Lords Sitting of 25 July 1934

Preamble
The House met at three of the clock. The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
VISCOUNT WAKEFIELD.
Charles Cheers, Baron Wakefield, C.B.E., having been created Viscount Wakefield of Hythe in the County of Kent—Was (in the usual manner) introduced.
LORD ALNESS.
The Right Honourable Robert Munro (commonly called Lord Alness) late Lord Justice Clerk and President of the Second Division of the Court of Session, having been created Baron Alness of Alness in the County of Ross and Cromarty—Was (in the usual manner) introduced.
CATTLE INDUSTRY (EMERGENCY PROVISIONS) BILL.
Brought from the Commons endorsed with the Certificate from the Speaker that the Bill is a Money Bill within the meaning of the Parliament Act, 1911; read 1a; and to be printed.
WHALING INDUSTRY (REGULATION) BILL. [H.L.]
Returned from the Commons, agreed to, with Amendments.
SHOPS BILL. [H.L.]
Returned from the Commons, with the Lords Amendments to the Commons Amendments and the Lords consequential Amendments to the Bill, agreed to.
PUBLIC WORKS FACILITIES SCHEME (PENICUIK WATER) CONFIRMATION BILL.
Considered on Report (according to Order).

MATRIMONIAL CASES.
THE EARL OF LISTOWEL THE EARL OF LISTOWEL rose to ask His Majesty's Government what steps they have taken to implement the Lord Chancellor's statement in this House
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that "The Home Secretary is prepared to have examined the question whether particular days and hours can be assigned for the hearing of husband and wife cases, and the question whether it is possible to extend and develop the present methods adopted at many courts of subjecting applications for separation orders to a preliminary informal investigation "; and to move for Papers.
The noble Earl said: My Lords, there is a great deal of business down on the Order Paper, and I am extremely glad to be able to say that I shall detain the House for only a moment. To explain the exact nature of the Question, I would ask your permission to recapitulate a little past history. There is complete agreement amongst all those acquainted with the business of police courts that the treatment they accord to matrimonial cases is at the present moment extremely unsatisfactory. As a result of that general consensus of opinion, two months ago I introduced a measure which I hoped would do something to improve the situation. The noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack, answering on that occasion on behalf of the Government, was good enough to say that the Home Office would seriously consider at least two of the suggestions which were raised in the course of the debate on my measure. My Question to-day is simply to ask His Majesty's Government what steps have been taken, in accordance with the noble and learned Viscount's remarks on that occasion, in the first place to enquire into the possibility of arranging that matrimonial cases should be heard separately from the ordinary criminal cases that come before the magistrates, and in the second place to enquire whether it was, or was not, possible to subject all matrimonial cases to "a preliminary informal investigation," to use the words of the noble and learned Viscount, before they come before the court.
In the course of his speech the noble and learned Viscount met the suggestions of those who are thoroughly dissatisfied with present conditions generally and in a manner that went far to accord with their wishes, but at the same time there are two points which he did not mention and which I should like to stress for a moment. These are two question of procedure in the police court, which in our opinion would do much to remedy the present situation. The first is that some

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serious consideration should be given to the question of whether or not some restriction might be imposed, at the discretion of the magistrates, on those reporters who are present, in the manner at present adopted in the Divorce Court. The second question is whether the Home Office could not consider, concurrently with other matters which will come before it for consideration, whether the general public could not be excluded from the hearing of these cases, in which matters of a very personal and private nature must necessarily come up. This, of course, is a procedure adopted at present in the children's courts.
I have an appeal to make to the noble and learned Viscount who is answering on behalf of the Government, and I should like to associate myself in this appeal with three of the speakers who took part in the debate last May. They were the noble Marquess, Lord Reading, an ex-Lord Chief Justice of this country, the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury, and the noble Lord, Lord Merrivale, whose authority on questions of divorce is, of course, unchallenged, all of whom begged the Government to accord to any Committee that it might be proposed to set up the widest terms of reference. I do appeal very definitely to the Government that any Committee that is established should be allowed to consider the two questions to which I have just referred, as well as those for which we already have an absolutely substantial guarantee. In case His Majesty's Government are not able to meet this proposal, I should like to ask the noble and learned Viscount whether he has thought of other methods of inquiry, or whether he intends to introduce any legislation in this. House or elsewhere to deal with the matter. All those who are in any way concerned with the treatment of matrimonial cases in our police courts are convinced that these are matters which deserve very serious consideration, and that, if some reform on lines which are no departure from our existing legal system could be adopted, they would alleviate a great deal of the completely unnecessary hardship and suffering which are incurred owing to our present method of procedure. I beg to move.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (VISCOUNT SANKEY): My Lords, the Government are indebted to the noble Earl for putting
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this Question on the Paper. He has taken a very great interest in the subject, and it is not too much to say that, thanks to his efforts, public attention has been drawn to reforms, some of which at any rate, in the opinion of those qualified to judge, are long overdue. The Government fully recognise the importance of enabling courts of summary jurisdiction to make proper arrangements for a preliminary and informal investigation of applications for separation orders by husband and wife with a view to bringing about reconciliation in all cases where this is practicable and desirable. Careful examination has been given to the question of the best method of inquiry into the subject with a view to getting practical steps taken as early as possible to improve the existing position, which cannot be said to be entirely satisfactory.
As I stated on May 15, in replying to the noble Lord's Bill on the Motion for Second Reading, the conciliation work in courts may be undertaken, and is undertaken in many courts, by probation officers, and it is generally recognised that, where there is a probation officer with the time and ability to deal with conciliation problems, he is usually the most suitable person to undertake this duty. But your Lordships will readily recognise that the system of establishing probation officers is not one which is wholly free from difficulty. It may well be in a busy Metropolitan court that the services of one probation officer are hardly sufficient to deal with all the cases which it may be desired to set before him. On the other hand, in a remote country court there may be only one or two or three cases in the course of a month, and therefore there is not enough work in the country courts, unless you have a difficult system of grouping the services of a probation officer for several areas. An inquiry therefore into the arrangements that ought to be made in conciliation work must take account of the position of probation officers. Many probation officers are fully occupied with their probation duties, and no progress in those cases would be made by simply loading new duties on to officers who already have as much work as they can carry out effectively.
Moreover, conciliation work and probation work do not comprise the whole of

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the cases which fall upon such officers. In addition to probation work proper and to conciliation work, there are other services of a social character which are becoming increasingly important if courts of summary jurisdiction are to function to the best advantage. Frequently inquiries are desirable into the circumstances of an offender before a court decides whether he should be dealt with by probation or by some other method. Often, again, it is desirable that when a young offender has been fined and given time to pay he should be placed under supervision until the fine is paid, in accordance with the provision of Section 1 of the Criminal Administration Act, 1914. Very little use has hitherto been made of this provision, but where the method of supervision is employed the probation officer is usually the person to whom the duty is given. A suggestion has also been made in the Report which has just been published—I think it was published on Monday or yesterday—of the Departmental Committee on imprisonment in default of payment of fines and of other sums of money, that it would frequently be advantageous to the court to have the services of a social investigator to enquire into the circumstances of persons who fail to pay sums of money, in cases where the information before the court is insufficient to enable them to determine how far the default is due to poverty rather than to wilful refusal or culpable neglect. The Committee point out that in many of the cases where men are summoned for arrears under maintenance or affiliation orders, information as to the defaulter's earnings is frequently vague, scanty, and conflicting, and the court has no power to supplement by its own inquiries such information as may be given to the parties.
There is the further question whether, in view of the very extensive use which is now made of the Probation Act, adequate arrangements are made at all courts for the supervision of offenders who are placed on probation. The last inquiry into the probation system was made as far back as 1902 by a Departmental Committee on the training, appointment and payment of probation officers. As a result of the recommendations of this Committee, various steps were taken which led to improvements in the probation service, but the steps hitherto taken have only been partially
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effective. The success of probation as a system of dealing with offenders depends largely on the qualifications of the persons appointed as probation officers and on the time and attention they can give to individual cases. Questions concerning the appropriate remuneration of probation officers, regarding the training of suitable persons, and the appointment of a sufficient number of officers to enable the work to be carried out at all courts in a thorough and efficient manner deserve careful attention and review.
With regard to the two questions which the noble Lord has been good enough to address to me specifically, the first was as to reports of proceedings. I agree with him that it is most important that that question should receive the most careful consideration. I must say that generally the Press may be trusted to exercise a very proper discretion as to what to report. But no doubt there are cases from time to time that find their way into the newspapers which are unfortunate, and which perhaps, had there been a little more time for consideration, the Press would not have published. Then the noble Earl raised the question of the exclusion of the public. That is also a matter that wants very careful consideration. Our English system, which has worked extremely well for many generations, believes in publicity. Publicity, it has often been said, is the soul of justice. Therefore, although there may be some cases where the court has power, and ought to have power, to clear the court, these cases must be very carefully determined before any general enactment is made regarding the clearing of the court for all cases.
In view of these considerations my right honourable friend the Home Secretary has come to the conclusion that if progress is to be made the problem of conciliation in matrimonial cases must be considered in relation to the other social services connected with the administration of justice by courts of summary jurisdiction, and that an inquiry ought to be directed to the general question of providing the courts with adequate means of carrying out the whole of these social services. He accordingly proposes to appoint a Departmental Committee with the following terms of reference:
"To enquire into the social services connected with the administration of justice

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in courts of summary jurisdiction, including the supervision of persons released on probation and in suitable cases of persons ordered to pay fines; the application of conciliation methods to matrimonial disputes; and the making of social investigations on behalf of the court for this and other work falling or likely to fall upon probation officers; and to report on the above questions and as to what changes are required in the existing organisation of probation services and otherwise."
My right honourable friend also proposes that this Committee should be asked as part of their inquiry to consider what arrangements should be made for hearing matrimonial cases separately from ordinary charges in the police courts. As I said at the beginning, so I shall conclude by saying, I am indebted to my noble friend for asking the Question. I hope I have partially satisfied his ambition, though I am afraid I shall never be able wholly to satisfy his ambition. I would only add that there are no Papers to be laid, and I hope the noble Earl will be satisfied with the terms of reference.
LORD MERRIVALE: My Lords, the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, has raised a very important question and, if I may respectfully say so, has raised it with great appreciation and much moderation. He raised it in May. Here we are on the verge of August, and we are where we were, except that there is going to be an inquiry of a fairly limited scope. It would be more satisfactory, I think, if the inquiry could be entered upon and brought to a practical close, say, before Parliament reassembles. These questions really are questions of policy. Large numbers of people know all about them. The Home Office and other Departments have officers who are well informed with regard to the matter, and I believe that a very few sittings of a little body of competent persons would put the questions which the noble Earl has brought to the attention of the House in the way of being settled in the public interest.
The present state of things is very unsatisfactory. It is not an advantageous thing that, if a man and his wife fall out or a woman and her husband fall out, there is then the possibility of the lower class of journalists, if the people are well enough known, exploiting their differences and increasing them. There ought to be some means of dealing with that matter. I am not myself perhaps so sanguine as the noble Earl may be, be-
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cause a long time ago I introduced a very little Bill in this House and your Lordships passed it, dealing with the publication of evidence in cases of petitions for nullity of marriage—a perfectly simple matter about which there was no division of opinion. If that Bill passes into law in the course of the next three or four months those who favour it will be glad that it should be so, but it is not necessary even in these crowded times that there should be that amount of delay. With regard to the question of publicity, there are of course safeguards against publicity now. There used to be power in a Judge, if a witness was embarrassed, to clear the court. There is power at the present time to exclude persons in certain classes of cases under the Criminal Law. What is needed is attention to the matter, and I sincerely hope that the noble Earl will press on with his proposals so that some legislation in a concrete form, if legislation is necessary, may come before Parliament and be brought into effect.
THE EARL OF LISTOWEL: My Lords, I wish in the first place to thank the noble and learned Viscount for his very accommodating answer to the Question which I have asked this afternoon, and to say that we are very grateful to the Government for conceding so much. We are grateful that they are willing to appoint a Departmental Committee and that the Committee will be able to enquire into at least the two important matters which the noble and learned Viscount mentioned in his speech. I should like to associate myself with the noble and learned Lord who has just spoken in requesting the Government to appoint this Committee as soon as may be, in order that its recommendations may have their attention at the earliest possible opportunity.
At the same time I must confess—I think in common with the noble Lord who has just spoken and with those people whom I mentioned as taking part in the debate in May—disappointment that the Government have not been able to do anything at all in the matter either of considering the restriction of publicity or of excluding the public during the hearing of these cases. All I wish to say on that point at the moment is that we still hope very anxiously that the Government may reconsider this question

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and possibly will be willing to appoint a committee of inquiry or even to legislate themselves in a matter of such importance. It is obviously much more difficult for private members of either House of Parliament to produce legislative proposals which are likely to succeed, and for that reason, if for no other, we are most anxious that the Government may reconsider their present rather frigid attitude towards the somewhat more advanced, but I think extremely reasonable, proposals I have made. In view of the answer given by the noble and learned Viscount, I ask leave to withdraw my Motion.
Motion for Papers, by leave, withdrawn.

IRISH FREE STATE.
LORD DANESFORT LORD DANESFORT had the following Notice on the Paper—To ask His Majesty's Government whether their attention has been called to the statements made by Mr. de Valera in the Dail on the 8th, 13th and 20th of June to the effect that his people were determined not to observe the Treaty or any of their obligations to the British Government; that his Government, by their general economic policy, were getting the country into a position of strength for the time when the final severance of the connection with the British Government will take place, as he was sure it would take place; and that his Government proposed with all possible speed to get rid of the post of Governor-General and all those functions carried on by what they regard as an unnecessary official; and whether, in view of the manifest intention of Mr. de Valera and his Government to secede from Great Britain and establish a Republic in Southern Ireland at the earliest possible date, and of the widespread anxiety amongst South Irish born loyalists in regard to their future, His Majesty's Government will give an assurance that they will take adequate steps to safeguard the constitutional status and the legitimate rights of all South Irish born loyal subjects of the King; and to move for Papers.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, the object of my Motion is to obtain from His Majesty's Government an assurance which will allay the deep anxiety that is felt by Southern Irish Unionists as to
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their future. The recent speeches which have been made by Mr. de Valera in the Irish Dail show that he and his Government are determined to repudiate the Treaty of 1921 and all other solemn engagements entered into by the Free State with Great Britain and to secede from the Empire on the earliest possible occasion. May I in a very few words recall the main conditions on which the Free State was established, which were accepted by the Free State and which were embodied in legislation both in the Parliament of the United Kingdom and the Parliament of the Free State? Those conditions were well stated by Sir Austen (then Mr.) Chamberlain in another place on the Second Reading of the Irish Free State Bill on February 22, 1922. Then, after referring to the position of almost absolute liberty which was offered to Southern Ireland, he used these words:
"We place upon this offer only these limitations, that Ireland shall remain within this Empire, and accept citizenship; that she shall acknowledge allegiance to the King, and that she shall give us those securities which are vital to our national existence and to the maintenance of the communications of the Empire."
That speech will be found in the OFFICIAL REPORT, Vol. 150.
I would ask your Lordships to consider for a very few moments how those conditions have been carried out. Let me quote, at no length I hope, some of the numerous recent utterances of Mr. de Valera in the Dail. On May 24 of this year he said:
"If we want a Republic we are entitled to have it. The majority of our people want a Republic."
On June 8 last, referring to the Treaty of 1921 and other Agreements with the British Government, he said:
"These Treaties and contractual obligations are standing in the way of a proper settlement."
We know what in his view a proper settlement means. He went on:
"We say quite definitely that our people will not keep them—"
that is, the Treaties and contractual obligations. Again, on June 20, he declared that the intention of his Government was to abolish His Majesty's representative in Southern Ireland, whom he called "that unnecessary official the Governor-General," with all possible speed. And on July 13—I think

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this is the last quotation I need trouble your Lordships with—he referred to their "general economic policy of getting the country into a position of strength" for the time when the final severance from Great Britain would take place, as he was sure it would take place.
But Mr. de Valera has not confined himself to mere words. He has made elaborate preparations with a view to severing the link with Great Britain and establishing a Southern Ireland Republic. Let me remind your Lordships of some of the things he has done. In the first place, he has abolished the Oath of Allegiance in direct violation of one of the conditions laid down by Sir Austen Chamberlain. In the second place he has swept away the appeal to Privy Council which was embodied in the Treaty; and then, further, the Governor-General, the King's representative, is destined for extinction. Already—and this is yet another step towards his ultimate object—legislation has been passed in the Dail for abolishing the Free State Senate, and, although that Bill was rejected by the Senate, it will come into operation automatically next March. Fifthly, and lastly for the moment, the annuities which were payable by Free State tenants—they were a just debt, as we all know, to Great Britain for the moneys which were advanced by Great Britain to enable the tenants to purchase their holdings—have been withheld from Great Britain and have been appropriated by the Free State, I suppose as part of his announced policy to get the country into a position of strength with a view to a final severance.
I want to refer for a moment to a somewhat remarkable letter which appears in to-day's Times from Mr. Frank MacDermot, who is a well known Member of the Dublin Dail and a man of some independence. Be says this:
"The present Irish Government can hardly avoid asking at the next General Election for a mandate to declare a Republic unless something happens in the meantime."
Mr. MacDermot appears to suggest that the best way of avoiding a Republic is to give the Free State complete power to declare a Republic. It seems a somewhat strange way of avoiding secession to say "Secede if you like." However, one cannot quite follow all the workings of
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the inner mind of some of the gentlemen in Ireland.
In that state of things is it any wonder, I ask your Lordships with all sincerity, that the Irish loyalists feel deep anxiety for their future? They have suffered, as your Lordships know, severely in the past through no fault of their own and they have good reason to fear for the future. Some may ask: What are the anticipated dangers? They are dangers to which no free-born British citizen ought to be asked to submit. Let mo briefly suggest some of those dangers. As regards residents in Southern Ireland, if a Republic is declared these men, unless the British Government by appropriate legislation or otherwise intervene, will forfeit all their rights as British citizens find become aliens with all the consequent disabilities. Perhaps it is hardly necessary to remind your Lordships, but I will state some of those disabilities. They will be unable to enter this country for business or for any other purpose without a permit. They will be unable to get employment here. They will be ineligible for obtaining diplomatic or other protection from the British Government. So much for the residents in the Irish Free State.
As regards those Southern Irish born subjects who are not resident there, their constitutional position, in the view of many of the best constitutional authorities, may be imperilled. Their fears are not wholly without reason, because your Lordships will remember that by the Statute of Westminster passed as recently as 1931, under Sections 2 and 3, the Free State is empowered to repeal or to amend any existing or future Act of Parliament of the United Kingdom so far as the same is part of the law of the Free State, and, further than that, the Free State has full power to make laws having an extra-territorial operation. It may be said with perfect truth that the other Dominions have similar powers by the Statute of Westminster, but I think it is only fair to say that the condition of affairs and the prospects of the future in the other Dominions are very different from the condition of things and the prospects of the future in the Irish Free State.
So seriously do the Irish loyalists regard the situation that they have formed a new organisation the object of which, to use their own words, is "to assert the

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constitutional rights of all loyal Southern Irish born subjects of His Majesty." That organisation is known as the Irish Loyalist Imperial Federation. Its president is Lord Carson, a name which I think will always be respected in this country and in Ireland and throughout the Empire. The organisation's offices are at Broadway Court, Westminster. Large numbers of men have already joined that Federation. They include not only residents in the Irish Free State, in Northern Ireland and in this country, but residents in Canada, in Australia, in South Africa, in India, and also in Kenya and other outposts of the Empire. May I be permitted strongly to urge on all those whom my words may possibly reach the importance of joining this association? If they desire to maintain by legitimate means the rights and interests of these Southern Irish loyalists for whom I speak I ask them to join the Federation without delay.
Before I sit down I desire to make it clear to your Lordships' House and to the noble Viscount who, I think, is going to answer for the Government, what is my request. I do not ask them to make a pronouncement to-day as to the general attitude they would adopt towards the Free State Government in case the Free State Government proclaim a Republic. The representatives of His Majesty's Government here would probably say—I think they have already said it in another place—that such an announcement would be premature and that they declined to make any statement on the subject. What I do ask His Majesty's Government is this: I beg of them to give an assurance that they are determined, in the words of my Motion, to "safeguard the constitutional status and legitimate rights of all Southern Irish-born loyal subjects" of His Majesty. Such an assurance as that could not be said to be in any sense premature. We are accustomed in this country in various matters, in matters of defence, in matters affecting the interests of large sections of the population, to look a bit ahead and to make preparations for contingencies which may happen. Your Lordships had an instance of that in the debate which took place yesterday. If they did not do so I think His Majesty's Government and the Parliament of this country would be accused of dereliction of duty. I venture to think that such an assurance as that
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for which I ask would not only be reasonable and right, but would give relief and deep satisfaction to those loyal subjects of the King who have so severely suffered by their loyalty to the Crown.
LORD RANKEILLOUR: My Lords, as an old militant Unionist I have every sympathy with the object of my noble friend's Motion, but all the same I deprecate the Question that he has put, and I deprecate it on two grounds. In the first place, I think it is highly inexpedient to ask a responsible Government what they would do in a hypothetical situation. In the second, I deprecate it because, although I do not think my noble friend intended it, there is a hint of what I can only call defeatism in the words of his Question. It might be construed as meaning that were a Republic to be proclaimed in Ireland all we should have to think about would be to salve the interests of our particular friends as in the case of the United Empire Loyalists in the year, I think, 1784. I repudiate that suggestion. If a Republic were proclaimed in Ireland the Ministers proclaiming it might call themselves what they pleased, but none the less they would remain British subjects and we could not regard them as anything else. Of course, undoubtedly a de facto situation would arise, and that situation would have to be dealt with, but I believe that without any question whatever of force it could be effectively dealt with. But it would be entirely premature to discuss it now.
I cannot myself believe that the forces of lunacy are always going to prevail in Ireland. We may remember that for some years after the Irish Treaty was signed Ireland was governed by men who kept faith and respected minorities and under whom the country prospered. Indeed it was a matter of taunt to some of us old Unionists that the condition of the country then belied our fears. Now it is proved that our fears had only been too well justified. But I submit that even now we must exercise further patience. There are men still with influence in Ireland, men who, I trust, may attain to power and may be willing again to keep the word they have pledged. I entirely repudiate any speech or any Motion that may suggest that sanity and good faith may not again prevail in Ireland.
LORD STRABOLGI: My Lords, I am sure that I may be allowed to say that noble Lords on this side of the House feel sympathy with the noble Lord who introduced this Motion in his anxiety as an old campaigner in Ireland and for Ireland. He naturally feels that his fellow Irish former Unionists may be in some danger in the future. I desired to make that perfectly plain at the outset of the very few remarks that I propose to address to your Lordships. The noble Lord, Lord Rankeillour, who has just addressed your Lordships, while deprecating the Motion of the noble Lord, Lord Danesfort, let fall certain expressions that, if I may be a lowed to say so, will be splendid ammunition for the very Republican elements who so alarm the noble Lord, Lord Danesfort. To speak of Irishmen, who are in their own good judgment claiming certain national rights, as lunatics and to question their good faith and so on really does no service, if I may respectfully urge that upon the noble Lord, to either country.
The first observation I desire to make in the remarks I intend to address to your Lordships is that I myself am a frequent visitor to both the east and west of what is now the Irish Free State. I have been at pains to find out what really is the position of those whom I may call the ex-Unionists, those who were opposed, in the past, to Home Rule, who are, generally speaking, Protestants and who, I suppose, would be described by the noble Lord as loyalists. I believe it is unquestioned that in the vast majority of cases they are suffering no kind of persecution at all. I am speaking of the former Unionists in Ireland who are living there now. They are not in a favoured position, that is perfectly true, but they are not treated any worse or any better than other Irishmen, and I believe that both Parties that have held the reins of government in Ireland have been most careful to see that there are no religious or former political disabilities on these families. Since the noble Lord put his Motion on the Paper I have seen two important Irish gentlemen who have large business interests in Ireland, who are always backwards and forwards—they are actually domiciled here—and who would fall within the exact category described by the noble Lord. They have assured me that there
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is no sort of differentiation or disfavour shown to them.
I would also very respectfully venture to observe to the noble Lord and to the other distinguished Peers and leaders who are organising this League of Irish Loyalists of Empire, or whatever they are called, with offices in Westminster, and with the very distinguished Peer, Lord Carson, at the head of them, that that sort of action is calculated to arouse suspicion in Ireland. Therefore I would ask the noble Lord, when he addresses your Lordships' House again at the conclusion of this debate, to tell your Lordships a little more clearly—and I most seriously ask him to do this—what is the object of this new body. If it is to bring pressure to bear upon the British Government, and if it consists of electors resident here or in the Dominions, well and good, there is no complaint; but if it is a league formed in London to bring pressure to bear upon the present Irish Government, then I do most seriously warn the noble Lord that that is a very dangerous step indeed to take.
With regard to the broad terms of the noble Lord's Motion, I do not want to say anything which will make more difficult the task of peacemaking, which I hope the Government are now once more going to undertake; but there are certain remarks which, should be made. We hear a great deal now about loyalty and loyalists. I would remind your Lordships, if I may, that a forced loyalty is no loyalty at all; it really is not worth having. I would further remind your Lordships that the old argument, which I have heard for the last thirty years and longer, that it would be strategically dangerous for this part of His Majesty's Dominions to have an independent Ireland on its flank—that strategical argument, if I may so describe it—is quite out of date now, for the reason that in Southern Ireland there is practically complete self-government now, and if we were involved in any international complication there would be equal danger (if such a danger exist) from the present Free State Government in Dublin as there would be if it were called a Republic.
The next point which I wish to make to your Lordships is that we are to-day actually stimulating the more extreme section in Ireland by the course which is at present being pursued. I do not wish

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to use the name of any Party, because, as in this country, Irish political Parties have their different wings and their different sections, but the members of the more extreme section in Ireland are actually being stimulated to-day by the non-committal attitude taken up as to our action in the possible event of a Republic being declared. I also read the letter from Mr. MacDermot in The Times to-day which was referred to by the noble Lord. He is a man who carries weight in his own country, and his remarks should carry weight here. He is a member of a very ancient Irish family who performed great services to their country in the past. Mr. MacDermot puts in another way what has been put by another very distinguished Southern Irishman, a fellow-countryman of the noble Lord opposite, Mr. George Bernard Shaw—a most distinguished Irishman of whom every Irishman should be most proud. He said that the best way to deal with this matter was to threaten Irishmen with a Republic. That is putting Mr. MacDermot's argument in another way. So long as it is possible to say to the people of Southern Ireland, especially to the young men, who are of a militant nature (as we found to our great profit when we needed them as soldiers), "You are being prevented by the overwhelming power of Britain from doing certain things," naturally they will be stimulated into doing those very things, or at any rate talking of doing them.
I desire to end by thanking the noble Lord, Lord Danesfort, if he will allow me to do so, for bringing this Motion before your Lordships' House, because I think the time has come when we should have some declaration from the noble Viscount who leads us as to whether the Government are really going now to make an effort to settle the present difficulties over the land annuities and to get rid of the great friction and loss which is occurring to both countries. Here you have that small country, a neighbour of this mighty and wealthy country; that small country used to be our best customer, with the possible exception of the Indian Empire, and we were practically her only customer. We can really in this case afford to be generous. How long is this wretched, sordid dispute going on?
And the situation has changed. If every nation which is owed money and is not paid is going to carry out a policy
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of trade reprisals, then what international trade still remains will end completely. Ireland is declared to be a defaulter. Technically we are defaulters to the United States of America—unavoidably, if you like; I do not want to enter into that now, but technically we are defaulters in that sense. Many valuable customers of ours and valuable trading friends are also defaulters, perhaps through no fault of their own. We really should, I think, re-examine this whole question. The stronger we think our case—I must, I am afraid, speak a little frankly here—the more ready we should be to submit it, if necessary, to a tribunal of arbitration with an independent chairman. Otherwise, if we maintain what I may call the Thomas attitude, we are standing on a punctilio, to the loss of many farmers in Ireland, working people here and traders generally, and of course adding to the embitterment of relations between the two countries.
The Irish think that they have a case over the land annuities. It is not simply a mere question of default. They do not simply say: "We are not going to pay, because you oppressed us in the time of Cromwell or of Queen Elizabeth." That is not the Irish case. They think that they have a strong legal case. His Majesty's Government believe that they have a strong, or a stronger, case. Very well; if we think that we have a strong case, we can afford in those circumstances to give way and to say: "Very good, we will have a tribunal if you like, and the chairman of it shall be a citizen who does not belong to the Empire." We are strong enough, we are powerful enough, and generally speaking, we are just enough in our dealings, and clean enough in our reputation, to be able to do this thing. We do not lose prestige by doing such a thing as that; we gain prestige enormously, and by doing it I believe we should strengthen our position throughout the world amongst those many Irish Empire builders referred to by Lord Danesfort who sought their fortunes overseas, and played a great part in our Dominions and in other countries such as the United States of America. They have long memories; and they have a double allegiance—an allegiance to their Irish ancestry and an allegiance to the Empire with which hitherto they have been proud to have associations.

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In dealing with Ireland we have to remember, speaking most respectfully of that great people, one of the mother peoples of the world, that they regard things of the spirit as very much more important than material things. It is the way the approach is made, the way the demands are met, that matters in the case of Ireland. I do not believe that we are going to force the Irish to come to our way of thinking by cutting off their trade. The more I see of Ireland and the more I talk with Irishmen, even those who are opponents of the present Government in their own country, the more convinced I am of that. I do once more thank the noble Lord, Lord Danesfort, for bringing forward this Motion, as I think your Lordships should have discussed it, and I think the time has come when we should have some hopeful and constructive suggestion from His Majesty's Government.
THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (VISCOUNT HAILSHAM): My Lords, everybody of course realises the real interest which my noble friend Lord Danesfort has always, taken in this Irish question, and the enthusiasm and sincerity with which he has sought to champion the cause of the Irish loyalists which he has always taken so much to heart. But unlike the noble Lord who has just spoken, I confess that I am really sorry that he has chosen to bring this matter to debate in your Lordships' House this afternoon, because I cannot Feel that any useful purpose is served by discussions in Parliament upon this topic, or that anything I am likely to be able to say is calculated to bring about that peaceful and friendly settlement of any disputes which all of us in this country, at any rate, most earnestly desire.
So far I agree with the noble Lord opposite, that I am glad to understand that the Irish loyalists are not suffering from any injustice or persecution by reason of their political faith. I think it is quite true that those who served in our Forces during the War are in a worse position in Southern Ireland than they are in this country, but that is due very largely to the fact that Ireland itself is a poorer country, and that in Ireland, without in any way inflicting persecution or ostracism, or anything of that kind, undoubtedly the fact that they have served in the
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War does not make the same appeal to their compatriots in Ireland as it makes in this country, by reason of the fact of a man being, as we call him, an ex-Serviceman. But, so far as I understand, there is no justification for saying that those whom we describe as Irish loyalists are being penalised for their loyalty in Southern Ireland. I know there have been articles in the newspapers, recently, which suggest that they are suffering hardships, but I know also that there have been indignant protests in the Irish Times and the Irish Church Gazette which disclaim any persecution or ill-treatment, and I think your Lordships will be reassured to know that this, so far as we can ascertain it, is the real position.
It is true that Mr. de Valera has made the statements some of which have been cited by my noble friend Lord Danesfort, and it is true that those statements are calculated to cause considerable anxiety as to the attitude which he and his Party adopt. I think it is fair also to say that Mr. de Valera has made other statements which are more promising, and certainly more conciliatory. For instance, just at the same date as the speeches to which my noble friend has called attention he made a statement in the Press in these terms:
"The Irish people have always been anxious for friendly relations with the people of Great Britain. They would welcome a just settlement of the political and financial questions at issue between the two countries. The Government would also welcome it, and it is not our fault if it has not hitherto been achieved."
I do not think I should be assisting matters by bandying words as to whose fault it is that a just settlement has not been achieved.
Personally, I profoundly disagree with the noble Lord opposite when he suggests, or seems to put forward, that we in this country have not been willing to submit the question of the annuities to arbitration. So far from that being the case we have offered over and over again to submit that question to arbitration, and have actually offered to submit it to the very tribunal which all the self-governing Dominions, including the Irish Free State, thought to be suitable as recently as 1930. Unfortunately that offer has not met with acceptance on the other side of the Irish Channel, and all

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I can say in regard to that is that it has been repeatedly stated, here and in another place, that we should be very ready to resume negotiations with a view to a settlement of that and other questions when a suitable basis of settlement can be found. Unfortunately it has not been found possible to find a common basis or common means of adjudicating upon the questions which are in dispute. We believe, with regard to the land annuities, that we have an unanswerable case, and we are quite willing to have that question arbitrated by any impartial Imperial tribunal. Unfortunately that proposal has not yet found acceptance on the other side of the Irish Channel, and so far as I know there is no immediate prospect of its being accepted.
I wish here and now to disclaim the suggestion involved in the speech of the noble Lord who has just spoken that we are endeavouring to force the Irish people to give in by destroying their trade. It has always been made clear that the purpose that we have in view in imposing such duties as it has been found necessary to impose has merely been to collect those sums due by way of annuity, and no question of attempting to penalise trade arises, because in the first instance it would defeat the very object we have in view, and secondly, if we desired to penalise the Irish people by stopping their trade we should not levy duties on the goods we allow to come in, but would prevent the goods coming in. We have scrupulously refrained from doing anything of the kind, as I think is well within the recollection of your Lordships. If that statement can possibly be made and perhaps allowed to go unchallenged, it is an illustration of the sort of risk which is run by too much discussion on matters of so much delicacy as the questions between the United Kingdom and the Irish Free State.
I have, like noble Lords who have spoken, read the letter which Mr. MacDermot wrote to The Times. He is the leader of one of the Parties in the Irish Free State, and a gentleman of position. I think all that it is probably useful for me to state with regard to his letter is this. The position of the members of the British Commonwealth in relation to one another was described in the Declaration of the Imperial Conference of 1926, in which the representatives of the Trish Free State participated
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and to which they assented. That Declaration was in these terms:
"They are autonomous communities within the British Empire, equal in status, in no way subordinate one to another in any aspect of their domestic or external affairs, though united by a common allegiance to the Crown, and freely associated as members of the British Commonwealth of Nations."
Your Lordships will remember that in the Report of the Inter-Imperial Relations Committee of that Conference a further comment upon it appears:
"The tendency towards equality of status was both right and inevitable. Geographical and other conditions made this impossible of attainment by the way of federation. The only alternative was by the way of autonomy; and along this road it has been steadily sought. Every self-governing member of the Empire is now the master of its destiny. In fact, if not always in form, it is subject to no compulsion whatever."
That was a statement which was made as long ago as 1926, and was made unanimously by all the representatives of the self-governing Dominions and of the United Kingdom.
And that statement defines the general position in the case of the Irish Free State as of the other members of the British Commonwealth, but of course in the case of the Irish Free State it is conditioned by the terms of the Treaty under which the Irish Free State was granted the status which it enjoys, and the main difference which seems to me to arise between Mr. de Valera and the British Government is his assumption that a Treaty which is entered into by two parties can be repudiated or modified at the will of one of them. I do not want to do him any injustice, but he seems to have a theory that, inasmuch as no one enters into a treaty completely freely, that is to say, that since every nation when it enters into a treaty does so under the pressure of surrounding circumstances, but for which it would probably not assent to the terms contained in the treaty, therefore it is involved that any nation can at its will repudiate the obligations which it has undertaken under a treaty, whilst at the same time retaining the advantages. I believe that doctrine is wholly untenable either in International or Municipal Law.
In every contract between individuals the reason why the particular individual makes a particular bargain may be due

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to the pressure of surrounding circumstances. I may be compelled to sell my property when the market is very much against me by reason of the fact that I am in urgent need of ready money; or, to take a more extreme instance, in the Criminal Law we know every day that young offenders are bound in their own recognisances to come up for judgment if called upon to do so. They enter into those recognisances under the pressure of the knowledge that, if they did not, they would probably be sent to prison. But I have never heard it suggested in the Courts of this country or of any other country that those facts enable the person who sells an article which he would much prefer to keep, at a price which he thinks inadequate, or the person who eaters into recognisances to which he would much rather not submit if he were not compelled by circumstances to do so, is at liberty later on to repudiate his bargain and to claim to be entirely free of his obligation.
And the same is true in International Law. If it were possible for any self-governing community to contend that it was at liberty at its will to repudiate all its contractual obligations with other countries, merely on the ground that at the time it made the bargain circumstances existed which compelled it to accept them, and that those circumstances have now disappeared, there would be an end of any possibility of agreement between any sovereign States, because one would know that at any moment the persons who have accepted an obligation did so on the implied condition that they might thereafter claim to be free, on the ground that they were compelled by pressure of circumstances to accept the obligation, and therefore it was not binding on their conscience. There is, in fact, of course no such condition.
Nobody suggests that a treaty—the Irish Treaty or any other international agreement—remains sacrosanct for ever and is incapable of alteration. But what we do contend is that, in order to make an alteration, there must be an agreement between the two parties to the treaty. In the very instance of this Irish Treaty there were several occasions on which modifications of its terms were negotiated between the Irish Free State and the Government of this country, on the ground that a particular obligation pressed hardly on the Irish Free State,
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or was one which it could not be fairly asked literally to perform. But that is a wholly different proposition from saying that either the Irish Free State or the United Kingdom is at liberty to repudiate its obligations under the Treaty, while retaining the advantages, merely on the ground that the circumstances of the time were such as virtually to compel it to accept the bargain.
I think it is important that we should define where the British Government stands upon this matter. If there are any terms which it is desired to discuss we are willing to discuss them. But if it is suggested that we are to accept a unilateral repudiation, that is a position in which His Majesty's Government is not able to acquiesce. Then my noble friend asked whether I would make a declaration in the terms of his Motion, a declaration which, he said, did not involve, or was not intended to involve, an intimation that force would be used to prevent the establishment of a Republic, but which was intended to assure the Irish loyalists, on whose behalf he was purporting to speak, that they might rest quite satisfied that we should take, as he describes it, "adequate steps to safeguard the constitutional status and the legitimate rights" of those people. I think that that would be a highly dangerous statement or assurance to make.
I am not in the least oblivious of the fact that there are duties which legitimately rest upon His Majesty's Government with regard to the interests of British subjects of the classes named by my noble friend. But to assume, first of all, that there is going to be a change in the relationship between the Irish Free State and this country, and then to announce in advance what steps we should take, or that we should take any particular steps, in the event of such a change taking place would, in my judgment, tend to do the very opposite to that which my noble friend desires. It would tend to create a feeling of resentment and hostility and indignation in the Irish Free State, and it might even go so far as to make the position of those whose interests he has at heart more difficult than it is at present. In those circumstances I very much hope that my noble friend will not press his Motion, because I cannot help feeling with my noble friend Lord Rankeillour that it

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would be far better not to ask for the sort of declaration that I have referred to.
I have endeavoured to repeat as definitely as I can the attitude of His Majesty's Government. I can assure your Lordships, as we have repeatedly assured you in the past, that we have nothing but the friendliest feelings and the desire for the most cordial relations with the Irish Free State, as with the other self-governing Dominions. Mr. de Valera is of opinion that it is not the fault of the Irish Free State that those relations are not so friendly to-day. For our part we equally feel assured that it is not our fault that they are not so friendly as we should like them to be. I can only say that any—I will not say any advance, but any sign of a willingness to enter into a friendly discussion would be welcomed by His Majesty's Government as cordially as by any member of your Lordships' House, and that it is a matter of profound regret to us that under existing circumstances there should be these unsolved differences existing between the two countries, differences which cannot redound to the good of either of them, considering the geographical and economic relations in which they necessarily stand to one another. I am sorry that there are no Papers which I can offer to the noble Lord. I have done my best to state as frankly and as fully as I can the position of His Majesty's Government and to explain the reason why I am not able to give my noble friend such assurances as he asks for, and I hope that, after that explanation, my noble friend will see his way to withdraw his Motion for Papers.
LORD DANESFORT: My Lords, the only satisfactory portion, to my mind, of the speech of the noble Viscount was his reassertion of the undoubtedly correct principle that a treaty entered into by two parties cannot be abrogated by one party alone. He insisted on that with great strength, as he has done before, but unfortunately he did not seem to apply that principle to the state of affairs in Ireland. He had not one word to say in condemnation or comment as to the breaches of the Treaty that have already taken place in Ireland. Of these breaches of the Treaty, breaches of solemn obligation entered into, not a word did he say, not an assurance did he give to those in
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Southern Ireland who are deeply concerned as to their future. The noble Lord, Lord Strabolgi, asked what was the object of my Motion.
LORD STRABOLGI: No; what is the object of this new League of Loyalists.
LORD DANESFORT: I am much obliged. The object of my Motion, I wish to make quite clear to the House, is to show to those Southern Irish who have observed with anxiety all these breaches of the Treaty and all the preparations that have been made for a Republic, that we in this country are not prepared to forget them, to abandon them, to do nothing to help them, when their hour of trial comes. I am quite certain that there are large numbers of people in this country who, if they knew the facts as to the situation of the Irish loyalists, would be only too delighted to show their sympathy and determination to help them in any way they could.
Lord Strabolgi is, if I may say so without hurting his feelings, a typical example of a man who speaks on a subject of which he is entirely ignorant. I do not know what personal knowledge he has of Ireland, but he gives the impression that Southern Irish loyalists have every reason to be satisfied with their position, that they are not being badly treated, and, I suppose he would add, that they have no real ground for anxiety. I do not know whether he would go as far as that, but that is his general view, and in support of that he said he had been told something to that effect by two unnamed gentlemen who came from Ireland. I should very much like to know who they were, if he could tell me without breach of confidence; but, whoever they were, let me tell your Lordships that I have received representations not from two, but from very large numbers of Southern Irish loyalists who are not given to unnecessary fears or extravagant anticipations, and who say that their future is to them a matter of the gravest anxiety.
As regards ill-treatment, I think my noble friend would do well to go over to Ireland and hear from some of these people what their position is. They are looked upon as strangers, as outside the Irish desires for a Republic and greater independence, and they have this terrible fear before them that in an event which appears to be very possible, and

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indeed probable, they may become aliens and be deprived of their rights as British subjects. The noble Lord is proud of being a British subject. How would any of your Lordships like to have this staring you in the face, that at any moment, by the decision of the Irish Dail, you may be deprived of the rights of British subjects to which you have been born? Is that not a matter for anxiety? Is that not a matter in which they deserve reassurance? One or two other points in the noble Lord's speech really did surprise me. He asked what is the object of this new Federation? I have a statement here of the reasons why this Federation was established. I would be delighted to furnish my noble friend with a copy, and perhaps after reading it he may decide to join. The Federation is formed to assert the constitutional rights and privileges of all loyalist Southern Irish born subjects of the King, wherever resident, and to take such steps as may be necessary and as the occasion arises, and they see what dangers are in front of them.
They do not desire war. They desire by peaceful organisation to influence the British people in this country and elsewhere in order that they may be able to preserve their rights. The noble Lord referred to Mr. Bernard Shaw as being a distinguished Irishman. Some people admire his works more than others. I agree that he is most distinguished, but my noble friend did not tell your Lordships that Mr. Bernard Shaw has taken very good care in the last fifty or sixty years to live out of Ireland. He does not show his devotion to the Irish Republic or to Mr. de Valera or any of these leaders of revolutionary Irish opinion by going and living in Ireland and sharing the fate of the Irish loyalists. I shall not comment on him any more, but I recommend my noble friend, if he wishes to cite a case, to get a better one than that of Mr. Bernard Shaw as showing; the happiness and prosperity of Southern Irish loyalists.
As regards the speech of the noble Viscount, the Leader of the House, with the exception of that very clear declaration he made about the sacred rights of treaties there was nothing in it that did not cause me the most profound disappointment. He said not one word of
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all I have put before him—probably he knew it before—as to the declarations of Mr. de Valera and the Dail, clear and decisive as they were. He said not one word of all these breaches of the Treaty which have already been made. He said not one word of the preparations that have been made for declaring a Republic. He did refer in what I may call a somewhat half-hearted manner to what he described as the more encouraging statements of Mr. de Valera. The only statement of that kind that I have been able to find is when Mr. de Valera said on one occasion he would like a just settlement. Of course he would. He wants to get off all tariffs and so on, and be able to trade with this country as if he had paid his debts. That is what he means by a just settlement, and that is the best and most encouraging statement of Mr. de Valera which my noble friend can produce.
I cannot think it is a very good answer to the anxiety which these Irishmen feel for whom I desire your Lordships' sympathy. I hope my noble friend feels rather more than he is able to express. I hope he does feel real sympathy with these people and a real desire—I am sure he does, although he did not express it—to help them in the future if the occasion should arise. Meanwhile, I am glad to think that there are people in this country who are deeply sympathetic regarding what has happened to them in the past and what may happen to them in the future, and who are determined when the occasion arises to protect their interests and to get any Government that may be in power to take the necessary steps for this purpose. My noble friend says there are no Papers. Therefore I beg leave to withdraw my Motion.
Motion for Papers, by leave, withdrawn.

FUEL OIL PRODUCTION.
THE DUKE OF MONTROSE THE DUKE OF MONTROSE asked His Majesty's Government what is the present position in regard to the production of fuel oil in the United Kingdom, and whether it is the Government's intention immediately to aid an increase in home production in view of the increase of the world's armaments. The noble Duke said: My Lords, I wish to ask the Question standing in my name in order to give the noble Lord who is going to

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reply an opportunity to tell us something about the oil supplies in this country. We have heard a good deal in the last few weeks about the increase of armaments, particularly the increase in the Air Force and the increase in the Navy, but we have heard nothing about an increase in oil supplies in order to balance the increase in armaments. When one comes to think of it, it is no use having an increase in aircraft and an increase in the Navy unless you have some form of increase in your oil supply. We can all recollect how in the Great War we suffered great difficulty in connection with our oil supplies. We can recollect all the restrictions that were put into force in order to safeguard our supplies of oil, and we can recollect how, in a week when the submarine menace was at its worst, our difficulty was to get any oil at all into this country.
At the beginning of the War we were importing 484,000,000 gallons of oil; to-day we are importing 2,224,000,000—that is, to-day we are using four and a-half times the amount of oil that we were using at the beginning of the War. And just as our oil requirements have gone up and up, so also have the means of attack on oil-carrying ships increased and become more efficient, and if we suffered difficulty in getting oil brought into this country at the time of the Great War we are going to suffer far more difficulties in the next war because our requirements have so vastly increased. I am not sure that I have been correctly informed, but I have been informed that at any given time to-day there is not more than three weeks supply of oil in this country. We require four and a-half times as much to-day as we did at the beginning of the War yet there is not three weeks supply in this country. We are face to face with grave dangers. What are we to do? There are only two alternatives. One is to increase our imports of oil. But what good is that? You simply increase the difficulty and danger of bringing foreign oil into this country. The only other alternative is to increase the home supply of oil. I want to know what is being done by the Government to increase our supply of oil.
Of course, we have had a tariff put on imports—a tariff of eightpence on petrol and a penny on crude oil. That tariff brings in a revenue of £40,000,000. On whose shoulders does the burden of
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that £40,000,000 fall? It falls mostly on the shoulders of our own people, because the imported oil does not compete with any home-produced oil. There is no home-produced oil worth speaking about in any quantity. The burden of that large sum falls then, by reason of the tariff, on our own people, and our manufacturers and power users say that the tariff affects their cost of fuel by raising it 30 per. cent. I would not mind putting a burden of 30 per cent, increase on the fuel costs in this country if we really got something for it. If the Government could say, in return for the burden upon the fuel users of the country, that we were getting an assured supply of oil, or if they would say: "You are supporting a new industry which is giving employment to our people," I would say then that the increased burden was worth it. But the Government cannot say that the oil required for our defence is assured, and they cannot say that we are yet starting a new industry in this country to give employment to our people.
The position of the oil trade is exceedingly disappointing because, notwithstanding the tariff, there are only about two factories working, or two factories which are worth speaking about as working. First of all, there is the factory at Billingham which is being built by the Imperial Chemical Company to produce petrol by hydrogenation from coal. That factory will not be completed for five or six months. That is to say, we shall come to the beginning of 1935 before we get any petrol from that plant. That plant cost £2,500,000 to erect. The company will not erect another plant until they have ascertained the results from this one. That means, possibly, a year's working, and it will bring us to 1936 before they put up a new plant, and it will be 1937 before that plant is finished. Are we going to wait then till 1937 before we get petrol from home supplies under the hydrogenation process at Billingham? The only other alternative is low temperature carbonisation. There is only one factory which is really working the low temperature carbonisation process on a commercial basis. That is the Low Temperature Carbonisation Company's factory, but the amount of fuel oil that they are producing for the Navy is simply a bagatelle in comparison with the quantity that the Navy requires.

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Therefore, as things stand to-day, notwithstanding a heavy tariff bringing in £40,000,000, we have really no home supply of oil worth speaking about. What are we going to do? I say that the matter is urgent. There is only three weeks supply of oil in the country, and the difficulties of importing oil are growing greater. I do not know why we are not getting more factories erected. I suggest that a Committee should be appointed to enquire why it is that more factories are not being erected to produce oil from British coal. The answer, one suspects, would be that, whereas there is a large capital ready for investment, capitalists are not ready to put their money into new processes and new industries; they are only ready to put the money into old processes and well tried industries. It requires more than a tariff, it requires Government encouragement to draw capital into this new process. After all, we have had the Government spending money on helping wheat, on helping sugar beet, on helping shipbuilding. Why should they not do something to help coal distillation and the supply of home oil? I would suggest that the Government should give a guarantee for ten years, perhaps up to £2,000,000 with interest on that capital at 5 per cent. The burden would be only £100,000 a year. It is surely worth the Government risking £100,000 a year in order to draw capital into a new industry which will provide an increased supply of oil for home defence. It is terrible to think that at present we have only three weeks supply of oil in this country and that we are using four and a-half times as much as we did at the beginning of the War.
THE UNDER-SECEETARY OF STATE FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS (EARL STANHOPE): My Lords, as the Royal Commission is now due I suggest this might be a convenient moment for the House to adjourn during pleasure.
House adjourned during pleasure.
House resumed.

ROYAL COMMISSION.
The Royal Assent was given to the following Bills:

Trustee Savings Banks (Special Investments),

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Architects (Registration),

British Sugar (Subsidy),

Administration of Justice (Appeals),

Law Reform (Miscellaneous Provisions),

Shops,

National Maritime Museum,

Ministry of Health Provisional Order Confirmation (Leek),

Ministry of Health Provisional Order Confirmation (Sheppey Water),

Ministry of Health Provisional Order Confirmation (Stoke-on-Trent),

Ministry of Health Provisional Order Confirmation (Weymouth and Portland Joint Hospital District),

Ministry of Health Provisional Order Confirmation (Wey Valley Water),

Ministry of Health Provisional Order Confirmation (Wycombe and District Joint Hospital District),

Ministry of Health Provisional Order Confirmation (South Middlesex and Richmond Joint Hospital District),

Ministry of Health Provisional Order Confirmation (Herriard and District Water),

Glasgow Corporation Order Confirmation,

London Midland and Scottish Railway Order Confirmation,

Rotherham Corporation (Trolley Vehicles) Order Confirmation,

Torquay Corporation,

Chailey Rural District Council,

Sunderland and South Shields Water,

Lowestoft Corporation,

Tynemouth Corporation,

North Wales Electric Power,

Tyne Improvement,

Wantage Urban District Council.

House adjourned during pleasure.
House resumed.

FUEL OIL PRODUCTION.
Debate resumed.
THE EARL OF MUNSTER: My Lords, in December, 1932, the noble Duke raised

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a somewhat similar question to that which appears on the Order Paper to-day and on that occasion he was given a very full reply by my noble friend Lord Templemore, which referred to the steps that the Government had taken to encourage the production of oil products from coal. Since then three other additional measures have been placed upon the Statute Book and have been debated at some length either in this House or in another place. I need, I think, only refer to them very briefly. The first was that an import tax of £1 per ton was imposed on all heavy oil as from April 25, 1933. Besides assisting the coal industry in meeting the competition of imported oil, this tax also constituted a substantial preference of a penny per gallon on all heavy oil produced from coal and its derivatives, as these oils of course do not pay any duty.
I might mention here that since that tax was imposed, just over a year ago, information is available to show that larger quantities of creosote are being used as fuel oil, and there is every hope that this may lead to the production of a larger quantity of creosote from the coal tar available. The estimated production of creosote during the past three years has been: in 1931, 63,000,000 gallons; in 1932, 55,000,000 gallons, and in 1933, 65,000,000 gallons. In a discussion on the Navy Estimates in another place, on March 12 last, the Civil Lord of the Admiralty stated that creosote was a welcome substitute for petroleum fuel in an emergency, and that the Admiralty had used about half a million tons of it during the War and after the War.
I would also refer shortly to another Act which your Lordships will recollect, the British Hydrocarbon Oils Production Act, giving a guaranteed preference for a period of years on all motor spirit produced from indigenous coal, shale, or peat, or from substances obtained from those materials. As a result of this guarantee, as the noble Duke has mentioned, Imperial Chemical Industries, Limited, decided to erect a commercial scale hydrogenation plant at Billingham, and that plant is expected to begin production early next year. I may mention that this process can be used for the production of fuel oil, and although under present conditions it will, for economic reasons, be used mainly for the
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production of motor spirit, during an emergency it is considered that this process may afford a very valuable additional source of home-produced fuel oil. Samples of this fuel oil have also been tested by the Admiralty, who are satisfied that it is of suitable quality.
A new Act, designed to encourage the search for natural petroleum in this country, was also submitted to Parliament this Session and is now on the Statute Book, and I need not worry your Lordships with an explanation of it. I think the noble Duke will recognise, from the action which the Government have already taken, that they are fully alive to the importance of this matter, and of giving every help to the principal industries of this country. The other suggestions which the noble Duke made will be carefully examined to see what additional action by Parliament may be necessary at any time to give, an increased output of fuel oil. I have very little further information that I can give to the noble Duke, but I hope he will be satisfied with the short explanation which I have given him.
THE DUKE OF MONTROSE: I thank the noble Earl.

THE TWENTY-FOUR-HOUR SYSTEM.
LORD LAMINGTON LORD LAMINGTON had given Notice that he would ask His Majesty's Government whether they will lay on the Table of the House before its adjournment a report on the working of the twenty-four-hour system from the B.B.C.; and move for Papers. The noble Lord said: My Lords, I am not going to weary you with a long speech, but only want to put the simple question. I am inclined to wonder whether the Government's announcement, to which at the time I took exception, that it was waiting for a Report on this system from the B.B.C., was not likely to prejudice the system in the minds of the public. I am not a listener to the B.B.C, at any rate in London, and I was not aware how far this prejudice had been entertained by the public, but I have here a letter from Sir James Marchant, who says:
"I have many friends here and in town whom I meet daily, and not a single one approves this most unfortunate experiment. It is simply ridiculous to tell us afternoon tea is at 16.40 to-day, and so on. We resent it being thrust upon us. It arouses

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opposition which might otherwise not arise … It is doing harm and not good to the cause we advocate."
He is a supporter of the system. I therefore reiterate that it is unfair to have this system of experiment. Why do not they enquire of the three great Departments of State which are mainly concerned? Not having any idea of what the answer of the Government will be, I will defer any further remarks that I have to make until later.
LORD NEWTON: My Lords, before the noble Lord replies for the Government, making, I presume, the usual thoroughly unsatisfactory reply, I should like to say a few words about the miserable bungling evasion which has characterised successive Governments in dealing with this trivial and unimportant question. It is more than sixteen years ago that a Committee thoroughly enquired into this subject, and recommended it unanimously, and so far as I know every single Postmaster-General—the Post Office is the only Department concerned—has been in favour of the change. Whenever I have approached them they have said: "I am in favour of it, and no doubt the advocates of it are perfectly right, but I have to consult my colleagues, and cannot do it without their consent." As a matter of fact, he need not consult anybody. It is merely an administrative matter.
One can understand what would happen if he consulted his colleagues. He would go to his colleagues in the Cabinet and suggest that it was a good scheme, that it was going to cost nobody anything, and would be for the general convenience, but the reply he would get from his colleagues would be: "It is all very well from the point of view of your Department, but what we want to know is whether it is any good for getting us votes." The Postmaster-General would have to admit that he did not see any prospect of their getting votes by passing this particular measure. Then his colleagues would say: "Not only do you tell us that we cannot get any votes by making this change, but we know that there are a great number of people who are very much opposed to it. There is, for instance, the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury"—whom I am happy to see in his place—"and there is the noble Lord, Lord Banbury, and there are all the people who are under
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the impression that the introduction of summer time is responsible for the drought and for other misfortunes, which occur in agriculture."
No doubt you could add to those the people who believe that the earth is flat and all those who entertain peculiar views. "Well," they would say, "this is a very formidable body of opinion; we really cannot run the risk of falling out with these people, therefore we had much better leave it alone." Then I suppose the Postmaster-General, whoever he may be, revolved the matter in his mind and thought he would arrive at a compromise. And, as a compromise, he or somebody or other has selected the B.B.C. as the body upon which to perform what is known in theatrical parlance as "trying it on the dog." A more unsatisfactory solution could not possibly have been suggested.
I have done my feeble best to explain that this is not a colloquial question at all. You need never make use of these figures which perplex the people who cannot count. It is purely a matter of time tables and HO forth. Imagine the effect produced upon the people who cannot count, if it were announced that Professor Boreham or somebody of the kind is going to hold forth at quarter past eighteen. That is the kind of thing that would irritate anybody, I am not sure that it would not irritate me; but it is perfectly unnecessary. It is no question of making use of these numbers in conversation; it is merely a question of time tables. As nobody has been able to make any valid objection to the proposed change, it really is exasperating to find that nothing can be done because of the ignorance and the prejudice which prevail.
I remember that in one of the poet Schiller's masterpieces he uses an historical phrase in which he says, "The gods themselves fight against ignorance in vain." I do not class my noble friend Lord Lamington as a god, or even a demigod, neither do I claim myself to belong to so distinguished a circle, but it is a fact that this proposal is rejected simply on the grounds of ignorance and prejudice. Nobody has adduced any valid argument against it, and the only satisfaction which I feel at the prospect of a Labour Government ever coming into

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office is that I have had an undertaking from those Benches that when they come in they will put it into force.
THE EARL OF CRAWFORD: My Lords, I agree with my noble friend that the opposition to this is largely based upon prejudice, or upon inadequate information, and I think a good example of this is contained in a resolution recently passed by a Northern branch of the National Union of Manufacturers to this effect:
" This meeting regards the arbitrary attempt by the B.B.C. to foist upon the public, without sanction of Parliament or other known authority, a system of time reckoning contrary to the custom of the country as an act of high-handed impertinence and gross abuse of a privileged position, and desires that this opinion shall be known in appropriate quarters."
Your Lordships will no doubt thank me for making this opinion known in appropriate quarters. But it is an illustration of what my noble friend Lord Newton referred to, and a curious combination of touchiness and pomposity. It is the mentality of the people who squealed and who rioted in the eighteenth century when the calendar was reformed; it is the mentality of people who insist upon printing their price-lists in terms of pounds, shillings, pence and occasional halfpence and disdain to quote in yen, pesos, or in lire, because it is contrary to the custom of the country. I hope that those who are interested in this great reform will not be discouraged by this innovation of the B.B.C. from continuing their efforts to bring it about, least of all by branches of the National Union of Manufacturers passing a ridiculous resolution of this character.
LORD TEMPLEMORE: My Lords, my noble friend behind me originally put this Motion down for a week ago to-day, on the 18th July, and I was very sorry he did so, because I knew that if the debate had taken place on that day we should not have had the presence of my noble friend Lord Newton, and, really, a debate on this subject without the presence of Lord Newton would have been more than I could stand. I am very glad it was put off for a week because we have him back looking fresh and well from his foreign travels and, I am glad to say, in his old form. In answer to my noble friend's Question, I have to say that no formal report has
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been received by His Majesty's Government from the B.B.C. as regards the experiment which has been going on now for some one or two months, but my right honourable friend the Postmaster-General understands that the Corporation will before very long make a statement on the subject.
As regards the general question, as my noble friend is aware, His Majesty's Government have had under consideration the question of extending the use of the twenty-four-hour method of expressing time in the light of the information given them by the British Broadcasting Corporation, following the experiment which has been carried out by the Corporation. The Corporation considers that, taking into account the difficulties attending the experiment, the results warranted further investigation by the Departments concerned. His Majesty's Government appreciate the action of the Corporation in the matter, but I am authorised to say that after carefully reviewing the whole question of adopting the twenty-four-hour notation for official purposes, they have come to the conclusion that there is still no sufficient evidence of general public demand for the change to justify them in taking any action in the matter. I fear I have no Papers which I could lay in this connection.
LORD LAMINGTON: My Lords, it is, I think, a surprisingly negative answer that we have had from the Government. I asked my noble friend whether he would not ask the Government to address the Army and Navy and Air Force about the result of their thorough testing of the twenty-four-hour system over a number of years—they have had plenty of experience—as to how far it affects their private lives. Of course it does not affect their private lives at all, nor does the experiment of the B.B.C. affect the private lives of people. As showing how very widespread the movement has become, I dare say your Lordships saw a notice in The Times with regard to the Continental timing system at a congress held in London. It stated that:
"The twenty-four hour system of time keeping is to be used at the Fifth Annual Congress of the International Federation of Surveyors, which is to take place in London from July 18 to 21. For the convenience of delegates from France, Belgium, Denmark, Holland, Switzerland, Italy, and Poland.

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the programme of the Congress has been arranged on the twenty-four-hour system."
Does not that give any light to the Government to show how beneficial is this system and how (much easier it makes life?
I am not aware of a single organisation connected with travelling, commerce, and the coastal trade round these shores that does not ask for this system, and there is also the very strong attitude of the Astronomer Royal. Obviously there is somebody in the Home Office who does not know what is going on in the outside world, and the Government obey his dictates. Many representatives of the Government have stated that personally they approve of the system. I know one high official in the Post Office—I shall not mention his name—who approves of it, and yet somebody objects to it. Who is it? The only thing to be done is to put down a resolution asking for the name of the objector! It is a wanton waste of effort for the Government to say they will not do it because there is not sufficient public demand for it. There is a public demand, and I sincerely trust that there will be some sign on the part of the Government that they realise that this is a system that adds to the public convenience. I suppose members of the Government do go abroad to the Continent where the system is in vogue. Do they find it inconvenient? Many thousands of the public also go abroad to the Continent. Do they find it inconvenient? Why cannot the Government pluck up courage and introduce this system? It is certain to come, as Lord Newton has said. It will come if the Labour Party get into office, but I hope the Government will have the sense to anticipate the Labour Party. I ask leave to withdraw my Motion.
Motion for Papers, by leave, withdrawn.

BANNS OF MARRIAGE MEASURE, 1934.
THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY moved to resolve, That in accordance with the Church of England Assembly (Powers) Act, 1919, this House do direct that the Banns of Marriage Measure, 1934, be presented to His Majesty for the Royal Assent. The most reverend Primate said: My Lords, the
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purpose of this modest Measure is to regularise the reading of banns at the proper time and place by a layman under certain conditions laid down. In so far as it has passed the Church Assembly without any opposition, and is recommended for passage by the Ecclesiastical Committee, I think it may be regarded as non-controversial. The Marriage Act, 1823, prescribes that banns have to be proclaimed and the banns register signed by the officiating minister, and in the Prayer Book at the beginning of the Marriage Service it seems to be implied that the officiating minister must be a man in Holy Orders. Until quite recently no question could arise, but latterly, owing to the shortage of clergy, it has become usual and indeed necessary in many places for the public service on Sundays to be read, under the Bishop's permission and under conditions laid down by him, by a layman. A public service conducted under this permission by a layman is precisely an occasion for which the publicity required for the reading of banns is necessary. It would be most inconvenient if parties whose whole arrangements for their marriage might be thrown out of gear if they lost a Sunday found that, although it was a public service conducted under the Bishop's authority by a layman, their banns could not be proclaimed.
Accordingly, of late in many cases, banns have so been read and the register of banns has been signed by laymen, and this Measure only proposes to regularise that practice, which otherwise it might at least be said was doubtful. A large number of the Chancellors throughout the country held that its legality could not be contested, but in older to put any matter affecting marriage beyond any possibility of doubt it has been thought desirable to frame this Measure and lay it before Parliament in the usual way. As it affects some rubrics in the Book of Common Prayer, it had to go through the extraordinarily cumbrous procedure designed to meet such cases. It had to be debated and voted on by all three Houses—the Bishops, the Clergy, and the Laity separately—and then it had to receive the assent of the two Convocations and finally be submitted to the Assembly of the Church—and all this on the point whether a layman could officiate. That at least shows that there has been ample discussion of this Measure, and I hope your

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Lordships will be pleased to allow it to be presented to His Majesty for the Royal Assent, and thus do something to remove a not infrequent cause of inconvenience to those of His Majesty's subjects who desire to run the risks of matrimony.
Moved to resolve, That in accordance with the Church of England Assembly (Powers) Act, 1919, this House do direct that the Banns of Marriage Measure, 1934, be presented to His Majesty for the Royal Assent.—(The Lord Archbishop of Canterbury.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

CATHEDRALS (AMENDMENT) MEASURE, 1934.
THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY moved to resolve, That in accordance with the Church of England Assembly (Powers) Act, 1919, this House do direct that the Cathedrals (Amendment) Measure, 1934, be presented to His Majesty for the Royal Assent. The most reverend Private said: My Lords, this is a highly technical and therefore, I hope again, an entirely non-controversial Measure, but it is one, within its area, of some importance. By the Cathedrals Measure, to which your Lordships gave your assent in 1931, a body was created called the Cathedrals Commissioners of England, charged with the duty of enabling the old cathedrals and the cathedrals of the new dioceses, which may be called the parish church cathedrals, to fulfil more fully their very great functions in the life of the Church and people. They have conducted their work admirably and with the utmost assiduity for the last four years, first under the chairmanship of Lord Chelmsford and, since his much lamented death, under the chairmanship of the Bishop of Derby, with the help of their able secretary Sir Henry Sharp.
They have been visiting all the cathedrals throughout the country, both the old cathedrals and the new parish church cathedrals, preparing schemes, revising statutes, and the like, and in the course of their labours they have naturally encountered many technical difficulties arising from the legislation of the principal Measure or of other Acts of Parliament, but especially Local Acts, such as those affecting cathedrals in Newcastle, St. Albans, and elsewhere, and accordingly they have prepared this Measure
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to remove these technical difficulties. As the matter is so technical your Lordships will not for a moment suppose that I propose to weary you by reciting its provisions. If any of your Lordships desire, you will find them cited in the Report of the Legislative Committee of the Church Assembly, which is annexed to the Report of the Ecclesiastical Committee of Parliament. If any noble Lord is in trouble or perplexity on the matter I should do my best to relieve his mind if he so desires. Let me only call attention to one or two clauses which may be regarded as of more general interest.
The Ecclesiastical Committee of Parliament calls attention to the fact that a clause of the Measure affects the transfer of property from minor corporations in connection with cathedrals—minor canons and the like, sometimes vicars choral; and these small corporations, which are a relic of the Middle Ages, are often very inconvenient. It is proposed to transfer the property belonging to these minor corporations to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners in some cases and to the Cathedral Chapters in others. It was thought, I hope needlessly, that there would be a temptation to these minor corporations, in view of the compulsory transfer, to proceed to make arrangements for sale or lease which would be more advantageous to themselves than to the body to whom the property would ultimately be transferred, and so it is proposed to prevent any such abuse. The Ecclesiastical Committee calls attention to this as affecting the rights of property, but considers that in the circumstances the clause is reasonable and proper.
There is another clause which I ought perhaps to mention—namely, that which proposes to confer on the Chapters or the Cathedral Councils of the new parish church cathedrals the same powers over ornaments, fabrics and churchyards as are enjoyed by the old cathedrals and so to exempt them from the jurisdiction of the Consistory Court. I think it is desirable that these two kinds of cathedrals, for many reasons, should be assimilated and that is the object of this clause. I am sure the Commissioners will issue directions to these newer cathedrals which will prevent them from making undue use of this privilege and

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restrain their possible inexperience. There is one other clause which is interesting because it shows the effect of appeal to sentiment. The provision of the principal Measure is that all the estates and Chapters are to be transferred to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners unless provision is otherwise made. In the case of Durham, the Chapter pleaded that the warmth of affection between them and their tenants should not be broken and the Church Assembly sanctioned the retention in their own hands by the Dean and Chapter of Durham of their own estates.
This Measure, as I say, is important, but it is highly technical. It deals with proved difficulties in administration. I do not think there are any questions of principle, and, as I said, it was after full discussion passed unanimously in the Church Assembly, and it was commended by the Ecclesiastical Committee to Parliament. I beg to move.
Moved to resolve, That in accordance with the Church of England Assembly (Powers) Act, 1919, this House do direct that the Cathedrals (Amendment) Measure, 1934, be presented to His Majesty for the Royal Assent.—(The Lord Archbishop of Canterbury.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

RUSSIA.
LORD CHARNWOOD LORD CHARNWOOD had given Notice to call attention to information circulated in this country upon apparently good authority according to which the systematic policy of the Russian Government has recently caused widespread starvation among the population of grain producing areas in Russia, and is likely to do so this year through the measures taken for the rapid introduction of collectivist cultivation and the enforcement of a law transferring property in the produce of agriculture to the State, and through the removal by the Government of grain for purposes of exportation, and for the supply of the Army, without regard to the needs of subsistence of the cultivators of the grain; to ask His Majesty's Government whether they have information which tends to confute this allegation against the Russian Government; and to move for Papers.
LORD PONSONBY OF SHULBREDE:
My Lords, on a point of order, before the
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noble Lord moves his Motion. I desire to call your Lordships' attention to the terms of the Motion which he is about to move. The undesirability of discussing in Parliament the internal policy and concerns of foreign nations has been generally admitted and such a Motion as this would certainly not be allowed on the Order Paper in another place either as a Question or as a Motion. While the Government may, and indeed should, have information with regard to all public proceedings in other nations, there are domestic matters over which it can have neither control nor responsibility and the discussion of which may cause embarrassment and even mischief.
So far as I am aware, there is no method in your Lordships' House of controlling the Motions which may be put down on the Order Paper for discussion, and this matter, as indeed all matters of order, rests in your Lordships' hands. While discussions have, of course, taken place on matters such as the German debt situation or the obligations of Germany under the Treaty of Versailles, in that case we had a responsibility. Discussions years ago took place on the question of Rumania which may have been interpreted as an internal concern of the Ottoman Empire, but we, as protectors of Christians in the Ottoman Empire, had a, direct responsibility. I dare say occasions have arisen in your Lordships' House where what I am trying to put before your Lordships has been contravened. I think my noble friend Lord Marley did put down such a Motion and I called his attention to it, and I hope he will not offend again.
I think it is clearly undesirable that we, especially in the present state of Europe, should have discussions on internal matters in foreign countries for which we have no responsibility whatsoever. I feel sure, if the noble and learned Viscount the Leader of the House were to intimate his concurrence with the view I have expressed, he would receive the general support of your Lordships, and he would prevent the establishment of a precedent which, if extended further, might lead to grave abuse and be seriously embarrassing to the Government of the day. In the event of the noble and learned Viscount taking the view which I am trying to present to your Lordships now I feel sure that the

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noble Lord, Lord Charnwood, would not proceed with his Motion.
VISCOUNT HAILSHAM: My Lords, as the noble Lord opposite has said, these matters are, in your Lordships' House, not the subject of a ruling from the Woolsack and are not the subject, so far as I know, of any express Standing Order. On the other hand, it is quite plain from precedent that your Lordships have always exercised, and no doubt are still in a position to exercise, a control over the Questions and Motions which appear on the Order Paper. There are precedents. The noble Lord was good enough to tell me that he was proposing to raise this matter. Therefore I looked into some of them, and I find, for instance, that in the year 1883 there was an occasion when a series of Questions was put down containing the very gravest imputations against a distinguished member of the Indian Civil Service. The course adopted in that case was for the Leader of the House to move "that these Questions be not put and that they do not remain on the Minutes of your Lordships' House," and that was carried. Therefore there is power to control Questions if any noble Lord brings before your Lordships a matter which is thought undesirable.
There are other methods which are sometimes less dramatic but more effective. For example, in the year 1906, there was a Question of which Notice was given with regard to the action of a particular club in London towards an eminent public person in connection with an election. That Question was thought undesirable, and the Clerk of the Parliaments in those days communicated with the Leader of the House and the Leader of the Opposition and, ultimately, the noble Lord who had given notice of the Question agreed that it should not appear on the Order Paper and it disappeared. There is no doubt that there is full power in your Lordships' House to control these matters. The question then arises as to the circumstances under which that power should be exercised, and I think your Lordships will probably all be agreed that, while it is eminently desirable that we should retain, and should assert our retention of, a complete discretion, at the same time it is plainly a discretion which must be exercised with very considerable restraint and care because we do not desire that any noble
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Lord should be unduly fettered in bringing before the House any matter with regard to which he thinks that discussion would be useful or valuable, unless the Question was in itself offensive or in itself dangerous to the interests of this country.
The noble Lord the Leader of the Opposition referred to what I think is the most recent, as well as perhaps the closest precedent. That was the Question which was put down in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Marley, but which was in fact asked on his behalf by the noble Earl, Lord Kinnoull. It was a Question calling attention
"to the disquieting information now being received from Germany with regard to the treatment of political prisoners, particularly the treatment of the leaders of the suppressed political Parties, and to ask whether His Majesty's Government has any information as to the allegation that the Reichstag Deputy Torgler is being kept in chains in prison."
The noble Lord has said that is undesirable. It may be he is right but at any rate no objection was raised at the time and, without wishing to make Party capital out of it, I cannot help noting that noble Lords opposite are more tender when it comes to Russia than they seem to be when Germany is the country which is involved.
So far as the present Question is concerned I think it is quite true to say that it is not probable that His Majesty's Government will be able to give to the noble Lord who raises it very much information. On the other hand I cannot myself see that we can properly say that it is not a Question that might be asked because, among other reasons, your Lordships will remember that under the Covenant of the League of Nations to which this country is a party, we are bound, under Article 23, to
"endeavour to secure and maintain fair and humane conditions of labour for men, women and children, both in their own countries"—
that is, in our own country—
"and in all countries to which their commercial and industrial relations extend, and for that purpose will establish"
various organisations, and so on. I do not think it is quite right to say that it is a matter with regard to which we have no concern at all, although it is perfectly true, as the noble Lord said, that it is a matter on which we are not likely to have much information, with

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regard to which we cannot, as a Government, accept any responsibility, and with regard to which we, as a Government, should not think it right in any way to attempt intervention. As the Question is only directed to obtaining information, I think it hardly fails within the category of Questions which your Lordships would not allow to be asked, although, for reasons I have indicated, I do not think it is a Question which will admit of any lengthy discussion or in reply to which the noble Lord can hope to receive very full information.
LORD CHARNWOOD: My Lords, the reason why, with your Lordships' permission, I am raising this certainly very disagreeable Question is a simple one. All the people that I know who are in a position to judge at all assure me of their belief that some amount of definite good is done to unfortunate persons in Russia from time to time by the manifestation of interest shown in other countries, more particularly in this country, in regard to certain matters which prima facie are the domestic concern of Russia. At the present moment, and in the particular case to which my Question refers, there is some special reason for thinking that good results are not at all unlikely to follow. That being the best advice that I can get, I was not willing—except in compliance, of course, with your Lordships' opinion on the point just raised—to keep silent.
May I add one further word of preface? I, at any rate, do not approach these matters with any rooted or bitter prejudice against the Communist idea as such. On the contrary, hopes, however visionary, of somehow producing a much more equal distribution of wealth and a more equal state of society do, I confess, arouse in me a very decided sympathy. I am quite aware that many Russian Communists in particular, have been pursuing these objects, however visionary, with sincerity and with self devotion. But, my Lords, if in that pursuit they are led, an my Question plainly suggests, into a good deal of action which from our point of view seems actually atrocious, I should in imputing that merely be imputing to them the consistent practice of principles which from first to last every one of their leaders has proclaimed or preached—principles which I do not want to de-
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scribe in harsh language, but which are directly contrary to those principles and sentiments of compassion with suffering humanity as such which we are glad to know in this country permeate our own Socialists through and through.
But if I am to ask a Question at all I must give as fairly as I can a somewhat dry statement of what the information is to which I refer. I want to ask the Government whether the knowledge which they have runs contrary to what is so widely circulated. I would like to say that I have carefully avoided even looking at information which I thought might possibly be coloured by any political aims in regard, for example, to the independence of the Ukraine. Your Lordships know quite well the difficulty of naming publicly those authorities on whom reasonable persons in this country most rely for information, inasmuch as they are men of business in Russia or travellers there to whom it would be highly inconvenient that their names should be published in this connection. I refer only to one or two authorities. I think I have done pretty well all I can to put the Foreign Office in full possession of my sources of information and I should be willing to give them privately to any of your Lordships who are interested.
The first of the sources of information I would like to mention to-day is the statement widely circulated in this country by an interconfessional committee of which the President is the Cardinal Archbishop of Vienna. This consists of leading ministers of various denominations, not only of the cardinal's own Church but Lutherans also and, I believe, Jews whose congregations in countries bordering on Russia have constant relations with men of like race and religion in that country. It would be ridiculous, I think, to suggest that statements coming from a source like that, statements from an organisation of which so important a personage as the Cardinal Archbishop of Vienna allows himself to be the principal spokesman, constitute evidence of a negligible kind. They are also supported—to mention only two other printed sources of information—by articles which have lately appeared in the Christian Science Monitor of America, an able paper, from the pen of a Mr. Chamberlin and articles from the pen of Mr. Mug-

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geridge, a Socialist gentleman I believe, whose articles appeared in the Morning Post. I have made inquiries about both these gentlemen and there is no question that they are publicists of very high standing, singularly well informed. Last, but not least, of my sources of information there are the Decrees and other pronouncements of the Soviet Government.
There is at this moment, and there has been for some months past, very grave fear entertained as to a possible failure to a considerable extent of the actual harvest in Russia. There are many indications of that, and with the weather of the world as it is, it seems in itself not improbable, though recent information at any rate has not come my way as to how the actual growing crops are at this moment in Southern Russia, Southern Russia being the whole grain-producing area of Russia. Even a very slight failure of the crop would be likely to produce the most terrible consequences unless something were done very different from what was done last year. Even in the absence of any actual shortage of crop, the experience of last year makes the prospects of the rural inhabitants gloomy enough. During the year 1933 all authorities concurred that there was famine on a quite terrible scale, presumably not absolutely everywhere but throughout vast tracts in almost all parts of Southern Russia.
I ignore the largest figures of deaths from famine that I have heard mentioned by quite reasonable men, and content myself with an estimate derived from what I personally think is the most reliable source at which I could get, which puts the deaths from famine alone in Southern Russia during 1933 as being 3,000,000 at least, and possibly several millions more. That is enough. On the surface of all that we know this famine appears to have been purely artificial. In the early part of 1933 of course it was the grain which remained unused from the previous year that mattered. I believe it was not up to the average. I have not seen it suggested at all that the crop was a very bad crop. The crop of last year, though at first the amount of it was over-estimated, is known to have been a very good one, allowing for some considerable wastage that may have occurred in the getting of it in. Yet the famine went on through the whole of last
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year, as far as I can gather. During the early months of this year, as I know from people to whom I have talked who have been travelling in Southern Russia and have come home during the last two months at the outside, the agricultural population generally was quite manifestly suffering from insufficient nutrition.
Now how did that happen? I think it is necessary for me to trouble your Lordships with something of a survey of the events of the last five years. For some years previously to 1929, as your Lordships may know, the Soviet Government encouraged peasant proprietors, many of whom throve enormously, I believe, under that policy. Suddenly in 1929, without any one in this country knowing anything about it, their whole policy was reversed, and the Government began the process of driving the rural population into large collective farms. These now cover the greater part of the grain area. There is a minority of individual farmers remaining on sufferance, and about them I would only say that they are under heavy taxation, to be delivered to the Government in grain. At the same time modern American tractors and other machinery have been rapidly introduced, and with their introduction old and accustomed methods of cultivation have been prohibited. There are stringent regulations establishing control by the Government of the whole produce, and I need not mention that the whole trade in corn and the whole transport of the country is completely in the Government's hands. There are stringent regulations to enforce delivery to the Government of all grain that it claims for use elsewhere, leaving what is supposed to be a stated proportion of the whole on the farms for distribution as wages. Of course, the welfare of the cultivators always depends on whether in the end that actual proportion supposed to be reserved for them is left there at all, a point to which I shall later refer.
This revolutionary change, as your Lordships will imagine, met with stubborn resistance, and that resistance was met with unhesitating ruthlessness. The greater part of the resistance was vapidly damped down to very slight proportions. There were great numbers of people shot, and innumerable whole families were deported to labour camps, the conditions of which appear to be very various

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indeed. In all cases the inmates are what we should call slaves. Not only that, but in the grain-growing district there has been the removal from certain villages of the whole population bodily to regions in the north, where they can hardly, if at all, raise a subsistence for themselves. All that has gone on, and by that means undoubtedly all the most vigorous element of the rural population has been simply eliminated, and the remnant live in what is evidently a state of mutual suspicion and of penetrating espionage and terrorism everywhere. For the running of this whole system of the organisation of labour, the utilisation of the new machinery and, above all, ensuring the delivery to the Government of all the grain that they want, the Government expressly rely not only on strictly Government officials, as we understand them, but equally—and here I am quoting—on "Party organisations," "secretaries of provincial Party committees" and on "Party cells" on the farms, "chiefs of political departments" and so on. Those are a few of the phrases by which the Government themselves have described the agency upon which they principally rely for running the whole system.
The Party to which I have referred is itself repeatedly purged to get rid of "alien elements who have worked their way in" and "to secure iron proletarian discipline in the Party and to expel from the Party all unreliable, unstable and selfish elements" of any kind; also "to achieve a higher ideological standard among Party members," and, finally, to ensure "accurate fulfilment of grain deliveries." The workers are roused by the Government to a due state of Party fervour by national conferences and by exhortations of Comrade Stalin, quoted in Government publications. I notice in a circular, which happens this time to concern railway workers in particular, that they are to be "inoculated with a sense of revolutionary watchfulness" and that they are cautioned against "blindness and naïve tolerance to wreckers and other class enemies." That is the standard mainly required of persons who are responsible for the running, in this case, of the transport system.
Last year these local agencies were reinforced—I am going to the same set of authorities—by sending "thousands of trained Bolshevist organisers to the
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villages as members of the political departments attached to the machine and tractor stations." What in practice has resulted very naturally is the shooting of a great number of people without trial, for such offences as wrecking machinery, a thing which no doubt has happened, or may happen, but which is indiscriminately suggested as the natural and common practice of the whole wretched population concerned. Particularly there have been shootings for what is called grain stealing, where men have been trying to keep back for their families some small portion of the grain which they themselves have grown, and which they have been led by long custom to regard as their own property. These shootings are not, so far as I know, recorded in any official publication of the Russian Government.
There is, however, a result of that policy which is recorded in the same Decree of last January. After the famine of 1933 there is a result recorded by the Russian Government with satisfaction—namely, that in 1933 "the grain deliveries were fulfilled before the time, and in full." I refer to this because it is I believe the fact that early last year there were exaggerated estimates of what the grain produce was going to amount to, and then what quantity was to be given to the Government and what quantity was to be reserved on the farms was fixed in accordance with that exaggerated estimate. That the estimate was exaggerated was very soon known, but what then happened? The Government got the deliveries which they had demanded in full, and the whole shortage fell upon that portion which was supposed to be reserved for the sustenance of the people who grew it. The Government on that result congratulated themselves upon the success of their agrarian policy, making no mention of facts which in other countries are becoming notorious. Therefore I need not ask very closely how the grain was disposed of. The cultivators at any rate did not get their proportion of it.
I have in my Notice mentioned exportation because the committee I have referred to attaches importance to it. For all I know to the contrary the exports may have ceased since that mistake in the estimates of the harvest was made.

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I therefore am not anxious for the Government, unless they happen to have information, to deal with that question of exports. Then, of course, the food of the industrial population in the towns is a very large object for which the Russian Government require their portion of the grain. Observers note not, indeed, great prosperity but comparative comfort on the part of the industrial population of the towns, and, broadly speaking, I have found no suggestion anywhere of famine touching the towns such as ravaged the agricultural districts. There is one other class of people who do not go short, and that is, of course, the Army. I mention this because the most marked point in stories by recent travellers in Russia was the contrast between the famished state of the agricultural workers and the markedly well-cared-for condition of all soldiers. I find that it is the opinion of the most weighty authorities that the one primary object of the Soviet Government throughout is to see that they keep in good fettle what I understand to be the second largest army in the world. The bulk of it, I believe, to be stationed in a very remote part of the Russian Empire, for purposes which, good or bad, are distinctly Imperialistic, and are only remotely connected with the welfare of the producers of the grain in Russia. Anyway the Government got their full share and the rural population which produced the grain did not, but to a large extent, on the contrary, died from famine.
I want to make this quite clear, that there seem to have been some recent regulations on the part of the Government of Russia connected with these matters which do appear to be aimed, so far as they go, at making better provision for the peasantry than last year. As to the effect which they are going to produce—and what I am going to say now is largely the reason for my Question—it is going to depend upon the spirit in which, and the energy with which, these regulations are carried out. It will necessarily be long before we get news of what happened in that matter, but many people in the civilised world will watch with anxiety to see whether, in the season now beginning, the human claims of this great mass of the subjects of the Soviet Government have at last begun to count with the Soviet Government as a matter of first-rate importance.
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I have purposely avoided any horrifying details which may be exceptional; I have tried to be even dry in my treatment of this matter; I know I have been moderate in my summing up of the results; and I apologise for delaying your Lordships so long. I beg to move.
THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY: My Lords, I think those of your Lordships who have been able to follow the noble Lord will feel that he had some justification for calling your attention to this most painful matter. As one who may be regarded in some sense as a representative of Christian public opinion in this country I cannot be wholly silent on this occasion. It is an extremely distasteful thing to criticise in this House or anywhere the domestic affairs of another country, but I think that the Parliament of this country would be a very different place from what it has been in the past if it were afraid to raise a voice of protest against what seem to be violations of the ordinary instincts of humanity, whether they occur in a small country like Liberia or a great country like Russia.
I know that the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, in the remarks with which he prefaced this discussion, was animated entirely by his vigilant care for the traditions of this House and the purity of Parliamentary procedure, but I cannot refrain from saying that I am sometimes surprised to notice on the part of some of those commonly associated with him that, while they are most eager to defend workers and peasants in this country who are alleged to be exploited by capitalism, they seem so extraordinarily averse from considering peasants and workers in Russia who are exploited by a powerful capitalist bureaucracy. And I must say I am sometimes surprised—because the noble Lord knows that I share to the full his care for any in this country who are living under conditions of misery and poverty or in distress—that they seem always to resent any attempt to lift the veil which is so carefully placed over foreign observers by the Soviet Government and to realise the appalling misery which over vast areas of Russia lies behind.
I am not going into any details—the noble Lord has done that quite sufficiently—I can only give you the impression left upon my mind after a long and

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full study of an immense mass of documents and evidence coming from all quarters, partly from impartial foreign observers who have penetrated the far recesses of Russia, particularly in this matter of Southern Russia from eye-witnesses of scenes, and in many cases from sufferers themselves, some of whom have escaped from Russia and whom I have examined, and as to whose trustworthiness and freedom from party bias I can have no manner of doubt. The impression left on my mind is that the condition of things last year in Russia, particularly in the Southern parts of Russia, was appalling; that there was going on a famine of a degree of severity which has hardly ever been known. I think the noble Lord was most moderate, as he was in all his statements, in saying that the number who perished in the famine was about 3,000,000. I think it would be much nearer the mark to put it at 6,000,000. I know that in one town of 240,000—because it was not merely confined to the country districts—no less than 40,000 died of hunger. For the reasons given by the noble Lord, your Lordships will understand that not even here can I quote the names of my informants or even the places where these things occurred, because, in the event of the most distant allusion, all-vigilant eyes will find the means of tracking out the informants and visiting them with death, or with expulsion to a labour colony, or will let them loose in the wastes of Siberia.
I think there is no question as to the reality, and indeed the extent, of this appalling famine, and, even as to the living, they have been for a large part of last year subsisting on dogs and cats, and horse flesh was a luxury. In some places the advent of mice in the spring was regarded as almost providential as a means of securing food. I do not want to exaggerate, but I fear there is no doubt that at the beginning of last year there were even cases of cannibalism in what is regarded as a civilised country. I have seen photographs myself, the authenticity of which it is impossible to doubt, of corpses lying in the streets, and other bodies lying simply waiting for death on the pavement, and the people of the town passing by as if there was almost nothing particular in it to notice because it had all become so customary,
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and bodies have been carried off the streets in lorries and buried anyhow.
I do not think it can be said that the harvest last year was from a natural point of view conspicuously bad. It was that the conditions imposed by the policy of the Government were such as to make it almost impossible for the grain which was there to be brought in. It was a case of demanding bricks without straw. The workers even in the collective farms had not really enough on which to live, much less to work. No wonder that the results disappointed expectations when you had a whole agricultural population ill-nourished and broken in spirit and in heart. As the noble Lord pointed out, there were many cases where the peasants concealed grain in the hope that they might be able to get some of it for themselves and their families, and when it was discovered they were either shot or sent at once to one of the labour colonies in the North. Therefore it was exceedingly difficult for these people, when there was any harvest at all, even to reap enough on which to live.
It may be said that all that refers to the past. I earnestly hope that some of these appalling events do belong to the past, but there cannot but be apprehension about the future. How is this vast population of Russia, who went through that experience last year, to be fed and kept alive in this present year? In one part of Russia which used to be the richest granary in Europe there are now forests of weeds, and I am assured it will take a campaign of four or five years to clear this rich ground of the weeds which have been allowed to accumulate. It is impossible for these peasants, under the conditions in which they live, even to work as ordinary peasants might on the land. Who are to clear the weeds? I am informed that in large parts of Russia, further away than foreigners are allowed to travel, the men have largely perished or been banished and the work is left to be done by the women and children, ill-nourished as they are, and horses and oxen, also ill-nourished and scarcely able to carry a load. As for the hope of multiplying the use of tractors on which the regulators of this policy in Moscow depend, you cannot even work them without good will and intelligence and keenness on

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the part of the people. As in many cases the people are broken-spirited, ill-nourished, and apathetic, it has become necessary to send droves of young workers from the various towns, but their ignorance of machinery and agricultural conditions is so great that no wonder the machines break down; and then it is not these workers but the unfortunate peasants who are punished for the sabotage of tractors and the like.
There is some apprehension that even this year there will be export of grain from Russia. I hope that is not true. I hope there will be no further export of grain from Russia until it is clear they can feed their own people. I hope it is not true that ample grain is only secured for the bread and food of the Army and for the privileged town workers. If the Government are able to give us some assurance that that is not so, or that these accounts have been exaggerated, no one will be more thankful than myself. How can any one but be thankful if these statements are exaggerated when we realise what they mean in terms of human life, and therefore if the noble Lord can give us any assurance that these things are exaggerated it will be welcome. Perhaps he may be able to give us also an assurance that the Soviet Government are taking strenuous steps to see that the conditions of last year are not repeated. If so, that also will be some alleviation of anxiety.
My hope is that if the Government make some inquiry as to statements of this kind at Moscow it will be an indication to the Soviet Government that public opinion in this country is gravely concerned about the things that happened last year. I have said more than I meant, but the matter is really very terrible, having in view this mass of destitution, often veiled from inspection by the most careful system of superintendence. I rejoice that Russia is showing a new desire to enter into friendly relations with other countries. I desire to see Russia inside the League of Nations. I have no objection myself to the trade arrangements that are being made, but, if Russia is to be welcomed in the comity of nations, I venture to say it must necessarily depend on how far its Government shows that it has for its own people, the masses of
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its peasant people, that care which civilisation and the common instincts of humanity demand.
THE EARL OF DENBIGH: My Lords, I do not want to keep your Lordships more than a few minutes, but I should like to say with what pleasure I saw that the noble Lord, Lord Charnwood, was drawing attention to this matter. I have been in a position to hear a great deal lately concerning the appalling conditions in the Ukraine where, as it so happens, the largest portion of the Catholic population of Russia is to be found. I have heard authentic accounts of the treatment of Bishops and clergy and others in the Ukraine, and of course they are only one portion of the population. Incidentally, I have seen also all the photographs and information to which the most reverend Primate has alluded, describing the appalling state of affairs in the streets and in the country generally. I do not want to hurt the feelings of noble Lords opposite, but we have to remember that all this is being brought about by the deliberate policy of that bloodthirsty and callous system which has been practised over there for the purpose of forcing the population into doctrines of Communism. There is no getting away from that fact.
With regard to the reluctance of noble Lords opposite that this House should pay any attention to these matters, I do not know whether your Lordships are aware that in the House of Representatives in the United States in May there was a Resolution submitted which was ordered to be printed and referred to the Committee on Foreign Affairs, and this Resolution called attention to the fact that:
"Whereas several millions of the population of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, the constituent part of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, died of starvation during the years of 1932 and 1933; and
Whereas the Government of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, although being fully aware of the famine in Ukraine and although having full and complete control of the entire food supplies within its borders, nevertheless failed to take relief measures designed to check the famine or to alleviate the terrible conditions arising from it, but on the contrary used the famine as a means of reducing the Ukrainian population and destroying the Ukrainian political, cultural, and national rights; and
Whereas intercessions have been made at various times by the United States

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during the course of its history on behalf of citizens of States other than the United States, oppressed or persecuted by their own Governments, indicating that it has been the traditional policy of the United States to take cognisance of such invasions of human rights aid liberties: Therefore be it
Resolved, That the House of Representatives express its sympathy for all those who have suffered …"
I shall not read the whole of it, but it is rather a striking Resolution to have been brought up in Congress in the United States, and it shows at all events that on that side there are not such delicate feelings as some people have on this side.
In the Party of noble Lords opposite there are many who show the most extraordinary sympathy with the perpetrators of these iniquities. Let me mention Lord Marley, who, I regret, is not here to-day. I should like to have called the attention of Lord Marley to a report by the correspondent of the New York Times, quoting the words of the noble Lord in the course of a broadcast discussion on disarmament between him and Rear-Admiral Yates Stirling, of the United States Navy, in New York on March 1 this year, when he said:
"Russia is the only country on earth where there is any justice"—
a nice thing to come from a Peer and a member of your Lordships' House. I should recommend Lord Marley to pay some attention to what appeared in the Daily Telegraph a few days ago. A telegram from Moscow appearing in that newspaper called attention to a speech made by M. Krilenko, Commissary for Justice, in which he chastised the judicial officials who had been making a mockery of justice through the sentences they had been passing in so many cases in Russia. At all events it is hopeful of a better feeling in Russia that the Commissary for Justice should have been moved to call attention to that matter. Among the sentences of ten years in a concentration camp quoted by the Daily Telegraph are these:
"Peasant, for stealing 2 lbs. of grain;
"Peasant, for openly taking a handful of peas, when hungry after a long day's threshing;
"Aged watchman on a collecting farm, for eating three potatoes after being left at his post forty-eight hours without any food."
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I think if Lord Marley would pay more attention to such things he would have a different opinion as to whether there is any justice to be found in Russia or not.
LORD PONSONBY OF SHULBREDE: My Lords, I had no intention of intervening in this debate had it not been for the speech of the most reverend Primate. I would only say, with reference to the noble Lord who has just spoken, that it is usual and courteous in this House to give warning to a noble Lord if you intend to refer to him, to attack him or to quote him. The most reverend Primate has illustrated precisely what I meant when I said it was undesirable to discuss the internal affairs of foreign nations. The door has been opened. The noble and learned Viscount the Leader of the House described the situation with regard to these Motions perfectly accurately, and I was quite satisfied with the reply he gave to me, but I would ask him now whether there was not some justification for my protest.
We are discussing Russia to-day. We may be discussing Italy next week or when we resume; we may be discussing Austria and what goes on in Vienna, and discussing what goes on in Berlin, and what goes on in the United States or any other country; and then the most reverend Primate is going to get up and make one of those most eloquent, pleasant speeches telling these foreign countries how they ought to behave and pointing to the wretched condition of their citizens and their cruelty to them. It makes me perfectly hot to think that our Parliament should assume a self-righteous rôle of that sort. This is precisely what I thought would happen and it has happened, and it is the most undesirable thing. It makes me wish more than ever that I Was back in another place where the rules would prevent anything so undesirable, so mischievous as this from happening. May I remind the most reverend Primate, when he accuses my Party of only having compassion that has a Party bias in it, that people in glass houses had better not throw stones and that the position of the Anglican Church—
THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY: May I interrupt to say that what I did was to express surprise that sometimes that impression had been created?
LORD PONSONBY OF SHULBREDE: That is the way the most reverend Primate emphasises some things, by putting them in the mildest possible terms. The fact remains that the Anglican Church is pre-eminently in a glass house because it is pre-eminently on the side of authority. What authority does has to be praised, and what other people do has to be distorted. I do not remember the most reverend Primate getting into a state of indignation about the appalling atrocities that were committed under the Tsarist régime, and which were brought out with documentary evidence rather than with the amount of hearsay we have in the charges made against the Soviet Government to-day. But the Anglican Church is those days was perfectly silent. Not a word was said, because it was authority.
THE LORD ARCHIBISHOP OF CANTERBURY: I do not want to interrupt the noble Lord but I remember myself taking part in a most strongly worded attack upon the authorities in those days for their persecution of the Jews.
LORD PONSONBY OF SHULBREDE: I withdraw if the most reverend Primate made a protest against the persecution of the Jews, but there were many terrible persecutions in those days, and I do not seem to remember the Anglican Church being particularly articulate on the subject. But I rose to register my protest, and the protest of those who act with me in this House, at these opportunities being taken to lecture foreign countries, to tell them how they ought to behave, on very insufficient evidence to give catalogues of crime and instances of hardship when, as we all know, if we had research into other parts of the world we might receive information which would rouse us to great indignation. I am sorry to say that if we had investigations into some of the cruelties that are taking place in our own country because of the poverty and malnutrition and destitution that exist we should find that perhaps our eyes had better be turned at home before we find fault with our neighbours. Famines have the most terrible consequences. There have been famines in India. In the United States to-day the Middle West is in a very parlous condition. It is not the business of Parliament in this country to point the finger
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of scorn at other countries, to deride and attack them for maladministration of their affairs. We on these Benches very much regret that this opportunity should have been taken to turn this debate in the direction which I did my best to prevent when I intervened at the beginning.
EARL STANHOPE: My Lords, my noble friend the Leader of the House intimated to your Lordships that my reply would necessarily be brief, and I think the noble Lord who initiated this debate realised that that would be the case. I am not, of course, going to follow the noble Lords who have just spoken into the many points they have raised. I would merely remark in passing that I do not think it is necessary for this House to take its example from the Legislature of any foreign country, or indeed from another place. I think we are capable of looking after ourselves. His Majesty's Government are familiar with a great deal of the information which has been given to your Lordships both by the noble Lord who put down this Motion and by the most reverend Primate. I think I recognise some of the sources of the information which has been given.
But it is not the business of the Government to enter into discussions on the subject of the internal affairs of foreign countries. It does not collect information for that purpose, and there are, therefore, no Papers which I can lay. Nor have the Government any material for contradicting the information given by noble Lords except that which has been published through the official propaganda of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. That, of course, is available to your Lordships, and your Lordships are aware that it does not correspond with information which comes from other sources. Your Lordships are fully capable of deciding which of those sources of information you think is the more reliable. I have no other information which I can lay before your Lordships, and as I have no Papers to lay I am afraid that that is the only contribution I can make to the debate on the subject. I hope that the noble Lord will not accuse me of any lack of courtesy in that my reply is so brief.
LORD CHARNWOOD: My Lords, I am much obliged to the noble Earl for his

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reply. I am quite aware that if there were any Papers which might be laid he would be very ready to lay them. Perhaps I might be allowed to recall the extreme patience and courtesy with which, when he was Foreign Secretary, Mr. Henderson met those interested in similar questions a few years back, and the pains he took to satisfy them as to what Papers could possibly be laid. I well remember the courtesy and straightforwardness of Mr. Henderson on that occasion and I am perfectly certain that the noble Earl would not fall behind him in that respect. I would like also to remark, on the speech of the most reverend Primate, that whatever defects my speech may have had he has more than amply made good. The noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, rebuked the most reverend Primate in a very authoritative manner. I think I may leave him and the most reverend Primate alone, because I recollect that when two or three years ago the most reverend Primate made a powerful speech, amply well informed, replete with sufficient evidence, the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, got up and rebuked him in tones of very serious admonition for the rashness and inexperience which he had displayed. The noble Lord had then been a member of this House, I think, for a period of about three months.
I do not think I need take upon myself the charge of defending the Archbishop, but I must be allowed to make one remark and I make it without the slightest wish to be personally discourteous to the noble Lord. He spoke like a man who, seeing a cruel thing being done and seeing another man trying to intervene, rebukes him for his self-righteousness. I am convinced at the back of my mind, absolutely convinced, that the noble Lord himself is a man of humane instincts, but since he came to this House it has been appalling and distressing to me to see how readily and how consistently he has stepped into debates connected at all with this subject—on which he invariably remarks ho has no information—in the pose of a man steeped in abnormal callousness towards human suffering, towards oppression, and towards human woe. I beg leave to withdraw.
Motion for Papers, by leave, withdrawn.

SOLICITORS BILL. [H.L.]
Order of the Day for the consideration of Commons Amendments read.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, in moving that the Commons Amendments be considered I need not occupy your Lordships' time for more than a very few minutes. What happened was this. A flaw was found in the Solicitors Act under which a limited company could act as solicitors. That made it necessary to amend the Solicitors Act. Your Lordships passed a Bill and it was made to apply to Scotland. It was found in another place that some technical Amendments were necessary to make the application to Scotland effective. I beg to move that the Commons Amendments be now considered.
Moved, That the Commons Amendments be now considered.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

COMMONS AMENDMENT.
[The references are to Bill No. 41.]
Clause 1, page 1, line 20, after ("sections") insert ("thirty-six").
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, I would ask your Lordships to allow me to explain this Amendment in conjunction with a later Amendment excluding the application of subsection (1) to Scotland. Section 36 of the Scottish Act of 1933 corresponds to Section 46 of the English Act of 1932. The High Court in England decided that "person" in Section 46 did not include a corporation. Subsection (1) of Clause 1 reverses the law as laid down in that decision to the effect of bringing a corporation within Section 46 of the English Act. As there has been, however, no similar decision in Scotland, it is better to exclude subsection (1) of Clause 1, and to bring a corporation within Section 36 of the Scottish Act by including that section in subsection (2). The penalty provided in subsection (1) is not the same as the general penalty provided by Section 40 of the Scottish Act. Nor would the provisions of that section as to the place at which, and the time within which, proceedings may be brought apply to a contravention by a corporation of subsection (1) of Clause 1, but they will apply to a contravention of Section 36 if that section is brought within subsection (2) of Clause 1. I beg to move that this, House doth agree with the Commons in this Amendment.
Moved, That this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendment.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

COMMONS AMENDMENT.
Page 1, line 22, leave out ("impose penalties on") and insert ("prohibit").
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, the sections of the Scottish Act of 1933 mentioned in subsection (2) of Clause 1 do not specify the penalties attached to the acts prohibited by these sections, but merely say that a person who does any such act is guilty of an offence under the Act, the penalty therefor being provided by Section 40. Accordingly the descriptive words "which provisions, impose penalties on the doing of certain acts" are not strictly accurate. If "prohibit" is substituted for "impose penalties on" the descriptive words more aptly fit the Scottish enactment mentioned in the subsection and apply equally well to the English ones. I need hardly say that the Scottish Office have put forward these Amendments. I am very glad to move them.
Moved, That this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendment.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

COMMONS AMENDMENT.
Page 1, line 25, at end insert ("(3) Subsection (1) of this section shall not apply to Scotland").
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, this is the Amendment which I referred to in connection with the first of the Amendments. I beg to move that the House doth agree with it.
Moved, That this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendment.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

MILK BILL.
Order of the Day for the Third Reading read.
THE PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY OF THE MINISTRY OF AGRICULTURE AND FISHERIES (EARL DE LA WARR): My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a third time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 3a.— (Earl De La Warr.)
LORD STRACHIE: My Lords, I want to take this opportunity of asking the noble Earl one or two questions. I want to ask him about the milk subsidy which has been, I understand, paid to Scotland on the ground that if they do not have a subsidy paid to them they will send milk into England. It is said that at the present moment a subsidy of 4d. per gallon is paid to the Scottish producer of milk in order to get him not to send it into England. I ask the noble Earl whether he will enquire what is the actual price and also whether he will say upon what number of gallons the subsidy is paid, whether it is 4d. or whether it is a smaller amount. I notice that the Farmer and Stockbreeder, in its issue of last Monday, stated that this milk which came from Scotland was outside the jurisdiction of the English Scheme, seeing that as far as the Milk Board are concerned, and I suppose as far as the Minister of Agriculture is concerned, they have no power to stop this raiding by Scotland upon England.
In the past there has been a good deal of that sort of thing, but then there was open competition generally. Now the producer in England has the price fixed for him; he is not a free agent in this matter. It is not a question merely of supply and demand. I notice also that it is said by the Farmer and Stockbreeder, which I have already quoted, that great advantage accrues to Scotland in that they are able to send all their surplus milk over to England and get the liquid milk price for it, whereas if they had to retain it in Scotland they would get simply the manufactured price, which shows that they have made a very good bargain indeed and have got a very great advantage over the English producer. They have practically no liquid milk left on their hands; all of it can be used as liquid milk instead of being used for manufacturing purposes. This milk upon which the subsidy is paid now will have to go for manufacturing purposes, but if they get 4d. per gallon, or even 3d. per gallon, they are doing very much better than the English producer, whose surplus milk has to be sold at a price of 3½d. or 4d.
I notice with much amusement that the Farmer and Stockbreeder says that it was a very good bargain indeed for England. It is a very good bar-

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gain indeed for Scotland. I am very well aware that the Scottish people are very good at bargaining, and very clever at all that sort of thing. They have certainly got the advantage of the Englishman in this case as very often in other cases they have got the advantage of him. I venture to point out to the noble Earl that this is very hard upon the English producer, because it is of course the English producer who has to find this money. The Milk Board have got no money with which, to pay for it, and they have got to raise extra money from the English producer in order to pay this sum of money to Scotland. Of course the noble Earl may tell me that the Minister of Agriculture has no power to require the Milk Boards to give him any information about this matter. If this is so I would venture to suggest to the noble Earl that it would not be at all out of the way—Departments often do it—for him to make inquiries of those organisations and ask them as a matter of courtesy to tell him what is the exact state of things.
I am sure that farmers would be very disappointed indeed if the noble Earl were to give me that answer, because certainly farmers look upon the Minister of Agriculture as the man who is to look after their interests and protect them, not only in Parliament but also outside Parliament. If this state of things goes on I think it will be found that English farmers will say: "It is not fair to us to be fined in this way and to be taxed for the benefit of Scotland," and therefore they will ask for some legislation in this matter. I hope that he will give us full information in some way or another. On the other hand, if he cannot give full information to-day I hope that the Minister of Agriculture will do something to bring pressure to bear upon Scotland to ensure that they do not behave to England in this way, to the detriment of the English producer.
EABL DE LA WARE: My Lords, I am afraid I really cannot help the noble Lord upon the point on which he has put this question. To begin with his whole speech was based on certain statements in the Farmer and Stockbreeder and on something which he has heard about 4d. per gallon being paid to the Scottish Milk Board from the English Milk Board. There is no authority whatsoever for the
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statements which, have been made and which the noble Lord has brought to your Lordships' notice. It is understood that the English and Scottish Milk Marketing Boards have arrived at an agreement whereby the unnecessary movement of milk between the areas of the two Schemes will be reduced as far as possible, but the Minister is not in possession of the detailed information necessary to enable him to give the noble Lord an answer to this question, nor indeed, so far as I am aware, has the actual agreement yet been signed.
I would make the point very clear—the noble Lord suggested that I would do so and certainly I wish to make it clear—that there is no statutory obligation at all upon the Boards to furnish the Minister with particulars of purely private trading transactions of this nature. Speaking for myself, I think it would be most undesirable, if it were possible, for the Minister of Agriculture to be able to step in and interfere in the day-to-day trading arrangements of the Boards. Fanners require no protection from the Boards. The Boards are composed of the appointed representatives of farmers, and I suggest that the relations between the Boards and farmers are far best left to the farmers and the Boards themselves to look after.
On Question, Bill read 3a, with the Amendments, and passed, and returned to the Commons.

ROAD TRAFFIC BILL.
Order of the Day for the Third Reading read.
THE PARLIAMENTARY UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOE THE COLONIES (THE EARL OF PLYMOUTH): My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a third time.
Moved, That this Bill be now read 3a.—(The Earl of Plymouth.)
LORD PONSONBY OF SHULBREDE:
My Lords, before we part with this Bill I desire on behalf of my noble friends around me, and I think I may say on behalf of the whole House, to express our thanks to the noble Earl who has conducted this Bill through the Committee stage and the Report stage with such unfailing courtesy and patience. I only want to mention three small points which I should like to bring to his notice.

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The Bill is concerned with them, of course, but they do not refer to any particular Amendment. They are points which I should like him to bring to the notice of the Minister of Transport.
The first point arises on an Amendment which was passed, as the noble Earl will remember, with regard to the necessity of preventing noise. It was passed by general consent of the House, and the noble Earl told us that there was going to be a scientific inquiry into the matter in order that they might have some knowledge of the quantitative measurement of noise. I think he used that expression twice. I want to point out to the noble Earl very respectfully that that would seem to me to be the wrong way for the scientists to go to work. It really is not quantitative noise that we want to get at. Nobody minds a clap of thunder, or even an explosion, but what we all mind is this constant raucous throbbing, which disturbs people night and day, from the exhausts of motor cars and motor cycles. I think therefore if they concentrate on quantitative noise they will really not arrive at any satisfactory conclusions. Scientific people are rather apt in their eagerness to make very intense investigations into matters which do not very much signify.
Another point which I mentioned, I think, during the Second Reading debate, and to which I should like the noble Earl to give rather more attention, is the question of fines on the spot. I sincerely believe that that method, after careful investigation, might be adopted for minor offences where there can be no question of the offences having been perpetrated, like the absence, of a reflector on the back of a bicycle, or a car being drawn up in a spot whore parking is quite clearly forbidden such as within the white lines at the corner of a road. In cases of that sort I feel that the method which is being adopted abroad for these smaller offences is rapid, is not likely to inflict any injustice and, at the same time, enables the police to deal with these minor offences instead of, as now, going through the wrong procedure of allowing these culprits to escape.
The third point is the Highway Code. I listened very carefully to the remarks of the noble Earl on that point, and I did not hear anything really in the way of an assurance that some plan has been
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thought out as to how this new edition of the Highway Code could be distributed. It is not sufficient just to distribute it to motorists. We want as many people as possible throughout the country to get it; and without entering into various ideas which have occurred to me, I hope the noble Earl will press the Minister of Transport to think out some method of broadcasting this little pamphlet in such a way that it may be available in all public places without the least possible difficulty. Except for that I only want once more to thank the noble Earl for his courtesy.
EARL HOWE: My Lords, I would like, if I may be allowed to do so, to associate myself most sincerely with what the noble Lord the Leader of the Opposition has said with regard to the noble Earl who is in charge of this Bill. As one who has been, I am afraid, a rather hostile critic, I may say that I have been treated by him with the most extraordinary courtesy and kindness on every occasion. Before we finally part with this Bill I want to say a few things with regard to it. Yesterday the noble Earl, Lord Bathurst, referring to some remarks of mine, said:
"This Bill has been brought in to try to decrease the lamentable number of deaths, but I am afraid that the noble Earl, who has been one of the leaders of those who put down Amendments on behalf of the motorist, is one who has overcome that feeling about accidents and deaths. The whole object of those noble Lords who support him is to increase the pace of motor cars."
He then cited another Amendment of mine and said "It was simply designed to enable cars to go a little faster."
The noble Earl said I misrepresented him. If I did so I am indeed sorry, but in those few remarks he entirely misrepresented my attitude and the attitude of those with whom I have acted in respect of this Bill. For years past I have been drawing attention to the appalling casualty roll on the roads. I did it in 1930, when the Road Traffic Act was being passed, and I did it before then, and I could get little support from anybody. It did not seem possible to attract the serious attention of any one in this House. Ever since then I have been referring to the matter. My object has not been to increase the speed of motor cars. That is entirely wrong. What I and we say is that this present Road Traffic Bill will do nothing to increase public safety. It pro-

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poses to have a speed limit of thirty miles an hour. What does that speed limit represent? It certainly does not represent a safe speed. What may be a safe speed for one car is entirely unsafe for another. What is safe for one driver is unsafe for another. We say that it encourages a wrong mentality in drivers, policemen and magistrates, and that it will do a great deal to side-track attention from what really matters. What we want on the roads is an improvement in manners and road sense. If we can get those two things we shall do something actively effective to reduce the casualty roll.
This Bill also sets up the most appalling multiplicity of signs. Under this Bill, with reference to the thirty miles an hour speed limit alone, we are going to set up no fewer than five distinct new signs which the motorist has got to keep an eye on. If he disregards any of those signs he may be landed in gaol, and if he is a paid worker it may be a very serious matter to him. Then, again, nothing is going to be done under this Bill, so far as I can make out, with regard to the coloured background behind traffic light signals—a most important matter. The speed limit is going to depend upon lamp posts, a most thoroughly unsatisfactory matter from the point of view of the motorist. Lamp posts are not put up so as to be easily visible, nor are they painted a colour which is easily seen, and no provision is made for colour blindness, although I believe there are a large number of colour-blind people.
Then the charges are to be brought before tribunals which will often be very inexpert and even prejudiced. As in former years, in the case of the twenty miles an hour speed limit, and even since, conspicuous offenders will often be let off with practically no penalty at all, whereas others in far less serious cases will receive savage sentences. We know from the experience we have had in connection with motor legislation in the past, that the Surrey courts of summary jurisdiction will be able to revive the species of public competition that they seemed to run in connection with fines for technical offences. I say this advisedly, because they actually did publish figures, and there seemed to be a sort of competition between the various courts of justice.
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Another grave defect in the Bill from the point of view of the motorist is the fact that a man may be convicted on the evidence of a single policeman. No one has greater admiration for the magnificent uprightness of our Police force, but it is always possible for people to make mistakes, and it is not satisfactory that a man should be convicted, as he can be under this Bill, on the evidence of a single policeman, of a very serious charge indeed. I can only hope for your Lordships' sake that it does not happen to be any member of this House who so suffers. The effect of the Bill has already been to send up motor cycle insurance by 50 per cent., and motor cyclists are not the most affluent section of the community. The Bill also perpetrates what the motor community looks upon as a grave injustice—namely, the motorist having to pay the doctor's fees although he may be not in the least responsible for the accident. It must be obvious that the principle embodied in that provision is one which is quite foreign to our laws as a whole, and one which will be bitterly resented.
There are good things in the Bill. The first good thing I can see in it is that there are to be tests for drivers. I can assure your Lordships it will be very carefully watched by the motoring community to see that the tests are real tests. If it should happen that the tests imposed become too easy to pass, instead of some real knowledge of the Highway Code being required, then the tests will mean but little and they will become more or less perfunctory. So long as they are real tests I am convinced that they will do good and will do something to reduce the number of accidents. But they will only operate slowly, because only those who took out licences after April of this year will be subject to the tests. Therefore it will take a long time before we get an improved standard of driving under these tests.
Another good thing about the Bill is that it at last gives the Minister power to regulate pedestrian traffic. I regard this as being possibly the greatest thing that could be done to reduce the number of casualties. I sincerely hope that the Minister will do everything he can to extend the use of pedestrian crossings, and further that steps will be taken to prevent pedestrians from launching off

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into the middle of roundabout systems of traffic. That is the sort of thing that causes accidents. Those are, to my mind, the great points about the Bill.
There are four questions I should like to ask the Minister. Your Lordships will appreciate that the Report stage only finished yesterday and there has not been much time to consider the questions arising from it. The first question is: Will the Minister say that the thirty miles an hour speed limit will not come into operation until the speed-limit signs—the five separate signs which he has to set up under the Bill—are in position? I do not mean every single sign throughout the country, but I hope that broadly speaking the signs will be in position before the thirty-mile speed limit is brought into operation. I think it is only fair that one should ask that, in view of the very serious effects that may follow charges brought under the Act. With regard to the Highway Code I am indeed glad to hear what the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, said on that subject, and I entirely share his anxiety. I hope everything will be done to bring the Highway Code before all the schools of the country—public, private and elementary. I hope that every use will be made of the cinema and of broadcasting, and I hope that in the four holiday periods special sections of the Highway Code will be textually reproduced in the public Press, and that no fee will be charged for reproducing them.
With regard to the causation of accidents, an important letter appeared in to-day's Times, signed by Sir Auckland Geddes, in which he pleads for a scientific inquiry into the causation and prevention of accidents. We have had a police inquiry and a compilation of statistics very carefully gathered and collated by the Ministry of Transport, but that does not go far enough. I entirely agree with the point made by Sir Auckland Geddes, and I hope very much that the Minister will be able to give it his consideration. Would it not be a good thing to set up a really scientific inquiry into the real causation of accidents, and to put all sorts of people on that inquiry, provided they are real experts? Then with regard to road construction, what is the Minister really going to do to try to get better road surfaces throughout the country? We have all seen the
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circular letter which the Minister sent round in February, but every one of us who has experience knows that the road surfaces still leave much to be desired. There is too much variation, and the roads are far too slippery. They are often unsuitable from the point of view of horse drivers and cyclists, and equally unsuitable for the motorist. They are very dark in colour where they should be light. That is going to be an important point in relation to the picking up of these signs under the Bill. The dark background at night, with headlights on, will make it extraordinarily difficult to pick up the signs.
I hope the Minister will be able to do a little more to improve road construction. By that I mean road construction at corners, super-elevation at corners. That is not done in order to enable the motorist to go faster. It is done simply and solely to enable traffic to keep on its own side of the road at corners. You often see slow traffic keeping too much on the inside of corners, solely because of the camber on the road, and the drivers are afraid they will slip if they go too far over. I sincerely hope that the Bill will do good. I trust that my forecast that it will not do good will be wrong, but I am perfectly certain that the mere imposition of a speed limit, with the technical offences following in its train, will do nothing at all to reduce casualties on the road.
EARL BATHURST: My Lords, in view of what the noble Earl has said I should like to point out that I did not in my speech last night accuse him of wishing to increase accidents. I said that the cause he was pleading was that of increased speed, and I quoted the words of the Commission that speed is the cause of all these dreadful accidents. The noble Earl assures me that his object is to reduce the number of accidents and I accept what he says, but I must say that, as regards speed, appearances are rather against him. In the first place, he did all he could to support the absence of the speed limit between twelve o'clock at night and five o'clock in the morning, and I am glad to say that there the sense of the House was against him.
EARL HOWE: The noble Earl has completely misrepresented me. I was one of those who supported the Amendment that there should be a speed limit all round the clock.
EARL BATHURST: I beg the noble Earl's pardon. I did not realise that.
EARL HOWE: Furthermore, if the noble Earl will cast his mind back to 1930 he will remember that I resisted the removal of the twenty miles an hour speed limit.
EARL BATHURST: I must apologise for making that mistake. But there was also the case of the by-pass roads—the removal of the speed limit in the case of by-passes. I think the noble Earl supported that Amendment, and that is decidedly one which increases speed in built-up areas, because all those by-passes will be built up some time. I think the noble Earl can hardly say that that was not with the object of increasing speed.
LORD SANDHURST: My Lords, I only rise to refer to something that fell from the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby. I may have misunderstood him, but I certainly understood him to encourage the Ministry to deal, so far as noise is concerned, almost entirely with silencers. I hope that is not his intention nor that of the Minister, because if he will go and sit in my office he will realise that noise in London is not mainly the noise of exhausts. It is gear box noises, back-axle noises, and chassis rattle noises, and almost; the last thing you notice is the exhaust.
LORD PONSONBY OP SHULBREDE: Perhaps I may be allowed to correct the impression I gave. I did not mean that every sort of noise ought not to be dealt with. I only felt it would be unwise to concentrate merely on what is called quantitative noise, that is the intensity of noise like a clap of thunder. I said there were many other things besides that which might not be registered very highly on one of these machines for registering noises.
LORD SANDHURST: I am very glad to have the noble Lord's assurance, because I certainly gathered that he was going on the point of the noise of the exhaust only. I hope they will concentrate particularly on tyre noise. I do not know whether the Government are aware that one of the best non-skid tyres on the market is almost dead silent; and they have only got to listen to the omnibuses going along the street to realise
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where a tremendous lot of the noise of London comes from.
THE EARL OF PLYMOUTH: My Lords, first of all I desire to thank the noble Lord the Leader of the Opposition and the noble Earl who sits behind me for the terms in which they referred to my conduct of the Bill through your Lordships' House, which I need hardly say I greatly appreciate. I have been asked a, certain number of specific questions. I am afraid I am not in a position to answer them all, but I should like briefly to reply to the noble Lord opposite. He mentioned the question of noise, and put forward the view that he did not think a scientific investigation of this matter was the proper way of dealing with the subject. I am not at all sure that I agree with him. After all, so long as there is no scientific investigation of the matter you will always get the difficulty of saying what is excessive noise and what is not excessive noise, and I imagine this investigation of the question was precisely with a view to seeing if a way could be found of estimating the amount of noise being made. I do not think anybody would deny that if a way of achieving that were found it would be of very great value in this matter.
Then he also mentioned once again the possibility of allowing policemen to fine offenders on the spot for minor offences. I expressed the views of the Government on this matter during the Committee stage, or perhaps it may have been on the Second Reading of the Bill. This question has been considered, and I am afraid I cannot add anything to what I said then—namely, that at the present time the Government do not view the proposal with favour. Both the noble Lord and the noble Earl once again referred to the Highway Code, and expressed a very strong feeling that steps should be taken to make this Code available to the public far more easily than it is at the present moment. I know that attention will be paid by the Minister to what has been said in this House and to the strongly-expressed feelings on this matter. I know it will be the object of the Minister to make the Code available to the public as easy as possible, and to give facilities to all respectable publishers to reproduce it. I feel certain close attention will be given to this

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matter, and I quite realise the importance of it.
LORD PONSONBY OF SHULBREDE: Can the noble Earl say whether the new edition of the Code is ready?
THE EARL OF PLYMOUTH: I am afraid I cannot say definitely, but I think not. Turning for a moment to the words of the noble Earl, he delivered a strong attack on certain features of this Bill, and discussed at some length many of the basic principles of it. I am sure your Lordships will not wish me to go into these matters further at this stage. We have given them very full consideration, and your Lordships have come to the conclusions you have reached after having been thoroughly into these matters. The noble Earl asked me four questions to which I shall attempt to give him some sort of reply. Firstly, he asked whether the thirty miles an hour speed limit would not be brought into operation until the signs which the Minister and the highway authorities are to put up as the result of Clause 1 have been placed in position. I cannot give him a definite assurance that every sign will be put up before the speed limit operates, but I cannot imagine that the speed limit will be put into operation until, generally speaking at any rate, all these necessary signs are in position. Then he referred to the Highway Code, which I have already dealt with, and to the question of road construction.
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The question of road construction is a matter to which the Minister is giving the very closest attention. The importance of it is fully realised, and the divisional road engineers are, of course, giving this particular matter their very closest consideration. Every kind of influence is being brought to bear on the highway authorities to improve their roads in this respect, and I think I am right in saying that the Minister is in a position to withhold the grant for any road improvement unless the surface approved by the Minister has been made use of. Lastly the noble Earl referred to the letter written by Sir Auckland Geddes to The Times, suggesting that we should have a scientific inquiry into the causation of accidents. I have not had time to go into that matter or consider it fully, but I will certainly bring the noble Earl's remarks in this respect to the attention of the Minister. I hope your Lordships will now give this Bill a Third Reading.
On Question, Bill read 3a, with the Amendments, and passed, and returned to the Commons.

POOR LAW (SCOTLAND) BILL.
Read 3a (according to Order), with the Amendments, and passed, and returned to the Commons.
House adjourned at fourteen minutes before eight o'clock.