Lords Sitting of 15 July 1930

Preamble
The House met at a quarter before four of the clock, The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
The Lord Mostyn—Sat first in Parliament after the death of his father.

STOCKPORT CORPORATION BILL.
Read 3ª, with the Amendments.
THE CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES (THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE): My Lords, I will not to-day make the Motion that this Bill do now pass.

SOUTH YORKSHIRE AND DERBYSHIRE GAS BILL.
Read 3ª, with the Amendments, and passed, and returned to the Commons.
LONDON AND NORTH EASTERN RAILWAY (No. 2) BILL.
Read 3ª, with the Amendments, and passed, and returned to the Commons.
MINISTRY OF HEALTH PROVISIONAL ORDERS CONFIRMATION (MACCLESFIELD, SETTLE AND WILLESDEN) BILL. [H.L.]
House in Committee (according to Order) on re-commitment of the Bill: The Amendments proposed by the Committee made: Then, Standing Order No. XXXIX having been suspended, Amendments reported: Bill read 3ª, and passed, and sent to the Commons.
PIER AND HARBOUR PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 2) BILL.
House in Committee (according to Order) on re-commitment of the Bill: The Amendments proposed by the Committee made.
MINISTRY OF HEALTH PROVISIONAL ORDERS (GOOLE AND OLDHAM) BILL.
Read 3ª (according to Order), with the Amendments, and passed, and returned to the Commons.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
THE LORD PRESIDENT OF THE COUNCIL (LORD PARMOOR)THE LORD PRESIDENT OF THE COUNCIL (LORD PARMOOR) had given Notice to move, That Standing Order No. XXI be considered in order to its being dispensed with for the purpose of giving precedence to the Coal Mines Bill over the other Notices and Orders of the Day. The noble Lord said: My Lords, the object of the Motion which stands in my name is that the consideration of further Amendments made by the Commons to the Lords Amendments in connection with the Coal Mines Bill shall have the first place to-day. I understood that to meet the general convenience of the House and therefore I move the Resolution which will enable it to he done. Whilst I am speaking I do not think there is any objection to my stating that I propose, to-morrow, to move a Resolution in the form which was adopted by the late Lord Curzon. I think it is the best form, because it really saves any private Resolutions or Motions or Orders that are now on the Paper. I intend to move that Standing Order No. XXI be considered in order to its being suspended for the remainder of these sittings, and that during that time Government business, except with the consent of the Government—those are the words introduced—shall have precedence over any other Notices or Orders of the day. I am sure that is a necessary Motion if we are to get through our work at this stage.
Moved, That Standing Order No. XXI be considered in order to its being dispensed with for the purpose of giving precedence to the Coal Mines Bill over the other Notices and Orders of the Day.—(Lord Parmoor.)
On Question, Motion agreed to, and ordered accordingly.

COAL MINES BILL.
Order of the Day read for the consideration of further Amendments made by the Commons to the Lords Amend-
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ments, and the Commons Reason for disagreeing to certain Amendments last made by the Lords.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (LORD SANKEY): My Lords, I beg to move that the Commons Amendments to the Lords Amendments and the Commons Reason for disagreeing to certain of the Lords Amendments be now considered.
Moved, That the Commons Amendments to the Lords Amendments and the Commons Reason for disagreeing to certain of the Lords Amendments be now considered.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: My Lords, I hesitated to rise for a moment, for I was not quite certain whether the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack, on behalf of His Majesty's Government, was about to make any statement in reference to the position in which your Lordships' House finds itself placed by the Motion which has just been moved from the Woolsack. I assume that the Government are not prepared to say anything for the moment, and perhaps it may be to your Lordships' convenience if, as on previous occasions, I were to state very shortly how I think many of your Lordships sitting on this side of the House would regard the business which is now before us. The Bill has been returned to us, and the points which still remain to be settled are not new. There were Amendments on Clause 5, an Amendment on Clause 3, and the Amendment at the end of the Bill which is known as the spread-over Amendment. As regards the Amendments made by your Lordships to Clause 5, the Commons have proposed to add certain words—certain conditional and limiting words. I have done my best to consult those who are specially conversant with that clause of the Bill and I find that there is no very great objection among them to the words which the Commons propose to insert. They are, perhaps, miting words, but they do not go very far, and, so far as my humble voice extends, I would suggest that your Lordships accept the Amendment which the Commons have proposed to Clause 5.
Then I go back to the Amendment on Clause 3—the district levy. In respect of the district levy, I hope to make quite clear in a word or two how the matter stands. It is a little bit complicated as

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it appears on the Paper, but the matter is really comparatively simple. The Commons appear on the face of it to accept the position of the Lords in respect of the district levy—that is to say, they do not any longer insist upon paragraph (b) of subsection (3) of the clause. But they add a proviso to the next subsection which goes back a part of the way which they have already traced. The clause is drawn in this way. As it reached your Lordships originally there was a special power given to the district scheme to provide for a district levy. That, for reasons which I will not repeat, was struck out and the Commons have accepted that. But there is another subsection to the clause which gives a general power to modify schemes subject to the consent of both II oases of Parliament, and by a proviso which the Commons now propose the question of the district levy is to be put amongst those powers which can only be brought into force with the consent of both Houses of Parliament. In other words, wherever a district levy may hereafter be proposed as an amendment to a district scheme, it will be in the power of your Lordships' House—and, of course, of the House of Commons—to dissent from it and therefore to reject it.
I admit that that proposal of the Commons does constitute a very considerable concession to the views of your Lordships. I think—I continue to think—that the way the Lords left the Bill was the right way. It is hardly conceivable, having regard to the views which your Lordships hold in this matter, that we should be willing to consent to a district levy and therefore it seems unnecessary to put a provision into the Bill which will be subject to rejection by your Lordships, if it be true that your Lordships will always wish to reject it. It is not necessary to be too absolute in this matter and it is, of course, conceivable that there might be a very exceptional case where a district levy might be acceptable. But I do not conceive it myself. I do not see the possibility. Therefore there is a distinction between the position as it now reaches us and the way it left us when we sent the Bill back to the Commons. At the same time, there is no doubt whatever that as the Bill now stands, as it comes from the
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Commons, it remains absolutely in your Lordships' power to prevent a district levy if you so think fit. That is so great a concession that, as far as I am concerned, I should be prepared to rest content with that arrangement.
Now I come to the much more important question of the spread-over. I would like to make this point absolutely clear. We have said so over and over again, but I would like to make it absolutely clear that the spread-over provision is absolutely permissive. There is no obligation under the words as we framed them and as we sent them to the Commons upon either the employers or the workers in any district to adopt the spread-over system. They are absolutely free. It is essentially a permissive clause. As I think I said the last time your Lordships did me the honour of listening to me on this subject, that is, in our view, essential. So essential is it that we were quite willing on the last occasion to modify the form we had originally adopted in order to make that more evident. That still is the view which I take and which I believe all your Lordships on this side of the House take. We would be very glad to take any words which make it absolutely clear that the option to the employers or to the men is absolutely free.
I know it is said that in the form in which the Amendment stood when we sent it to the Commons the men would not be really free. There was a suggestion that in any negotiations which might take place the men would be acting under a sort of duress and might be morally compelled to accept what they did not approve of. Is there any ground for believing that? Does anyone who has watched industrial developments of late years think that the great trade unions of the country are so weak that, when they are engaged in an industrial dispute with employers, they act under duress? Of course it is not true. If you want an example look at the position of the Eight Hours Act, as it exists until this Bill passes into law. Under that Act it would be possible for the employers to insist that the men should work eight hours, not only on five but on six days a week. But, of course, it has never happened, except by consent in parts of

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Scotland. The workers' organisation is amply strong enough to prevent it. But take a still stronger case. Take Yorkshire and the counties that are allied with Yorkshire. Do the men there work eight hours now? Are they forced to do so because the present Act of Parliament leaves it possible for them to work eight hours? Of course not; they work only 7½hours. Accordingly it is abundantly clear that the men are free agents in this matter and that their organisation is free.
Are any further words required to make it doubly sure that the men of each district should be free to consent or not to consent to the spread-over system? I read in the Press statements by trade union representatives that no miners, or at least no representative miners, are in favour of the spread-over arrangement. If that be the case it will never take place. They have it absolutely in their power. If there really be a unanimous feeling of the workers in each district against the spread-over, no spread-over will come into force. But I do not believe for a moment that the men are unanimous in that matter; and, if it be not true that they are unanimous, if there are a great many men, and indeed a great many districts that would like the spread-over arrangement, why should they not have it? That is the question that I put to your Lordships' House.
I suppose that, while I am speaking on this matter, every one of your Lordships is thinking of the ease of South Wales. I need not tell your Lordships that I do not pretend to have any personal knowledge of industrial conditions in South Wales, but I suppose that all of us who are interested in this subject have been the recipients of a good deal of correspondence dealing with the point. I have received a number of letters. I received one only this morning. I have every reason to think that my correspondent merely states the truth. I dare say that the organisation in whose name he speaks is not the same as the great miners' trade union, but still he speaks with authority and, I have no doubt, with responsibility. He writes on behalf of the South Wales Miners' Industrial Union, and he says that there have been thirty open-air meetings in most of the prominent parts of the South Wales coalfields. He mentions a num-
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ber of the places by name, and states that 500 men attended one meeting and their decision was unanimous in favour of the spread-over; 700 men attended another meeting with exactly the same result; there were 500 men at a third meeting, and 600 at a fourth, and in each case they were, either unanimously or by overwhelming majorities, in favour of the spread-over; and so it goes on. He says that these meetings of which he gives the figures are only a small percentage of those that have been held, and he adds:—
"But I can assure you that the remaining ones have had the same results as the above mentioned, and we have vet to find a district in South Wales where they are in favour of a rigid 7½ hours."
It is impossible, in the face of evidence of that kind, to believe that everybody is against the spread-over arrangement. Indeed, the inference is that there is a large body of miners in South Wales emphatically anxious to have that arrangement.
This is not surprising, for what is the alternative? Everybody knows that in that particular coalfield the industrial position is very acute, and it is only with the greatest difficulty that even the mines that are working can be kept in work. If an extra burden is thrown upon them, which is involved by the rigid 7½ hours arrangement, there are only two alternatives left. Either pits must be closed down or there must be a reduction of wages. Are not the men entitled to say: "We prefer the spread-over arrangement to the closing down of the pit or to a reduction of wages?" How can we reject a plea of this kind? We are not throwing any compulsion upon them, but we are saying to them: "If you men, fully able to think and act for yourselves, desire to avoid the great in-crease of unemployment in South Wales which would be involved in the closing of the pits, if you wish to avoid a reduction of wages, we give you an opportunity. If you think fit, to adopt the spread-over system, by which these things may be avoided." I cannot doubt that an appeal to Parliament of that kind is one to which we ought not to be deaf.
It is perhaps dangerous to speculate as to what is the true opinion of members of the House of Commons. Sometimes their opinion is a little disguised, but I

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will go to this length and say that, if all the members of the House of Commons voted in the temple of truth, this spread-over Amendment would be carried in that House, just as it was carried in this House. I believe that public opinion is in favour of the spread-over Amendment and that your Lordships, as interpreters of public opinion, ought to sustain it. Why should we not? What are the reasons alleged why we should not adhere to the spread-over Amendment? We are told that the reason is that the Members of Parliament representing miners' constituencies are against us. I want to speak, of course, with the greatest respect—respect which I entirely feel—for the representatives of the miners in another place. They are fully entitled to express their opinion, but we all know, unless rumour is strangely false, that the original decision against the spread-over Amendment was carried by a very arrow majority in the miners' organisation, and is it to be true that Parliament is to be controlled, not by the free 'opinion of members of both Houses., but by the despotic decree of the representatives of one particular trade union organisation? This matter does not concern the miners' representatives, or indeed the miners, only. This question concerns the whole country—all the working classes, and indeed every class—because coal enters into the life of every one, and we are not to be told that the House of Commons or the House of Lords is to be absolutely bound by the decision of the miners' representatives.
Then what other reason is there why we should not insist? It is said that, some Second Chambers could insist, but that the House of Lords ought not to insist. The House of Lords, it is said, is an hereditary chamber, and hereditary chambers must not insist. I have very little patience with arguments of that kind. Your Lordships are trustees, and are trustees who happen to be hereditary to be false to their trust? Why, it is quite evident that, however we come to be here, as trustees we must do our duty. It is not a game we are playing. We are dealing with the most essential interests of our country. One would think, as people discuss this matter, that there were no great difficulties in industries at this moment, that everything was prosperous and plain sailing. We know
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the country is passing through probably the most severe industrial crisis for one hundred years or more, and are we lightly to agree to throw an extra burden upon industry, an extra handicap in the effort to bring about the recovery for which we all long? Are we to agree to that because we are told an hereditary chamber has no right to an opinion of its own? I cannot ask your Lordships to take that view. So long as we are convinced that what we are doing is in the interests of our country, so long as we are governed not by extreme views but by what we can conceive of moderate statemanship, we may go forward without fear, and I shall ask your Lordships to adhere to your Amendments.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

LORDS AMENDMENT.
[The references are to Bill (No. 108) as first printed for the House of Lords.]
Clause 3, page 9, line 6, leave out paragraph (b)
The Commons do not insist on their disagreement to the above Amendment, but propose the following consequential Amendment to the Bill:—
Clause 3, page 9, line 43, at end insert:
("Provided that in the case of any draft order providing that a district scheme may be amended so as to provide for empowering the executive board for the district, subject to the consent of the central council, to collect from the owners of coal mines in the district levies for the purpose of facilitating the sale of any class of coal produced in the district the foregoing provisions of this section shall have effect as if for the reference therein to a period of twenty days there were substituted a reference to a period of twenty-five days.")
THE SECRETARY of STATE FOR AIR (LORD THOMSON): My Lords, in view of what has fallen from the noble Marquess, the Leader of the Opposition, I hope it will be unnecessary for me to inflict upon your Lordships a speech upon the Amendment concerning the district levy, and I therefore beg to move that the Commons Amendment be agreed to.
Moved, That this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendment.—(Lord Thomson).
On Question, Motion agreed to.

LORDS AMENDMENT.
Clause 5, page 12, line 17, after ("interests") insert, ("or is unfair or inequitable in its operation")
The Commons do not insist on their disagreement to the above Amendment, but propose to amend it as follows:—
After the first ("or") insert ("ought to be amended on the ground that it")
Moved, That this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amend-ment.—(Lord Thomson.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

LORDS AMENDMENT.
Clause 5, page 13, line 24, after ("interests") insert ("or is unfair or inequitable")
The Commons do not insist on their disagreement to the above Amendment, but propose to amend it as follows:—
After the first ("or") insert ("ought not to be permitted on the ground that it")
Moved, That this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendment.—(Lord Thomson.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

LORDS AMENDMENT.
Clause 5, page 14, line 5, at end insert the following new subsection:
("(10) Any person agrieved—

(a) by the neglect or refusal of a committee of investigation to report to the Board of Trade that any provision of a scheme is contrary to the public interests, or is unfair or inequitable in its operation, or where such a report has been made is aggrieved by any act or omission of the Board of Trade in relation thereto; or

(b) by the neglect or refusal of a committee of investigation to refer a complaint to arbitration under subsection (8) of this section;

may, with the leave of the Railway and Canal Commission, appeal to that Commission who shall have Dower to make such order as they think fit.")
The Commons do not insist on their disagreement to the above. Amendment, but propose to amend it as follows:—
Line 5, after ("or") insert ("ought to be amended on the ground that it").
Moved, That this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendment.—(Lord Thomson.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

LORDS AMENDMENTS.
Clause 14, page 20, line 32, at end insert:
("Provided that if an application, by agrement between representative organisations of the owners of and the workers employed in or about the coal mines in any district, is made to the Board of Trade in that behalf, the Board of Trade shall make an order, which shall become effective forthwith, that the substitution of the words half an hour ' for the words 'one hour' in Section three of the Coal Mines Regulation Act, 1908, shall not apply as respects any
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mine in such district at which the daily hours below ground on an average taken over the twelve weekdays in any fortnight do not exceed the daily hours permissible under Section one of the Coal Mines Regulation Act, 1908, as amended by the Coat Mines Act, 1919, by more than the extension of half an hour made under Section three of the Coal Mines Regulation Act, 1908, as amended by the Coal Mines Act, 1926, and this section;
"At any mine where an extension of time is in any week made under the said Section three, the workmen, by agreement between representatives of employers and workmen, may, notwithstanding anything in the Coal Mines Act, 1908, as amended by any subsequent enactment, begin their period of work on the Saturday of that week before twenty-four hours have elapsed since the beginning of their last period of work, so long as at least eight hours have elapsed since the termination thereof.")
Clause 18, page 23, line 40, leave out ("Part IV") and insert ("Parts III and IV")
The Commons disagree to the above Amendments made by the Lords for the following Reason:—
Because they consider it desirable to reduce for every day of the week the maximum hours of work permissible in coal mines and consider it undesirable to allow such a reduction to be prevented by district arrangements.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: I beg lo move that this House doth insist upon the Amendments.
Moved, That this House doth insist upon the said Amendments.—(The Marquess of Salisbury.)
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, I regret to hear that your Lordships propose to insist upon the spread-over Amendment. This matter has been debated very fully, and it is unnecessary to go into details or to repeat the arguments that have been so often advanced against your Lordships coming to this decision. May I be permitted, however, to place on record what we consider to be the present situation? The Government of the day cannot accept this Amendment. The House of Commons has twice rejected it. The miners' representatives in the House of Commons, none of whom unfortunately can address your Lordships—how much I wish they could! —are against it to a man. An endeavour has been made by the noble Marquess to support it upon the ground that the legislation is permissive. What would have happened to our social legislation for the amelioration of the conditions of the workers if it had always been upon a

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permissive basis? Some people cannot protect themselves; others have to be protected against themselves. It is for this reason that the Houses of Parliament have so often inserted clauses in their Acts that there should be no contracting out of them.
What is the use of passing an Eight Hours Shop Act if you allow the masters and men in any particular street of a town to contract themselves out of it? Forgive me, my Lords, for reminding you that when starvation stares a man in the face he is no longer a free agent. He is not able to resist. He does not get a square deal. Peace on such occasions is an imposed peace, and will not last long. If you insist upon this Amendment you will undoubtedly cause widespread provocation and widespread resentment. And for what purpose, for what good? It has been pointed out time after time that this spread-over is only to last for eight months. Why, for the sake of eight months, do you run the risk of causing all this provocation and all this resentment? We are labouring for peace. I beg you not to prepare the battle.
LORD GAINFORD: My Lords, as the author of this Amendment, I claim your indulgence in order that I may put one or two additional points before you in this final stage. Not only has the Lord Chancellor very eloquently endeavoured to voice the views of the miners, but this House has paid attention to the various speeches of the miners' representatives in another place; and, in order that we may be in no doubt as to what their attitude is, I will read to you an extract from the speech of Mr. Bevan, who spoke on the last occasion in another place against this Amendment. He said:
"The miners have stated more than once that if this spread-over becomes part of the Bill, they would rather not have the Bill than have it with the spread-over. That point has been clearly put, and that is our position."
It is, therefore, a matter for us to decide whether, when the men's representatives speak so definitely in another place, we shall insist on this Amendment or drop it. Whether the Government accept the Bill with this Amendment or not, I feel that our course is perfectly clear. This Amendment cannot possibly do any harm. It may prevent the closing down of hundreds of collieries, with consequent
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unemployment to thousands of men and misery to their families. The position is very different from that suggested by the references to other Bills just made by the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack—Bills connected with contracting out, shop hours, and other matters. This is an affair almost of life and death to the mining community and to the mining industry in certain districts.
There is one set of persons who have been ignored in all the debates on this Bill—namely, the comparatively poor shareholders in colliery undertakings. Many people seem to think that the coal owner is a sort of plutocrat, whereas those of us who are responsible for the administration of colliery enterprises know that the large majority of the individuals who are our shareholders are men and women in poor circumstances in life, who have put their whole savings into colliery enterprises in the hope that they might secure somewhat higher profits than they could out of other investments. It is on their behalf that I wish to say a word. A few years ago we endeavoured to ascertain the number of the shareholders in colliery enterprises in this country. We found that in 683 colliery undertakings there were 856,000 miners employed, and 194,000 shareholders in those undertakings; in other words, the shareholding community represented about one-fifth of the number of miners employed in the mines of this country. They have had no one in either House to voice their interests, and I am sure that they will be grateful, even at this last moment, to one in your Lordships' House for saying a word on their behalf.
The arguments in favour of the spread-over are well before your Lordships' House, but there are two or three points which were made by the Minister for Mines in another place to which I wish to refer in a moment. To me it is almost incomprehensible that an option should have been rejected by another place, in the interests of the men as well as in the interests of the industry. But the unreasonable character of that opposition, I think, can be best illustrated by the fact that this Amendment is a twofold Amendment. The second portion of it would secure for the miners a half-holiday on practically every Saturday, and a whole holiday for a great number of miners on every alternate Saturday. And yet this provision

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has not been even referred to in another place, but it has been rejected just as much as the first portion of the Amendment.
There has been an allusion made to the unanimity of the men in desiring that there should be no spread-over. I could only wish that the men in South Wales, in Durham, in Northumberland, and in Scotland could have a secret ballot taken with the relevant facts before them; I have no doubt whatever what their verdict would be if such a ballot could be taken. I, too, have had many letters indicating that the men are not unanimous, and I will refer in a few moments to the changed attitude in the last few weeks of the miners' representatives, even in regard to the spread-over. On July 9 in the House of Commons the Minister said, as the Lord Chancellor has said to-day, that the miners would have no alternative in certain districts but to accept the proposals, and they wanted to save them from having to accept them. If the economic case is so overwhelming, and starvation the alternative, and lower wages a certainty in the event of the spread-over not being accepted, surely we are right and justified in asking Parliament to give the men a free chance of securing the same amount of wages as they are doing at present.
Then it is said by the Lord Chancellor, and also by the Minister for Mines, that the spread-over would promote disagreement and be a provocation. In my judgment, exactly the reverse would happen. I should like to read to your Lordships an extract from the speech, which appears in to-day's issue of The Times, by Sir John Beynon, representing one of the large businesses in Wales, which produces coal, iron and steel. Speaking yesterday to the shareholders, he said this:—
"If this amendment is passed, with its rigid 7½ hours, frankly I can only see three alternatives. First, a drastic reduction in wages, which no coal owner would desire, and which would be strongly and bitterly resented and resisted by the men. Failing that, a prolonged strike; and again I cannot visualise either owners or men facing such a strike, which, whatever its result, would mean the bankruptcy of the miners' organisation and leave very few collieries which were not in the hands of the Official Liquidator."
I have no knowledge personally of South Wales, but probably no one speaks with
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greater knowledge than Sir John Beynon in connection with the industry in that district. I am absolutely sure that a demand for lower wages at the present moment would intensify that provocation to which the Lord Chancellor has referred, whilst an insistence upon this Amendment will give the men, who are very well able to look after their own interests, a fair deal with their employers if they so desire.
Then it was stated that the Government resisted this Amendment because they desired uniformity of hours in the country. But Mr. Shinwell later in his speech admitted that it was impracticable with all the variations of the mining industry to secure uniformity, and Sir Philip Cunliffe-Lister, in reply to Mr. Shinwell, pointed out how absurd that contention was because the difference in hours, as the noble Marquess who leads the Opposition has already said, is patent to everybody in the different districts of the country, and both in hours and in wages there must be variations owing to the differing conditions in the industry. Again, it is said that this spread-over would not reduce the hours of work. In many mines that may be so, but certainly in the district that I come from there will be a reduction of four hours for at least a third of the men employed per fortnight, and in Scotland I am told there will be a reduction of at least two or more hours. But what will be secured to many of the men by the passage of this Amendment is a half-holiday after twelve o'clock on every Saturday in nearly every district, and certainly a whole holiday for a great number of men on a Saturday every fortnight which otherwise they would not obtain.
The last point I want to make is that this spread-over principle is of real importance from an international point of view. The Washington Convention provides that where the hours of work on one or more days of the week are less than eight the limit of eight hours may be exceeded by agreement between the representatives, provided that in no case shall the daily limit of eight hours be exceeded by more than one hour. In other words, the Washington Convention contemplated a spread-over of ninety-eight hours per fortnight as against the lower number of hours which we are suggesting in this case—namely, ninety. The

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Washington Convention goes on to say that where persons are employed in shifts it shall be permissible to employ persons in excess of eight hours if the average number of hours over a period of three weeks or less does not exceed eight per day and forty-eight per week; that is, ninety-six hours per fortnight.
Then, in the preliminary Technical Coal Conference held last January at Geneva, the principle was again supported by the international Committee appointed to draw up a Draft Convention. There was a clause in that Draft Convention providing—
"If by mutual agreement between representatives of employers and employed….the daily hours specified may be exceeded as long as the total hours for the fortnight do not exceed twelve times the daily hours specified."
When that was voted upon by the representatives of Governments, of the owners, and of the men, it was carried by eighteen votes to seven. The British Government at that time, I believe, did not vote, but nine employers, six Governments and three workers voted in favour of the spread-over and six workers and one Government voted against it. But the curious point arises that the British workmen's representatives did not keep to the arrangement they had previously made as representing the Miners' Federation both at a conference at the Board of Trade in December and at the time when this Bill was being read a second time in the House of Commons. The representative of the miners stated at that conference that he was in favour of it, and the Miners' Federation representative accepted the principle and intimated that they would commit their executive to it. Again, when that representative was at Geneva in the following month he adopted exactly the same position.
Therefore, it is left to the representatives of the miners to explain why their attitude in regard to the spread-over in December and January changed and why their representatives to-day are resisting it in the House of Commons. It is plain to all those who know the position that the miners, as a body, have been very nearly in favour of this spread-over, and I believe that if they have an opportunity they will secure it for their own benefit and for the benefit of their industry. I feel, therefore, that I can
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urge your Lordships in this final stage of the Bill to secure that spread-over so as to avoid the frightful cataclysm which I believe will occur in the coal industry and to our industrial life if this Amendment is not accepted.
LORD MELCHETT: My Lords, after the speeches to which we have listened I do not wish nor is it necessary to detain your Lordships very much longer on a point which has been before us so often. Speaking on behalf of the South Wales coal industry, in which I have a somewhat large and responsible part, I must say with the very greatest regret that the action of the Government can only be regarded as a departure from the earlier discussions which led to this proposal being made. The case is presented as if the employers were wickedly endeavouring somehow to deprive the miners of South Wales of something which they ought to have, and as if they are prepared to threaten the miners with starvation, as the Lord Chancellor said, and similar terrors unless they accept something which they do not want. Surely, every one knows the position of the coal industry. Every one knows that in the coal industry to-day it is not a question of what the coal owners want to do. It is not a question of a prosperous industry beating down its workmen for long hours or low wages. It is a question of an industry struggling to continue to exist, having the fiercest competition in all its branches in the export trade and in which the economic conditions of the world compel you to shut down a pit because you cannot operate at a profit if certain hours are worked and your costs go up.
This may be a most regrettable fact. It may be a very unhappy thing, but it is useless to blame those who are conducting the collieries and who represent, after all in most cases I should say to-day, the banks or the debenture holders rather than the shareholders. That is where I think the Lord Chancellor's view falls short. Let me take a shop hours analogy. If the shop-keepers in a particular area of England represented that unless some exception was made in the Shop Hours Act they would go bankrupt and they would all have to go out of business, the shops would

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be shut, empty of wares, and the shop assistants in the street. Would he then still argue that for the sake of uniformity, for the sake of some ideal principle, it would be much better that that should happen than that the shop-keepers and assistants should be allowed to make sure arrangements whereby both could exist? That is the position to-day. These are the actual facts.
I have been reading the debate on the Amendment in another place, and I did not find that one single speaker, either the Minister of Mines or any of the representatives of the miners, ever attempted to grapple with that simple economic position. They argued, as the Lord Chancellor has argued, that they want uniformity; that the miner, if threatened with deprivation of work, would sooner be a sensible man and work a little longer than go on the "dole," and, therefore, the miner is acting under duress. But under what duress? Under the duress of economic events, a duress under which, I may say, the whole country is working. If the Labour Party and responsible Labour Ministers are going to go on with that kind of illusion, that you can preserve any kind of ideal principle in a world economic crisis, that you must not depart from it in any event, and that the whole country can go into liquidation rather than come to the practical point of where the world economic crisis is bringing us to-day, I tremble for the future of this country, not merely from the point of view of the capitalist but also from the point of view of the worker.
What is the spread-over? It is, after all, a method of endeavouring to arrange hours of work not on a rigid, daily system, but on a fortnightly system. It reduces the hours of work, and, I say frankly, it will to some extent increase costs. From what has been said you might think the spread-over is a thing that the employers would ask for. Nothing of the kind. They would ask rather to be left where they are. This spread-over is a compromise. It inflicts a certain amount of increase in the cost of production of coal, but not to such a large extent as to make the collieries unprofitable. What is the use of saying to me: "I have to do something to raise the price of coal 1s. 6d. per ton and to make 1s. a ton profit when I cannot get any more for it? "It is an im-
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possible thing to ask anyone to do. Parliament is being invited to-day to interfere in matters in one direction without going the whole way. If you want the colliery owner, or the colliery proprietor, or the shareholders and those who own collieries to carry out these schemes, you must also provide them with the money to enable them to do so. If the Government are prepared to subsidise the coal industry the miners can work seven, six, five, or any number of hours a day that the Labour Party think it is a good thing for the miners to work.
The noble Marquess referred to a letter which he had received. I have had a letter from which I think it is both interesting and important to quote one very relevant passage. It comes from the South Wales Miners' Industrial Union. They say:—
"We have also to hand authentic information that at the general conference of the South Wales Miners' Federation held at Cardiff on the 27th and 28th June last, the whole conference were unanimous in favour of the spread-over."
What has the Lord Chancellor, or any of the noble Lords who sit opposite, to say in reply to that? Will they tell me whether it is true or not that the whole conference was in favour of the spread-over? Why did the conference go back upon that? Not because of economic reasons, not because of the miners, but because of the following argument which apparently was advanced:—
"Mr. S. O. Davies, vice-president, then appealed to the delegates to re-consider their decision, and stated that the officials of the Federation had framed this election pledge, and they had also been in negotiations with the Government, which lasted several months, in an endeavour to shorten the working day. Mr. Davies then asked what would become of the prestige of their leaders if the conference turned down the hours clause. 'Our dignity would be gone,' said the speaker, 'and we would be made the laughing stock of the whole community.'"
In order to save the dignity of these gentlemen tens of thousands of miners in South Wales are to be thrown on to the streets, and hundreds of thousands of people are to be ruined!
I want an answer to the allegation I make. I make the statement in all seriousness, and the people who gave it to me are reliable people. What is the reply to be? I think we are entitled to hear.

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"After hearing this appeal the conference decided to rescind the former resolution"
being moved deeply no doubt by the fact that their revered leaders would be made to look rather foolish. I ant sorry the conference did that. People ought not to be so particular about their prestige in this world if they have made a mistake. The conference would have been much better advised to adhere to their first resolution. That is a very striking commentary upon a situation known to all of us who know something about the coal situation from the inside and not from the outside. We are well aware of that situation. The noble Lord, Lord Gainford, spoke of the Geneva position. We have never had a word from the Government Benches to explain the extraordinary thing which took place, and what is taking place now.
We are told the Government will not go on with this Bill if this Amendment is insisted upon. But why not? The Lord Chancellor said it would only last eight months. Why not have an experiment for eight months? Why not let us see how it works for eight months? Obviously, we have to deal in the next eight months with a very difficult position. I do not suppose there is any thinking person who imagines you can automatically go back to a day. If you cannot, then obviously, between now and the time of that period arriving, a great deal of careful thought will have to he given to the whole question of hours. The spread-over experiment in certain districts may he a method in the future of organising the time and hours of the coal industry in a manner perhaps a little less perfunctory and possibly a little better from the point of view of organisation than we have had in the past. Why divide your industry into daily periods? Why have such a rigid idea? From the technical point of view and that of the management of mines—overhead charges, repairs and many other things—you cannot run a colliery on a daily basis, and in practice you do not do so, and, therefore, the spread-over as an experiment may become profoundly useful. It is because it is a principle of very great future value that many of us who are interested in this industry, and who represent to some extent those who are interested in it, want to see it introduced.
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If it was merely a question of eight months it would scarcely be worthy of this discussion in this House except for one thing. There is a very great principle underlying a great deal of this—something that is forgotten nowadays. There is the principle of the liberty of the subject to the his life and to earn his living in the way he thinks best. That very fundamental principle of citizenship seems to me to-day to be continually overlooked, to be ridden over rough-shod, and to be refused to the British people, who, as far as I can see, are becoming more or less in the position of being ordered about from morning to night, from childhood to their grave by those who think they are better able to regulate their affairs than they are themselves. That has never been my conception of a free British State, nor is it my conception of what the British people really like. From that point of view alone I think this Rouse would be well justified in maintaining its attitude, whatever the consequences may be. I see the Minister of Mines is already threatening us with abolition. Whether that ever comes about or not, at any rate let us once more put on record the determined opinion of noble Lords sitting on this side of the House that there are still some people left who do believe there is some right in the individual to direct, as far as lie can at any rate, his own destinies.
EARL BEAUCHAMP: My Lords, the House knows, I think, that at this time there is a good deal of criticism of our methods of Parliamentary government and I cannot but think that those who criticise our system of government upon the score that it takes too long to pass a Bill can find great justification in regard to this particular measure. This measure was read a second time in another place before Christmas and it is only now that it comes to your Lordships at last for final decision. Now we have what the representatives of His Majesty's Government, who, after all, are the authorities responsible in this matter, have declared to be a wrecking Amendment. His Majesty's Government have told us that they are not prepared to surrender upon this point. I am not in their secrets and I cannot therefore speak upon their behalf, but if that is so surely the really important question before your Lord-

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ships' house is whether you are prepared to wreck the whole Bill, to waste the six months which have been spent upon considering this matter—a matter of first-class importance.
I say six months, but after all there were earlier negotiations which took place outside Parliament. They took a long time. Then there were weeks spent on specific Amendments, months of debate, and now, by whatever attractive arguments this Amendment may be supported, the question is whether we are prepared to run the risk of sacrificing the Bill. On previous occasions your Lordships have been good enough to allow me to say that I thought it was possible that there might be some accommodation between the two sides with regard to this Bill. Listening to the debate, nothing has presented more difficulties to the outsider than the way in which coal owners from the north have opposed coal owners from South Wales. What is acceptable to one is not acceptable to the other, but I am bound to say that I thought that with good will on both sides something might be arrived at. I was not without some hope that some compromise might have been come to. But the position is far more important than this particular Amendment. It is whether the Bill as a whole should be passed or not.
This particular Amendment has been rejected root and branch by the miners' executive. It has been rejected by the miner Members of Parliament. You cannot find a member of the Miners' Federation, you cannot find a branch of the Miners' Federation, you cannot find a district of the Miners' Federation which is in favour of this particular Amendment. His Majesty's Government have made themselves responsible for this Bill because they wish to institute, as I wish to institute, a shorter working day in the mines of this country. If this Amendment is carried, and His Majesty's Government are defeated, in their opinion the object which they have in their minds will also be defeated. I do not think any Government with self-respect could be expected in those circumstances to accept the Amendment.
I know it is customary in your Lordships' House in regard to this Bill to deride the representatives of the miners who have spoken in another place upon
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this subject. We are told that they do not represent the miners themselves. In this country it is difficult to know how else you can secure their opinion unless you go to their elected representatives. The noble Lord who has just sat down told us, not for the first time, how much he knows about South Wales. People who know a great deal about a subject and who are great experts do not generally blow their own trumpets or tell us whether they are great experts or not. The noble Lord has told us he is very intimately connected with South Wales. I remember a little time ago when he was more intimately connected with South Wales, when he was member for a large and very important community in South Wales. Indeed, I think I had the pleasure of going down to South Wales and speaking on his platform and urging Liberals in that district to return him to Parliament upon what seemed to me very sound arguments, all of which, I am afraid, the noble Lord thinks are entirely foolish and wrong. However that may be, I felt bound when I heard him speak of his own knowledge of South Wales to make a little further investigation on the subject.
I find that now, at any rate, his chief interest in South Wales is in the Amalgamated Anthracite Company, a very large and important company of which, if I am not mistaken, the noble Lord is Chairman. The Amalgamated Anthracite Company controls 80 per cent. of the total output of Welsh anthracite coal. The capital, I think, is something between £9,000,000 and £10,000,000 of money—on paper, not in actual fact: it has fallen to a very much smaller amount. I think the shares were quoted yesterday at 4s. each, and for the last four years there has been no dividend paid. It may be that the shareholders in that company wish the noble Lord knew more about South Wales coal than he told us he knew on the last occasion and also this afternoon.
I am not afraid when I hear arguments about the liberty of the subject. That is what everybody said at the time of the passing of the Factory Acts. Everybody was to be allowed to sell their labour for less than it was worth because otherwise

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you would interfere with the liberty of the subject. What seems to Inc far more important than the spread-over is this: Is this an issue on which your Lordships would wish the old question to be raised again of this House asserting its rights over the wishes of another place? It is an important challenge, much more important than the spread-over, and whatever happens to this Bill the controversy will be carried from the floor of this House on to the platforms and to the street corners all over the country.
When your Lordships remember the unfortunate result upon the last occasion, I venture to say that, now that the electorate is four times as large as it was in 1910, you can hardly expect a better result than there was on that occasion. This issue seems to me to be of great importance, and that is the reason why I venture to say that I hope on this occasion your Lordships will be prepared to say that you have carried the matter far enough, that your responsibility has been carried out, that you have done all you think necessary in this matter, and that you will allow the representatives of the miners to be judged by the people whom they represent as to whether they are right or wrong. I do feel profoundly that for the future of your Lordships' House, it would be a great mistake to insist on the Amendment.
THE EARL OF HALSBURY: My Lords, I had not desired to intervene in the debate on this subject, but after the speech which the noble Earl has just delivered I feel I must say something. For the first time he has said that the Government as at present constituted have said that if the Amendment is insisted upon by this House, they are going to drop the Bill. I have never heard anybody from the Government side say that and I should like to know where the noble Earl got his information from. I should like to know whether it is correct information or not. I should further like to know whether your Lordships are going to vote as your consciences tell you or whether your vote is depend upon whether or not there may be annoyance in another place. I thought we were here to decide—whether rightly or wrongly—upon the particular Amendments before the House and not upon what is going to happen to this House.
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I am bound to say I should like to know something else. The noble Earl thought proper to make a most extraordinary personal attack upon the noble Lord on my right. I have not the least idea why. What I did gather was that the noble Earl seemed to class anthracite coal and ordinary coal together in South Wales. All I have to say is that if he did that he did wrong. The situation in South Wales has been bad and has been getting worse, but it has been getting worse in the anthracite field much less than in the ordinary coalfield.
LORD DARLING: My Lords, I should not have ventured to intrude upon your Lordships in the debate on this Bill if I did not think I could contribute possibly to some easing of a difficult and I think dangerous situation—dangerous and difficult for Parliament, dangerous for the country. I have an Amendment to propose which I ought to explain. It is not printed. It could not be printed because there was no time. Had I had time, I should, of course, in deference to the convenience of all your Lordships, have put the Amendment upon the Paper at the earliest possible moment, but until this morning I had no certain knowledge as to what course the Leader of the Opposition would advise your Lordships to take. That course is that, with regard to all but one of the Amendments of the House of Commons, or their refusals to accept your Lordships Amendments, we acquiesce, but upon one of them and one only, that relating to the spread-over, the proposal is that this House should insist upon its Amendment and, if necessary, continue to battle with the House of Commons upon that ground.
I have wondered how long the ball was to be tossed backwards and forwards between the two Houses. The proposal, therefore, which I venture to put before you is that we should return to what was an ancient practice of both Houses of Parliament in turn, and that is to request that there should be a Conference of the two Houses to see if some arrangement could be come to upon the matter in difference between them. In this case the matter in difference is, to my mind, a very small one and not worth joining battle over between the House of Commons and the House of Lords. The Amendment could not be put upon the

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Paper, although I should like to say that it is quite regular, as your Lordships will see from a debate which took place in this House only a week ago, when the noble Earl, Lord Beauchamp, raised some question regarding Amendments at this stage and the noble Marquess who leads the Opposition explained the matter. The Amendment that I propose is perfectly in order, although it is not printed, and could not be printed, on your Lordships' Paper. I propose to move as follows:—
"That it is desirable that a Free Conference should be held with the House of Commons upon the subject matter of the Lords Amendments to the Coal Mines Bill to which the Commons have disagreed."
This used to be a not very unusual manner of arranging differences between the respective branches of the Legislature. I have looked into the matter and I find that the last occasion on which it was made use of was in regard to the Municipal Corporation Bill, 1836, and the previous occasion was upon some difference between ourselves and Spain in 1740.
I do not think it is any detriment to an argument in this country to say that, if there is a precedent, it is an old one. Something must be said against it other than that. This country is an old and venerable country. It has traditions and it has precedents which many another powerful country has not. Accordingly I hope that your Lordships will consider this proposal, as I feel sure that you will, absolutely on its merits and in its application at the present day to the matter now before your Lordships' House. The noble Earl, Lord Beauchamp, said that he had hoped some time ago that it might be possible to reach some accommodation in regard to this dispute. That is my view. I wish it had been left to somebody with a higher standing and more influence in this House than I have to make this proposal but, although it is only I who make it, I feel certain that your Lordships will consider it upon its merits and accept it or reject it upon its merits.
It appears to me that, at this moment of all others, it is most inexpedient that we should come to a bitter dispute between the two Houses of the Legislature. We have at this moment difficulties enough at home and abroad without adding that to them. We have any
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amount of enemies abroad and any amount of enemies here in our own country, and among those enemies there are very many—the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, has called attention to one enemy of this House—who would like nothing better than to choose this Bill as a field of battle for a quarrel with this House. They believe that a good answer to the cry of a "Dear Coal Bill" would be "Down with the House of Lords!", and there are some people with whom the mere demand to vote for such a measure as that would find a great deal of immediate assent. Already there are being used upon this question, because it is thought that we may refuse to agree with the House of Commons, what Sydney Smith most properly called "rude and rabble-rousing words," and we shall hear more rude and rabble-rousing words, I think, if we do not do something to accommodate this difference.
What is the question at issue? The question at issue, which it is said is of sufficient gravity to cause a great constitutional dispute between the House of Commons and the House of Lords, is this: When shall a person who is entitled to have an hour's leisure take it? Did anybody ever hear of so flimsy an excuse for a quarrel? There is, I think, a parallel case. It is the case reported by Dean Swift of the reason why the Lilliputians were at war with the people of Blefescu. They all had to eat eggs, just as all these men have to have holidays, and the question was whether they should break the eggs at the big end or the little end—a question which was almost as important as this one, because we have heard authorities on both sides as to the importance of taking a holiday in the afternoon or in the morning or on one Saturday or another. In consequence of this dispute it is asked that we should stand by our Amendment.
With regard to the procedure which I ask your Lordships to accept, it is set out in Sir Erskine May's authoritative book, and also in a little hook written by an official of this House, not now living, called "Companion to the Standing Orders of the House of Lords on Public Business," and the author says this:—
"In consequence of the practice adopted by both Houses in 1851 with regard to the communication by Message from either

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House of the reasons for its disagreeing to Amendments made by the other, or insisting on Amendments of its own to which the other has disagreed, the only kind of Conference between the two Houses which could now serve any good purpose is what is called a Free Conference"—
and that is the Conference which my Amendment asks your Lordships to accept. The author of this bock explains how a Conference takes place. A certain number of members of this House are told off to meet an equal number of members of the other House; and when the Lord Chancellor said that he wished that members representing the miners in the House of Commons could discuss the matter with members of your Lordships' House, I can only say it occurred to me at once that he must agree with the proposal which I am now laying before your Lordships. That is a proposal to enable your Lordships to hear what is to he said by those who really do represent the miners in Parliament and also in the trade unions. The author of this book goes on to say that when the Conference has taken place a Report is made to the Houses as to the result of it.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: Will the noble and learned Lord give the references in the book from which he is quoting?
LORD DARLING: What I first read is on page 67, and what I am now referring to is on page 69, beginning "The Report proceeds." The author goes on to say exactly how the matter is done. I will not weary your Lordships, if I have not already done so, by reading from the book, but it comes to this: The Conference takes place between those deputed by both Houses to discuss the matter. They either agree or they do not agree. Sometimes they have agreed upon some part and disagreed upon another, and then each reported to the House which appointed them. That was the practice of our ancestors, and although it has not been used lately I hope to give the House an opportunity of using it again. In case after case it led to the restoration of harmony between the two Houses which I think could not have been achieved without it. I am told that I cannot move my Amendment now, and can only move it later on, but I was told by those with whom I discussed it that it would be for the convenience of your Lordships that I should explain the
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matter as early as possible, before there could be a prospect of an immediate Division upon the proposal.
LORD PARMOOR: My Lords, I rejoiced to hear what the noble and learned Lord said in his speech. It is, of course, impossible to move his Motion at the present time. I think he recognises that, and what he has done is to adumbrate what he would wish to bring before the House in the event of disagreement arising on this point between this House and the House of Commons. I do not desire to say a word upon that at the present time, because, as he has stated clearly, there has been no opportunity of looking into this matter in any way, and in fact, although he intimated to me that he was going to move his Motion, I did not see the terms until just before coming into the House. Clearly what we have to do now is to vote on the other matter, and then consider what the noble and learned Lord has said on this question.
LORD BUCKMASTER: My Lords, I do not propose to consider the suggestion of Lord Darling, because, as has already been pointed out, its immediate discussion may be out of place. It does of course provoke the obvious comment that no Conference can take place without two parties. At the present moment we are not quite certain there would be one, and we are almost sure there would not be two. On the Amendment itself I desire to say a few further words. Debates of this kind invariably give rise to two perfectly distinct questions. The first is the actual merit of the proposal out of which the controversy has arisen. The second is whether or no, whatever those merits might be, this House ought to insist upon retaining the position it has set up. With regard to the first I have found myself in some considerable difficulty. When the Bill was before this House which ultimately became the Act that it is now sought to amend, I think I was the only member of these Benches who spoke in its support. I thought then, and I think now, that it was the only possible chance that could be given to redeem the coal industry. I knew that the line that I took would be exceedingly unpopular with the people whose interests I most desired to serve. Therefore I cannot be accused of having any

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rigid, hard-and-fast feeling upon this matter; but I am bound to say that it does seem to me that this Amendment raises rather a different question.
The object of the present Bill is manifestly to amend that Statute. And why? It is impossible to look backwards over the history of the coal industry in this country without being struck with the repeated efforts that the miners have made, from time to time, to lessen their hours of work. They have succeeded in reducing their hours first to nine, then to eight, and then ultimately to seven, and it is easy to understand the passionate resentment that these men feel if they think that what they have won by these repeated struggles in the past is going once more to be taken away. I believe it is because of that feeling that the Miners' Federation and representatives have opposed this provision. They think that its effect is to defeat what they hope this Bill will secure, a reduction of a further half-an-hour off the eight hours, and a total of 7½ hours. If that be so, their attitude is at least one with which it is easy to sympathise. Nobody can possibly desire that men should live underground longer than absolutely necessary to the interests of the industry in which they are engaged. And I think everyone must be struck with the fact that as this Amendment stands it necessarily contemplates eight hours under the ground every day, with a break, of one day out of fourteen. It does not seem to me that it is necessary to be a miner to understand that such a suggestion is one that they bitterly resent.
We have had a number of most instructive and valuable speeches in this House, and not least from the noble Lord, Lord Gainford, but I must say some of them have filled me with some anxiety lest our attitude be misunderstood. When I hear the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, say: "I speak for the coal industry in South Wales," I would like to know what are his credentials to speak on behalf of the thousands of miners who work in the pits? Or does he suggest that the coal industry in South Wales is represented by a board of directors, some debenture holders, and shareholders who may or may not get their dividends? It is precisely that attitude that makes the expression of opinion in this House suspect outside.
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It is because people will insist on speaking on behalf of an industry as though those interests were the only ones that had to be considered.
From time to time we have had that in this debate and in previous debates, and indeed Lord Gainford, who never lacks courage, ventured on this occasion to speak also on behalf of the shareholders. Well, it is very difficult to reconcile the miners to the belief that their interests and the interests of the shareholders are the same—there is no doubt about that. It may be that their interests are identical, but remember, these men, as I have heard them say, have always resented the position that the profits from the mines can be distributed among the shareholders without regard to the ultimate welfare of the men, without the miners having a word to say in the matter. And it sometimes happens, as the result of that improvident distribution, that a mine is brought to disaster, simply because it has not got sufficient reserves of capital when the crisis comes.
It is not surprising that, with that position, the miners do not feel when the shareholders' case is being advocated that their views are being put before the House. And in all these matters I strongly resent the idea that there is any one set of views that should be put before the House. I think all of them ought to be. But it must be frankly admitted that during the whole of these debates we have heard very little indeed of the miners' point of view in this matter, and their representatives in another place have been treated—on the last occasion certainly by the noble Lord, Lord Melchett—with a lack of courtesy which I deeply regret. I do not see how we can "turn down" and ignore the men whom these miners have themselves chosen to speak on their behalf. They must at least be better representatives of the men than we can possibly be. And so I have felt throughout, and I feel still, that in this debate the views of the men, who are at least as deeply concerned in this matter as are the owners, the shareholders, the debenture holders and the board of directors, have not been properly expressed through the mere fact that we have no one here who can properly represent them.

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It is then said: "Well, after all, this is a permissive matter, and the men are at liberty to choose for themselves." If that is the case, I do not see what is the use of amending the existing Act, because that is permissive too, and I do not see why there need have been any trouble at all about the Amendment. If you are going to act on the hypothesis that these men can make the best bargain for themselves, and that you need not consider here whether or not they may not be constrained by circumstances to make a very harsh one, we need not trouble ourselves about the Bill. But in truth we all know that, though it may well be that in certain cases the men are able to look after their own interests, in other cases it is not so. And I must say that it is very difficult to imagine a fair bargain between a man who has got a big balance at his bank and the man who has got nothing at all. I feel what the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack said, and I believe it to be true, that though he may, equally with myself, cherish the idea of individual liberty, it has been found that individual liberty cannot be given free play in regard to our commerce and our industries without inflicting grievous injustice upon poor, weak people who are unable to protect themselves.
Now, are your Lordships going to insist on this Amendment when, as has been pointed out already, it is only a matter of eight months and the whole of the original Act falls through? If this Bill does not pass you will in eight months have a position in which the permissive Eight Hours Act will have vanished, and where will you be then? What then will the owners and the industry have got, if you insist on this Amendment at the present moment, and the Commons reject the Bill? I should have thought that the position would be infinitely worse than it is at the present time. At any rate, for such a period and in such circumstances is it wise, is it well for your Lordships to insist on something which is not going to have a permanent effect, but a temporary effect, upon this industry?
If there be, as there well may be, some big occasion when some permanent interference with the laws of this land is attempted, which in our judgment will be mischievous and hazardous for the nation, I hope your Lordships will insist
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on what you think is the right view; but at this moment the thing that seems to me to be most essential is not necessarily what your Lordships think as to the merits of the Amendment, which is the way in which this matter has been put before you from the first, but whether you think your action on this Amendment is going to result for the benefit, not of the coal miners, but of the nation as a whole. If you think that to promote and provoke a conflict between this House and another place upon this issue at this moment is for the benefit of the nation as a whole, I deeply regret that I cannot share your views.
Somebody asked: "What authority have you for saying that this Bill will be ended if the Amendment is insisted upon?" Well, we had the quotation that was made, I think, from the Woolsack, which was very strong on that point; but I dare say your Lordships, in common with myself, have received circulars in respect of this matter, some of them couched in language so intemperate, so violent, so utterly ignorant of the great issues that are involved, that it made me sorry to think that people should have allowed them to be sent forth. I am bound to say that one of the most violent was under the head of the Coal Consumers' Association, and not a single name appeared upon it. Who the people were I do not know. But it was throughout, in large black letters, "Kill the Bill!" That is what they were asking you to do, and they were asking you to do it because they believed that if this Amendment is insisted upon you will kill the Bill. You will kill the Bill. I only sincerely and earnestly hope you will not kill something far more precious than that.
VISCOUNT HAILSHAM: My Lords, as we are only to have one speech on behalf of the Government, that from the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack, I am sure that he and his Socialist colleagues must feel glad that they have so powerful an ally in the noble and learned Lord who has just spoken, and I hope your Lordships will forgive me if, for a few minutes only, I deal with some of the points which have been made by the noble and learned Lord Chancellor and my noble and learned friend who has just spoken. First on the merits, because my Lord Buckmaster divided his

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speech into two points. On the merits, said the advocates of dropping this Amendment, it is not fair to allege that the Amendment is merely permissive because, as the Lord Chancellor put it, there are some who cannot protect themselves and others who have to be protected against themselves. Into which category he puts the miners he did not tell us, but at any rate in one or the other. And, said my Lord Buckmaster, there are men who are unfairly handicapped in discussion, and individual liberty if pressed too far results in injustice and oppression. But noble Lords will forgive me if I say that those remarks seem to me to lose sight entirely of what the Amendment proposes to do.
If this were an Amendment to allow the miners and the mine owners if they chose to contract out of the hours limit I should think there was very great force in what they say. But in truth it does nothing of the kind. The Bill provides that men are to work not more than 7½ hours a day. Lord Buckmaster said that the Amendment proposes to let them work eight hours a day for thirteen out of fourteen days; he meant, no doubt, eleven out of twelve.
LORD BUCKMASTER: Yes.
VISCOUNT HAILSHAM: Be it so; his arithmetic more nearly agrees with my own. That is not an agreement that they shall work more than ninety hours in the fortnight. It only is an agreement that the distribution of the hours, if they choose, shall be slightly altered and that they shall get one day off altogether a fortnight instead of working 7½ hours on six days of the week. We are told that the effect of taking their time in that way will be to enable them to earn considerably more wages than the mine otherwise could afford to pay. It seems to me idle, if that is the proposal, to talk about depriving them of individual liberty and protecting them against themselves.
The noble Lord said: "Well, the miners' representatives are against this Amendment." Of course the miners' representatives, the political representatives are against the Amendment, not because it is one which damages the men but because, as the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, pointed out, it is one which may very seriously damage the prestige
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of the political leaders. They promised the men at the last Election that they were going to have a 7-hour day at once without any reduction in wages. Now, when they find that all they can give them is a 7½hour day with a reduction in wages—a great many of the men have the 7½ hours already—no doubt they are unwilling to accept the Amendment which has been put into the Bill. But that does not mean to say that it is necessarily not in the interests of the men. Says the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack: "Starvation stares them in the face." It is to prevent starvation staring them in the face that the Amendment is put in. We have been told, and nobody has denied it, that the effect of this Bill without this Amendment must be either to involve the closing down of a large number of pits or else a very severe reduction in wages of the men employed in a great many pits. We on this side desire something very different from that. We want the men to have the chance, rather than lose their jobs altogether or lose the greater part of their earnings, of re-arranging the hours, which the Bill permits, to give them one day's holiday a fortnight and to give them a reasonable remuneration for their work.
Having dealt with merits I come to the question of expediency. The noble Lord who argued that question stated that these provisions only lasted for eight months. I think it is agreed that seven or eight months makes no difference. I am not sure that that is really true, in the first place, although literally, of course, it is true. We all know that next July, unless something happens meanwhile, the provision with regard to seven hours takes effect. I do not think anybody on either side of your Lordships' House supposes that when next July comes it will be possible to allow that provision to take effect, and it may be very important, when the time comes to negotiate a new arrangement, that something in the nature of the principle of a spread-over may have been tried and worked out between the masters and the men. If it were true that it is only seven or eight months, surely that is an argument which the noble Lord on the Woolsack might well address to his colleagues.
The noble Earl, Lord Beauchamp, told us that this was a wrecking Amendment

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because the Government would not have the Bill with the Amendment in it. Many of us on this side of the House think that this is a bad Bill. But we believe that as things have gone so far —I speak for myself and I believe it—it is better to have this bad Bill than to have all the dislocation which would be involved by dropping the Bill altogether. But noble Lords opposite profess at least to believe that it is a good Bill. If they believe it is a good Bill, why should they throw away this good Bill and deprive the industry and the country of all the advantages which it confers merely because for eight months there is to be power under this Amendment to make this redistribution of the ninety hours? In fact, the eight months' argument is the strongest against the obstinacy of noble Lords opposite and is no argument at all against your Lordships' House insisting on an Amendment which we believe to be a fair one.
The noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack finished one of those eloquent speeches which we are all accustomed to hear from him with an appeal that while the Government laboured for peace your Lordships should not prepare for battle. Is it true that the Government labour for peace? Have your Lordships read, as I have read in the newspapers, the speech made by one who is presumably the official spokesman of the Government in matters o this kind, the Minister for Mines? Speaking on Saturday last, the Minister for Mines declared that whatever your Lordships did, whether you passed the Bill or not, and whether you accepted the Amendment or not, the Socialist Party intended that the next Election should be fought on the cry of the abolition of the House of Lords. Is that what the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack calls labouring for peace, or is it preparing for battle?
It may well be true that from the purely Party point of view it were better to drop the Amendment and deprive the Socialists of the advantage of working up this agitation against your Lordships' House and enabling the unhappy consumer to find out what a mischievous Bill this really is. It may well be that that would be good Party tactics. But it is not Party tactics which ought to govern your Lordships' decision upon the matter. If we look at this matter from the proper point of view, if we regard the interests of the consumer whose fuel will cost him more if this Amendment is not incorporated in the Bill, if we regard it from the point of view of the interests of the miner who will be faced with reduced wages or greater unemployment if this Amendment is dropped, if we regard it from the point of view of the industry which will be further handicapped by the refusal to allow this arrangement to be made although the districts may desire to make it—from whichever view we regard it, in the interests of the nation it is right that the Amendment should be maintained.
Is this the time either to do anything to increase unemployment or to add to the burdens by which our industries are already handicapped? It is because believe emphatically that the effect of dropping this Amendment will be to increase unemployment which has grown so rapidly under Socialist maladministration, and to impose a burden on industry which it is already unable to bear, that I ask your Lordships to accept the advice of my noble Leader and to insist upon the Amendment that has been made.
On Question, Whether the House shall insist upon the Amendment to Clause 14, page 20, line 32?
Their Lordships divided:—Contents, 168; Not-Contents, 36.

CONTENTS.

Argyll, D.

Lansdowne, M.

Clarendon, E.

Beaufort, D.

Linlithgow, M.

Denbigh, E.

Rutland, D.

Normanby, M.

Doncaster, E. (D. Buccleuch and Queensberry.)

Somerset, D.

Salisbury, M.

Sutherland, D.

Winchester, M.

Effingham, E.

Wellington, D.

Eldon, E.

Abingdon, E.

Graham, E. (D. Montrose.)

Abergavenny, M.

Albemarle, E.

Grey, E.

Ailesbury, M.

Ancaster, E.

Halsbury, E.

Camden, M.

Bathurst, E.

Iddesleigh, E.

Exeter, M.

Beatty, E.

Iveagh, E.

Lauderdale, E.

Alvingham, L.

Kylsant, L.

Lichfield, E.

Annaly, L.

Lamington, L.

Lindsey, E.

Arundell of Wardour, L.

Latymer, L.

Lucan, E. [Teller.]

Askwith, L.

Lawrence, L.

Lytton, E.

Auckland, L.

Leconfield, L.

Malmesbury, E.

Balfour of Burleigh, L.

Leigh, L.

Mar and Kellie, E.

Banbury of Southam, L

Lloyd, L.

Midleton, E.

Barnard, L.

Luke, L.

Minto, E.

Bayford, L.

Melchett, L.

Morton, E.

Bellew, L.

Meldrum, L. (M. Huntly.)

Mount Edgcumbe, E.

Biddulph, L.

Mildmay of Flete, L.

Onslow, E.

Brancepeth, L. (V. Boyne.)

Monkswell, L.

Peel, E.

Camrose, L.

Monteagle, L. (M. Sligo.)

Plymouth, E.

Cawley, L.

Newton, L.

Powis, E.

Clifford of Chudleigh, L.

O'Hagan, L.

Roden, E.

Clinton, L.

Ormathwaite, L.

Sandwich, E.

Cranworth, L.

Ponsonby, L. (E. Bessborough.)

Searbrough, E.

Cushendun, L.

Selborne, E.

Daryngton, L.

Rayleigh, L.

Stanhope, E.

Dawnay, L. (V. Downe.)

Ritchie of Dundee, L.

Stradbroke, E.

Deramore, L.

St. John of Bletso, L.

Vane, E. (M. Londonderry.)

Desborough, L.

St. Levan, L.

Westmeath, E.

Dynevor, L.

Saltersford, L. (E. Courtown.)

Westmorland, E.

Doverdale, L.

Ernle, L.

Saltoun, L.

Bertie of Thame, V.

Erskine, L.

Sandys, L.

Brentford, V.

Fairfax of Cameron, L.

Savile, L.

Burnham, V.

Faringdon, L.

Sempill, L.

Churchill, V.

FitzWalter, L.

Somerleyton, L.

Elibank, V.

Forester, L.

Southampton, L.

Falkland, V.

Foxford, L. (E. Limerick.)

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

Falmouth, V.

Gage, L. (V. Gage.) [Teller.]

FitzAlan of Derwent, V.

Gainford, L.

Strachie, L.

Goschen, V.

Gifford, L.

Sudeley, L.

Hailsham, V.

Gisborough, L.

Sydenham of Combe, L.

Hambleden, V.

Glentanar, L.

Templemore, L.

Hereford, V.

Greenway, L.

Thurlow, L.

Hood, V.

Hamilton of Dalzell, L.

Trenchard, L.

Novar, V.

Hampton, L.

Treowen, L.

Plumer, V.

Hare, L. (E. Listowel.)

Vivian, L.

Scarsdale, V.

Harris, L.

Waleran, L.

Sumner, V.

Hindlip, L.

Wavertree, L.

Ullswater, V.

Hothfield, L.

Weir, L.

Howard of Glossop, L.

Wharton, L.

Aberdare, L.

Hunsdon of Hunsdon, L.

Wigan L. (E. Crawford.)

Abinger, L.

Islington, L.

Wraxall, L

Addington, L.

Jessel, L.

Wynford, L.

Aldenham, L.

Joicey, L.

NOT-CONTENTS.

Sankey, L, (L. Chancellor.)

Durham, L. Bp.

Hay, L. (E. Kinnoull.) [Teller.]

Lincoln, L. Bp.

Parmoor, L. (L. President.)

Southwark, L. Bp.

Hemphill, L.

Amulree, L.

Ker, L. (M. Lothian.)

Reading, M.

Arnold, L.

Marks, L.

Bethell, L.

Marley, L. [Teller.]

Beauchamp, E.

Buckmaster, L.

Passfield, L.

Cranbrook, E.

Clwyd, L.

Ponsonby of Shulbrede, L.

De La Warr, E.

Cornwallis, L.

Remnant, L.

Strafford, E.

Danesfort, L.

Riddell, L.

de Clifford, L.

Sanderson, L.

Devonport, V.

Denman, L.

Stanmore, L.

Mersey, V.

Dickinson, L.

Sudley, L. (E. Arran.)

Douglas, L. (E. Home.)

Thomson, L.

On Question, Motion agreed to.

Resolved in the affirmative and Motion agreed to accordingly.
LORD DARLING: My Lords, I think at this point it is proper that I should
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move the Motion to which I have referred. I therefore beg to move, That it is desirable that a Free Conference should be held with the House of Commons upon the subject matter of the Lords Amendments to the Coal Mines Bill to which the Commons have disagreed. I have already said what I

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desire to say to commend this Motion to your Lordships' House. If it is acceptable to the Government, of course there will be no difficulty about it. I should like to know whether the Government do accept it. If they do not I should not think of putting your Lordships to the trouble of a Division upon the matter.
Moved to resolve, That it is desirable that a Free Conference should be held with the House of Commons upon the subject matter of the Lords Amendments to the Coal Mines Bill to which the Commons have disagreed.—(Lord Darling.)
LORD PARMOOR: My Lords, I rise to give the best answer I can give to the noble and learned Lord. I thank him for bringing forward this matter, but it would be quite impossible for the Government to accept the suggestion in view of what has happened. Of course we have had no time to consider this. He says it has never been done since as far back as 1834—
LORD DARLING: 1836.
LORD PARMOOR:—and, before that, since 1740. Therefore there can be no question of accepting it now. I could not give a promise on behalf of the Government on a point of that kind.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: My Lords, I venture to hope that my noble and learned friend will not persist with this proposal. He sees the reception it has had from His Majesty's Government. It is a precedent of very long date, and although certainly it is not for me, or for any of your Lordships sitting on this side of the House, to deprecate ancient precedents, I cannot think that in this particular case it is likely to work well. I therefore hope the noble and learned Lord will not persist.
On Question, Motion negatived.
A Committee appointed to prepare a Reason for the Lords insisting on one of their Amendments: The Committee to meet forthwith.
Report from the Committee of the Reason to be offered to the Commons read and agreed to; and a Message ordered to be sent to the Commons to return the Bill with the Reason.

HOUSING (No. 2) BILL.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
LORD PARMOOR: My Lords, I will endeavour to be as brief as possible in proposing the Second Reading of what undoubtedly is an extremely important Bill as regards oar national homes and our national health. I bear in mind the fact that this Bill, important as it is, received a Second Reading and a Third Reading in another place without a. Division and I think that when I have made such explanation of the Bill as I think necessary your Lordships will agree with me that, so far as there is any matter of controversy, it really is a question of the details or the clauses of the Bill and not of the Bill itself. At any rate I shall propose the Second Reading on the understanding, unless I am corrected, that the Second Reading will be allowed by your Lordships' House, and that dicussion will take place subsequently.
The Bill was well called in the other House a "continuity" Bill, the reason being that it takes its place in the sequence of a considerable number of Bills which have been passed in recent times in an attempt to deal with this great scandal, if I may so call it, of our slum districts. There was the Act of 1890; there was the Act of 1919, on which the compensation clauses of this Bill are founded; there was the Consolidation Act of 1925—I think the noble Earl opposite (Lord Onslow) was responsible for that in this House—and now we have this Bill, founded on experience, attempting to extend the area in which the other Acts are operative and particularly to alleviate as far as we can the duties and responsibilities of local authorities by whom the Bill will be operated. I may add that the association representing all the various local authorities has unanimously expressed an opinion in favour of the Bill. What perhaps operates most strongly in my mind is that, this being a Bill immediately affecting the health and sanitation of the homes of some of the poorer of the working classes, I believe it has a very large measure of support from the medical officers of health, who in reality are the inspiring persons upon whom the local authorities rely for advice in matters of this kind.

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If your Lordships will look at the Bill, I will discuss its various Parts as shortly as I can. If I leave any matter undiscussed, it can be raised at a later stage, but if, in the desire to be short, I do not give sufficient explanation, I am sure the noble Earl opposite will be prepared to ask me any question even at the present time. Part I of the Bill deals with clearance areas. A clearance area is an area in which every house must be demolished for sanitary and health purposes. Every house in a clearance area stands condemned and, so far as houses are condemned, the first question that arises is this: though a demolition order may be made under which the present owners of those houses are required to carry out the demolition of the condemned premises, retaining, of course, whatever value there may be in the material from the demolition of the houses, no compensation case—I shall have to explain this a little further in a minute—arises at all. The other alternative is that the clearance area should be purchased by the local authority and that the demolition should he carried out under the control of the local authority, as distinct from the owners of the houses. Then, of course, the question does arise of the compensation payable under those conditions.
I want to make this point quite clear. So far as the compensation payable under those conditions is to be assessed, there is no difference between the proposals of this Bill and the proposals of the Bills of 1919 and 1925. The result of experience and discussion has confirmed the advisers of the Government in the view that the compensation principles then adopted have worked fairly, justly and equitably in their operation as regards the owners of property. The actual position is this. Within these clearance areas you have the site principle as regards the basis of compensation, and in addition, in particular cases, you have what is called the reduction factor—that is, a certain amount taken off the compensation which would otherwise be assessed owing to the fact that the land when taken over is either to be used for the replacement of houses or is to be thrown into an open space. I do not want to discuss that question in detail at the present moment, but
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that is the actual operation which would have taken place under the present law, and I am told that transactions on that basis have taken place within these areas and the present owners knew perfectly well what the conditions would be.
There is one other matter which I think I might mention with regard to these clearance areas. They may be surrounded by adjoining areas which would also be called clearance areas under the terms of this Bill, but the compensation there is quite different. If the land is taken not on account of its insanitary condition or of containing buildings dangerous to human life and health, but merely to improve the scheme to be carried out by the local authority, then it is perfectly just and right that the owners of property taken for the purpose of making an efficient scheme and not on account of its inherent badness should have the ordinary measure of what we call market value compensation. The treatment of the clearance area will be found in Clause 5, and there is also a power for the local authority to purchase cleared land which owners have failed to redevelop. I do not think there is any mystery or change of principle in regard to clearance areas. The difference, as I shall show by and by, is rather in the method of procedure, through which an easier road towards the attainment of the desired result can be found than is applicable under the existing Acts referable to this subject matter.
The next portion of the Bill deals with improvement areas. As the noble Earl opposite will know very well, this is a new proposal and a provision which you do not find in dealing with these areas at the present time. It is in this sense, I think, a great improvement, that it limits what you have to do and the obligations of a local authority within the improvement area, the idea being, quite rightly, that if you intervene in time you will prevent an area becoming what I may call a regular slum area, or at any rate you prevent it being in a condition which, if it were left alone, would, in course of time, convert it into what is known as a clearance area. The local authorities may declare an unhealthy area to be an improvement area, and then the treatment of the area is as I shall describe it. You have a different system of compensation from that which obtains in regard to the

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clearance area. I will draw attention to that point when. I come to the compensation clause by and by. It is necessary, in the case of an improvement area, that the local authority should make a declaration. It is a simple form of procedure, although the question whether that declaration is properly made or not would be a subject for discussion and appeal. Still it is a much simpler form than in the case of a clearance area. In fact the conditions are different, for in the one case you must have the whole of the buildings in the clearance area demolished, whereas in the improvement area you take only a certain number of buildings and deal with them in a different way.
Then we come to the general provisions under Part I, in regard to which there are one or two matters which ought to be explained to the House. First we come to the obligations of the local authority with regard to re-housing. It has often been stated, quite accurately, that one of the difficulties in these clearance or improvement schemes arises from the fact that there is no place to which the displaced population can have recourse for their homes. Under this Bill an obligation is imposed upon the local authority that they shall not proceed to get rid of these slum areas without providing alternative accommodation for the population which they displace. Your Lordships may know that this principle has already been adopted in a good many Railway Acts and other Acts, and the principle, I think, is perfectly sound. You ought to provide alternative accommodation for the displaced population, who have been turned out of an area under an area scheme of this character.
Then we get to the provisions as to the purchase of land. Clause 11 is an extremely important one, and I think it ought to commend this Bill in a very special way to your Lordships' consideration. At the present time, if an order is made by a local authority and confirmed by the Board of Trade the work goes forward, but is is always open to the possibility of a question being raised at a later stage as to whether all the matters have been carried out in a legal way and within the powers conferred upon the local authority by the Act. That is extremely inconvenient to all parties. It makes the
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question of whether what is done is within the powers of the Act or not a matter of discussion at a time when it cannot be decided, and there have been cases lately, particularly the Derby case where, the matter not having been decided at an early stage, at a time when the scheme was almost brought into operation, and after great expense had been incurred, the whole matter, quite properly if it was so, was declared to be ultra vires of the local authority.
If your Lordships will look at Clause 11 you will see that a very much better plan of dealing with a matter of this kind has been adopted. If any person who is disquieted by anything that has been done beyond its powers by the local authority desires to question the validity of the action of the local authority, he may, within six weeks after the publication of the notice of confirmation, make an application for the purpose to the High Court, and if any such application is duly made (1) the order shall not come into operation before the final determination of the proceedings, and (2) the Court, if satisfied that the order is not within the powers of this Act or that the interests of the applicant have been substantially prejudiced by the requirements of the Act not having been complied with, may quash the order. Think what an advantage that gives. Your Lordships have often asked, as regards administrative orders made by local authorities, whether there was a danger that they might exceed the powers conferred upon them and at the same time have pointed out that to ascertain whether that was so or not was a matter of considerable expense, trouble and uncertainty. This clause proposes to deal with that great difficulty in a most efficient manner. It says that within a short time any person aggrieved may bring the matter to the judgment of the High Court, and there and then it can be determined whether what is proposed by the local authority is right or not, before great expenses has been incurred. Personally, I regard this as a most important and valuable provision. It is the greatest safeguard you can afford to the individual, and at the same time provides a method by which questions of right can be determined at the earliest possible moment. I hope when we come to consider the clauses it will be reckoned to the benefit of the

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general provisions of the Bill that a clause like Clause 11 has been introduced.
I ought to refer at length to Clause 12, which deals with the assessment of compensation in respect of land purchased compulsorily. I think it is easily explained. In the case of land comprised in a clearance area the compensation to be paid for the land, including any buildings thereon, shall be assessed in accordance with the provisions of subsections (1) and (2) of Section 46 of the principal Act—the principal Act being the Act of 1925—subject, as regards the first of those subsections, to the modifications contained in Part I of the Third Schedule to this Bill. I hope the noble Earl opposite (Lord Onslow) will look at Part I of the Third Schedule, because he will find there that there is no difference in principle between the Act of 1925 and the present proposal, and the only object of what is set out in that Schedule is to make it clear that what is called the scheme in the Act of 1925 is the same as the clearance area under the present Bill. In fact it applies to clearance areas, ipsissima verba, the terms applied as to compensation to schemes in the Act of 1925. The third subsection of Clause 12 provides that in the case of any other land—except land in a clearance area—the compensation shall be assessed in accordance with the provisions contained in Part II of the Third Schedule to this Bill. If you will look at that your Lordships will find there really applied the well-known market value principle, subject to necessary deductions in respect of the condition of the houses which are condemned in the improvement area declaration.
Under that declaration, as I said before, the first proposal would be that the owners themselves should demolish or repair or do what is necessary with these houses, and compensation only arises at a later date, but in that case, as regards the provisions contained in Part II of the Third Schedule, I think there is ample compensation provision, and compensation provision in accordance with the ordinary principle. I am very anxious personally that on the arbitration point the right principle should be observed—that in all these cases where land is taken for public purposes compensation should be assessed properly fairly and justly, having regard to the
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condition of the property when it is to be taken for public purposes. I do not think there is anything else under the head of "General" that I need trouble your Lordships with. I have pointed out what is to be done as regards clearance areas and improvement areas to bring them under the operation of the Act. I have referred to the safeguards, particularly in Clause 11, and to the principle of compensation which is already to be found in the Act of 1925, or, where the area is not itself a clearance area, under the provision contained in the appropriate Schedule of this Bill.
Part II of the Bill contains provisions with respect to the repair or demolition of insanitary houses. I wish to make this clear. We have dealt with clearance and improvement areas. This deals merely with individual houses, or particular houses, which have to be dealt with owing to their insanitary character, or owing to the fact that they are maintained under conditions dangerous to the health of the occupier. On this matter what I want to call your Lordships' attention to is Clause 22. Here again, I submit, an admirable improvement has been made. The question whether a particular house should be demolished as an insanitary house is a pure question of fact. There is no law involved in it at all, and it has sometimes been thought, and perhaps rightly, that the appeal of the owner whose house is said to be insanitary should be made, not to the local authority but to the central authority. Here is a very simple method and, I suggest, a far more satisfactory one.
If a house is declared to be insanitary, and the owner wishes to question that and to show that the facts do not constitute the house an insanitary one, he is entitled to go to the County Court Judge and to have his decision, which is final; and there is a provision that that inquiry shall be held under proper rules, and that in this particular case it is not a question for a jury but a question for the Judge himself. You find that in Clause 22, which is entitled "Appeals," and under the terms of the sections applicable to this case. That is an admirable improvement. In matters of this kind so much has been said about the prejudice introduced by various Departments. You have an appeal at the earliest possible stage to the High

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Court, and an appeal in the other case, upon what is merely a question of fact, to the County Court Judge, whose decision can be given on the facts, and who can go and see and determine for himself.
The next Part of the Bill is Part III. I do not know whether the noble Lord, Lord Balfour of Burleigh, is here, but before I go into Part III I should like to call attention to Clause 29. That is a power vested in the local authority to make arrangements for the provision of houses by public utility societies. There are some public utility societies which have done admirable work in this connection. The Kensington House Society is, I think, the name of one which was quoted when we had the last discussion on this matter. I think it is of great importance that local authorities should have this power to make arrangements with public utility societies. This is a valuable provision which, I should hope, might he adopted in other cases as an excellent precedent. There is one other matter I must deal with in Part III. The assistance to be given from the Treasury is on an entirely new scale, and on a new principle. The proposal, I think, is a very effective one. It is at once to make a fair contribution and to arouse the interest of the local authorities in pressing forward the beneficial provisions of this Bill.
You have two methods of pecuniary assistance which might help to lessen the too-high rents which are often chargeable for houses constructed under Acts of this kind by a local authority. First of all, the Government gives £2 5s. per individual. That is based on the number replaced—those for whom the local authority has to find replacement accommodation. At the same tune the local authority out of the rates provide a sum, not per individual but per house, of £3 15 s. Let me give an illustration of how that would work. Suppose you replace 100 displaced persons out of a clearance area or a slum district, which, of course, is what is desirable. Each of those persons would he provided for by the State to the amount of £2 5s.; that would be £225 in all. Suppose those 100 persons occupy twenty houses, then you would also get the contribution towards their rent from the local authority, which would amount to another £75. In other
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words, you would get £300 in assistance towards the rents to be paid by those dispossessed and replaced people. That is a very considerable sum.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM: Is that annually?
LORD PARMOOR: Annually for forty years. I am taking an illustration which has been given to me. The replacement of the population, I imagine, under the conditions obtaining would mean an annual charge of about £600 per year. Thus you get half the amount provided, which is to go in mitigation of a rent that might be too high for the persons so displaced. The hands of the local authority are not tied. They have this money at their command in order to deal with such cases, where the rent, if an economic rent covering all the expenses, would really be beyond the means of the persons for whom the houses have been provided. I dare say the noble Lord, Lord Banbury of Southam, has had experience in country districts. But any one who has had experience in the housing of replaced persons from an insanitary area knows perfectly well that the difficulty is to give that replacement accommodation on terms which the person displaced can possibly pay. Here you have, it scents to me, an admirable system. It causes the least trouble to the central authority; it causes the least trouble to the local authority; it makes the interdependence of the two as little difficult as possible; and it provides a sum for the very purpose for which a sum is most wanted, that is, in lowering the rent which would otherwise have to be charged to the poorest of the poor.
As we all know, certain subventions have already been given, but never on this principle, which has been carefully thought out, and which certainly appears to us to be an admirable improvement on anything which has been done in this direction in former Acts. I hope the noble Earl, Lord Onslow, who, I know, has taken so much interest in these matters, will very carefully consider this, because I am sure that he would approve of the provisions in Part III for the double purpose o ensuring replacement of the population and also ensuring replacement of premises.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM: Who will find the money—the ratepayer or the taxpayer?
LORD PARMOOR: The taxpayer will find £2 5s. per head of the replaced population—that has nothing to do with the houses, it is the replaced population. The rates will contribute £3 15 s. per house. That will be a contribution for forty years.
The next Part with which I deal is really new, that is the provision of houses in rural districts. That is a matter with which I admit I have had much more to do than with the provision of houses in town districts. Anyone who has to deal with housing in rural districts will be concerned in the building of cottages. Many members of your Lordships' House are much concerned in the provision of cottages and will know how extraordinarily difficult it is to provide alternative accommodation on terms which can possibly be met by the poorer men in the country districts. In regard to the provision of houses in rural districts, it becomes the duty of the county council to see that they are provided, and that where slum areas exist they are swept away. Then you have agreements by county councils for assisting rural districts, who feel very much the heavy expense of schemes of this character. In the event of a rural district council failing to exercise their powers the county council can come in and operate the Act. If the county council does not act the Minister can take steps to enforce the execution of its provisions.
The last Part that I need deal with is Part V. I do not think I have omitted anything from my explanation so far as I have gone, although I have tried to be as brief as possible. There is what is called a standard of re-housing accommodation laid down in Clause 36. That is quite right; but I rejoice that under Clause 46 there is a modification regarding houses for aged persons. My experience, at any rate in the country, is that aged persons do not want a house up to the family standard, and not only do they not want it but it is a disadvantage. They cannot keep it tidy or warm, or provide in any way for its comfort. So that, although there is a standardisation of re-housing accommodation laid down, as there certainly ought to be, there is at the same time a provision that
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in the case of the aged poor less accommodation can be provided. That is extremely important both from the point of view of expense and the point of view of comfort. That is one matter which I am sure would appeal to noble Lords opposite. No one Who has to do with cottage property in the country desires to do other than provide accommodation for the aged poor in his own parish or district, and it ought to be possible to do it in the most convenient form and at the least expense.
I ought, I think, to say a word about Clause 41 because that has been a much-discussed matter. Under these clearances you undoubtedly do harm to certain people who are dispossessed, particularly small business people whose customers have been in the cleared area. It is sometimes very hard that they should be dispossessed and yet get no contribution at all for the loss and expense which they have incurred. Under Clause 31 there is power in the local authority to make allowances to certain persons who are displaced. It is not compensation. It is an ex gratia allowance which ought to be made in order to deal as fairly as possible with all persons who have any interests in these districts. I think it is a great advance on what has been done before, because it has often been a matter of complaint that those who need assistance most if they are turned out of their house or small business in a slum area, have no consideration of any kind from the pecuniary point of view. They would not be entitled to compensation and that is not the suggestion. That would upset the whole idea of what compensation is meant for.
I do not think there is any other clause to which I need draw special attention. The remaining clauses of the Bill are really procedure and machinery. I fully admit that when we come to consider the matter in Committee, as I hope we shall without too long a discussion on the Second Reading, the representatives of the Government in your Lordships' House will be prepared to give full and detailed explanations of any questions that are addressed to them. A great deal of this Bill is merely the re-enactment of existing provisions. I think I have explained to your Lordships the special new points and, without spending further time upon it, I hope I may commend the Bill to

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your Lordships' consideration. I hope that it may get at any rate a Second Reading as early as possible, because your Lordships must be aware that we are approaching the end of our Parliamentary time, though we cannot be exempted from our duties until we have dealt with the legislation which comes to us in the ordinary Parliamentary course. I beg to move that the Bill be now read a second time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2ª.—(Lord Parmoor.)
THE EARL OF ONSLOW: My Lords, in commencing his extremely lucid speech of explanation the noble and learned Lord said that this was a continuity Bill. It is certainly true that it consists of a great deal of repetition or re-statement, with a few alterations, of existing legislation, and in that sense it is, of course, a continuity Bill. But it also contains very complicated and involved clauses. Some of them, possibly, are not of vital but of very considerable importance, and I think they deserve very careful consideration by your Lordships' House. Your Lordships are well aware that had the late Government been returned to power at the last Election they would have given their most serious attention to this question of slum clearance. It is not a Party question. It is a question which everybody recognises, and everybody wants to do the best they can to remedy it. Indeed, it is not want of energy in any Government, whether a Coalition Government, a Socialist Government, a Conservative Government or any other Government, that has prevented this matter being radically dealt with before.
As I say, the problem of the slums has long been before Governments and local authorities and they have sought measures for dealing with it. The reason why it has proved difficult or impossible to deal with it drastically hitherto is the extraordinary complexity of the problems which it presents. I do not think I need go into them, but your Lordships are well aware of them. We have had many debates on the subject and it is a matter of common knowledge. The local authorities have not been idle, but it is only within the last year or two that they
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have been able to concentrate upon the slums at all. The general business of providing houses for everybody has been so great that they have not been able to concentrate upon the slums. But it cannot be sail that nothing has been clone. If not so much has been done as we might wish, something at any rate has been done. A. great deal of unostentatious work in our great cities has been accomplished. On an average half a million of houses a year have been repaired on the representations of local authorities. I think I ought to say, and I am sure your Lordships will agree with me, that a great deal has been done and a great many houses have been repaired on the initiative of property owners without any incitement from local authorities.
That brings me to some of the defects of this Bill. I regret very much that this Bill makes so little provision for re-conditioning. We were told in the last debate on this subject that noble Lords opposite did not have much faith in the policy of re-conditioning.
LORD PARMOOR: May I interrupt? I ought to have said, dealing with individual houses, in regard to the question of repairs and demolition that reconditioning is one of the matters the local authority can insist upon.
THE EARL OF ONSLOW: I am much obliged to the learned and noble Lord. I quite see that comes under Part II—the repair of the house—but I am talking of re-conditioning on rather a larger scale, such as was described in the last debate on housing in your Lordships' House. I do not want to go into this, but I am sorry it is not facilitated more under this Bill. I had hoped when this Bill was adumbrated, that it would have been referred to in greater detail. This brings me to another matter, and that is, there is no provision, so far as I can see, for encouraging the better management of property. I think that management is one of the most important things to encourage if you wish to guard against the future development of slums. Unless you have proper management you risk your property being deteriorated rapidly, and in fact going back to the state of slumdom from which you have rescued it. I do not know that the pro-

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perty in question here is likely to deteriorate so far as all that, for I do not suppose local authorities or owners would be so foolish as to allow slums to grow up when modern conditions and modern facilities can prevent it. Still, without scientific management and administration, property is bound to deteriorate.
I come now to another, and I think even more important matter, and that is the lack of provision for town planning in this Bill. I should have thought that it is axiomatic that town planning should precede, or at any rate go hand-in-hand with, any great scheme for the clearance of buildings. When you want to build a house you do not go to the builder first; you go to the architect. It is he who provides your designs. Similarly, when you begin to reconstitute your great cities, it seems to me you should go to the town-planning experts before you settle exactly how you 'are to lay out your new cleared areas. I very much regret we have nothing more than a vague promise that a Town Planning Bill, which I believe is on the stocks, will be produced at some time. Your Lordships are well aware of the congestion of Parliamentary business, and I fear that it is very unlikely we shall see that Bill in the near future; at any rate not before this Bill has got into working order. I not want to bring any Party politics if I can help it into this discussion. I rather ask myself what is the reason of this; whether it is a political expedient, the putting of the cart before the horse, so to speak, and whether that is why we do not see any reference to town planning in this Bill. If the noble Lord opposite is contemplating a Town Planning Bill, as I believe he is, may I make him one small suggestion in regard to this matter? The difficulty which I think will be encountered will be to get a free area to which to transport your slum dwellers, because all these people are attached to factories and works near by their present residences. There is a tendency, as your Lordships are well aware, for many factories to go into the country if they can. Many owners of factories would like to do that, but they cannot afford it, and I am wondering whether it would not be possible to give some assistance to enable factories to be removed into the country
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and so open up fresh land to which slum dwellers can go. It is only a suggestion, but I venture to put it before noble Lords opposite.
In regard to Part I of the Bill, it was referred to at some length by the noble and learned Lord. I think that in this Part we see the worst blot upon the Bill, the greatest omission in it. If your Lordships will turn to Clause 1, you will see that all buildings may be condemned in a clearance area and (this is the important point) not only because they are unfit for human habitation—of course we perfectly understand that a building which is unfit for human habitation should be condemned—but also because of the narrowness or the bad arrangement of the streets causing them to be dangerous or injurious. It does not say that these houses must be in a bad condition. They may be in a perfectly good condition. I know that it is probable that in many slum areas there are islands of property where the houses are in good repair, the landlords having spent money upon them, and where they are perfectly fit for housing people. I understand from what has passed that these will be excluded from the clearance area. You cut them right out.
LORD PARMOOR: They will be islands.
THE EARL OF ONSLOW: Quite so. Supposing you have a very narrow street—doubtless a very unsatisfactory narrow street—and in that street you have a good house. You might have a town hall even. I do not think it likely, but it is possible. You might at any rate have a perfectly good building in a clearance area, and if it is in a clearance area the building may be ordered to be demolished at the expense of the owner, whose only compensation would be that provided for in Clause 12, subsection (2). That is to say, that he would only get the site value. Let me turn to Clause 12, subsection (2). That perpetuates an injustice which has been on the Statute Book since 1919. I was rather surprised to hear from the noble and learned Lord that the fact that it has been so long on the Statute Book and was repeated in the Act of 1925—which, I would remind your Lordships, was a Consolidation Act and not an ordinary Act of Parliament—seemed to him to be a reason for its continuance. If the noble and learned

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Lord continues to utter those sentiments I should rather expect to see him return to his original fold on this side of the House. To argue that a thing should remain because it has been so long in existence is an argument different from that which is usually used by noble Lords opposite.
I think that it is a great pity that this section has been retained. It has been responsible for more bitterness and more ill-feeling perhaps than any enactment of recent years, and that is only natural, because if you take away a man's property, which he has done his best to look after, and you treat him as if he was maintaining a house that was unfit for human habitation, you are perpetrating a really gross injustice. I go further—and I do not think this is denied for a moment—and say that local authorities have in the past bought, property under the Act at its site value, and they have not demolished the buildings but have proceeded to let them and to draw a handsome profit out of the rents. They are making a handsome profit out of buildings which they have condemned to be demolished after they have taken them over without payment. They are now making a good thing out of them.
There are several cases, but I will only quote one to your Lordships. The Batterby case may be familiar to many of your Lordships. In this case the Hull Corporation were undertaking a housing scheme, and Mr. Batterby owned property within the clearance area that was taken by the Corporation. He was paid the site value of £400, and of course he got nothing for the buildings. I understand Mr. Batterby still continues to live in his own house, as before, but now pays a rent of £25 10 s. a year to the Corporation, and the whole rent of these buildings, which the Corporation got for nothing, amounts to £130 a year, and for that property Mr. Batterby only received £400. Noble Lords opposite will doubtless say that hard cases make bad law. Perhaps that is true, but what possible justification can you have for a law which permits a local authority to acquire buildings from the owner for nothing, and then to utilise those buildings so as to divert the rents to their own pockets and make a handsome profit out of them? I have always thought that this provision got into the Act of 1919
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by inadvertence, and I think it is a great pity that the Government have not taken this opportunity to set right this injustice. I go further and say it is a very serious thing, because the attitude they have taken up of insisting upon these unjust provisions will go very far, I am afraid, to prevent owners from dealing with their property and spending money upon it. How are they to know, after they have spent the money, that an order may not be made and their property condemned and taken from them, in which case they will only receive the site value?
I do not want to say anything more about Part I, and as to Part II I do not think I need say much, because it has been gone through very carefully by the noble and learned Lord. It really contains minor matters, most of which, I think, are not without value. I come, then, to Part III, which deals with the question of finance and has been described—and rightly described I think—as the kernel of the Bill. Of course, the financial provisions are the most important part of the Bill. I said, I think, in my opening observations that this Bill contained very few novelties, but the noble and learned Lord told us that this new method of the subsidy is absolutely novel. It is very complicated. You have not one subsidy, but two subsidies—a subsidy per person and a subsidy per house. Then the local authorities—I am glad I shall not have to do it—will have to amalgamate these two and to deal out such justice as they may. The subsidy for the house comes from the local authorities and goes to the house, whereas the second subsidy, I understand, is to be used for the purpose of differential rents. I think I am correct in that.
LORD PARMOOR: Both these subsidies may be used for differential renting. They are calculated in different ways, one on the house and one on the replaced population, but when calculated they are both to be used for differential renting.
THE EARL OF ONSLOW: I am very grateful to the noble and learned Lord, but that only makes the matter more complicated. However, I do not think it is much good discussing the question, because the noble and learned Lord thinks it is an excellent system and will produce magnificent results. I do not know. He may be right, but we cannot

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judge now. It is only from experience that we shall be able to tell whether it is of value or not. I will only say one word more on the subject of the subsidy. The main weapon, if I may so describe it, against slums in this Bill is the increased subsidy. I think your Lordships will all agree with that. I am not going to argue the question as to whether an increase in the subsidy increases the price of building or not. We have discussed that very often and it is a matter of considerable controversy. I will only point out that private enterprise can build houses without a subsidy at practically the same cost as with it, and notwithstanding the higher subsidy paid on the Wheatley houses the rents for those are not less than those paid for the Chamberlain houses. Will this Bill with its increased subsidy produce houses for which tenants can afford to pay? That is the crux of the whole matter. Only time can show. Previous experience has not encouraged me at any rate to think that increased subsidies lower the cost of building, and if the cost of building rises then the whole of the Bill will be really inoperative.
I pass on to Part IV of the Bill, which deals with the provision of houses in rural districts. I am rather doubtful whether a great deal may be expected from this Part of the Bill. The increase of the personal subsidy is 5s.—2 10 s. instead of £2 5s. I will only say that we must see the scheme working before we can say what it will produce. Now I come to the more important Part, that dealing with facilities given to county councils to associate themselves with housing. They are very limited and seem to consist only of a permit—or an obligation I think it is—to pay £1 for every agricultural cottage. I think that is the main provision with regard to county councils. I must say I have always thought it would be a good thing were county councils to associate themselves more with housing. I have always advocated that. But if it had really been intended to put this duty seriously within the power of county councils, I think you would have to have a much more comprehensive measure than this. I do not know what the intentions of the Government are with regard to the Rural Housing Act, but if they propose, as has been suggested, to repeal that Act, and
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if they think these provisions are going to replace it, I can assure them they are mistaken. I do not know whether those are their intentions or not.
I come now to the last part of the Bill, Part V. Your Lordships will see in that Part of the Bill one clause which was not mentioned by the noble and learned Lord. It is Clause 3S which deals with the duty of a local authority to have regard to the amenities of a locality. That has a remote relation to town planning. It also enables local authorities to preserve historic buildings and to preserve amenities, such as views and so forth. So far as it goes I welcome that clause. Then there is Clause 41, which to a certain extent—although I think only to a very limited extent—modifies the hardship of Clause 12 and enables the local authority to give soma compensation for disturbance to persons forcibly removed from a clearance area and to render a certain amount of assistance there. It is purely optional. Every local authority is allowed to deal with the matter as seems best to themselves in accordance with the conditions laid down in the Bill. It seems to me that the result will be very uneven working because one local authority may do one thing and another local authority another thing. That, I think, will produce a sense of injustice among people in adjacent areas, because you may have a slum extending from the area of one local authority to another.
Clause 46 was referred to in very glowing terms by the noble and learned Lord. It modifies the Housing Act of 1923. I was responsible in your Lordships' House for that Act, and I am very glad to see this amendment, but I wish the noble and learned Lord had been able to go further. Why does the Government intend to benefit only aged persons? There must be lots of people who are not aged but who do not want so large a house. Why should those persons not be accommodated?—spinsters for example, bachelors even, and other people as well. I do not see why aged people should be the only ones considered in the Bill. I have only one other clause to refer to, and that is Clause 47, which is a clause giving power to local authorities to advance money to people who want to repair their houses. There is one other clause which I think might have been added in this Part of the Bill, and that is one to pro-

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hibit local authorities from imposing conditions, in respect of municipal housing esates, as to light and heat. I think that is really rather important and perhaps we may take the opportunity of discussing that in Committee.
I do not think the Bill goes very far. Its principal fault is that it perpetuates the injustice whereby a man with perfectly good property may be obliged to part with it at site value, or even less than site value when the reduction factor is brought into account. I cannot see why the Government have persisted in maintaining the clause of 1919. The Bill introduces very complicated subsidy, which no doubt will give a great deal of occupation and trouble to local authorities, but we must hope for the best and hope that it will work out in the way the noble and learned Lord suggested. Its main failure, I think, is that it fails to deal with town planning and I cannot see how any Housing Bill can really succeed unless, before it is brought into operation by the local authority, the whole question of town planning has been carefully considered.
EARL BEAUCHAMP: My Lords, I venture to apologise for speaking twice in the same evening, but I shall show the sincerity of my plea for indulgence by being really brief. I want to say on behalf of my noble friends and of myself that we are very anxious to support this Bill as far as it goes. It has been the subject of very careful examination in another place and I think it is on the whole an enterprising and workmanlike Bill. The criticism I make is somewhat the same as that made by the noble Earl who has just sat down, that in several respects the Bill does not go far enough. In the wise and shrewd criticisms made by the noble Earl he spent more time on criticising omissions from the Bill than in criticising what is in it. I am the more inclined to look at the Bill with a little anxiety because it has evoked so little serious hostility. If it were actually going to interfere with the class we call slum landlords, I cannot help feeling that we should have heard them squeal before now.
Generally speaking, I am bound to say I think these slums are held by small landlords. Usually a large estate is well managed. These slums, and the worst
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property, in many cases belong to small men who have bought a few houses at a time and have allowed them to fall into disrepair, very often because they have not been able to afford what was necessary to get them into better condition. I doubt very much whether the provisions of this Bill go far enough. The problem of the slums is really a problem of vested interests—the vested interest in land and the vested interest in building material—and I cannot feel that these are attacked with sufficient vigour in the present Bill. If I could hope that the noble and learned Lord would, in the course of the passage of this Bill, introduce in Committee a series of Amendments of a more drastic character, I can assure him that he would receive my support.
I confess that I feel some doubt whether the Bill will do everything which the noble and learned Lord, the Lord President, expects of it. I doubt very much whether it will do a great deal in rural areas. After all, the unfortunate agricultural labourer is now earning an average of £1 12 s. 6d. a week, and out of that he cannot afford 10 s., hardly can he afford 7s. a week for rent. I could wish that there was some hope that His Majesty's Government might go further in this direction. There is the further difficulty that a great deal is left to local authorities, who, indeed, have a great deal of power now. Unfortunately there are some recalcitrant local authorities who do not take advantage of the powers which they already possess, and although the Minister of Health takes power to compel them, I feel very doubtful whether, under this Bill, he will take more drastic stems than he has taken in the past. He has had these powers, but has never used them in days gone by, and it seems doubtful if he will use them in the future.
With regard to the subsidy, I feel that His Majesty's Government might perhaps have done something more. The noble Lord who is always such an advocate of economy, Lord Banbury of Southam, is unfortunately not in his place, but I would venture to point out one direction in which something more might have been done by making a comparison with the analogy of the roads. Your Lordships who use these new arterial roads must have seen how on each side there

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are springing up numbers of new houses. The land on each side of these arterial roads has increased in value, but the increase has gone to the landlord. If, when these arterial roads were first built, the Road Board had bought a sufficient area on each side of the road and had given fair compensation to the landlords, the increased value caused by the formation of the road and created at the public expense would have fallen to the public authority, and we should have had more money with which to deal with roads and in the end, no doubt, a great deal of wealth would have accrued to the advantage of the community. As it is, it is seldom that I use these roads without thinking how the community has wasted wealth which ought to belong to it at the present time. I cannot help thinking that, if this matter is tackled in a big way, there will be much more possibility of getting money than if it is done in a niggling and half-hearted spirit.
There is one question that I should like to put to the noble and learned Lord with regard to the Housing Department of the Ministry of Health. At one time I believe there was rather a large Department there, with special Commissioners. I do not know if they are still there or if they have been replaced, but I think your Lordships will be glad to know what is the attitude of the Ministry of Health in this direction. I say that I welcome this Bill and that my noble friends welcome it as a serious and sincere attempt to deal with the question, but we do not look upon it as the last word in the matter. It is not the end of the journey, but only a milestone along the road, and I hope that before long we may have a somewhat more stringent measure which will effect a great deal more than I am afraid this Bill is likely to effect.
THE LORD BISHOP OF SOUTHWARK: My Lords, at this late hour in the evening I promise to keep my remarks within a very few minutes. It is quite unnecessary for me to speak either about the evil of the slums, on which we are all agreed, or of the failure of the great housing schemes, which have been carried through so successfully, to reduce to any extent the number of those who are actually living within the slums. I think that we are also agreed that the
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causes that have stood in the way of any effective dealing with the slums are really three: the procedure has been very cumbrous and lengthy; the cost has alarmed local authorities; and it has not been found possible to provide houses at a low enough rent for those who are moved from the poorer districts. Those three tests I bring to this Bill, and I find, first of all, that the Bill does simplify the procedure considerably. It does away with the formal scheme which was originally required, it separates the acquisition of land from the disposal of it and, of course, in the case of individual houses, it simplifies matters considerably by giving the appeal, not to the Ministry of Health but to a judicial body, the County Court. All of us who have had any practical experience in the matter know that this will mean a considerable saving of time and the removal of obstacles.
Next, the Bill does to a certain extent remove the serious obstacle of cost. In any case the cost of slum clearance must be considerable, but in more than one way this Bill will help to remove it. Already, as the noble and learned Lord who introduced the Bill has pointed out, it makes it possible for the local authority, after the necessary order has been obtained, to turn to the owners who hold this slum property and to order them to demolish it at their own cost. That is perfectly fair, and it will save the local authority large capital sums of money. The local authority will also have the advantage of knowing exactly what grant they will receive. At the present time there is a good deal of uncertainty about it. The method of estimating the grant which they are to receive is somewhat complicated, and this Bill, by changing the basis of assessment from the loss on the house to the person, makes it very much more simple, so that at the very outset the local authorities know what kind of grant they will receive. Further, as regards the actual amount which they will receive, it will no longer he 50 per cent., but will be a larger amount.
In the third place, the Bill does help to meet the very serious difficulty of providing houses at a rent which can be afforded by the people who come from the poorest parts. The very centre of this problem is to he found in the difference of rent. The lowest rent of most of

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the provided houses is, on the average, 12 s. a week, while the slum-dweller as a rule pays about 7s. a. week for his accommodation. Of course you will find considerable variety in different localities, but that is a rough statement of the situation. This Bill will help not only because, as the Minister of Health said, it will afford a level increase of 2s. a house—it is doubtful if it will be quite so much, if taken all round—but, by the system of allowing local authorities to differentiate, it will be possible for the local authorities in certain cases to reduce the rent considerably below the ordinary amount. While the man who can afford it, the man with no family, will no doubt be charged the full rent of say, 10A. a week, the man who has a large family will, if it seems good to the local authority, be charged a lower rent. This becomes possible through the system of differentiation, which, I think, is the most striking feature of the whole Bill. It will enable the local authorities to try within certain limits what is often called the "children rent rebate," by which it is possible to allow a lower rent according to the number of children in the family. I believe that a good deal can be done in that way. On these grounds I am able to welcome the Bill as a whole.
It is significant that a number of conferences have been held by the National Housing and Town Planning Council with the local authorities. I believe eleven such conferences have been held within the last few weeks, and all passed resolutions in support of the Bill. Of course there have been criticisms in detail, and some of those criticisms have been heard this evening. There is criticism about the compensation clauses. I admit that I always feel some difficulty about the existing compensation clauses, but I understand that municipal authorities as a whole are against any change in them, as it would make the work of slum clearance very much greater than it will be if the Bill goes through as it now stands. It is, however, one of those matters which we shall be able to argue out in Committee.
Then there is an important point of detail which I would like to raise myself. It is that there is no minimum size of house provided for in this Bill. The number of rooms is stated, but there is
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no standard minimum. The rooms may be very small indeed, and the houses extremely small. One of the things in which we have legitimate cause of pride in our housing policy of the last few years has been the high standard of house built. We hear of some ingenious and striking experiments on the Continent, but I think, apart from the interesting character of the experiments, and the picture, we shall find that the average house built on the Continent for the working classes is very much smaller than those built in this country. The Minister of Health on the Report stage in the House of Commons was pressed strongly on this matter, and he gave a promise, almost a pledge, that when the Bill came to this House he would see that this matter was set right. I hope that the able and learned Lord, in reply, will be able to tell us that some Amendment will be proposed in Committee by the Government, laying down a minimum size for these houses.
There is just one other matter to which I would like to refer. The whole of this housing problem is gigantic, and it is quite possible that the very bent measure will be upset through failure to carry it out. I am told that the number of houses which have been built this year under the Wheatley Act is less than in previous years, and, as the noble Earl pointed out, it is possible that in any district, if there is great competition, prices may go up and all the hopes which we entertain of reduced rents may be disappointed. The problem is not a local problem but a national one, and therefore I urge upon the Government, for consideration, a suggestion made originally by The Times, and then afterwards by others interested in housing, that for some years at any rate a Housing Commission under the Ministry of Health should be brought into being, and that the Housing Commission should have as its sole duty the work of seeing that the provisions of these Bills are properly used, and that various schemes throughout the country are co-ordinated. The Ministry of Health has so increased in importance to the country, and its work has so increased, that it is almost impossible for it to give full attention to the innumerable details which measures of this kind require. Therefore I hope that the Government will seriously con-

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sider the calling into existence of a special Housing Commission, or Housing Council, consisting of four or five experts, who will deal with the different sides of the problem. I welcome the Bill. I believe that it is a powerful weapon placed in the hands of the local authorities, and that if rightly used it will do much to abolish slumdom, in which disease, poverty and unhappiness have found refuge for so long.
LORD BALFOUR OF BURLEIGH: My Lords, I offer apologies to the House for intervening at so late an hour, and without having had the advantage of hearing the earlier part of the debate, but I was unable, owing to matters beyond my control, to be here. One of the criticisms which I make of the Bill is that it does not make sufficient use of the public utility societies, and I hope to put down Amendments when the Committee stage is reached which may carry the matter a little further. I should also like to support what the right rev. Prelate said with regard to differential rents. I believe that a great deal of money has been wasted in subsidies owing to houses going to people who ought not to have had them. Differential rent may be in the nature of a real economy of public money. I welcome the Bill but, as I have said, I shall have Amendments to put down on the Committee stage.
LORD DYNEVOR: My Lords, I should just like to add my protest to what has already been said with regard to the question of compensation, which in many cases is really quite inadequate. When one remembers that at one moment property may be valued for Death Duties at its full market value, and may shortly afterwards be acquired and demolished and the owner only receive a small payment, it does not seem to be fair and right. I would also like to point out to the noble and learned Lord that mortgages are in great danger under the Bill. Under the Rent Restrictions Act a mortgage cannot be called in, yet when a local authority acquires land and premises under this Bill, in certain cases the owner of the mortgage will receive absolutely nothing. It is quite right to abolish the slums, and when premises are insanitary and unfit for habitation we need not give consideration to the owners of the premises, but the Bill itself deals with premises in good repair which are going to be swept
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away. Therefore, in Committee I shall move some Amendments to deal with the hardships and injustices of the Bill.
LORD PARMOOR: My Lords, I feel grateful to the House for the general way in which it has received the Bill. I no not propose now to discuss matters like compensation, though I agree we shall have to discuss that subject in Committee. I should like to say one word in reply to the right rev. Prelate as regards the size of the houses, to which he referred. The Government will propose for your Lordships' consideration an Amendment dealing with that very question.
On Question, Bill read 2ª, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: My Lords, I would like to ask on which day it is proposed to take the Committee stage.
LORD PARMOOR: Of course time is getting on, if we are to get away, as many hope, by the end of July. I should have hoped that I might put the Bill down for Committee on Monday next.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: May I make a suggestion? I know the noble and learned Lord is a sanguine man and one only hopes that his sanguine character is justified in the present case. Personally, I am not so sanguine. He is going to make a statement about business to-morrow, and make a Motion, and for whatever day he now puts the Bill down provisionally for the Committee stage, I hope he will allow me to communicate with him, if necessary, after his statement to-morrow, and that he will not fix the Committee stage of the Bill definitely until then.
LORD PARMOOR: I always desire to meet the convenience of the House. May I put it down provisionally for Monday, and discuss the matter more certainly to-morrow?

BRITISH MUSEUM BILL.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
LORD HANWORTH: My Lords, I beg to move the Second Reading of this Bill.

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The purpose of the Bill is plainly marked upon its face and in its title. It is one "to relieve the principal librarian of the British Museum of the care of the Natural History Departments of the Museum and from liability to enter into a bond for the due discharge of the duties of his office." It will be remembered that the British Museum at Bloomsbury was incorporated under an Act of the year 1753, an Act which enabled the purchase to be effected of the museum or collection of Sir Hans Sloane. That Act is the Act under which, in the main, the British Museum still acts and has its powers. At that time all the collections were housed at Bloomsbury, but in the early 'eighties of the last century a new Museum was built for the purpose of housing the collection of the natural history specimens, though at the same time that remains, as I hope it always will remain, an integral part of the British Museum.
That Museum has developed very largely, and one of the recommendations of the Royal Commission on Museums in their Report was that, in order to give further powers to that branch of the British Museum, steps should be taken to give the director of that part of the British Museum the right of access to the Treasury, and for that purpose that the should be made an accounting officer to the Treasury. The scheme is one which the Trustees of the British Museum desire to carry into effect. It is, however, impossible to carry it into effect unless and until the terms of the original Act of incorporation, the Act of 1153, are amended, for by Section 16 of that Act it is not possible for the chief officer at Bloomsbury, who is called the principal librarian, to delegate any of his duties at all to anyone else. If, therefore, freedom was to be given to the principal director at the South Kensington Museum it would be necessary first of all to enable the principal librarian at Bloomsbury to be discharged of the responsibility that he at present holds in respect of the Natural History Museum. Clause 1 therefore is drawn for the purpose of enabling that alteration to be made in Section 16 of the Act of 1753.
That is really the substance of the Bill. At the same time in Clause 2 opportunity has been taken of getting rid of
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an old-time provision of the Act of 1753. It may startle some of your Lordships to learn that by the terms of that Act the principal librarian at Bloomsbury is bound to give a bond of not less than £1,000 for the due performance of his duties and the safe custody of the specimens entrusted to his care. By regulations made subsequently to that Act the bond that is required from the principal librarian is not less than £10,000. We have, therefore, the curious position that a man of such eminence and distinction as Sir Frederic Kenyon, trusted by everyone to carry out his duties, is also under the necessity of providing a bond of £10,000 for the due performance of them. It is proposed in Clause 2 to get rid of that liability and to prevent its falling upon the accounting officer and principal director at South Kensington.
That is the whole Bill. I ought to explain to your Lordships how it comes that I introduce it. It ought to have been, and would have been, introduced by the Archbishop of Canterbury, had he been free at the present time to undertake the duty. It would have been introduced by the Lord Chancellor if he had been less engaged. It would have been introduced by my noble friend Lord Crawford, if ho had been in a position to undertake the duty. It ought to have been introduced also by the Lord President of the Council, who is a Trustee. But all these great persons were very busy, and in those circumstances I was, at their instance, asked to introduce the Bill. The Bill presses, for, as you will have seen, unfortunately Sir Frederic Kenyon intends to resign his position, and therefore changes will have to be made at Bloomsbury, and it is convenient that the liability under which his successor remains under the, Statute should be removed before that successor is appointed. I have already communicated with the Prime Minister, and he has undertaken, if it is possible, to take what part he can in furthering this Bill through another place, should it be passed by your Lordships' House. In these circumstances I beg to move that the Bill be read a second time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2ª.—(Lord Hanworth.)
THE EARL OF CRAWFORD: My Lords, I wish to make an observation on one

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point only, and that is the urgency of this Bill. As my noble and learned friend has said, Sir Frederic Kenyon will retire at the end of this year. It is really important that his successor should not be subjected to the two obligations under which the existing Statute would place him. There are three Trustees of the British Museum present in the House, the noble and gallant Lord, the Secretary of State for Air, my noble and learned friend Lord Parmoor, and the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack. I beg members of the Government present really to do their utmost to get this Bill through the House of Commons.
It is preposterous that a man of the standing and character of Sir Frederic Kenyon, one of the most distinguished living public servants, a man who has served the State with distinction and with fidelity for well over forty years, should be subjected to what in the Act of 1753 is called a "penal bond," as though it were assumed that he might be trying to make away with the Elgin Marbles for his own benefit. He is now subject to a bond of £10,000. It is intolerable that a public servant of his standing or of the standing of his successor should be subjected to so gross a humiliation. Apart from that it is really very important in the interests of the efficiency of both Museums that the director and principal librarian at Bloomsbury should he relieved from responsibility as accounting officer for the Natural History Museum. It will be better for the efficiency of the South Kensington branch, and equally it will he a relief for the head official at the Bloomsbury branch if this amendment can be made; and I do implore the Government to use their good offices with their colleagues in another place to en
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sure that the Bill passes before the Prorogation.
On Question, Bill read 2ª and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

CRIMINAL APPEAL (NORTHERN IRELAND) BILL. [H.L.]
Amendments reported (according to Order).
AIR TRANSPORT (SUBSIDY AGREEMENTS) BILL.
Read 3ª (according to Order), and passed.
OVERSEAS TRADE BILL.
Read 3ª (according to Order), and passed.

LOCAL GOVERNMENT (ELECTORS UNDER THE TEMPERANCE (SCOTLAND) ACT, 1913) ORDER (SCOTLAND), 1930.
THE PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY OF THE MINISTRY OF TRANSPORT (LORD PONSONBY OF SHULBREDE): My Lords, on behalf of my noble friend Lord Marley, I beg to move the Motion which stands on the Paper in his name.
Moved, That the Order made by the Secretary of State under the Local Government (Scotland) Act, 1929, entitled the Local Government (Electors under the Temperance (Scotland) Act, 1913) Order (Scotland), 1930, which was presented on the 2nd June, 1930, be approved.—(Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede.)
House adjourned at twenty minutes before eight o'clock.