by the county council, he would undoubtedly award such compensation as would enable the owner to replace the cottage without loss.
I need hardly remind your Lordships that if it came to replacing cottages without loss to-day it would be a very considerable amount of money that would have to be found compared with what would have been necessary in 1908. In such circumstances, no council would wish to proceed with its claim, it would be cheaper for them to acquire other land and erect their own cottage. The Government are very anxious not to do anything in this Bill to modify the compulsory clauses which have, on the whole, worked well, and I am not, therefore, in a position to accept the Amendment. I hope my noble friend will not press the Amendment.
LORD CLINTON: The latter part of the noble Lord's reply does not appeal to me at all. I endeavoured to deal with the

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point when I was moving the Amendment, and I tried to point out that the method of compensation might not have come into the question at all. It is quite true that, if a man's cottage is taken, he will be paid back, but take a case when you have, for instance, an old lodge. It is no compensation to you that your lodge should be taken away and that you should be paid to erect another in some unsuitable place. I am not prepared to say whether Section 41 of the Act of 1908 really covers my point. It never occurred to me that it would do so, because no question of cottage holdings was under consideration when that Act was passed. If the noble Lord really believes that it covers the whole of my point, I will not at the moment press my Amendment. I had intended to take it to a Division, and I shall certainly bring it up again on Report if I am advised that my point is not fully covered.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME: May I ask the noble Lord who is in charge of the Bill to explain where the evicted occupant of the cottage to go to during the building of another cottage? The noble Lord, Lord Clinton, spoke of the Report stage but, so far as I can see, there will be none, for no Amendments have been accepted.
LORD BLEDISLOE: My noble friend Lord Bertie is, so to speak, a little "Previous." I think this question can be most effectually answered by the procedure necessarily to be adopted. People, after all, are reasonable, and, if they are not, I hope and believe that the Minister would see that reasonable action was taken. I welcome my noble friend's suggestion that the matter should be considered between now and Report. Perhaps he will be good enough to discuss it with me. As he has expressed some doubt about the provision of the Act of 1908, let me read the first part of the relevant section. It runs:—
"No land shall be authorised by an Order under this Act to be acquired compulsorily which at the date of the Order terms part of any park, garden, or pleasure ground, or forms part of the home Farm attacked to and usually occupied with a mansion house, or is otherwise required for the amenity or convenience of any dwelling-house—
that would cover the lodge, I think—
"or which is woodland not wholly Surrounded by or adjacent to land acquired by a council under this Act, or which at that date is the property of any local authority
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or has been acquired by any corporation or company for the purpose of a railway, dock, canal, water, or other public undertaking, or is the site of an ancient monument or other object of archeological interest."
If the noble Lord studies the Act more meticulously, I think he will find that it covers his case. At any rate, we can consider it before Report.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 12 agreed to.
Remaining clauses agreed to.
First Schedule:

SMALL HOLDINGS AND ALLOTMENTS BILL.

  FIRST SCHEDULE.
  Minor Amendments.

  Enactment to be amended.

  Amendment.

  The Land Settlement (Facilities) Act, 1910—

  LORD CLINTON LORD CLINTON moved, in the reference to Section 16 of the Land Settlement (Facilities) Act, 1919, to insert:—

  "Section 16.

  In subsection (2) for the words 'fifty pounds' there shall be substituted the words one hundred pounds.'"

  The noble Lord said: It would save the House some time if the noble Lord would accept this as a consequential Amendment.
  Amendment moved—
  Page 15, line 36, insert:—

  ("Section 16.

  In subsection (2) for the words 'fifty pounds' there shall be substituted the words one hundred pounds.'")—(Lord Clinton.)

  LORD BLEDISLOE: I think this was an oversight in drafting. It is obviously consequential.
  First Schedule, as amended, agreed to.
  Remaining Schedule agreed to.
  EARL BEAUCHAMP: My Lords, may I ask the Lord President on which day he proposes to take the Report Stage and Third Reading? I notice that for Friday, which would obviously be the

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  day, there are already eight Bills down, and I suggest that we should take the Report stage on Monday. If the noble Earl is good enough to agree to that I should offer no objection to his taking the Third Reading also on the same day. Thus no time would be lost to the Government and the Bill could go to another place for approval. I hope that will be for the general convenience of the House.
  THE EARL OF BALFOUR: I think that course will be quite convenient.

AUCTIONS (BIDDING AGREEMENTS) BILL. [H.L.]
Read 3ª, according to Order, and passed, and sent to the Commons.
House adjourned at eleven o'clock: