Lords Sitting of 2 April 1935

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

BIRMINGHAM CORPORATION BILL. [H.L.]
THE CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES (LORD STANMORE): My Lords, by Standing Order 105 a Private Bill has to be read a second time within seven days of the First Reading. This provision sometimes conflicts with another Standing Order, Standing Order 103, which lays down that the Attorney-General must approve of a Bill in certain cases. In this case the Attorney-General has approved of this Bill, but the interval of seven days has been exceeded because of some delay. Therefore I hope that your Lordships will agree to dispense with the Standing Order. I beg to move that Standing Order No. 105 be considered in order that it may be dispensed with in respect of this Bill.
Moved, That Standing Order No. 105 be considered in order to its being dispensed kith in respect of the said Bill.—(Lord Stanmore.)
On Question, Motion agreed to, and Standing Order No. 105 suspended accordingly.
LORD ROCKLEY: My Lords, as the member for many years for the Aston division of Birmingham, I have been requested to move the Second Reading of this Bill. The Birmingham Corporation, after giving the subject very careful consideration, have come to the conclusion that an adequate air port for the City is essential. For that purpose they are acquiring an area of 500 acres, a considerable portion of which is actually in the City, although at a distance of approximately six miles from the centre, and the cost of the land and the equipment of the air port will involve an expenditure of £250,000. I beg to move that the Bill be read a second time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Rockley.)
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed: The Committe to be proposed by the Committee of Selection.
LORD MOUNT TEMPLE: My Lords, I beg to move that it be an instruction to the Committee to which the Bill may be referred to amend the Bill by leaving out paragraph (c) of subsection (1) of Clause 103. In effect, that means that, although the Corporation of Birmingham under this Bill would have power to purchase and lay out an aerodome, they would not have power to run an air service from that aerodrome. I understand, privately, that the noble Lord, Lord Rockley, on behalf of the Birmingham Corporation, will accept this instruction, and therefore I will not detain your Lordships any further.
Moved, That it be an instruction to the Committee to which the Bill may be referred to amend the Bill by leaving out paragraph (c) of subsection (1) of Clause 103.—(Lord Mount Temple.)
LORD ROCKLEY: My Lords, in answer to Lord Mount Temple, I may say that the Corporation have already stated—about a month ago—that they proposed to withdraw this clause, and they intend to adhere to that decision.
THE EARL OF DUDLEY: My Lords, as a business man whose interests this paragraph is framed to look after, perhaps I might be allowed to say one word in regard to this measure, and to explain what I understand was in the minds of the Birmingham Corporation when this paragraph was framed. They propose to spend a great deal of money on this aerodrome, and they naturally wish to ensure that in the future there shall be an adequate air service, if and when necessary in the interests of Birmingham and the Midland districts generally. At present, I believe, there is no service whatsoever linking up the capital with the most important provincial City in England, or linking up that City with other parts of the Empire. I do not say that is either necessary or economic at the present moment, but still that is a condition which obtains and which I believe does not obtain in any other important nation in the world.
Personally I travel backwards and forwards between Birmingham and London

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as much as anyone, and I would not use an air service myself—a train is good enough for me—but the day will probably come when aeroplanes will be quickened up and safer and when access to aerodromes will be easier, and it may be important that Birmingham should have an efficient service between London and other parts of the Empire. There is at present nothing to ensure that we shall get such an efficient service, and such an economic service. This paragraph, I understand, was framed to act as a sort of lever that such a service shall be obtained and, if private enterprise is not forthcoming, to provide that the Birmingham Corporation—and after all Birmingham is the best governed City in England—shall be empowered to maintain and provide that service. I think it is a very reasonable request, and I rather hoped that we might have a word from the noble Marquess, the Secretary of State for Air, giving us an assurance that if the time does arise when it is necessary in the interests of Midland commerce that such an air service should be instituted, particularly in view of the fact that the Birmingham Corporation propose to spend such a large sum of money, the Government will ensure that we shall get it.
THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR AIR (THE MARQUESS OF LONDONDERRY): My Lords, I had not proposed to intervene in this debate, but the noble Earl who has just sat down invited me to say something, to give the attitude of the Air Ministry in connection with this matter. Lord Mount Temple has drawn attention to paragraph (c) of subsection (1) of Clause 103, by which the Birmingham Corporation were seeking powers, in connection with their proposed aerodrome undertaking, to
"provide own work and use (but not manufacture) aircraft and by means thereof convey passengers and passengers' luggage parcels and merchandise to and from the aerodrome and demand and take in respect of traffic conveyed services rendered and facilities afforded in connection with such aircraft such reasonable fares rates and charges as they may think fit and as may be approved by the Secretary of State for Air."
My right honourable friend the Minister of Health and I myself, in my capacity as Secretary of State for Air, objected to this provision, which would enable the Corporation of Birmingham to
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establish air services to and from the Continent, or within this country, and thus to compete with air transport undertakings which have not the rates of a great city to back them. Both my right honourable friend and I consider that commercial air transport services are something entirely different from road or tramway services, which are essentially local in character, and that air transport, services are not a suitable subject for municipal provision and management.
I can assure your Lordships that the establishment of an air port by Birmingham is most warmly welcomed both by the Minister of Health and by myself. I am sincerely hoping that their splendid example will be followed by the great municipalities all over the country, and that in a very short time we shall find that aerodrome accommodation will spring up in many places, and that will probably encourage our air lines more than anything else. While we fully recognise that the Corporation would be prepared to agree to the Secretary of State's being given express power to allow or veto an air service, this does not meet the objection, and I am sure your Lordships will agree when I say that we do not consider it suitable or desirable to put upon the Secretary of State the onus of vetoing a service when Parliament, as it would do, has given approval in principle. I can assure your Lordships that the attitude of the Government on this question has only been arrived at after the fullest consideration of all the arguments so ably put forward by a deputation, headed by the Lord Mayor of Birmingham himself, which had been received at the Ministry of Health by officials of the two departments. I should add, for the information of your Lordships, that the Government have heard with satisfaction the statement made by the noble Lord, Lord Rockley, on behalf of the promoters of the Bill, that in accordance with the views expressed by the Government the provision to which my noble friend has taken exception will be withdrawn on the Committee stage.
THE EARL OF DUDLEY: Can the noble Marquess give the Birmingham business men an assurance that the Government will support and encourage private enterprise in providing a proper air service at economic rates—not at exhorbitant rates—between Birmingham and London and

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other parts of the world, should necessity arise?
THE MARQUESS OF LONDONDERRY: The noble Earl is inviting me to open up a very wide subject on which I should be only too glad to dilate to your Lordships, because the development of air services all over the country is one of the chief objects we have in view. At a recent date there were seventeen air lines in this country, and I sincerely hope that the number will be greatly increased. I should like to repeat what I have already said, that I hope the example which Birmingham has given by the provision of aerodrome facilities will encourage the development of these services, to which we are all looking forward with so much interest.
On Question, Motion agreed to and ordered accordingly.

VOLUNTARY HOSPITALS (PAYING PATIENTS) BILL. [H.L.]
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
LORD LUKE: My Lords, attached to this Bill you will find a Memorandum which contains a brief statement of the reasons for and the conditions of the Bill. This Bill will enable additional hospitals to provide private accommodation or pay beds in wards of one or more beds and thus enable the neighbourhoods they cater for to have the advantages enjoyed by many other parts of the country. There are already 4,600 pay beds as compared with 73,000 ordinary beds in the voluntary hospitals of the whole country, showing that the principle is well established. These pay beds have not been provided at the expense of a reduction in the ordinary beds; they have, in fact, been accompanied by an increase in ordinary hospital beds. The patients requiring these pay beds are those whom the hospital almoner would not usually accept for the ordinary wards but who cannot afford the cost of private treatment in their homes, and urgently require treatment in a hospital, with all its specialised equipment and staff. These patients sometimes have to be admitted to ordinary wards because the treatment cannot be given outside a large hospital. Thus the provision of pay beds should release ordinary beds occasionally used in this manner.
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The patients I refer to are not the very poor but are comparatively poor, when faced with the great cost of serious illness or an operation. They are those who are without the benefits of national insurance, and who have sometimes been called "the black-coated poor," and they are certainly very deserving of our sympathy. King Edward's Hospital Fund records show that the proportion of pay beds to ordinary beds in London hospitals is 1,871 to 13,800. For these 1,871 beds, charges of from £2 2s. to £7 7s. a week are made in the case of 1,680, and higher charges in the case of 191 beds. These pay beds have provided advantages not only for the patients who could not afford to obtain facilities elsewhere, but also for the hospitals. The hospitals have profited financially by the surpluses realised, by the fuller use of their expensive equipment, and by the friends they have made among the new classes whom they have served. This has facilitated the maintenance and extension of their ordinary beds. Because of the advantages to both the hospital and the patients, the provision of pay beds has in recent years become recognised as a customary part of the function of a voluntary hospital.
There seems to be no reason why these advantages should be enjoyed only by hospitals whose trusts were settled after this became recognised, and should be denied to hospitals whose trusts were settled at earlier dates, and therefore denied also to the neighbourhoods served by those hospitals. This Bill is designed to provide a simple method of removing these inequalities. The immediate raison d'être for the Bill is that some hospitals in order to provide pay beds have recently had to obtain Private Acts at considerable expense, and other hospitals which wish to provide pay beds are in the same difficulty. The cost of such a Private Bill is at least £500, and it is a pity that hospitals should have to spend their scanty funds in such a manner. If numerous Acts are obtained privately by hospitals it is sure to lead to a lack of uniformity. This Bill provides a uniform method of removing these anomalies whilst the interests of the sick poor are safeguarded by reserving control to the Charity Commissioners, who are the recognised custodians of such interests. This is not the private Bill of an individual hospital enthusiast; it

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embodies the considered view of King Edward's Hospital Fund and the British Hospitals Association. Those leaders in the hospital world have approved every clause in the Bill. I should, however, mention that the following Amendments in detail will be submitted in Committee: To leave out the words after "made" in Clause 3, line 22, and in Clause 5, page 2, line 43, after "to," to insert "Scotland or to." As there are several noble Lords who will speak, I have only briefly covered the ground, and now beg to move that this Bill be read a second time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Luke.)
LORD SANDERSON: My Lords, the noble Lord has done so much good work for the voluntary hospitals for many years that I am sure your Lordships will treat with the greatest respect and consideration any suggestion he has to make with regard to the improvement of the voluntary hospitals. We on these Benches recognise that there is not adequate provision for health treatment for the comparatively poor people and even, I would say, for comparatively well-to-do people. There are many sorts of treatment which it is impossible for them to have in their own homes, and many nursing homes are very bad and most of them very expensive. I suppose also that it is becoming increasingly the case that various kinds of treatment are required which cannot possibly be provided in peoples' houses or even in the best equipped nursing homes, the treatment being too costly to introduce and too elaborate. Therefore it is only in hospitals where people of all classes can have certain necessary treatments for illness.
While we recognise that, we have certain rather serious misgivings about the Bill. While we recognise the necessity for better treatment for the comparatively poor people, we are very anxious that the Bill should not be the means of cutting down services for the people who cannot afford to pay. Nearly all the hospitals at the present time have very long waiting lists. I believe that the Royal Infirmary at Edinburgh, which is a hospital which will be affected by this Bill, has an average waiting list of about 3,000. That means, of course, that there are people waiting to get into hospital
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and who, when they do get in, may have become so ill that the treatment is not effective. A great deal of suffering is, I believe, caused in that way. Then again there are cases—I am afraid fairly frequent—in which patients have to be sent away from hospital before they have fully recovered or, to put it in another way, who certainly would benefit by a longer stay in hospital, which they cannot have because of the pressure for admission by people on the waiting list. We do not want these waiting lists to become longer. We do not want to run the risk of people's time in hospital being cut short so that they are not able to have full treatment. In fact, we do not want the provision of paying beds to be the means of cutting down services for poor people.
I know that Clause 4 (1) lays down that no order shall be made by the Charity Commissioners unless they are satisfied that accommodation for people who cannot afford to pay will not be diminished or restricted. That is all right but there is a qualification immediately afterwards "having regard to the monies at the disposal of the committee of management and the demand for accommodation" by persons who cannot afford to pay charges. That seems to me to be a loophole. It seems to me possible, as that clause stands, for a hospital to reduce its number of nonpaying beds and increase the number of its paying beds. I do not say that would happen, but it might happen. Supposing the income of a hospital was greatly reduced, then according to this clause it seems to me possible to reduce the number of non-paying people admitted and increase the number of paying beds. Supposing you had a hospital of 100 beds, for example, and the income fell off by 25 per cent., would it not be possible for the management committee to say: "We can only take in seventy-five nonpaying people and we can use the other twenty-five beds and make them into paying beds"? It seems to me that might be possible, but perhaps the noble Lord, Lord Luke, will be able to reassure us on that point when he replies.
My noble friends and I are very much dissatisfied with the hospital system or lack of system. We want to see all the hospitals taken over by the municipalities, to see them publicly controlled and

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kept open for free treatment for everybody who needs it, and to have them supported by the rates. That, I think, is, if I may say so, a better solution of the problem which this Bill introduced by the noble Lord raises. Of course voluntary hospitals have done good work in the past and are doing good work now, but the methods by which they are financed, or largely financed, are, think, most unsatisfactory; they are chaotic and entirely haphazard. It is not right that a great health service like the hospitals should be so largely supported by costly banquets, balls, bazaars, fêtes, and flag days, and very inadequately supported at that. Again, the present system of supporting the hospitals means they are very largely supported by a comparatively few rich people. Large numbers of people who could well afford to contribute to voluntary hospitals; get off scot-free. If these hospitals were put under public control they would then be supported on the principle of ability to pay, which would be far more satisfactory.
It used to be said, I believe, that voluntary hospitals were necessary in order to provide an outlet for the charitable instincts of the well-to-do and the rich, but I do not know that anyone would hold that view now. If they do I would merely say that if all the hospitals were municipalised there would still be ample opportunity left for charity in the true sense of the word. We shall continue to press for the municipalisation of the hospitals, but in the meantime we realise that adequate provision must be made for people who cannot afford to pay, and we criticise this Bill merely on the ground that it seems to us there is a loophole which might lead to the reduction of nonpaying beds, a reduction of the services to the poor, and the substitution of paying beds. That we should very much regret. We think the Bill requires amending so as to safeguard that position and make the position of non-paying patients, of the poor people, absolutely secure. I hope very much that the noble Lord will be able, if the Bill receives a Second Reading, to accept an Amendment on the Committee stage with that object in view.
THE MARQUESS OF READING: My Lords, I will only detain you for a moment or two upon this Bill, which I desire to support. Nevertheless I think
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it is necessary that we should pay considerable attention to the point raised by the noble Lord who has just spoken. My anxiety in reading this Bill is not with respect to its main purpose, which is to afford greater facilities for paying patients in the voluntary hospitals. The object of the Bill is to enable this to be done by hospitals which hitherto have not been able to do it because of their trusts. I imagine that your Lordships will have no doubt that the noble Lord in introducing this measure is really anxious, for the benefit of the public, to make it possible for those who are not able to indulge in the expense, of a nursing home and do not wish to go into a hospital in the ordinary way but are prepared to pay a moderate fee for what would be good accommodation and no doubt good nursing and. surgical and medical attendance, to do that. There is, however, a part of the Bill which gives me some anxiety and in regard to which I will address a few words to your Lordships.
We must take great care in the Bill that in giving these powers to the voluntary hospitals the effect will not be to decrease the advantages that are given to the poor people for whom these hospitals exist. Some figures were quoted by the noble Lord who has just spoken, and I agree with all he said on this subject. I think he quoted the case of one hospital where there was a waiting list of some 3,000 patients. There are other hospitals, to which attention could be drawn, in a similar position. I think any of your Lordships who have had an opportunity of looking into hospital affairs will realise that over and over again cases occur in which an outpatient is recommended for treatment at once, surgically, as an in-patient and there is no accommodation for that patient as an in-patient, so that consequently the patient has to wait and suffer. We must take care in this Bill that ample power is given to the Charity Commissioners. Clause 4, to which attention has already been directed, does purport to give the controlling power to the Charity Commissioners. I have no desire to take up your Lordships' time in discussing this matter at this moment. Obviously, it will be considered again in Committee.
As I wish to support the Second Reading, I make now only this one observation

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with regard to the Bill, that when we are considering it in Committee, and when the noble Lord in charge of the Bill has to deal with it, I hope every attention will be given so as to make the powers in Clause 4 as wide as they can be made. I doubt very much whether the words as they actually appear in the Bill are sufficient. There are some possible dangers, and we do want to make certain, notwithstanding that we in this House are in favour of allowing the voluntary hospitals to have these paying beds for patients, that poor people shall not suffer by decreased or worse attention that is at present given to them. I leave that matter at this stage, simply asking that the noble Lord will consult those who may be advising and acting with him, and take steps as far as possible to strengthen this clause so that it is made clear that, it goes sufficiently far to cleat with the matter have indicated.
With regard to the point raised by the noble Lord at the end of his speech, I do not propose to say anything now, because it does not seem to me that it is germane to this Bill. I do not complain of his having raised it, but it is a matter which has been discussed before, and, for myself, I think that so long as we can we should maintain the voluntary system, for it does afford to persons who really-wish to help poorer people the opportunity of supplying funds to the hospitals and in that way of providing all this accommodation. On the whole, it seems to me preferable to have a voluntary system of hospitals rather than a state or local authority system. I wish to support the Second Reading of the Bill.
LORD GREVILLE: My Lords, as treasurer of one of the voluntary hospitals, I should like to say a few words in favour of this Bill. Any hospital which up to the present date has not had the power to take in paying patients has had to apply for a Private Bill. This is a very expensive and a very lengthy proceeding, and if this Bill goes through it would put all hospitals on an equal footing. Anyone, I think, who has had anything to do with voluntary hospitals during the past twenty years will have noticed that we get a very different class of patient attending, or endeavouring to enter, voluntary hospitals—a patient who, perhaps, is accustomed to a certain amount of
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privacy and quiet, and who is unable to pay the fees of a nursing home, yet who could probably afford his doctor's fees and some small fee towards maintenance. This is a class of person in respect of whom applications to enter voluntary hospitals are being increasingly made every day. It is a class that probably may be taking beds away from those who cannot afford to pay at all. If this Bill goes through it will remove those people entirely from the general ward of a hospital. These extra paying rooms or beds will be supplementary to the ordinary beds in the hospital and will in no way interfere with those who cannot afford to pay, because the patients who go into these paying beds generally are treated by their own doctors and arrange their own fees and merely pay something towards their maintenance.
There is another class of patient that is continually, I am sorry to say, being brought to, our hospitals, a class of patient which even includes members of your Lordships' House. These are the patients that either are taken with sudden illness or meet with some accident in the street. In the hospital which I have the honour to serve there is no accommodation for any accident case except in the general ward, and we have cases of people in all walks of life brought in there. Many of them are perfectly well able to pay full fees to the doctors and full maintenance, and they are in the class of patients who will use these paying beds. I think that in the future there will be a very much larger demand on all hospitals from people who can pay something, and I should like to emphasise very strongly that these paying beds would be extra to the ordinary beds of a hospital.
As regards waiting lists, those are found in every hospital, but the way to overcome that difficulty, as a rule, is to get the patients out to a convalescent home as quickly as you can and fill your beds with fresh patients. As to the question of State hospitals, I do not propose to deal with that to-day, but as one who has been connected for a very considerable time with voluntary hospitals I should be very sorry to see the voluntary hospitals disappear from this country. I hope your Lordships will give a Second Reading to this Bill, which is long overdue and much needed.
THE EARL OF MALMESBURY:My Lords, as another member of your Lord

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ships' House who has had the privilege for very many years of being closely associated with hospital life and work, I should like to support my noble friend behind me (Lord Greville) who has commended this Bill to your kind sympathy. I do not think that there need be any real alarm on the part of the noble Marquess, Lord Reading, or on the part of the noble Lord who spoke from the Front Bench opposite (Lord Sanderson) that those who are unable to receive treatment other than through the voluntary system will be excluded by the passing of this Bill. If this Bill is passed, it will merely enable something to be done which has been done already in a great many hospitals, and for which there is, day by day, an increasing demand and need. I was very glad to hear my noble friend behind me refer to the importance of the voluntary system. I am convinced that if the voluntary system ever went, and if a national system was substituted for it, it would be one of the greatest blows which the nation could possibly receive. It is impossible to over-estimate the value of the magnificent work which the voluntary hospitals have done, and are doing, with increased effort at the present time. If it ever came about that an official system was substituted for the voluntary system based on skill, sympathy, care and love, the nation would soon realise the difference.
One thing I would like to say is that, as I think we all know, there is an increasing horror—I say it with all respect—of nursing homes. There are, of course, many good nursing homes, I do not doubt that for a moment, but a large number of people have told me that, if they ever had to receive treatment again, they would prefer to go into the paying ward of a hospital. In a hospital with which I am closely associated, there has recently been a big extension, and that extension was made, not only to provide more free treatment, but to provide paying wards in order to meet the increasing need. Naturally, those who go into, the paying wards of a hospital do not expect all the luxuries to be found in the best nursing homes. I support this proposal, not only because paying wards meet a need, but also because I feel sure that they will be a source of definite income to the hospitals.
There is one danger, however, in modern hospital life, and it is an
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increasing danger. I will tell your Lordships what that danger is. I have come across it, I am sorry to say, more than once. That danger is that there is a tendency for people to get into a hospital and make every attempt to disguise their means. I heard of a case recently—I will not mention the name of the hospital—in which a very expensive treatment was being given. To that hospital there came a patient whose wife said that his means were very small, and he was taken into the ward. It was subsequently discovered that he was a rich man. In these days when every-body wants everything for nothing—and they do not blush when they ask for it—I venture to say that this is a real danger which we have to meet. I hope that whatever Amendment the noble Lord opposite may think fit to move later, the Bill will be given a Second Reading.
THE EARL OF DUDLEY: My Lords, as chairman of one of the large voluntary hospitals in London I should like to add a few words in support of the Bill. There is, however, one point on which I should like to have an assurance from the noble Lord in charge of it. I should like to be assured that the Bill will not in any way interfere with the power to charge varying fees now possessed by the committees of management of some hospitals. I have heard it said—I hope groundlessly—that under Clauses 2 and 3 it is the intention of the Charity Commissioners to say that the limit of charge shall be seven guineas. That would be a hardship, as I think I can show to your Lordships, on patients who now occupy beds at a lower charge. In the hospital with which I am connected we are able to charge fairly high fees for single bedrooms—as high as ten guineas—because people can get there better treatment than anywhere else. If we have to limit our charges to seven guineas, it would mean that we should have to raise the charges to patients who now pay less, because the fee of ten guineas covers, to a large extent, the cost of the beds below seven guineas. It would tend to increase those charges of four, five and six guineas, which we now make, and that would create a hardship. I hope that the noble Lord will be able to give an assurance that that is not the intention.

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I should like to endorse everything that has been said by the two previous speakers about the voluntary system. I think it would be a tragedy for this country if ever it were abolished. The sick would, undoubtedly, not get the same treatment which they receive at the present time. With regard to what the noble Lord opposite said concerning banquets and balls and so on, I think he perhaps did not realise that the revenue derived from these sources is a very small part of a hospital's revenue. Such things are very irksome, but we live in days of publicity, and these things bring publicity to hospitals which increases their revenue. If the noble Lord had been more conversant with the situation, I do not think he would have made the remarks he did make. I hope your Lordships will realise that the higher paid beds cover charges which are of benefit to the poorer patients, and that the noble Lord will be able to assure me that this Bill will do nothing to prevent the charging of a fee which, in the view of the committee of management, the patient in question can pay.
THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (VISCOUNT HAILSHAM): My Lords, the introduction of this Bill has obviously aroused interest in all quarters of the House, and I was glad to hear from every speaker an expression of approval of the principles of the Bill and support of the Second Reading. I cannot claim to speak with the same authority as my noble friend Lord Luke, who brings this Bill forward with the support of King Edward's Hospital Fund, and I cannot claim the same intimate knowledge of the work of hospitals as my noble friends Lord Greville, Lord Malmesbury and Lord Dudley. At the same time, I think it would be useful for your Lordships that something should be said as to the Government point of view upon this measure. I have been at some pains to discuss the Bill with the Ministry of Health, and also with my right honourable friend the Attorney-General, and I have been able to ascertain the attitude which they think ought to be adopted towards the measure now before your Lordships' House.
As my noble friend Lord Luke said, there are a number of cases in which already by Private Bill legislation power
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has been conferred on individual hospitals to have pay beds, and I think—and I rather gather that your Lordships all agree—that a case is made out from the facts which he states as to the desirability of having some beds available for those who are able and willing to make some payment towards the necessary expense of their receiving adequate medical and surgical treatment, and who at the same time are unable to pay the sort of fees which are necessarily involved in their going to any nursing home. It is not an answer to say that those people might be treated in their own houses because, after all, in many cases very expensive and intricate apparatus is required which would not be available unless they went to some hospital or nursing home.
I think, therefore, that the case for paying beds is a case which is made out, and if that case is made out, then I think it follows that the Bill ought to have a Second Reading. At the same time, the Government have already felt the necessity for considering the point which was made by the noble Lord opposite, Lord Sanderson, and the view which we reached was that it was right to provide pay-bed accommodation but that safeguards should be inserted to ensure two things: first of all, that the property and funds of the hospital settled upon trusts for the benefit of the sick poor were protected; that is to say, were prevented from being diverted to any other purpose; and secondly, that the accommodation which would otherwise be available in the hospital for the sick poor would not be restricted; that is to say, that by the introduction of pay beds there should be no risk of preventing poor people from having that amount of accommodation which would otherwise be available for them.
Your Lordships will probably have noticed that under Clause 2 of the Bill it is possible to provide these pay beds by two different methods: first of all, by the erection of new accommodation on land which already belongs to the hospital or which is acquired by the hospital; and secondly, by the use of existing accommodation for providing for the paying patients. It perhaps tends to clarity if those two matters are dealt with separately. So far as new accommodation for the use of paying patients is concerned, it seems to the Government that

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there would be no objection to such accommodation being erected upon the land owned by the hospital, provided that such land is not required for the general purposes of the hospital and provided that it is made quite clear that the cost of erection must be borne by funds subscribed for the specific purpose of paying-patient accommodation, and that no part of the funds of the hospital subject to charitable trusts for the sick poor may be diverted to that purpose.
With regard, on the other hand, to the existing accommodation of the hospital, there would appear to be no objection to its user for paying patients in so far, and only in so far, as it cannot be used for the sick poor, either because of the lack of demand by the sick poor for such accommodation, or because of the lack of funds to maintain such accommodation and to keep it open for the sick poor. That is to say, that existing accommodation ought only to be used for paying patients so long as there is in regard to it what would be regarded in legal parlance as a failure of the purposes of the existing charitable trusts. Your Lordships will appreciate that under the existing law the Charity Commissioners or the Court may, in the event of such a failure, establish a scheme cy près, and to some extent the proposals in the present Bill may overlap those powers. The Fill, however, will enable the Commissioners to make orders in cases where under the existing law doubt arises whether failure has in fact taken place, or even to anticipate a failure which appears imminent.
I have pointed out those two matters, but my noble friend Lord Luke will no doubt reply that he has made provision in Clause 4 (1)—which was quoted by the noble Lord, Lord Sanderson—to deal with those two matters. While the wording of that subsection would seem to show that the restrictions therein contained are based on the right lines, yet they seem to the Government to be somewhat indefinite in scope and rather difficult of application. We do not feel confident that they will ensure that protection of the trust funds which is desired, and which we know that my noble friend Lord Luke desires just as much as we do.
Another matter which I think it is necessary to raise, and which was touched upon by my noble friend Lord Dudley,
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is that of the class of patients to be entitled to use the paying patient accommodation. The Memorandum accompanying the Bill states that the demand for paying-patient accommodation arises from the fact that there are many patients who cannot afford the cost of private treatment but are able and willing to pay for treatment in a hospital at charges proportionate to their means. The Bill as drafted provides in Clause 2 (2) that the charges for accommodation and treatment shall be in accordance with the scales specified in the order of the Charity Commissioners. Your Lordships will, however, appreciate that the fixing of charges does not limit the class-of patient to be treated. It would be equally open to the rich man—to whom I think the noble Earl, Lord Malmesbury, made reference—as well as to the person of more limited means, to pay the charges specified in the order. It is suggested, therefore, that it would be right that power should be given to the Commissioners to insert in any order made by them provisions reserving a certain proportion of the accommodation for patients of limited means. In those circumstances your Lordships will appreciate that, while the Government will support a Second Reading of the Bill, I think it is necessary to state now that we shall feel it our duty to move Amendments imposing specific safeguards with regard to the funds and property of the hospital and dealing with the other matters referred to in what I have just said. Incidentally, I may say that care has been taken to ascertain that the Charity Commissioners concur in the views that I have been expressing.
There is only one other matter to which I desire to refer. I may be asked whether the Government will undertake to give facilities for this Bill in another place. I should like very much to be able to say "Yes" to that question, if it were ever asked, but I am sure that your Lordships will appreciate that it is not possible at this stage to give any definite assurance. It is not possible, in the first place because we do not know in what form the Bill will emerge after the Committee stage, and in the second place because we do' not know what the exigencies of Parliamentary time may permit in the other place. But there is just this to be said. The noble Lord opposite indicated his preference for municipal rather than for

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voluntary hospitals. I am not going to follow him in that discussion. He will forgive me if I say that I do not agree with him, but I am very anxious not to embark upon a controversial topic of that kind because, although he holds that view, he was good enough to say that he regarded this as a useful measure under the existing condition of things. I think it would be a great pity if any difference of opinion which might prevail on that broader question of municipalisation were to threaten to hamper the quick and easy passage of the Bill, making the provision which we all desire, if it can be achieved, and I hope very much that nothing which is said in this House will give any encouragement to those in another place to raise difficulties about the passage of the Bill.
I hope very much it may be a matter about which it may be possible to obtain such assurances that the Bill would be granted a swift passage, so as to make it possible for the Government to find time to help it. I cannot give an undertaking that that will be so, but I feel sure, when I look around and see the powerful support which is given to the Bill from all quarters here, that there is valuable influence which I hope will be directed to obtaining such a smooth passage for the Bill that it will be possible to find time to discuss it. In these circumstances I can only say that we give it our blessing, for what it is worth, on the Second Reading, and I am sure that Lord Luke will appreciate that we desire only to assist the object that he has in view, when I venture to indicate the direction of the Amendments which we shall feel it necessary to bring forward on a later stage.
LORD MACMILLAN: My Lords, I would like to thank my noble friend the Leader of the House for the very sympathetic reception which he has accorded, on behalf of the Government, to this beneficent and useful measure. The Bill has really, I venture to say, two qualities which ought to commend it to all who are interested in the great work of our hospitals. It has a technical and a legal aspect, which has been alluded to by the Leader of the House, and also a philanthropic aspect. On the philanthropic side there is one point which I would like to bring before the House which is perhaps not fully
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appreciated. Owing to the very great strides made in medical and surgical science in recent years, the methods of treatment have become much more expensive than they formerly were, and consequently have been placed beyond the reach of many persons who would greatly benefit by receiving such treatment. Suffering knows no class and knows no incomes. It is a visitation which may befall any person, and we, who are responsible for the administration of the hospital system, feel that these means, which the hospitals alone can provide, should be available for all persons, without distinction of class or income. It has come to pass at present that in great hospitals probably better means are now provided for the treatment of sickness and illness than can be had in the best nursing homes, and why should not these means be made available to others who will benefit by them also? That sums up the philanthropic aspect of the Bill—that we desire that nobody should be unable to benefit merely because he is embarrassed with regard to money.
On the legal side what appeals to me is this. The position is really quite chaotic. Some hospitals have full power to provide paying beds. They may go on and carry on their beneficent work without obtaining the consent of the Charity Commissioners. Others are perplexed with doubt. They do not know whether they have power or not. They have to obtain the opinion of Counsel, and indulge in other such expensive luxuries to ascertain their position. Others are quite sure that they have not the power, because of prohibitory words in their charters or constituent documents. This is an anomalous position. We hope that under this Bill it will be possible to bring about a measure of uniformity, and that it will be possible for all hospitals to know where they are in this matter. It has been a feature of our legislation that a General Bill has often been preceded by a number of Private Bills. In this connection several of the hospitals which required these powers came forward and at their own cost got Private Bills. That is an expensive practice, but five or six such measures already stand on the Statute Book. The theory on which this Bill proceeds is that the time has now come for a general measure, and that private

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hospitals should be relieved of the cost of obtaining Bills for themselves. Those are the two main features.
May I say that I share entirely the anxiety voiced from all quarters of the House that nothing in this measure contained should in any way deflect the hospitals from their great work of ministering to the poor. If that had been even its possibly indirect effect I think this House might take it that the Bill would not have had the support of the two great organisations for which I speak, the King Edward's Hospital Fund and the British Hospitals Association. We have studied the case most carefully. We have endeavoured to secure the most adequate safeguards and I can assure the House that we are in no sense wedded to any particular formula; that those interested in the promotion of the Bill will be in no sense obdurate to any suggestion which may be made. We are most anxious to see that, so far from infringing in any way the primary purpose of the hospitals, these powers will enable the hospitals to do more good.
There are many instances where hospitals have found themselves in the position of having to close down some of their wards owing to shortage of money. In these cases we would be able, with the help of the money derived from paying beds, to reopen wards now closed, and possibly also to expand premises where expansion is needed. The purpose of the Bill is in no sense inimical to the primary purpose of the hospitals, but we believe it will enable them to extend more widely their beneficent services. We shall be most happy on the Committee stage to consider any suggestions which come from this House, which has shown itself so friendly disposed to this measure, because it is manifest that the principle of the Bill is accepted, and all we desire is to make it as workmanlike, as satisfactory and as safe as it can be made. I will only conclude by thanking the House for the reception which it has given to the measure.
THE EARL OF DUDLEY: Before the Second Reading may I press for an answer to my question, whether it is proposed in the Bill to limit the committees of management who at present have rower to charge for paying beds—to limit their powers to less than the scale which they are at present charging?
LORD MACMILLAN: May I say on behalf of Lord Luke that the point is this. The initiative of getting a scheme from the Charity Commissioners is left to the hospitals, and therefore the hospital which already has power will not require to apply for a scheme.
LORD LUKE: My Lords, I beg to thank the House for its kindly reception of this Bill, and I hope we shall be so fortunate as to find time in another place. My experience is that the opening of paying beds has not on the whole reduced the number of beds for the sick poor, but increased them. I would also like to mention with regard to the voluntary hospitals, that many people do not quite realise the magnitude of the finance that would have to be contemplated if we were deprived of them. The actual expenditure in the voluntary hospitals in this country amounts to some £12,000,000 a year.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

NOTIFICATION OF POVERTY BILL. [H.L.]
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
LORD STANLEY OF ALDERLEY: My Lords, it is perhaps in some measure fortunate that I should be privileged to introduce this Bill so shortly after the interesting debate which we had last week on the socialist system. In that debate this House, and in my humble submission rightly, decided against the value of a socialist system in this country, but at the same time I think it was admitted in all parts of the House that there was something wrong with our present industrial machinery. A fault has developed—whether it is, as my noble friends on my left think, a permanent and irremediable fault is open to discussion, but it is admitted on all sides that a fault exists. The Prime Minister, in a recent speech at Doncaster, admitted that there was a fault in our industrial machinery, and stated that he would welcome any responsible suggestion which might be put before him for getting rid of that fault. I thing I may claim that this measure is in some sort such a plan as the Prime Minister asked for. The fault to which I refer is one with which

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your Lordships are only too well acquainted, because it has been discussed many times in this House. It is due to the fact that in these latter years our powers of consumption have fallen out of line with our powers of production. Whether owing to good harvests or the advancement of scientific methods of manufacture, we have found that there is an increasing glut and overplus of the world's goods and the world's wealth, and, contemporaneous with that, we have found less and less capacity for the consumers of those goods to consume them. Now I think it to be almost beyond argument that there can only be one of two methods of redressing that lag which has occurred between production and consumption. Either we may cut down production of goods, or, alternatively, we may try to increase consumption. I think I shall carry the House with me when I say that it would be better to increase consumption. The only way to do that, to my knowledge, is to increase the purchasing power of those who most need it.
If your Lordships will allow me to say so, it is not members of your Lordships' House who need their purchasing power increased so much as other people. Supposing I were to introduce a Bill which would increase your Lordships' incomes by, let us say, ten, or fifteen, or even fifty per cent. a year. That might be very pleasant for us. The effect would, in fact, be that a very large part of that increase, if not the whole of it, would be devoted to swelling still further the present overplus of money and idle credit which are in this country, and it is therefore more likely that a remedy will be found by increasing the purchasing power of those less fortunately situated than ourselves. It is on that view that the broad economic basis of this Bill rests.
There is a class of people in this country, perhaps far larger than your Lordships realise—and I am not trying to make the best case I can, I am trying to be honest with your Lordships' House when I say that I believe that those people number five million persons—people in receipt of wages which are not controlled, or are not subject to any organisation such as a trade union, a trade board or an arbitration board. According to the figures of the Ministry of Labour, there are 18,000,000 persons
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in this country earning under £250 a year. Of those only 4,500,000 are trade union members, to whom this Bill does not apply. It is true that there are a great many who work at trade union rates, and those may number perhaps another 4,500,000. There are perhaps 2,000,000 workers whose wages are regulated by trade boards. Taking those figures as a basis, I think I shall be on the safe side in saying that there are 7,000,000 or 8,000,000 workers who have no protection in regard to the wages they are paid.
I want to make it quite clear from the outset that this Bill does not propose any compulsory minimum wage for any workers in this country. It merely proposes that the country should be divided up into what are called in the Bill "ascertainment areas" which, as far as I can see, for all practical purposes would be areas now controlled by local authorities, and the local authority in each of those areas would make itself responsible for determining what the cost of living in its area should be, either per hour or per week. That is a figure which can be arrived at without any great expense or difficulty. The Ministry of Labour, I think, would have all the necessary statistics at their disposal. The Bill further provides that when that has been done, such employers in that area as pay less than the cost-of-living wage as determined by the local authority—your Lordships will notice that I do not refer to it as the minimum wage, because it is in fact not a wage at all—will be compelled to make a return to the employment exchange.
Perhaps the implications of that are not immediately obvious, but I think the, main results would be as follows. In the first place, the amour propre of the employer would incline him to pay a better wage if he could afford it, rather than incur the public odium of being a bad employer. Under this Bill the result, I think, would be that comparatively few such notifications would be made. A great many ill-paid people would therefore receive a higher wage. Moreover, under the Bill the employer is given the chance of justifying the payment of a lower rate of wages than that fixed by the local authority, and if he could do that, no penalty would attach to him. It is my belief that the psychological effect of having to notify that you are paying less

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than a living wage would be enough to effect the purposes of this Bill. Thirdly—and I think this is important, though somewhat secondary—the notification of the employers who are paying these lower wages will, I believe, be of inestimable value to the Government. I have been at, some pains to find out from the Ministry of Labour how many people there are in these circumstances, and the Ministry of Labour can, in fact, give me no information so that any estimate I may make must be an estimate and no more. But I believe that the Government, being anxious, as it is, to improve the lot of our people, will find a great value in knowing where this disease of poverty most rife. That it can only find out by some method such as is incorporated in this Bill. In parenthesis I would remark that in discussing, as we so often do both in this House and in another place, the lot of those less fortunately situated than ourselves and the poorest of this country, we are a little prone perhaps to concentrate, and naturally concentrate, on the unemployed. I do seriously believe that there are a larger number of people than the two million unemployed who are much less well-off even than they. That is a thing which I am sure your Lordships would not be willing to lose sight of.
Furthermore, I would stress very strongly the point that I believe the passage of this Bill into law would involve no expense either to the ratepayer or the taxpayer. Machinery for determining the cost of living is already in existence, and the only other thing that has to be done under this Bill is for the employer to make a return of those employees to whom he pays a less sum. I can see no possible way in which expense to the Government could be incurred. I mention this particularly because the Prime Minister, again in his speech at Doncaster, said of any claim submitted to him that he must be satisfied if it did no good, at least it did no harm. I do not put that forward as an argument in favour of this Bill, because I believe the Bill would do good and certainly can do no harm.
Another point which comes to mind, and which I believe would result from a notification of poverty as is laid down in this Bill, is that it would act as a spur to inefficient workers and give a preference to the efficient worker. To-
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day you will find far too often that the efficient worker has to take the wage of the inefficient worker simply because the inefficient man is prepared to accept less. If by this means the efficient man is given a preference I believe that is carrying a principle into law which is a principle of very elementary justice. Moreover, this Bill will give a protection to what I may term the good employer. The good employer I take to be one who recognises his duty to his employees, and who will pay them at least a living wage and as much as he can afford to pay them. That is made very difficult by the existence of what is, I hope, a comparatively small number of bad employers who are prepared to employ labour which is unorganised and voiceless, and who are prepared to employ them in order that they shall pay less. Since this Bill has been made public I have come across, I cannot say millions or even thousands, but at least tens of cases—which in the short time is, I think, remarkable—of employers who say quite definitely they are prepared to increase their wages if the rest of the people in their particular line of business are prepared to do the same. They believe it would be good for the trade as a whole. As to the classes of people who would be affected by this Bill, they chiefly fall into those employed in the distributive and retail trades. There would be others, representing smaller classes, but in the total sum perhaps involving a large number. I might instance charing and similar work where the people engaged are in the nature of things not organised.
I cannot see—and I wish to stress this once more—that this Bill can have any ill effect at all, and I believe that the effect will be very much larger than perhaps some of your Lordships anticipate. I recognise that a large principle is involved, the principle to which I alluded very briefly because it was well discussed in your Lordships' House last week, and therefore I would ask your Lordships' House to give a Second Reading to this Bill on the understanding that if that is done it will be referred to a Select Committee. I do not claim, and it would be impertinent to do so, that at the moment this is a perfectly drafted Bill, nor do I claim that it is altogether complete. What I am anxious to establish, if I can, is that your Lordships are aware of this problem and that you should be

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aware that there are methods of dealing with it. I have tried briefly to outline what these methods might be. If you accept, as I think you must, that in order to set the wheels of industry in this country once more in motion, you must increase the purchasing power of those at the bottom rung, so to speak, of wealth and society in this country, then I believe this Bill is a step in the right direction.
I do not put it forward as a panacea for all our ills or even as a cure for all unemployment. I do believe, though, that if you have in a town such as those with which I am only too familiar, one of the Lancashire cotton towns, even 3,000 or 4,000—no more than that—men and women on Saturday evening with another five shillings to spend, the result will be that the money will be spent, and spent on essential goods—food, clothing, heating, and other such necessaries—and that that will so largely stimulate the productive trade in this country that we shall find, where machinery is now lying idle, it will once again begin to operate. I need hardly remind members of your Lordships' House who have industrial knowledge that one of the largest items in the costs of manufacture is not the wages we pay, but the machinery and plant which, to-day, alas! we have to keep standing idle. It is on these grounds, very briefly stated, as I am anxious to avoid boring your Lordships, that I would ask you to give this Bill a Second Reading and to do so, I repeat, on the understanding that it may be allowed to go before a Select Committee.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Stanley of Alderley.)
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME, who had given Notice that he would move, That the Bill be read 2a this day six months, said: My Lords, anyone who may have read the title of this Bill would probably be in favour of it, and some of your Lordships who have heard the moving terms in which the noble Lord has appealed to your hearts may at first blush also find yourselves in favour of it. I do not intend to appeal to your hearts but to your heads. I was glad to notice that in the course of the noble Lord's speech he did not reiterate the inaccurate statement which appeared in his Whip. I refer to the second paragraph in which he says: "This Bill passed its Second Reading
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in the House of Commons without a Division and had support from all sides of the House."
LORD STANLEY OF ALDERLEY: May I make an explanation? I had intended to refer to that. That statement was due to my ignorance, never having been a member of the House of Commons. I thought the First Reading in the House of Commons was purely formal as it is in your Lordships' House. I knew there had been discussion in the House of Commons, and therefore thought that that discussion had taken place on the Second Reading.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME: I do not for a moment suggest that the noble Lord wished to mislead your Lordships, but he has access to the OFFICIAL REPORT and he might have seen for himself what passed in the other House. As the noble Lord has told you, the purpose of this Bill is the enforcement of uniform minimum wages based on cost of living. These wages are not to depend on the circumstances of the industries and occupations in which people are employed, but upon certain arbitrary decisions of the Minister of Labour, based on his opinion as to the minimum amount necessary to provide reasonable amenity and to obtain reasonable comfort for at least two persons. I will deal with the general effects of such a statutory form of regulation of wages later. I will first draw your Lordships' attention to the arbitrary character of the proposals and to the uncertainty which would be introduced into the field of industrial relations by these proposals.
Before I further develop my argument I would stress the fact that hitherto Parliament has always taken care to avoid placing upon a Minister the authority to fix wages. For instance, in the Trade Boards Act wages are fixed by a properly constituted body, of which the representatives of employers and employees form the majority, and the power of the Minister of Labour is limited to granting or withholding legal sanction to the findings of that body. By this means political interference in regard to the fixing of rates of wages is avoided. This Bill enters upon the dangerous and undesirable course which so far has been deliberately avoided by Parliament. The wage which is to be the minimum is to be determined by areas, and is to be the minimum cost of living in those areas.

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Dictatorship immediately enters the matter, as these areas (which are to be fixed so that "throughout each of such areas the cost of living shall so far as is reasonably practicable be the same") are to be determined by the Minister. There is no obligation upon him to take any advice upon this difficult task, although so much depends upon the number and character of the areas chosen. Further, the Minister can change the boundaries of the areas whenever he thinks fit "to meet the change of circumstances."—whatever that may mean.
Your Lordships will already have seen that this power introduces an element of uncertainty into the wages situation, and that against the vagaries of a future Minister neither employers nor employees are given the least protection. Parliament can only enter into the matter if the Minister chooses to make regulations under Clause 6, and then only by a Resolution of both Houses. Why provide for the unusual course of a Resolution of both Houses instead of following the usual practice of a Resolution by either House? Is it because the noble Lord leans towards his left and agrees with the Socialist Party that this House should be treated with as little courtesy as possible? I can think of no other reason. But the Bill gives no protection in regard to the decisions actually taken by the Minister on areas and cost of living. It is of interest to note in passing that only England and Scotland are mentioned in the Bill. What about Wales? Is Wales to have a special new deal, or have recent events in Wales scared the noble Lord in charge of the Bill? Of course I refer to the fixing of assistance rates which have taken place in that country. Perhaps, on the other hand, the noble Lord thinks that the English and Scottish are more law abiding and more easily put under the heel of dictatorship.
Let me return to the determination of the areas. A question arises as to what is meant by the condition that "the cost of living shall so far as reasonably practicable be the same." The same for whom? Clearly the cost of living as defined by the Bill varies according to the class of persons whose cost of living is in question. I cannot help thinking that the noble Lord has fallen into confusion with the Ministry of Labour's cost-of-living index number. This index,
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however, refers to an average working-class family and it intended to show the percentage of change month by month over that family's cost of living in 1914. It does not pretend to fix the cost of living nor does it deal with the cost of living of all classes of workers. Nevertheless there has been continual controversy owing to its restricted character and to the difference of opinion as to the items included in the calculations. Different classes of workers have represented that it has no reference to their circumstances.
The matter becomes for more serious when a proposal is made, as it is in this Bill, that such a controversy shall be introduced into the settlement of statutory rates of wages, and there would clearly be disputes on this subject immediately this Bill came into operation. Only think for a moment of the Minister's problem—a Minister who, as your Lordships know, is already overworked—in determining the number of areas, and see how difficult would be this extra duty with which he is to be burdened, and realise how small is the chance of acceptance of any decisions he may reach. Under Clause 2 (1), having divided the two countries into areas, the Minister must proceed to ascertain for each area

"(a) the minimum cost of living for an adult able-bodied person living within that area; and

(b) the maximum values in money to ho attributed to receipts in kind."

These become respectively "the declared minimum weekly cost of living" and "the declared value of receipts in kind," and these determine the minimum wage to be paid.
It is important, to examine these provisions closely. Your Lordships will remember that the Minister already has power to alter the areas when he pleases, and in Clause 2 he is given the further power of introducing uncertainty and instability into the wages position by making new ascertainments and declarations whenever he thinks fit. Employers making forward contracts would be entirely dependent upon the vagaries of the Minister—I do not refer to the present Minister, who, of course, has no vagaries—in regard to the wages they might be expected to pay, and uncertainty of this kind can hardly be regarded as an advantage either to employer or employee.

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If any noble Lord makes a suggestion that this is similar to the cost-of-living scale it is an erroneous suggestion. It is not so, as in the cost-of-living scale there is prior agreement as to how this should move and the cost-of-living figure is calculated on a known and consistent basis. It is true that a sensible Minister would not make such changes lightly, but human nature being what it is, it is unwise to pass legislation which provides full scope for arbitrary action by an overzealous Minister.
It is almost incredible that so reckless an invitation to arbitrary action should ever have found its place in a Bill which purports to provide a scheme for determining a minimum wage such as is contained in this clause. If your Lordships will refer to the Schedule of the Bill you will observe that "the minimum cost of living for an adult able-bodied person" is in fact to be the minimum cost of living of not one, but two, adult able-bodied persons, so that either you get an incentive to a worker not to marry, which is contrary to public policy, or to marry another worker and so obtain four times the minimum cost of living. You may, I think, take it for granted that two such people would take care not to have a family, which is also against public policy. It is true that the Minister is given power to make provision for the maintenance of an unlimited number of dependants, and there you have the reverse side of the picture. An employer would naturally choose an employee who has no dependants, and so these wretched people will be thrown on to public assistance.
There is this further objection. The minimum wage applies equally to juveniles and to male and female employees with or without dependants, and whether skilled or unskilled, irrespective of the kind of employment, including even domestic service. I think it must be obvious to your Lordships that the noble Lord in drafting this Bill has confused the payment of wages with a system of public assistance of a most vague and arbitrary character, and has overlooked the fact that employees will not be prepared to have their wages determined as if they were recipients of public assistance. It must be clear that the determination would not be likely to be on a higher basis than that. I will not say too much as to the amount of controversy
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which would be likely to arise, especially where the ascertainment of wages depended upon the result, on items of food, clothing, accommodation, transport and the other items to be included in the Minister's discretion after consultation with such representative organisations as lie might choose to consult. It is well known that there is no end to the argument as to what items should be included in the cost-of-living index figures, and the weights to be assigned to them. At each level of wages or salary a case can be made out for different calculations, and the task set before the Minister in this case is obviously calculated to land him into a sea of trouble and to introduce an explosive element into industrial relations.
But the position envisaged by the Bill is made even worse by the provision which permits the deduction from money payments of a declared value of receipts in kind. This declared value is "the maximum values in money to be attributed to receipts in kind" as determined by the Minister. In this provision, the Bill seems to be contrary to the letter, if not the spirit, of the Truck Acts which have been of such inestimable value to workers as a protection against unscrupulous employers. There is no provision for assuring that receipts in kind are to be of the value assigned to them, and as full board and lodging are among the receipts in kind enumerated, there is obviously an open invitation here to a considerable reduction of the total minimum wage, and to a revival of a living-in system of the worst description with all the sanction of law.
The fixing of wages on a subsistence basis can only have the object of protecting the workers against the worst employers, and it is in that light that I ask your Lordships to examine the Bill. It is astonishing in these circumstances to find that one method of securing the payment of this subsistence wage is that the employer who is paying a lower wage should have to notify the nearest labour exchange of his guilt in order that his name may be inscribed on a black list to be open to public inspection. Surely that is a provision without precedent. The noble Lord, just now, said something about amour propre. I think he must be confusing fear with amour propre. It is a well-known fact that collusion in regard to breaches of wage

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regulations is most common among workers whose position is weakest, and that without an inspection system or an organisation such cases are never discovered except by chance. Bad employers could fairly safely take the risk of the formidable punishments contained in Clause 3 (2). It is true that there is an apparent safeguard in Clause 4—more apparent than real I think—that when an application for insurance benefit or public assistance is made the Government officer shall make inquiry as to the rate of wage paid to the applicant. Seeing, however, that an individual worker will not usually wish to make it more difficult for himself to obtain re-employment, as it undoubtedly might be if he was made the instrument of the prosecution of his former employer, it is quite possible that the truth will not be told.
I do not agree with the noble Lord when he says there would be no extra cost to the Exchequer. I believe that there would have to be a large addition to the staffs of the labour exchanges to check the statements made. Then there is no provision for requiring that records should be kept, or that receipts for wages should be given, so that under the provisions of the Bill there would be no, evidence upon which to rely against statements made by the employer—which, by the way, are not compulsory—and by the worker. The general effect of the Bill, therefore, is to introduce a minimum wage system on a public assistance basis without any real prospect of any result except to give legal sanction to such a rate of wages. What greater menace could there be to the wages system than passing this Bill into law? The noble Lord has given no indication that the Bill has any support from workpeoples' representatives, and it would be surprising if he could produce such support. For workers who need protection I submit that Parliament has provided amply in the Trade Boards Acts. The noble Lord has not said that these could not be used in the cases he has in mind, but he proposes legislation of a far less satisfactory character which would, in effect, express as the opinion of this House that wage earners should be treated in a similar way to applicants for public assistance, irrespective of the value of their work. That, I submit, is a backward step to which support ought not to be given in the interests of the general body of wage
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earners. I am afraid I have been an unconscionable time, but the Bill is of such an ambitious character that I felt it only courteous to the noble Lord to treat the subject fully. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Leave out ("now") and at the end of the Motion insert ("this day six months").—(Viscount Bertie of Thame.)
THE PAYMASTER-GENERAL (LORD ROCHESTER): My Lords, before addressing myself to the subject matter of this Bill, may I, as representing the Ministry of Labour in your Lordships' House, be permitted to pay a tribute to the memory of one who was a former chief of that Department, and who was called to higher service, with tragic suddenness, on Saturday last? Sir Arthur Steel-Maitland was Minister of Labour from 1924 to 1929. It was he who piloted the Unemployment Insurance Act of 1927 through another place, and one of his last acts as Minister of Labour was to propose the setting up of the Industrial Transference Board to help unemployed workers. I sat in the House of Commons with him for many years, albeit on the opposite side of the House. While holding strenuously to his own principles, he was always able to appreciate the viewpoint of those who differed from him. He was at home among the things that are pure and lovely and of good report. His life was actuated by nobility of purpose and characterised by undeviating loyalty. I feel sure that I may be permitted to associate your Lordships in all parts of the House with this expression of sympathy with Lady Steel-Maitland and the family.
Coming to the Bill that is before your Lordships' House, may I say that I believe there is no disagreement in any part of the House with the desire of the noble Lord who has introduced the Bill, that workpeople shall not be paid unduly low wages for their work. The main object of Government policy has been to create conditions which would not only increase the number of workpeople employed, but would also enable them to be employed under better conditions. It is satisfactory to note that during the last few months there has been increased employment of workpeople and increases of wage rates in many industries. In addition, the earnings of workpeople

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have been increased by more full-time working. Also my right honourable friend the Minister of Labour has during the past year taken action which has produced better conditions for thousands of workpeople, as for instance in the constitution of the National Conciliation Board for Commercial Road Transport, and the establishment of two more trade boards. If, therefore, I express serious doubts as to the value of this Bill, it is not because there is any lack of sympathy with its general object.
There are, however, considerations which the noble Lord who has introduced the Bill may possibly have overlooked, but which the Government cannot ignore with a due sense of its responsibility for the general interests of the workpeople of this country. I do riot propose to deal with all the details of his Bill, although I cannot help saying that I find myself in more or less general agreement with much that has been said by my noble friend Lord Bertie as to the Bill's provisions. I propose, with your Lordships' permission, to deal only with the main principles of the Bill, because if those principles are unsound, or are incapable of adoption, then the details concerning the application of the Bill do not, I suggest, call for your Lordships' minute examination.
The main principle of the Bill is that every person employed shall receive wages either by the day or the week at a rate not less than the sum calculated to provide the minimum cost of living for two able-bodied adult persons. Any employer who pays less than this sum is to be required to notify that fact to the employment exchange in order that his name may be inscribed in a register open to public inspection. An employer's name may also be inscribed by the employment exchange officials, if and when an employee applies for benefit. I have no doubt that it is by inadvertence that the Bill proposes no special provision for juveniles, for I scarcely think it can be the intention of the noble Lord that the wage of a juvenile should be such as to be not less than sufficient to provide for two able-bodied adult persons. The difficulty, too, of fixing a minimum cost-of-living amount is very great; and serious as may be the differences in some cases us to the rate of wages which can be paid in a particular industry, these differences are
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small compared with the controversy which could take place on the subject of a minimum cost-of-living basis. Moreover, under the provisions of the Bill, persons employed in the same industry would have differing legal rates of wages, according to the opinion of the authorities in differing areas as to the minimum cost-of-living sum. I scarcely think in such circumstances that there would be much stability in the position. I should like to ask the noble Lord whether it is seriously contended that, instead of the present trade board principle of fixing legal minimum rates According to the circumstances of the industry, it would be an improvement to adopt this new system of fixing rates on a minimum subsistence basis, irrespective of the circumstances of the industry.
The important point, however, to which I wish to draw the attention of your Lordships' House is this, which I feel by itself makes it impossible to regard the Bill as offering a practicable scheme for regulating wages. It would threaten the whole wage system of this country, and would create circumstances which, I submit, all responsible organisations of workpeople would almost certainly strenuously oppose. It would, in fact, create a situation in which any employer in any industry who paid to his workers a minimum subsistence rate would thereby fully satisfy his legal obligations. In other words, it would give direct encouragement to the reduction of wages to this level where they are now higher. The noble Lord smiles, but I would suggest for his consideration that the minimum would tend to become the maximum. There has been built up in this country a great body of voluntary negotiating machinery, by which wages are fixed by discussion between employers and workpeople's representatives on the basis of the circumstances of the industries concerned. In addition, there is a large number of trade boards for industries in which there is not sufficient organisation to permit effective regulation of wages by voluntary agreement.
There are doubtless large numbers of workpeople not covered by these arrangements, but is that sufficient reason for taking the backward step of fixing general minimum rates on the basis proposed in this Bill? On the contrary, is it not the more reason for continuing the policy of taking all possible steps to

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widen the scope of the various forms of joint wage-regulating machinery, so that proper protection can be given to work-people not at present covered? My right honourable friend the Minister of Labour has shown himself to be willing to take action where it has been shown that the need exists, and surely it would be both unwise and inexpedient to do anything to discourage the trade unions from making further progress in the regulation, of working conditions, on the basis of the voluntary organisation of those whose conditions are in question.
The Government hazard the view that this Bill would be opposed by work-peoples' representatives as a step towards the destruction of the structure which has been built up by long years of effort, and this alone, I submit, is a reason for not supporting the Bill. If the noble Lord cared to consult work-peoples' representatives on his proposals, I think they would probably point out to him, in more robust language than I have done, the serious effects which would be likely to result from the passing of his Bill. Speaking with a full sense of responsibility, as a member of the Government, I can assure the noble Lord that the Government are in full sympathy with his desire that all workers should be fairly paid, and it is only because they believe that this Bill would tend to have the opposite effect that they are unable to give it their support. For that, reason, too, the Government cannot recommend your Lordships to give it a Second Reading.
I submit that it is appalling to think of fixing the cost of living, in differing localities, upon which wages would be thereafter based and treated in a similar way to public assistance. I confess, too, that I cannot agree with the noble Lord when he says that it would entail no additional expense. I feel that my noble friend Lord Bertie made the truer case, for surely it would entail the setting up of a large staff of paid Government officials, and would thereby be an additional burden both on the taxes and on industry itself. Believing that the principle of this Bill is both unsound and incapable of adoption, I must resist on behalf of the Government its Second Reading, and ipso facto its reference to a Select Committee, which would, in the opinion of the Government, entail only waste of your Lordships' time.
LORD STANLEY OF ALDERLEY: My Lords, either I must be a greater fool even than I thought, or else Lord Bertie and Lord Rochester have not read this Bill. I leave it to your Lordships to judge which is the true case.
LORD ROCHESTER: I do not want to make any inference, but I have read the Bill.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME: I have not only read the Bill once but half a dozen times.
Loan STANLEY OF ALDERLEY: I am glad that Lord Bertie should have been at least six times more attentive than Lord Rochester, but in my opinion they are suffering under the greatest misapprehension as to what this Bill proposes. We have heard at great length, from both noble Lords opposite, grave objections to this Bill which I should be the first to recognise and admit if indeed they were true, but in nearly every case they depend upon the assumption that this Bill is to set up a minimum wage. That it does not do, and has no intention of doing. All it does is to make wages which are less than a certain minimum notifiable. There is no compulsion on anyone to pay wages greater than the minimum sum determined. Therefore the objections of Lord Bertie must fall to the ground. He envisaged an alarming state of affairs—a Communistic Minister for Labour who might fix an absurdly high standard of living, even as much as £100, a week. If such a thing happened it would bring this Bill into disrepute, necessitate a return of all employees, and therefore render the thing of less force and value. We do not believe that that is likely to conic about. It is true that Lord Bertie, with his usual acuteness, discovered certain drafting errors in the Bill, but those can all be set right, and I think if my noble friends opposite will read the report of this debate to-morrow they will find that not once did I use the words "minimum wage." Therefore they are under a complete misapprehension.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME: It does not make it a misapprehension because the noble Lord did not actually mention minimum wage. That is what it comes to.
LORD DARCY (DE KNAYTH): Does the noble Lord suggest that it ceases to

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be a minimum wage when it ceases to be a compulsory minimum wage?
LORD STANLEY OF ALDERLEY: I do not understand the question of the noble Lord, because a minimum wage must be a compulsory wage. It is one set up by Parliament, or by a body to whom Parliament gives authority to set up that wage. Lord Rochester mentioned one or two other things which perhaps did not come under the heading of the assumption that this Bill was to set up a minimum wage. He mentioned the fact that juveniles do not come under the Bill. That omission was made with intention, because we are satisfied for the present to deal with adult labour. No doubt the Bill might be improved in Committee and juveniles included, but there are reasons why they are not at present included in the Bill.
The only other considerable objection which was made to the Bill was a passionate defence of the system of trade boards by Lord Rochester. It seems to me to be self-evident that for the class of labour which this Bill is designed to help, trade boards can be no good. If you are to have a trade board for the determination of wages there must be an organised body to deal with the Ministry of Labour, and much of this labour is unorganisable. I mentioned, for instance, charwomen and casual labourers. So far from this being an attack on the trade union system of this country, that again is a major misapprehension under which the noble Lord opposite is labouring, because this Bill has nothing to do with workers who work under the trade union system.
Lord Rochester was at pains to explain to your Lordships the benefit which the working man has received under the present Government. This is neither the time nor the place to argue that with him, and I am the first to recognise and be thankful for such benefits as have been conferred upon the workers, but the increases of wages and improvements of times which have been brought about by the action of the Government have been only in connection with those classes of labour which are organised under trade unions, or whatever it may be. Those are people who can help themselves, and it is not surprising therefore that Lord Rochester should say that this Bill has found no backing from workmen's representatives. It is exactly because these people are unorganised, and have no voice
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to speak for them in Parliament, that I wish to put this Bill forward. So far from its being the fact that the representatives of trades do not want this Bill to pass, I have been inundated by communications from people all over the country, expressing the hope that something at last might be done for them—people having no trade union and no representative in Parliament to make a noise on their behalf. I hope that this Bill will be read a second time.
On Question, Motion negatived: Amendment agreed to, and Bill to be read 2a this day six months accordingly.

CRIMINAL LUNATICS (SCOTLAND) BILL. [H.L.]
Read 3a (according to Order); Amendments (Privilege) made; Bill passed, and sent to the Commons.

ARMY AND AIR FORCE (ANNUAL) BILL.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
THE UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (LORD STRATHCONA AND MOUNT ROYAL):My Lords, the Bill this year contains three Amendments in Clauses 4, 5 and 6 which are common to both the Army and the Air Force Acts, and two in Clauses 8 and 9 which concern the Air Force only. They are introduced for the sake of simplifying administration or of clarifying the meaning of the Acts as they already stand; but I think your Lordships might wish to have them shortly explained. With regard to Clause 4, as the wording of Section 64 of the Army Act stands at present, a soldier serving in a Colony who is sentenced to imprisonment or detention for a term of less than twelve months may, for administrative convenience, undergo his sentence in any part of His Majesty's Dominions which may be prescribed under Rules of Procedure. But the wording does not cover the case of a soldier sentenced in Palestine or Cyprus, which are Colonies within the meaning of the Act, undergoing his sentence in Egypt, which is a foreign country within the meaning of the Act. In fact, there are no military prisons or detention barracks in Cyprus or Palestine, and unless the men can be sent to Egypt they will have to be sent either to Malta or back to the United Kingdom

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(except in the case of short sentences which may be served in barrack detention rooms). The troops in Cyprus and Palestine are under the administration o the G.O.C. British troops in Egypt. Secondly, the clause is designed to amend Section 64 to make it clear that a soldier sentenced in a foreign country or in a Dominion shall, in accordance with the first proviso to subsection (4), be transferred as soon as practicable to serve his sentence in the United Kingdom (unless there are special reasons for not removing him). There is no doubt that this is the intention of the section as it stands already, but doubts have been expressed whether the present arrangement and punctuation of subsections (3), (3A) and (4) carry out this intention.
The purpose of Clause 5 is to define precisely what incidents of a person's service may be proved by documentary evidence in any proceedings taken under the Army Act. Under Section 163 of the Army Act a document purporting to be signed by or on behalf of the Secretary of State for War, or on behalf of the Army Council, or by the officer in charge of records, is prima facie evidence
"respecting the service of any person in, or the discharge of any person from, any portion of His Majesty's forces or respecting a person not having served in, or belonged to, any portion of those forces."
It has been doubted whether this provision extends to the proof of particular incidents in a person's service, for example, whether he ever attained a particular rank, or served in a particular campaign or foreign country, or whether he is entitled to wear medals or medal ribbons. The Amendment will save money and time in the conduct of proceedings when evidence of this character is required.
The object of Clause 6 is to subject to military law Reserve or retired officers who, under the authority or with the approval of the Army Council, are employed with their consent outside the United Kingdom in any military capacity. Officers on the active list and Militia officers are subject to military law at all times, but Reserve or retired officers are only so subject (1) when they are employed on military service under the orders of an officer of the regular forces who is subject to military law; or (2) when they are ordered on any duty for which as Reserve officers they are liable. It is considered necessary that
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Reserve or retired officers who accept military appointments such as A.D.C. to Governors-General or Governors, or membership of military missions abroad, should be subject to military law. Clause 7 applies the Amendments in Clauses 4, 5 and 6, whose purpose I have just indicated, to the Air Force Act, with the necessary adjustments.
I now turn to Clauses 8 and 9 which affect the Air Force Act only. Airmen are enlisted initially for twelve years or some shorter period and, if for a shorter period, the initial period of service may be "extended" provided that the total of the first period of service does not exceed twelve years. At present an airman who has completed nine years service may be re-engaged for such further period as will make up a total of twenty-four years, but may not be re-engaged for any shorter period. Clause 8 of the Bill alters the conditions of re-engagement in two respects. Subsection (1) authorises re-engagements for any shorter period than the legal maximum, and also allows of part of the re-engaged service being spent in the Reserve, which is not provided for at present. Subsection (2) permits re-engagements to complete a total of twenty-four years service or for some shorter period to be contracted at any time after the completion of eight years instead of nine years service on the initial engagement. The sole purpose of both these Amendments is to simplify administration. Clause 9 of the Bill is intended simply to improve the terminology of Section 146 of the Air Force Act, without affecting its substance. The present terminology, although technically not incorrect, is thought to be unsuitable. The two Schedules to the Bill call for no remark. The first is the usual schedule containing the billeting rates, in which no change is proposed this year. The second contains minor Amendments to the Air Force Act consequential on those provided in Clause 8 of the Bill. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Strathcona and Mount Royal.)
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

IRISH FREE STATE.
LORD DANESFORT LORD DANESFORT had the following Notice on the Paper:—To ask His

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Majesty's Government whether their attention has been called to the Irish Citizenship and Nationality Bill now before the Free State Senate, which lays clown a new definition of Free State citizenship, and purports to deprive Free State citizens of their rights as British subjects; and whether note has been taken of Mr. de Valera's repeated declaration to that effect; and further, whether the attention of His Majesty's Government has been called to the Aliens Bill which has been recently read a second time in the Dail, and which in effect makes all British subjects aliens in the Free State and subjects them on entering the Free State to degrading and harassing restrictions and disabilities whereby (amongst other things) they will be compelled to register as aliens and to be subject to police control, and will, when they engage in trade in the Free State, be liable to be subjected to an Aliens Order, made by a Free State Minister, involving summary arrest and search of their premises. What protest, if any, have His Majesty's Government made against these grave irregularities, and what steps have they taken to ensure that loyal subjects of His Majesty resident in the Free State will not be deprived of their rights as British subjects, and that British subjects entering the Free State shall be protected against unconstitutional restrictions on their liberties. And to move for Papers.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I rise to ask the Question and to move the Motion standing in my name. I desire to draw the attention of your Lordships to two Bills which are now before the Free State Parliament, both of which contain grave illegalities and infractions of the liberties of British subjects. The first of these Bills is the Irish Nationality and Citizenship Bill, which has passed the Dail and is now before the Senate. The other Bill is called the Aliens Bill, which passed its Second Reading in the Dail on February 14 last. The first Bill, broadly speaking, deprives British subjects residing in the Free State of their rights as British subjects. It lays down a long elaborate code as to what constitutes a Free State citizen, partly natural born, partly in consequence of naturalisation; but your Lordships will observe that this code is seriously at variance with the legislation of the British Parliament on the subject of the nationality
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of aliens in 1914 and 1918, and it is also at variance with the Common Law of England, and in order, I suppose, to justify in some sense or other this legislation, the Citizenship Bill purports to repeal the Acts of this Parliament of 1914 and 1918, and also—and this is a somewhat larger order—to repeal the Common Law of England bearing on this subject. The effect of that legislation, if it is sound, is to set up a position of irreconcilable difference between the position of the British subject under our laws and the position of an Irish Free State citizen under the laws of the Dail, and, further than that, to deprive British subjects of their rights in Southern Ireland.
I do not propose to go into the clauses of that Bill. It is a very long and complicated Bill, but I will summarise it by quoting the great authority of Mr. de Valera, who said, in the Dail, on November 28 last:
"No Irish citizen will be a British subject when this Bill is passed."
The unfortunate residents in Southern Ireland are to be deprived by this Bill of all their rights and status as British citizens. Such a thing was never done in the legislation of the Dominions or anywhere else before. There is a still more startling statement made by Mr. de Valera in connection with this Bill. It was made in the Senate on the Second Reading on January 17 last, when he claimed that the people of Northern Ireland were Irish Free State citizens. I should like to know what the people of Ulster will say to that. I know they treat with contempt such legislation, but at the same time it is not pleasant to be told by the people of Southern Ireland that they are no longer British citizens but Irish Free State citizens with all the disabilities and, I may use a stronger word, objectionable features attached to that status. This attempt to deprive British subjects resident in Southern Ireland of their rights and status as British citizens has been declared illegal by the Secretary of State for the Dominions in another place and was so declared most emphatically in your Lordships' House by the noble Earl, Lord Lucan, speaking on behalf of His Majesty's Government in December last. So much for the Citizenship Bill.
The Free State Government, not content with this grievous illegality, have recently introduced an even more indefensible Bill which they call the Aliens Bill. The effect of this Bill is to declare, with a few relatively unimportant exceptions, all British subjects whether resident in England, Scotland, Northern Ireland, the Dominions, or elsewhere who are not Free State citizens according to the definition in the previous Bill, aliens in the Free State. Again without going into the details, may I quote Mr. de Valera, who declared on February 14 on the Second Reading of this Bill:
"Every person who is not a Free State citizen is an alien."
It is really difficult to find adjectives adequately to describe a Bill of this sort. Nothing like it has ever been proposed in any Legislature in the world, and it is indeed strange that a country which calls itself, in name at any rate, a Dominion of the British Empire should have ventured to bring in a Bill of this character into their Parliament. Yet it is almost humorous to find that Mr. de Valera, with his strange cynicism as to the intelligence of the audience whom he was addressing, described the Bill on February 14 last as a "liberal Bill." I should like to know what a Bill which is riot a "liberal Bill" would be like if this Aliens Bill is in his opinion a liberal Bill.
The text of this Bill is well worth studying by those who desire to explore some of the amazing products of Free State legislation. Let me summarise very shortly some of these provisions. In the first place the Free State Minister may make Orders prohibiting British subjects from entering the Free State and, what is even more startling, make Orders prohibiting them from leaving the Free State, so that if any of your Lordships, for reasons of pleasure or business, should desire to go over to the Free State you may find your entrance barred or your departure prohibited. Is that a restriction which we or any British subject ought to submit in any part of the world at the instance of a Parliament such as that of the Irish Free State? May I add this I and I dare say many of your Lordships are continually being invited to go and enjoy the pleasure of being a tourist in the Free State. I wonder how many tourists will be induced to go over and enjoy
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the happiness of the Free State by reason of the passage of a Bill of this sort?
But that is not all which the Bill contains. It provides that the Minister may order British subjects entering the Free State to reside in a particular place, register with the Police, and inform the Police of any change of address, occupation, and the like. I do not think that needs comment. There is one other provision which I ought to mention and it is this. The Minister may, under the Bill, either himself make Orders or empower Customs and Excise officers to make Orders, and empower military and Police officers to make Orders. And what is the nature of these Orders? By these Orders they may subject British citizens entering the Free State to search both as to their person and their premises, where they are residing, and to detention and arrest. Again I say what an inducement for tourists to go and take advantage of the pleasures of the Free State!
One may well ask what is the meaning of legislation of this character which seems, on the face of it, not only so grossly unjust to British subjects but so grievously detrimental to the interests of the Free State itself. I cannot say. I cannot penetrate the occult minds of Mr. de Valera and his supporters, but let me say this, that the financial position of the Free State is extremely grave. I am not saying anything now which is not known to all the world. The financial position of the Free State itself and of the county councils is extremely grave. Do the Free State authorities think it likely they will improve that financial situation by legislation of this sort? The value of property in the Free State, as anyone who knows Southern Ireland will tell you, has gone down absolutely to zero in some cases. There was a case brought to my notice the other day in which the owner of a house and 100 acres of land wanted to get rid of his property because he could not stand the burden of the rates and taxes, which were exceedingly high. He put the property up to auction, but there was no sale, and eventually, in order to get rid of it, he had to accept the sum of ten shillings—for a house and 100 acres of land! I should have thought that was a fact worth considering by the Free State authorities.
Has not the time come when His Majesty's Government should devise some method of bringing these injustices to British subjects to an end? What has happened already? Let me give your Lordships the shortest possible summary. The Oath of Allegiance has been abolished. They have attempted to abolish the right of appeal to the Privy Council, and whether they do it or not is now under consideration of the Privy Council itself. The Senate is under sentence of death and will expire shortly. His Majesty's Governor-General, the representative of the Crown in Southern Ireland, has been humiliated and degraded to the position of a clerk, and he is made to register the assent of the Governor-General of Ireland to a Bill by putting a stamp across it. This has all been done in violation of the Treaty, and up to now His Majesty's Government have been unable to prevent what I call these outrages occurring. I have told your Lordships what has happened already, and now come the further two Bills, preposterous Bills, to use the most limited language I can.
The noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack, I understand, is going to answer for the Government. He is a classical scholar. I am glad of it. I say that with the utmost respect. He probably remembers what Cicero on a famous occasion said to a supporter of Catalina when he asked him: Quousque tandem abutere patientia nostra? Could not that question be equally well put to Mr. de Valera? How long is he going to be allowed to abuse our patience, our benevolence, our kindness? I trust that the time has come when that patience will be no longer abused. The present state of things—and this is almost the last word I shall say—is absolutely intolerable. The Treaty has been violated over and over again, and the rights of British subjects in Southern Ireland, in England, Northern Ireland and everywhere else, are swept away so far as the Free State can attain that end.
His Majesty's Government are rightly regarded, and I am sure nowhere more than in your Lordships' House, as the custodians of the rights and privileges of British subjects, and their solemn duty is to protect those subjects from injustice and from wrong. I now ask His Majesty's Government to take action before the two Bills which I have described
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have passed into law. I ask them, in the first instance, to make the strongest possible protest in their power to induce the Free State Government to excise the more objectionable portions of this Bill. I ask them to do something further. I ask them to discover and put into operation some effective mode of protecting British subjects from injustice and from outrage at the hands of the Free State. I beg to move.
LORD PONSONBY OF SHULBREDE: My Lords, I only rise for one moment to address a question to the noble Viscount the Leader of the House for our future guidance. I want to know to what extent this House can discuss projects or measures that are before the Parliament of a self-governing Dominion. Such matters would appear to me to be properly outside our discussions here. I am not referring to Acts passed by a self-governing Dominion, but to projects which are still under discussion in the Parliament of that Dominion.
VISCOUNT HAILSHAM: My Lords, I wish the noble Lord had given me notice of that question.
LORD PONSONBY OF SHULBREDE: I apologise.
VISCOUNT HAILSHAM: I would not like to give a considered opinion when I obviously have not had time to consider the subject. I should think it would be rather difficult to say that in no circumstances could it be proper for your Lordships' House to consider prospective legislation. Let us take an extreme and impossible case. Let us assume that there was legislation brought forward for deliberately inflicting an injustice, possibly even capital punishment, upon some British citizen in a Dominion. I cannot think that it would be outside the competence of your Lordships' House to call the attention of the Government to that proposal, because if you allowed it to become an Act it might be too late to undo the harm that would be done. Therefore, speaking without investigation of the precedents—and I am very anxious not to say anything which may turn out to be inaccurate—I should think that there was no rule which prevented our discussing these matters; but it is, of course, manifest that it would be in the last degree inconvenient if we were to make a practice of having debates on

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Bills which are introduced in a Dominion Parliament and which are presumably, at any rate, matters primarily for the concern of that Parliament rather than for ourselves.
LORD MOUNT TEMPLE: My Lords, I shall not detain you more than a few minutes, but I should like to enforce what has been so ably put by my noble friend Lord Danesfort. He has told you what the situation is, and has asked His Majesty's Government what they are going to do, not in any spirit of hostility, but genuinely seeking to ventilate a very important subject which affects the lives of many thousands of His Majesty's subjects. It seems to me there are three classes of people to be considered in this matter, those so-called loyalists resident in the Irish Free State, those who, like myself, have interests in the Free State and are resident here, and, finally, the very large number of people who are Free State citizens, if I may put it in that way, and who gain their livelihood in this country.
With respect to the first class, the so called loyalists, it really is about time we did something for them. We promised them protection when the Treaty was put through. Most of us thought when the Treaty was put through that they would never get any protection, and we were right. But surely, if anything can be done—I do not say it can be easily done—they ought to have the very first claim upon our sympathy and our help. I commend that to the notice of the Lord Chancellor, who will reply. Then there is the class which deserves less attention, of which I am one. Apparently, from what the noble Lord, Lord Danesfort, has said, if in the future, when the Bill he referred to becomes law, I go over to visit my property in Ireland, such as is left to me, and it is not much, I shall be liable to be stopped by the Customs and turned back. If I do get there, I shall be liable to domiciliary visits, to have my business interfered with by the Home Minister, and to have my place of residence prescribed for me, and I shall not be allowed to leave that place of residence to go more than a certain distance. In fact, I shall be treated as people are treated in Germany or Russia to-day. Finally, if I want to get back to England, I shall not be able to come if
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the authorities think it desirable to keep me there.
And who is being treated in this way? A British subject, a British subject in Ireland. I do not want to make too much about that. You may say: "Well, that is all true; what is going to be done?" Here, frankly, it is much easier to say something ought to be done than to prescribe what could be done. But there is this to be considered. There is a large class of people who have come to this country because they think they can fare better here, get a better livelihood, get old age pensions and unemployment benefit and all the sweets of our social system. These people have come over here to get their livelihood at the expense of Britishers and they are keeping Britishers out of jobs. I put that forward with great respect for the consideration of the noble and learned Viscount, the Lord Chancellor. It does seem to me that in the last resort we must do something to prevent ourselves being exploited by the citizens of a country who are hostile to us. If we do, possibly we shall get something done and at any rate we shall have protected our own people in this country.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (VISCOUNT SANKEY): My Lords, we know the great interest which the noble Lord always takes in Irish affairs and how anxious and solicitous lie is for the position of his friends in Southern Ireland. Therefore, I do not at all complain of the Question which he has asked, or of his putting it in the form in which it appears. But I am sure the noble Lord will appreciate that the position of anyone who replies to the Question is a somewhat delicate one, for these Bills are not yet Acts. These Bills are still before the Legislature of the Irish Free State, and therefore I am extremely anxious—and I am quite sure the noble Lord will be extremely anxious—that the whole of the picture should be presented to your Lordships and not merely one or two excerpts from clauses of the two Bills. I propose therefore, with your Lordships' permission, although it may detain you for a few minutes longer than I had intended, to try to put the whole picture before you, and it will then be for your Lordships to say, and no doubt for the Government to say later, what should be done in the circumstances.

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The noble Lord is perfectly right in saying that at present the Legislature in the Irish Free State is engaged in the consideration of two Bills. I have both of them before me in the state which they have at present reached. The first Bill is known as the Citizenship Bill. 1934, and the other Bill is known as the Aliens Bill, 1934. The position with regard to the first of these two Bills, is that it was introduced into the Dail as far back as June 27 of last year, and after it had been discussed in the Dail it aroused very considerable controversy both in the Free State and in Great Britain. Upon November 27 last the Secretary of State for the Dominions, Mr. J. H. Thomas, made this statement in another place as to the attitude of the British Government with regard to these two Bills. He said:
"His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom are in correspondence with the Irish Free State regarding the Irish Free State Citizenship Bill. They have informed the Irish Free State Government that the Bill cannot be regarded as making provision for the maintenance of what is known as the common status' of subjects of His Majesty on the basis of common allegiance to the Crown as contemplated in the conclusions of the Imperial Conference, 1930, relating to nationality. At the same time"—
these are important words—
"I am advised that the Bill does not purport to, and could not in any case, deprive any person of his status as a British subject."
That statement was made in another place, as I pointed out, on November 27, and a few days later, on December 1, the Secretary of State for the Dominions made a similar statement in a public speech at Derby. I do not propose to read that speech to your Lordships, but it proceeded upon the same lines as the statement to which I have already referred, although at rather greater length.
There was a debate in your Lordships' House in answer to a Question put by the noble Lord on December 20 last, to which the noble Earl, Lord Lucan, made an answer which will be found reported in Volume 95 of the OFFICIAL REPORT. At that time the Government were not in possession of the whole report of a debate which had taken place the previous day in Ireland, that is to say upon December 19, when Mr. de Valera made a speech upon the Third Reading of this Bill. I
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must refer your Lordships now to two clauses of the Bill, in order that you may see the whole picture. The Citizenship Bill is a very long and a somewhat complicated Bill. It describes as the citizens of Saorstát Eireann those persons who, by virtue of Article 3 of the Constitution, become Irish citizens. Then it goes on in a very long clause to describe who are natural-born citizens, citizens born since the date of the Treaty. That is a very complicated clause.
There is also a very big clause to which I must draw your Lordships' attention. It is Clause 23 of the Citizenship Bill. In order to present the whole of the picture to your Lordships, I must just indicate briefly what Clause 23 provides. The marginal note of the clause is:
"Mutual citizenship rights between Saorstát Eireann and other countries."
It says—I am not going to read the whole clause because it is very long and very complicated—that
"Whenever a convention made, whether before or after the passing of this Act, between Saorstát Eireann and any other country or between the Government of Saorstát Eireann and the Government of any other country -provides for the enjoyment in such other country (either absolutely or subject to compliance with conditions) by citizens of Saorstát Eireann of all or any of the rights and privileges of citizens of such other country…."
there should be reciprocity, and that the citizens of that State should enjoy similar privileges.
In the debate on the Third Reading of this Bill on December 19, this is what Mr. de Valera is reported to have said:
"We are then in these mutual provisions"—
that is, in the clause to which I have referred but of which I have not read the whole—
"saying: 'We are not going to say why it is you give them to us, but we admit that our citizens are, in fact, getting certain privileges in Great Britain, and in Canada, Australia and South Africa by the law of these countries; we say that, in so far as our citizens are getting privileges in these countries, we are prepared to give the citizens of these countries, with the exception mentioned'"—
I need not refer to them at all—
"'similar privileges. One of the first Acts of the Executive Council when this Bill becomes law will be, by Order, to confer on the citizens of those countries privileges akin to the privileges our people get in those countries.'"

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It is a reciprocity clause. The position with regard to that Bill is as follows. I have read Mr. de Valera's statement on the Third Reading, and that Bill has passed through all its stages in the Dail. It has passed Second Reading and Committee stage in the Senate, but I am informed that the final stage was deferred until progress had been made with the Aliens Bill.
I now turn to the Aliens Bill to see how the matter stands with regard to that Bill. The Aliens Bill was introduced into the Dail on November 22 last year. I have it before me, but all I have is the Bill as amended on Report. This is a very technical matter, but when the Bill was originally introduced on the First Reading it contained two clauses to which I must draw your Lordships' attention. It contained a definition of an alien in Clause 2, and it also contained a reciprocity clause similar to the reciprocity clause in the Citizenship Bill, in the clause which at that moment was Clause 9 of the Bill but which has now become Clause 10. I wish to draw your Lordships' attention to Clause 2 and Clause 10 of the Bill as it stands at. present.
Clause 2, if I may say so without offence to our Irish friends, is fortunately an extremely simple one. It is the simplest of the lot:
"In this Act the word 'alien' means a person who is not a citizen of Saorstát Eireann"
We know who the people are who are citizens, because we have that in the first Bill. The important clause, now again, is however the reciprocity clause, which was Clause 9 and has now become Clause 10. It is a short clause, of which the first subsection is the only one which I want to read:
"The Executive Council"—
that is, of the Irish Free State—
"may by order exempt from the application of any provision or provisions of this Act, or of any aliens order, the citizens of any country in respect of which the Executive Council are satisfied that, having regard to all the circumstances and in particular the laws of such country in relation to immigrants. it is proper that the exemption mentioned in such order should be granted."
That is the reciprocity clause, of the sort that is in the other Bill. When Mr. de Valera spoke on the Second Reading of
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this Bill in the Dail on February 14 last, he said this:
"We are making full provision for the maintenance of any rights or privileges to which members of one State of the Commonwealth, travelling into another, are entitled. We are doing that by Order. Once this set of Bills is passed, we can, by Order, make available all those privileges in virtue of the fact that, by law in some of those States, similar privileges are allowed to our citizens. But if any of those privileges are denied to our citizens, we would be free to deny similar privileges."
Let me stop for a moment, if I may. That is how the matter stands at present. The Bills have not yet become law because, with regard to the second of those two Bills—the Aliens Bill—the position is this. The Second Reading was, as I have said, on February 14, and that Bill remains now, as the other Bill remains, to be completed. Of course I cannot prophesy—no one can prophesy—what will be in the Bill upon completion, but there is no reason to suppose that either of those two clauses will not find its way into the completed Act.
LORD DANESEORT: Might interrupt the noble and learned Viscount for one moment?
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: Certainly.
LORD DANESFORT: It is to point out that Clause 9 does not say that the reciprocity shall take place. All it says is that the Executive Council may exempt if they think fit. Now there is nothing to force the Executive Council to pass this reciprocity, and therefore it may never come into operation.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: I quite agree. It appears, therefore, that the intentions of the Irish Free State Government are that, as long as the present practice continues whereby citizens of the Irish Free State are not subjected in the United Kingdom to the disabilities imposed by law upon aliens, the Irish Free State will be prepared, or rather—I certainly accept the correction—they will have the power under Section 9 of the Aliens Act to issue an exempting Order in respect of British subjects belonging to the United Kingdom.
Now the views of His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom as to the principle underlying Clause 2 are

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similar to those which have already been expressed by Mr. Thomas with regard to the Citizenship Bill. I called attention to Clause 9—as it was; it is now Clause 10—under which they have power to make these reciprocity Orders. How then does the matter stand? The position that the Government take up is this. The established policy of His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom is that all peoples of His Majesty, of whatever origin, should be treated alike in this country as regards admission and residence. The view of His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom is that Irish Free State citizenship does not deprive any person of his status as a subject of His Majesty. As I have already explained, His Majesty's Government propose to reserve their position until they see what form the Bills take when they become Acts of Parliament, and if, as is assumed, an Order is made under Clause 10 of the Aliens Bill—that is the reciprocity section—then no situation seems likely to arise which would call for any variation of the established policy of His Majesty's Government, to which I have already alluded. Therefore, as far as His Majesty's Government are concerned, we do not like to use the phrase "Wait and See," hut we shall see what happens to those two reciprocity clauses when the Bills become Acts. It will be time enough then for us to consider, as I have already indicated, what will be the position.
With regard to Papers, I have none that I can lay before your Lordships' House. If the noble Lord has not seen the full text of these two Bills—namely, the Citizenship Bill and the Aliens Bill—I shall be very pleased to hand him the copies which I hold in my hand. As I pointed out, however, the position at present is that the original first Bill has got as far as the Second Reading and
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there it is waiting. The Aliens Bill will no doubt in the course of time become an Act. It will then be possible to see what the real position is. I regret that I can answer the question at no greater length, and I really have no Papers that I can give to the noble Lord.
LORD DANESFORT: Will the noble and learned Viscount say if they have informed the Free State Government of the importance which His Majesty's Government attach to these so-called reciprocity provisions, and to the necessity for those being embodied in the law, in possibly stronger form than at present? Have they in particular informed the Free State Government that it must not be left to the Executive Council of the Free State to say whether or not the Aliens Bill is to apply to British subjects—that they must have a definite statement to the effect that British subjects in the Free State shall enjoy the same liberties and privileges as Free State subjects in this country? Further, if already such communications have not been sent, will His Majesty's Government do so?
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: The answer to my noble friend is this, that I will convey his very important remarks to my right honourable friend the Dominions Secretary, and I have no doubt that he, having had great experience of the whole of the negotiations with the Irish Free State, will do what he thinks right in this matter.
LORD DANESFORT: At this stage I do not press my Motion for Papers, but I gather that if there are communications such as I have indicated we shall be entitled to see them.
Motion for Papers, by leave, withdrawn.
House adjourned at twenty-two minutes past seven o'clock.