Lords Sitting of 17 July 1935

Preamble
The House met at three of the clock, The EARL OF ONSLOW on the Woolsack.
CROYDON CORPORATION BILL.
Read 2a.
EASINGTON RURAL DISTRICT COUNCIL BILL.
Read 3a, with the Amendments, and passed, and returned to the Commons.

DERWENT VALLEY WATER BOARD BILL.
Read 3a, with the Amendments, and passed, and returned to the Commons.
SUNDAY ENTERTAINMENTS ACT, 1932 (BOROUGH OF WIMBLEDON ORDER).
THE EARL OF FEVERSHAM: My Lords, I beg to move that the Order made by the Secretary of State for the Home Department for extending Section 1 of the Sunday Entertainments Act to the Borough of Wimbledon be approved.
Moved, That the Order made by the Secretary of State for the Home Department for extending Section 1 of the Sunday Entertainments Act to the Borough of Wimbledon, and laid before this House on the 9th instant, be approved.—(The Earl of Feversham.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

NATIONAL HEALTH INSURANCE AND CONTRIBUTORY PENSIONS BILL.
Brought from the Commons; read 1a; and to be printed.
PUBLIC HEALTH (WATER AND SEWERAGE) (SCOTLAND) BILL.
Brought from the Commons; read 1a; and to be printed.

SLAVERY.
LORD NOEL-BUXTON LORD NOEL-BUXTON rose to call attention to the Report of the Slavery Committee of the League of Nations, and to the recommendations made by that Committee to the Council of the League; and to move for Papers. The noble Lord said: My Lords, there is no need to remind this House of the stupendous nature of the evil of slavery. It has been debated several times in your Lordships' House, and many members of this House took part in celebrating the centenary of the liberation of the slaves in the British Empire. When they did so they had to have regard to the really amazing fact that, after one hundred years, slavery still survived in many parts of the world. Certainly several million slaves still exist, and the volume of suffering which this debate may possibly affect in course of time is therefore great. We know that slavery is very deep-rooted in the social customs of many countries, but its antiquity does not prevent it from being a deadly canker. It is said very often that the evils of slavery are exaggerated; but there is no need to exaggerate the facts, which are known from calm inquiry.
Of course many slaves are well treated. A predial slave may rise to be an important person. He may even rise to the comfort of the position of one of the family of the owner. There is never, however, any security against savage cruelty if the master is so minded, or, as often happens in slave-owning countries, is a drug addict. The most terrible facts are being elicited at intervals. At the best it is a system in which the husband may be sold away from the wife and in which the children are frequently torn away from their mothers. There is no need of "sob stuff" in connection with this subject to remind us of the urgency of reform. If the question has not the prominence in the public eye of a matter of Party controversy still, measured by the happiness or unhappiness involved, its importance cannot be over-stated. Today I want to show the urgency attaching to the new situation in regard to slavery.
I would like to say how much I regret that the noble Lord, Lord Lugard, is not here to-day. We had hoped that he would have opened this debate, but it was not found possible to arrange any date that would suit him, and he has asked me to say that he deeply regrets

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to have to be away to-day at a meeting of the African Institute at Basle. He was a member of both the previous Slavery Committees of the League, and his monumental work, "The Dual Mandate," is the classic on the subject of slavery. It was he who stated his conviction, after unparalleled experience as an administrator, that slavery is as demoralising to the master as it is debasing to the slave, and he took a leading part at Geneva in the development of the action of the League. We have to-day reached an important stage in that development. We have got machinery established, and we have the first Report of the new Expert Committee. I would remind your Lordships that the establishment of that Committee had been urged in this House on the Government, and we may feel legitimate pride that British influence has played a leading part in this development at Geneva. The British representatives there and the Foreign Office itself, backed by the untiring efforts at Geneva of Sir John Harris, have been the chief factors in bringing that about. We have now what is called the Advisory Committee of Experts with seven members, including as the British representative Sir George Maxwell. He is a man of the widest experience in the Far East and I think we are very fortunate to have him as a member of the Committee.
This debate is no occasion for criticism of His Majesty's Government but for suggesting lines of action while thanking them for what they have done. Let me remind your Lordships of what is defined as slavery by the League of Nations. The League has advanced further in regard to slavery than in regard to other parts of the great question of the treatment of native races. The other sections of the subject are classified as "forged labour" and again as "contract labour." There may be differences of opinion among us with regard to those fields of the subject, but there is none in regard to slavery. The definition of "slavery" in the Slavery Convention is this. It involves "the status of a person over whom any of the powers attaching to the rights of ownership are exercised." But though the League has advanced further in regard to slavery than in regard to forced labour, its work is not complete and the machinery of to-day is not the machinery
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which was urged in this House in previous debates.
Two main points arise from the Report. The first is that slavery is widespread and the second that the Committee is limited in its powers of exposing it. Let me take the first point. The Report deals with various aspects of the question, with the status of slavery, with trading, raiding, dealing in slaves, and with the modified forms of bondage. Reviewing what has happened since the last Report of the Temporary Slavery Committee of 1932 it begins by mentioning the States where slavery is still legal, notably Arabia, Yemen, Ethiopia, the various Sultanates of the Persian Gulf, with hesitating references also to Liberia and to China. The Report deplores that slavery still subsists where it was established in 1932 and later it says no measures appear to have been taken with a view to its abolition in those countries.
We can find several things in the Report which are hopeful. At Jeddah the British Legation has exercised its rights which were obtained by Treaty to deal with slaves transported across the Red Sea who present themselves at our Legation on the Eastern Shore, and 212 were liberated in that way who had originally come from Ethiopia. Then we have the statement of the Abyssinian Government, covering the period from 1933 to 1934, giving the figures of 3,647 slaves liberated in that time, 218 of those belonging to the interesting incident of the insurrection of the powerful Prince Hailu, which was suppressed, and following on that the Emperor liberated that considerable number of slaves. Then we have in the Italian Report a reference to 927 slaves who were liberated at the Kufia Oasis, from the Senussi.
In other directions there is not so much consolation. Take the matter of Arabia, conspicuous as the chief slave market still left in the world. We know how the Moslem law regards the slave as on the same legal footing as cattle. On the other hand the Koran enjoins kindness and liberation as an act of piety. But very little is known as to the numbers of slaves in Arabia or the real situation. His Majesty's Government in their very interesting contribution to the Report note how it had been urged by the previous Temporary Committee that any Treaty with an Arab State ought to in

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clude a clause abolishing slavery, but there we cannot record any advance. When we ourselves made a Treaty with Saudi Arabia we were only able to stipulate that the slave trade should be forbidden. The Report goes to to speak of the Yemen and says it has been undertaken by the Yemen Government that there should be no importation from Africa. The Report, however, is obliged to say that no information has been received in regard to the steps taken to carry out this obligation, and it goes on to say that:
"The Committee would be glad to know whether any proclamations have been published, whether any persons have been arrested for slave trading, and whether in reality the importation of slaves from Africa into these countries has been prevented."
This lack of information is really of very great importance. The well-known authority on Arabia, Mr. Rutter, holds that Ibn Saud would listen seriously to proposals for abolishing slavery altogether if other Moslem States, Egypt, Iraq, Afghanistan and others, were to express their views as to the advantages which would accrue to them from liberation, but that cannot be done till the League Committee can speak.
Now I come to a country which occupies a prominent place in the Report, Ethiopia. If I were to deal with the subject as the Report does under the headings of status, raiding, and trading, I should have to turn to that country each time and I want to avoid boring your Lordships by reiteration and to condense what must be said about it. There is a special reason also in these days for condensing what one says about Abyssinia. We shall all agree, I think, that this is a question which must be kept perfectly distinct from that of the present international crisis in which that country is involved. While it is not possible in such a debate as this to omit all discussion of conditions in one of the main centres of slavery in the world, what has to be said on that subject must not be taken as an apology for acts of aggression. On the contrary, the frank discussion of the evils in question and the genuine attempt to find a remedy for them, one which will not infringe International Law or the principle of collective security, is the best answer to any attempt to make the existence of those evils an excuse for military action.
Abyssinia reported in the autumn of last year to the League Committee and gave some very interesting facts. They recorded how in August, 1932, the Central Slavery Bureau was established followed by local bureaux combined with courts—slavery Judges—the number of which was raised from twelve to sixty-two. Reference is also made to the advantages in regard to slavery of new motor tracks, of trained troops in different parts of the country, and of sentences passed upon offenders. Perhaps I might add what the Emperor did not, in regard to himself. Lord Polwarth and I, on behalf of the Anti-Slavery Society, went to Abyssinia in 1932 and had many interviews with the Emperor, and I should like to say how much I feel that the admiration felt for him is justified. He struggles against reactionary forces of very great power. We urged upon him that he should ask the aid of the League of Nations in the form of an adviser, and I feel that success is almost impossible without such aid. The position, indeed, would be very much better in every way to-day if such aid had been invited.
The report from Abyssinia goes on to speak of the number of slaves liberated, but it says nothing to indicate any new legislation since the last Report. On the other hand, slave-trading has been tackled in some parts. The suppression of the rebellion of Prince Hailu gave good ground for optimism in the spring of 1932, and a very noticeable fact was the appointment of a British ex-official as adviser on the question of slavery, with a department responsible directly to the Emperor. A very good secretary-general was appointed, and things looked very well in the autumn of 1933. Unfortunately, then a set-back occurred, efforts were relaxed and at the end of 1933 the British adviser, Mr. de Halpert, felt that it was useless to remain, and he resigned. A great deal had been made of his appointment, but in the Report there is no mention of his resignation. That illustrates the extraordinary limitations under which the Committee worked in securing information.
There is much else that one might say on the subject of Abyssinia, but I see Lord Polwarth here, and I hope that he will deal with the details. I should like to say that I think the breakdown of 1933 has been largely due to the fear of

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aggression. There are two curious facts in regard to Abyssinia. One is that the Emperor has virtually the whole administration of the country in his hands, and that is almost beyond human capacity to deal with. Secondly, the officials of the provinces hove up to now been very largely unpaid. Owing to the fear of aggression, the attention of the Emporor was naturally diverted in a marked manner; and the funds which might have been available for a real bureaucracy, for a paid police, for paid Judges—all essential to reform—were also diverted. The fear of aggression became a deplorable influence against the development of a hopeful movement. Partisanship in regard to this question is no help to the cause of the abolition of slavery. To reach a just view in regard to Abyssinia one must take into account, on the one hand, the extraordinary difficulty of reform, slavery being rooted in custom and a so in religion. On the other hand, also, it is necessary to consider the gravity of the evils which remain and which are described, for instance, from official and other sources in Lady Simon's book on slavery. We shall, however, all agree that, Whatever settlement follows the present crisis, slavery must be dealt with.
Then the Report has passages on China and on very many British Colonies and Dependencies. There is the greatest variety in the character of slavery with which they deal, but every variety has some character of property abiding in the relation of master and slave. There are so many varieties and different countries that I can only touch very briefly upon them. I trust that other speakers will deal with them at length. The British Report deals with no fewer than 22 of our Colonies or Protectorates: most careful reports, full of interest, but not as a rule dealing with anything like crude slavery. We may feel the greatest pride, I think, in the prominent part occupied in the Report by these reports showing the enormous attention paid to the native question by British officials. Only two evils seem to me to be serious among the British reports—one is that of the girl slavery in Hong-kong, and the other is that of the Masarwa in Bechuanaland. In those eases, delay is frankly admitted. It may be regarded as blameworthy by some people, but none of us would wish that there should be
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concealment of the facts, and I hope that our example in facing them will encourage those States which opposed the formation of the Committee at Geneva in fear of the exposure of facts which existed under their administration.
What the Report says is very notable, but what it does not say is still more notable. There is nothing about Portugal, there is practically nothing about Liberia, yet Portugal has figured in the slavery connection again and again. It has, indeed, had an international history: Lord Grey was constantly occupied with the conditions prevailing in the Cocoa Islands. Rut such is the procedure under which the Committee has to work that there is no reference to Portugal at all, and the same applies to Liberia. The noble Earl, Lord Stanhope, has himself talked in this House on the misery prevailing in Liberia not very long ago; in fact, it is on the tapis at this moment. There was a debate in this House last year, and Mr. Eden raised the subject at the Council in the autumn. The American Government was invited to give its view, but not a word appears in the Report on this great question. Indeed silence, as well as these statement of the Report, is a reason for more means of information.
Now I come to the action that I want to suggest to His Majesty's Government. I want especially to urge that greater powers ought to be given for the obtaining of information. The limitation imposed on the Committee is as follows:
"The Committee may not receive depositions, or consult international or national organisations, whether public or private, or private persons. These may only send their complaints or observations to the Committee through the intermediary of their respective Governments."
Of course the Governments about which it is most necessary to obtain information are the least anxious to give it, and here are some of the statements in the Report showing the need.
The Committee expresses the hope that the Chinese Government will agree to furnish more definite information, and "will be good enough to communicate statistics concerning the application of the Edict of September. 1932." As regards Arabia, the Committee
"does not possess information as to the steps which have been and are being taken by the Sultans and Sheiks of Muscat, etc., to give effect to the Treaties mentioned above."

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Again, the Committee is
"not in possession of any information regarding the slave trade inside Saudi Arabia and the Yemen."
It has "no official information" with regard even to the situation of slaves in the peninsula. It would be glad to obtain information in particular on slavery in the plantations and pearl fisheries. Indeed the appeal for further powers appears on every page. The need for stirring the interests of backward States is shown by the proportion of matter appearing in the Appendices contributed by various Governments. Out of ninety pages your Lordships will hardly believe that various British Governments provide 68 pages, Italy 6½, France 2½, Holland 1½, Ethiopia 1¼, and Belgium, Spain and China one-half each.
The procedure for obtaining information is really as ridiculous as the procedure of a Law Court would be if it prescribed that no evidence can be adduced by the plaintiff, and that the case against the defendant must rely entirely upon any evidence which the defendant may feel disposed to provide. Of course every reasonable safeguard should, and could, be provided, but regard must surely be given to the main object of the slavery Committee's existence, which is to abolish slavery. It is no use blinking the fact that there is opposition to reform by some interested States; but that is an opposition which has in the past been shown to be capable of defeat. It is actually the case that the present powers of the Committee regarding information are less than those of the former Committees. Lord Lugard was a member of both previous Committees, and he has sent me his conclusions, which I think will interest your Lordships.
In 1924 no restriction was placed upon the Committee on Slavery as to the collection of evidence. It proposed to the Assembly that it should be free to consult persons designated by any Government, and that if it wanted information from other persons it should ask that Government if they were reliable persons; that charges should be forwarded to the Government accused, and that persons should be invited to appear, or to write their memoranda to the Committee. The Assembly approved that system, and no adverse comment arose from its practice; but when we came
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to the Committee of 1933 less power was given. In the discussion at the Council Mr. Madariaga said the rules consisted of a series of negations, and Sir John Simon urged that more powers were needed. I very much hope that the noble Earl will be able to tell us that the Government's delegates will press for an extension of those powers.
There is one specific proposal which I should like to make. There are many in the course of the Report, and I select one in regard to the Red Sea traffic—the chief case of oversea trade in slaves. It is a trade which has happily become difficult because it must pass through a, European Colony to reach the coast. It is still more difficult because of the British naval action, which has been well known and has been so active for a very long time, but the trade is not entirely suppressed. I myself have evidence of the fact that this trade in small dhows, which conceal themselves behind the coral reefs and cross the narrow straits with a favourable wind in a single night, continues, and without motor boats and hydroplanes it is perhaps impossible to eradicate it altogether. The proposal in the Report is that a new Convention should be brought into being. Indeed the Slavery Convention of 1926, in Article 3, urges that there should be a special Convention in regard to local problems of this kind. I will say no more on that, because I think my noble friend Lord Arnold will give the facts and the details.
There is one other point that I would like to urge, and that is that the Committee should not be limited, as it is now, in regard to the frequency of its meetings. At present the rule is that it should meet every two years. Anyone who glances at the Report can see that there is work to do without delay and the Committee must have parted at its last meeting with the feeling that a meeting in the early future would be very appropriate. The Mandate's Committee meets twice a year. The British delegates have before now expressed their view at the Assembly, and it was owing to British interest that permission was given to hold an extraordinary meeting next year. But that is hardly enough, and I trust that His Majesty's Government will instruct their delegates to press at the Assembly that there should be a meeting at least not less than once a year. These are the

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main points that I want to make, my Lords. I am sure the Government agree with the dictum that slavery is a crime against human nature. They know that before even the slave trade can cease slavery must come to an end, and I am confident that they will wish to expedite what is an avowed and specific object of the League of Nations, the abolition of slavery in all its forms. I beg to move.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: My Lords, I desire to lay a few words in support of the Motion of My noble friend, and they must be very few, because I have to be elsewhere, I am sorry to say, shortly, under the orders of the Government. Therefore I cannot, even if I wished to, occupy a great part of your Lordships' time. This Report which is the occasion for this debate initiated with such thoroughness, and such a very hereditary right to be heard on this subject, by Lord Noel-Buxton, is an extremely interesting document, and deals, though prepared under evidently great difficulties, with the subject extremely fully.
I think it is perhaps worth while recalling to your Lordships, though I hope most of you know it very well, that in this matter a succession of British Governments have played a very worthy part, if I may be allowed to say so. It was the late Sir Arthur Steel-Maitland, acting for a British Government, who originally raised this matter before the League in 1923. The result of that was the appointment in 1924 of the Commission to which my noble friend has referred, which reported in, I think, 1925. The matter was then raised by a British delegation in the form of the Slavery Convention in 1925–26, and that was adopted. We did not get everything we wanted in that Slavery Convention. If we had had the drafting of it exactly as we liked it would have been a more effective document than it actually was, but still we got a good deal. In 1929 again the British Government desired to appoint a Commission to see how the thing was getting on, how it was that such very meagre results were presented to the League, and so on. We struggled for three years at that time before we succeeded in getting it. We then did get the appointment of a Commission which reported in favour of a permanent advisory body, which was created.
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There again, I think you may say without undue national vanity that it was the British Government which urged the appointment of this permanent body, and was principally instrumental in persuading the Assembly to appoint it, and to draw up the rules of procedure under which it functioned. Again we were not able to get everything we wanted. There were certain Governments—one in particular which it would be indiscreet to mention by name, which I am quite sure was very anxious to prevent slavery, but was also so obsessed by the desire of not doing anything which could possibly interfere with national sovereignty that it saw difficulties and dangers where my more obtuse intellect was quite unable to perceive them. However, that was ultimately done, and this is the first Report as the result of that long study.
I think the document is, on the whole, an encouraging document. It is perfectly true that it testifies to the fact that a considerable amount of slavery still remains, and that here and there, particularly I am afraid one must say in China, the extent of something which is really indistinguishable from slavery, at any rate in some forms of its existence—the well-known mui-tsai—exists to a larger extent than I was aware of, and apparently it exists in many other countries which are more or less under the influence of Chinese institutions. Still, a great deal has been done there. I read with great pleasure of what has been done in Hong-kong in that respect, because your Lordships will be aware that for many years there has been great anxiety in many quarters as to the toleration of the institution of mui-tsai in Hong-kong and it was only after very considerable struggles that at last the local Government there was induced to agree to the institution of the system of registration. It is rather interesting to note the fears which they entertained as to the result, because I think it is encouraging always to see how official anxieties so often turn out to be quite unfounded when you overrule them and adopt your system in spite of the dangers that are threatened.
It was said that in view of the movement of the population to and from the mainland registration in. Hong-kong would be impossible until it was also enforced on the mainland; that it was practically impossible to prove that any girl was a mui-tsai girl; that an army of

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inspectors would be necessary and their visits would arouse resentment in respectable families; and that enormous expenditure would be incurred in providing homes and employment bureaux for mui-tsais. I believe it to be true to say that not one of these anticipations has been proved to be even moderately correct; and that, in point of fact, the number of registered mui-tsai girls has gone down to less than half what it was when the system was instituted; that in point of fact the expense has been negligible; that instead of an army of inspectors I think there have been two or three—all but one of whom, if I remember rightly, were voluntary workers—and that the system has moved with great smoothness and without exciting any anxiety or serious opposition. I think that is very satisfactory, because it gives one hope that it may be carried out in many other parts of the world. Indeed, I gather that in many other neighbouring parts the same system has been adopted, and I hope will produce the same results. You can only hope that something of the same kind may be done in China, though the difficulties, one must admit, are very great in China at the present time. I know that it is said that mui-tsai is not slavery, and no doubt very often it may not be, strictly speaking, slavery, but on occasions it is very bad indeed, and I do not think you can really seriously doubt that it does come within the definition of slavery—namely, the exercise of ownership by one human being over another.
My noble friend has gone through the matter very carefully, and there are only two other countries about which I wanted to say a word. One is Abyssinia, and there I quite recognise that there is still an immense deal to be done. Yet I think it is a fair reading of this Report that the Commissioners think that something has been done, and that there has been at any rate good will in the Central Government of Ethiopia in this matter. As to Liberia, the other country to which my noble friend referred, I should like to know whether the Government have any more information on the subject. Liberia is a difficult country, I admit, and the efforts which the League of Nations made to come to its assistance proved entirely abortive, owing mainly to local jealousies, and partly also to
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a feeling which is very important and must never be neglected in any consideration of this question—namely, the great, and perhaps one must admit the growing, jealousy between the black and white races. If my noble friend can give us any further information as to the circumstances in Liberia I am sure it will be very acceptable.
My noble friend Lord Noel-Buxton asked for three definite things. He asked for a fresh Convention to facilitate the prevention of slave trading, particularly in the Red Sea. The second thing lie asked for was the sweeping away of the hindrances imposed by the rules of admissible evidence for the Advisory Commission; and the third thing was that there should be more frequent meetings of the Advisory Commission. I want to say a word about each of those three points. As to a fresh Convention, the history of that matter is interesting. In the British draft of the 1926 Convention we proposed to make slave trading piracy. That would by itself have given very great rights to British ships both to search and to arrest dhows thought to be guilty of slave trading and to free any slaves that were found on board them. Unfortunately, certain of the other maritime Powers thought this was a device to fasten the British marine tyranny on the waters of the oceans. They were up in arms and would not hear of it, and all we could do was to get this rather feeble alternative, as I am afraid it is—namely, an undertaking that the countries concerned would formulate and conclude Conventions giving all necessary powers to deal with slave trading. That, I think, is really necessary.
I observe it stated—my noble friend will correct me if I am wrong—that within the last ten or twelve years British ships, of which I understand two are detailed for the duty, have arrested as many as 126 dhows which they had some grounds for thinking were engaged in slave trading. In each case they were forced to release the dhow because there was no evidence that there were any slaves on board belonging to other people. In each case there were slaves on board, but they were alleged to belong to the owner of the dhow, and so there was no question of slave trading. All that may be quite true, but it does present a certain amount of doubt to my mind as

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to whether, in the powers that now exist, the real facts were disclosed to the British commanders. My noble friend will know whether that doubt is shared by any of those engaged in the business of checking slave trading, but I cannot help having that suspicion myself. Certainly there is the strongest possible suspicion that slave trading still goes on. Indeed, not long ago, I read a book of reminiscences by an adventurer—not a British adventurer—in which he openly declared he had quite recently been engaged in this slave trading. Therefore I hope we may revive that suggestion of the Convention of 1926 and press that something should be done after these nine years to carry that into effect, if the advisers of my noble friend think it desirable and that more effective powers may be given to stop this horrible trading.
There is the second point which my noble friend raised on the question of the rules of evidence. I do not think that outside "Alice in Wonderland" any more fantastic arrangement was ever agreed to than we find here. The Committee may not receive depositions from, or consult, any international or national organisation, whether public or private, or private persons. These may only send their complaints of observations to the Committee through the intermediary of their respective Governments; at any rate that is how it has been treated. That is a perfectly ridiculous situation. There again., it was the result of vehement opposition, and it was a question of whether we could get an Advisory Committee at all or whether we should make the concession, the very large concession, of limiting its power of getting evidence in that way. I cannot help hoping that in some way or other that difficulty may be overcome. My noble friend has pointed out with great truth that from this document itself you can see that on many occasions the Committee have had to report they do not know about this or that, that they had not been able to ascertain exactly what the facts were about it is, that, and so on. I have not counted the number myself, but I should think it would be an underestimate to say that the phrase is repeated half-a-dozen or a dozen times in the Report. The broad fact that we get such very meagre reports from some of the Governments compared with the
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reports we have made, shows I think a very unsatisfactory state of things.
I cannot help hoping that every effort may be made to get that put right, and I am going to make if I may two suggestions on that point for the consideration of the Government. I do not ask them to reply, but I hope they will do me the honour of considering them. The first suggestion is this. I remember that when we agreed to that provision we contemplated that some well-disposed Government, the British Government for instance, might undertake to forward complaints by serious people, even if they were not strictly from Governmental sources. I think that is within the terms of the rule. As long as it comes from a Government, and the Government make themselves responsible for the seriousness of the evidence, that evidence may be received by the Commission. I should like the Government to consider whether they have done as much as they can do in that respect. Of course that is not a very satisfactory solution.
The other, and much the better plan, would be to get a simple change in the rule. On that point there is an important technicality which, again, I would ask the Government to consider carefully. As your Lordships are aware, nothing, as a general rule, can be done by the Assembly of the League—and I suppose this would have to be done by the Assembly of the League—except by a unanimous vote; but there is an exception on matters of procedure. It certainly appears to me that this is emphatically a matter of procedure. The nature of the evidence that may be received is a matter of the procedure of the Advisory Committee, and in that case any change can be carried by a majority of the Assembly. I have very little doubt it would be very easy to get a majority for a more easy rule. It may be, of course, that one or two countries with exaggerated fears as to their sovereign rights may resist, and if it is a question of unanimity that makes the position very difficult; but I believe this is a case where unanimity is not required, and it can be clone by a majority.
These are the observations I wanted to make on the question of evidence. The only other specific point raised by my noble friend's speech was the right of the Committee to sit more than once every two years If I remember rightly

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that provision was purely a matter of economy. I thought it was a ridiculous provision at the time, but it was thought it would cost so much more at that time; and the view prevailed, and perhaps still prevails, the perfectly idiotic view, that the amount spent at Geneva was very important, whereas it is really very unimportant. If you could save a few pounds by having meetings only once every two years instead of meetings more frequently, that was a reason which overbore any question of efficiency in stamping out the slave trade! I hope that kind of point of view is passing, if it has not already passed, and I hope the Government will press for what is the reasonable thing—namely, that the Committee should meet as often as it thinks desirable from the point of view of its work. That is the reasonable thing to do. That also seems to me to be a matter of procedure which, I venture to think, can be set right by a majority vote of the Assembly. I shall not trouble your Lordships any longer. I would only say in conclusion that we have for more than one hundred years a very fine tradition in this matter. That is not only a matter of gratification to us, but it imposes a very special responsibility on us with regard to what may be done in forwarding the great cause of stamping out slavery in the world.
THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY: My Lords, I think we shall agree that the noble Lord opposite has done a good service in asking your Lordships' House and the Government to pay heed to the remarkable Report which has just been issued. After what has fallen from my noble friend about the position of this country, I do not require to stress the need of paying great attention to every matter that concerns this great cause—the suppression of slavery throughout the world. It has been for a hundred years the special privilege of this country and of each successive Government to regard this as a matter which lies upon their honour. It will be within your Lordships' recollection that it was chiefly on the initiative of His Majesty's Government that this Permanent Slavery Committee was appointed by the League of Nations and therefore its first Report must needs be a document of very special interest and importance both to the Government and to the country.
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I do not propose to dwell upon the two defects which have been fully explained by the two noble Lords who have just spoken. Suffice to say that I most cordially associate myself with what has fallen from them both as to the inadequacy of the present rule of procedure by which the Committee is debarred from receiving evidence except through the channel of the Governments concerned. No one can read this Report, as I have tried to do, without seeing the truth of the observations that it is just those Governments from whom information is most needed who obviously supply least—the countries especially of China, Liberia; Ethiopia and Arabia. It seems to me common sense—and I hope that common sense will prevail over the technicalities which have just been mentioned—that this most important Committee should not be debarred from taking depositions from private bodies or individuals in the course of their inquiry.
True, every care must be taken lest the Committee should be embarrassed by the effusions of all those irresponsible cranks and enthusiasts who follow in the wake of every good movement, as no one knows better than I do. But it will be sufficient to make it plain that all these depositions which come from private individuals or bodies must be regarded as confidential until they have been submitted to the Governments concerned for their observations. I do not think we can get much further in this matter unless greater freedom is allowed to the Committee as to the sources of its information. I think the remark made by the noble Lord cannot really be questioned, that the present procedure is really as if in a court of law it were laid down that the only evidence admissible was evidence on the side of the defendants. The other point, about the time of the meeting of the Committee, seems to me also to carry with it obvious agreement. No one can read this Report without seeing the range of matters with which it deals in every part of the world, and I think there is grave danger lest, within two years, evils may grow up which might have been checked if the Committee had been able to meet more frequently.
After what has been said with far greater authority than I can possess by the two noble Lords who have spoken, I only propose to refer, and that briefly, to three matters within the Report itself.

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First of all with regard to Arabia, still one of the main centres of anxiety in this matter, I think His Majesty's Government in the past have done everything they can through the various treaties which they have made with the different States in Arabia, and nothing could be more praiseworthy than the efforts of our own Navy in the Red Sea. I think there are now two sloops continually engaged in this work, and, if I remember rightly, in 1932 they covered no less than 38,000 miles in that comparatively restricted sphere. I think it s true that they have not discovered any slave dhow of the old and bad description, but I fear there is only too much reason to believe that what my noble friend Lord Cecil has just said is true, that under the guise of shipments of other kinds and under the excuse that the apparent slaves found on board were in the employment of the shipowners, a great number of persons are admitted into Arabia who are really slaves, and a considerable number of those who may be admitted free are afterwards enslaved.
I am afraid there is need of constant vigilance in this matter. And here I would hope that His Majesty's Government would at least give careful attention to the suggestion of the Report, that in this matter, in order to prevent—shall I call it the hoodwinking which goes on in the transhipment of slaves from Ethiopia into Arabia?—the three high contracting parties who have territories on the Red Sea, France, Italy and ourselves, might make that special agreement contemplated by Section 3, paragraph 3, of the original Slavery Convention.
Then I turn, and may perhaps say a little more about it, to that old centre of anxiety to which both noble Lords have alluded, the system of mui-tsai in China and other parts of the East. I give it the name that is most familiar to us, though it has many other names in different parts of that area. Your Lordships are well aware of the system. It is that by which the parents of a poor family transfer one of their children to the guardianship of another family. There was much to be said for it in the old days. Economic pressure, and the poverty of families made it very natural that some of the poorest families should endeavour to have what they hoped would
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be a comfortable home for some of their children, and were willing to allow other families to go through the process which was called "adopting," but it really meant taking the child into the permanent and unremunerative employment of another family.
When conditions were more simple, and when the home to which the child in infancy was transferred was within reach of the parents or of their relatives, everything in many ways worked well, and it is unquestionable that there was a very great deal of kindness shown by the adoptive home towards these adopted children. But circumstances are entirely different now. The children are taken to an immense distance from their homes, and I fear there is only too much reason to believe that there is a very shameful traffic still going on with these children. Not to take up your Lordships' time, if you wish to see the evils which are still inherent in this system you have only to read that extremely able memorandum on the whole system which is appended to the Report by Sir George Maxwell, one of the greatest authorities on the subject. I think, after reading that Report in that Appendix, there can no longer be any question as to our right to regard this system as little short of the kind of servitude which we are pledged to do our utmost to suppress.
So far as China is concerned, it has put itself right, in a manner, by the Edict of 1932, by which it was declared that the taking of one of these Children into a home was prohibited unless the master regarded her as an employee and undertook the obligation of returning the child, if she ceased to be employed, to the parents or to some charitable organisation. But there is absolutely no information as to how far that Edict is observed. I fear it may be like other admirable Edicts in that country, where the control of the Central Government is so difficult. But here again is a matter on which further information is urgently needed, and is not likely to be very readily given by the Government of China itself.
I turn with more concern to our own Colony of Hong-kong, and there I agree with what the noble Viscount has just said about the improvement that has taken place. As I think he said, since the law of 1929 was passed making the

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registration of the children and the inspection of them compulsory, there has been a rapid diminution from 4,368 in 1930 to 2,291 in 1934. This has been done, it is worth noting, with the cordial cooperation of public opinion and of many voluntary societies largely composed of the Chinese themselves in Hong-kong. On the whole it is true to say that conditions there are immeasurably better than they were when attention was first called to this matter in your Lordships' House by my revered predecessor many years ago. I doubt very much whether it would be wise at present to press for anything like prohibition at least until the economic conditions of China are very different from what they are now, but a great deal could be done in steadily encouraging and pressing forward the good work that has been done in Hong-kong.
But things are not nearly so satisfactory in the International Settlements. In Shanghai, as I understand, most of the better-to-do Chinese families have one or two of these unfortunate children. I am not for a moment saying that in many cases they are not most kindly treated, but there are, so far as I know, no municipal regulations. And the same is true of Kulangsu in the Fukien Province. Therefore with great confidence I think that pressure can be brought to bear in the International Settlements to extend the system prevailing in Hong-kong. I hope your Lordships will forgive me if I again call attention to the Report of Sir George Maxwell because I think it is full of information on the present system in different parts of the world.
Let me turn for a moment to a country which is much in our thoughts to-day, Abyssinia. I have not much to add to what has been said already, and what has to be said here at the present time must be said with great care and with no desire to enter into the most formidable region of international tension which exists at present and is probably more tense than has existed, shall I say, since the War. It is, true, I am afraid it must be admitted—though I cannot speak with the authority of the noble Lord, Lord Noel-Buxton, or Lord Polwarth, who I understand will speak—that there was a raid in 1932 into the Soudan region where, I think, men, women and children were dragged from our territory into Ethiopia. There was a recent
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raid into French Somaliland which had to be followed up by a punitve expedition in which a French officer was killed. I suppose it must be admitted that large tracts of that country are still to be found where slavery still exists deep-seated in the traditions and customs of the tribes.
But it is only fair to recognise the efforts which have been made. My noble friend Lord Noel Buxton seemed to imply that there has been no legislation of a definite kind on the matter of slavery, but unless I am misinformed there were legislative acts of 1923 and 1924 declaring at any rate the status of slavery to be illegal within the Empire of Abyssinia. We all know how difficult it has been to enforce them, but let us at least remember what was said this afternoon that there are sixty-two bureaux and courts in Abyssinia, and that between September, 1933, and August, 1934, no fewer than 3,640 slaves have actually been liberated.
LORD NOEL-BUXTON: Will the most reverend Primate forgive me if I interrupt to say that my allusion was to the statement in the Report that since the Report of 1932 there had not been legislation?
THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY: Thank you very much. The reduction in numbers and the efforts to spread these bureaux which are intended to make legislation more effective, is a sign that the Emperor has been endeavouring to do his best. It has been questioned whether with slavery existing it was wise to allow Abyssinia to enter the League of Nations, but I cannot refrain from saying that Abyssinia was not the only country as to whose internal government no inquiries were specially made before admission to the League. At any rate Abyssinia is not to blame for that. I think every sympathy should be extended to the Emperor, whom some of us know personally, on account of the efforts he has gallantly endeavoured to make in spite of many difficulties. I am quite certain that the noble Lord was right in saying that it was the beginning of the threat of forcible intervention from outside that has retarded efforts which otherwise would have been made, and certainly no such aggression is likely in the least to solve, and may very likely increase, the difficulty of slavery in Abyssinia.

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May I conclude by saying that a great step has been taken by the appointment of this Commission and by the publication of its First Report? It must be extraordinarily difficult for His Majesty's Government, with the deepest difficulties and anxieties in every part of the world, to be as alert as they otherwise might be about this particular matter, but it is essentially one in which constant vigilance is necessary and in which want of vigilance increases difficulties and makes them harder to overcome in the future. I am sure I shall carry your Lordships with me when I say that I hope that His Majesty's present Government, like all British Governments, will regard it as one of their honours and privileges to be foremost throughout the world in combating if not suppressing this worst crime against humanity.
LORD STRICKLAND; My Lords, I feel it to be my duty to say a few words in this debate because many years ago I had the honour of being Governor of a part of His Majesty's Dominions where three-quarters of the population were the children of slaves and where there were still living those born as slaves under the English flag—the Federation of the Leeward Islands. As a result of my experience I would suggest to your Lordships' House that there should be differentiation between the general question of slavery and the repression of the slave trade. I am in full accord with and. indeed, I would go much further than the noble Viscount who spoke, with regard to regulations and administrative measures to suppress the slave trade, but as regards slavery itself those who were close to the time when the slave traditions and habits existed under the English flag feel it a matter of doubt whether the conditions of slavery were not preferable to those that exist under the system of competition. Life is easy in some tropical countries, in countries where food is easily procured, and where raiment is only required for the purposes of modesty, but not where between one season and another there is no food and no certainty for the future.
That exists also in China, for opposite reasons. What the most reverend Primate said with reference to Hong-kong was impressive, because there the long contact with English government has had and is having its educational effect. But when he referred to Shanghai and
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Northern China, he showed that the conditions are even worse than were put before your Lordships' House. There are large bodies of Christians only a short way outside Shanghai who are Christians because for three or four generations the children have been bought by the missionaries or by charitable persons for sixpence. The Christians have grown in numbers through those charitable efforts because life is so difficult in that part of the world. There is nothing but work, work, work; no Sunday, no Bank Holidays, no limitation of labour There are, therefore, conditions where to have certainty as to the food for to-morrow and the next week may have for human beings and for human nature an attraction which must be separated from the necessity of dealing with the slave trade.
As regards the slave trade, the sea belongs to all the civilised nations. There is something even more powerful on the sea than what the most reverend Primate referred to as common sense. There we have the law of nature, which is imperative; we have International Law; we have the right of the English nation and the English flag to enforce our principles, perhaps apart from the feeling of other nations and other communities. Nothing too great can be done to strengthen and support British ships and British officers in suppressing the slave trade, even to the extent that if mistakes are made, those who make those mistakes should be supported. But that is a very different thing from our nation, or any influence and power on our behalf, interfering with the internal-affairs of other nations and perhaps interfering with the best interests of the majority of the community, where very rapid or excessive interference with existing conditions might tend to lower instead of increase the standard and duration of life and that measure of peace and contentment which is called liberty, and which we should not seek to impose too rapidly and without a mandate upon other nations.
Let us remember that, before Christianity and altruism came upon the world, there was no progress and no civilisation except under the slave-driver's whip. Altruism and Christianity have changed all that. We have our noble friends opposite, and those who think with them in another place, talking about

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the slavery of the competitive system in countries whose condition of life we cannot possibly understand without going there and living there—we who live here amidst a standard of comfort never known before in the history of the world, or in Australia, where the standard of comfort and prosperity is even greater than we can imagine, in a country where a man can buy an acre of land for 10s. and have twenty years in which to pay for it.. There is no starvation and no pressure, and nothing can make him fear for the morrow. We should not interfere in countries where life of that kind does not exist, but should leave things alone. I hope that pressure will be brought to bear upon those in authority to refrain from using it to take steps beyond what is really required by the principles of Christianity.
LORD POLWARTH: My Lords, my only reason for venturing to intervene in this debate is that it was my privilege three years ago to accompany the noble Lord, my relative, on the other side of the House, who proposed this Motion, when we paid a visit to Ethiopia on behalf of the British Anti-Slavery Society and on the invitation of the Emperor himself to advise him as to how he could best liberate the slaves in his country. However doubtful we may have felt at first as to whether the Emperor really desired this reform, we were quite convinced after we had seen him and consulted him and his Ministers. We had three interviews with the Emperor and more with two of his Ministers appointed for that purpose. After that we were quite convinced that the Emperor really was in earnest in his desire to abolish slavery from his He expressed his views quite plainly: he said to us that his was a very Christian country, that slavery was inconsistent with Christianity, and that therefore he wished to see it abolished. He, at all events, had no doubt whatever that slavery was inconsistent with the character of a nation claiming to be civilised and in the comity of nations.
But I must say—and one speaks just now with great reserve and great thought—that I cannot help thinking that we have a little cause for disappointment with the results already obtained. As was mentioned in the Report of the Slavery Committee, he expressed to us
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the view that, as a result of the measures he had taken or would take, slavery would be extinct in his country in fifteen or, at the most, twenty years His own people stated to us the probable number of their slaves at 500,000 or 600,000. This was probably a very great underestimate; doubtless they put it as low as they could. But even taking that figure, and taking the figure stated in their own report that some 3,600 had been liberated during the year up to August last, you will see that it will take a very long time at that rate of progress before slavery ceases to exist, even allowing, of course, for the additional decrease in the number of slaves through death.
Here I may digress for a moment to refer to the legislation, to which indeed reference has already been made by the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury. The law of 1924 provided that the children of slaves born after that date should be free. Unfortunately, that law did not abolish the status of slavery as regards existing slaves, only as regards the children who should be born of them. These are entitled to claim their liberty when they reach an age to act for themselves—fifteen or sixteen years—and in the meantime the masters of their parents are obliged to support them. The number included also, as the noble Lord, Lord Noel-Buxton, has already mentioned, those who were the property of Ras Hailu. When that man, who was the most powerful of the Chiefs in Ethiopia, was convicted of treason, the Emperor confiscated most of his property, and ordered, in a Proclamation of which I saw a translation, those in charge of Ras Hailu's slaves to bring them to a certain place in order that they might receive their freedom. I cannot help thinking that those in charge of his slaves must have used a great deal of discretion in carrying out that order. Certainly popular repute would have assumed that Ras Hailu possessed far more than 200 slaves; he was living in Addis Ababa when we were there, with a very large retinue of 1,000 men, of whom many would be slaves, and probably his subordinates took the opportunity of disposing of the slaves in some other way.
But we must admit that the difficulties concerning the Emperor are very great. He did carry out his promise, and he did appoint a special bureau. We have

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been told, and they tell us in the Report, that it has 62 subordinate bureaux in different parts of the country, and they have, upon one ground or another, and mostly under the law of 1924, liberated 3,647 slaves. This law provides also that slaves escaping from their masters, and being absent and unclaimed for eight days, can claim freedom, as also can a slave who is treated cruelly. The law also forbids the sale of slaves from one person to another do not imagine that we can for a moment suppose that the sale of slaves does not go on, but it has been driven underground and is very difficult to trace. We also have evidence of kidnapping, even of children, in order to make them slaves.
A disappointing thing is that the British adviser has found it, impossible to carry on his work, and has had to resign. The slave bureaux are functioning to a limited extent, but until the officials are paid salaries, whether they be Governors of Provinces or Judges of outlying Slave Courts, the temptations to abuse will, I am afraid, be undoubtedly too great. One would not like to criticise the Emperor for perhaps failing to take action at the present time, as his thoughts must be very fully occupied with other matters, but the Report which has been quoted brings us down only to August of last year, before the present crisis had in any way arisen. Making every allowance for the difficulties, I do feel some disappointment. On the other hand, it is satisfactory to note that the Report of our Soudan Government states that since the raid of 1932 there has been no raid across that frontier for slaves, and there has been more control over the local Chiefs exercised by the Ethiopian Government.
I do think, however, it is due to that country to make allowance for the very great difficulties that, have to be faced Not only are the rulers owners of hundreds of slaves, who form a large part of their retinue, for no Abyssinian Chieftain would ever think of riding into the town on his mule without fifty, a hundred or even five hundred followers behind him; not only have the great men their slaves, but the priests of the Church, who are very numerous, all have their slaves for the purpose of doing domestic service. Even quite small men have their slaves. We saw an instance of a woman slave acting as nurse to the little child
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of a comparatively small headman living in a thatched but in a village outside the capital, and a man whom we employed as a groom for a time told us that his parents also had slaves. That will convince your Lordships how very widespread slavery is in that country, and that it will take a long time to eradicate it. The problem is also an economic one. If by a sudden decree you were to liberate all these slaves, what would they do Unless work could be provided in some way for them, or unless they could be settled upon the land, you would be faced with the problem of having thousands of men who could only live by thieving and robbery, and who would tend to become brigands in the country. This is a matter which will require careful attention in any general measure for emancipation in that country.
I do not think there is any occasion for me to detain your Lordships any longer after the clear and full statement which has been made by the mover of the Motion; but I very earnestly hope that action will continue to be taken, and that the League Committee will be given those greater powers which have been asked for, and about which Lord Cecil spoke a few minutes ago. They are absolutely necessary if the Committee is to function properly. I think we can quite safely say this with regard to Ethiopia, without in any way prejudicing the present position. The Emperor is in earnest, but he is faced with immense difficulties. There is no Press, except a small official Gazette and there is no public opinion behind him to support him. He deserves our sympathy, because he is an enlightened ruler, and it has been said that he has practically the whole government in his hands. Ministers do not function as Ministers, and a story is told of a call made at a Ministry when the whole staff of the Department was found to be out making hay for the Emperor. Doubtless it was a pleasant occupation for them, but hardly one tending to the efficient transaction of official business. I beg to support the Motion.
LORD GAINFORD: My Lords, the noble Lord who initiated this debate has an hereditary interest in the subject of the freedom of slaves. I had not the pleasure of listening to his speech, owing to another engagement, but one hundred years ago my grandfather, in the 1832

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Reform Parliament, did raise his voice repeatedly in favour of the liberation of slaves. At that time the case was very clear for emancipation, the facts were easily to be ascertained, and the country was horrified when it learned of the facts relating to slavery throughout the world. Emancipation was gradually proclaimed. It is now some forty years ago since I ventured in another place to protest against slavery in the East of Africa, especially in the British Protectorate of Zanzibar, and to move Resolutions year after year, even as a private Parliamentary secretary voting against my own Government, in order to call attention to the evils of the slave traffic and especially to the frightful mortality among the slave-bearers of commodities carried between the coast and Uganda.
To-day I have been looking through the Parliamentary Paper which contains a Report indicating that slavery is still existing in many parts of the world, but one of our difficulties in connection with the slavery which exists to-day is that steps have been taken to prevent evidence being procured—evidence which is required in order, I think, to convince the country of the necessity of the Government taking action. All we can do in this House is to press the Government, when they go to Geneva next September, to use their best endeavours to prevent the limitation which now exists on the means of securing evidence. The provision which we object to is "that the Committee may not receive depositions or consult international or national organisations, whether public or private, or private persons." We are aware from this Committee's Report that there is a good deal of slavery going on. There is a certain amount of raiding, there is a certain amount of selling of slaves, and a certain number of slaves are being imported from the mainland into Arabia.
We give full credit to our British Navy for endeavouring to stop the traffic in slaves. They have not succeeded in doing so, although they have examined a great number of dhows that have passed across the Red Sea. That that slave trade continues to a limited extent we have every reason to believe, and it is very easy, I am informed, for dhows containing slaves to go across from the mainland to Arabia. But what is essential is that we ought to be allowed to get that evidence in
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order to bring home to the individuals representing various countries at Geneva the responsibility of those countries. At the present time that is prevented, and that is the one point that I want to press upon the Government more than any other.
LORD LAMINGTON: My Lords, I should like to ask my noble friend who introduced this debate whether I have correctly understood him. He said that there is a considerable amount of slave trade across the Red Sea. All the west coast of the Red Sea is in the occupation or jurisdiction of European Powers. If that is so, how is it that such a considerable amount of this traffic should be allowed to continue? Is any one particular portion of the coast specially advantageous for this traffic? I gathered from the most reverend Primate that only small vessels were engaged in this trade, vessels ostensibly engaged in commercial business, and under that disguise carrying slaves across to Arabia. Presumably there can be only a very small number carried in this way. These vessels cannot be like real slave dhows. They can only carry three or four slaves in such small craft. I am only asking questions of my noble friend. At the same time I am glad to have heard—and fully concur in—the praise given to the Emperor of Ethiopia for his bold and honest efforts to put down slavery in his dominions. I think he deserves all the credit given to him this afternoon.
LORD ARNOLD: My Lords, although the discussion this afternoon has been necessarily somewhat long, but not too long for the importance and magnitude of the subject, I would crave permission to make some remarks, particularly about the transit of slaves across the Red Sea. It is not necessary for me to make any remarks of a general nature after the speeches which have been made, and after the very comprehensive and valuable speech of my noble friend Lord Noel-Buxton. Before I come to the Red Sea, I would just like to say one word on the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Strickland. I was under the impression that this was one of those occasions when there was practically no difference of view in your Lordships' House, but I am not quite sure what the position of the noble Lord, Lord Strickland, is. It seemed to me that nearly all his arguments about the

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slave trade were used in the old slave days to buttress up slavery itself. It was the same kind of argument. I do not think anybody wishes to go back to those days, though perhaps the noble Lord wishes to go still further back to the days of Aristotle, who had something to say about slavery. However, speaking generally, there is unanimity in your Lordships' House.
In regard to the transit of slaves across the Red Sea I would say in the first place, in reply to the noble Lord opposite, that I do not think it is suggested that the slaves who may be carried across or through the Red Sea necessarily come from Ethiopia. There may be some, for instance, who come from Madagascar or other places further a field Still his main observations were directed to Ethiopia, and I will try to deal with that. What does the Advisory Committee say? In paragraph 37 they say:
"It is not impossible that, in spite of the measures taken, human beings in limited numbers are still introduced into Arabia as slaves or, having entered as free men, are there enslaved."
Then they say in paragraph 32:
"In reality Ethiopia and Arabia are at present virtually the only countries that persons engaged in the slave trade have in view when committing acts outside those territories."
So it would appear that slaves are being imported into Arabia and, if so, many of them must come across the lied Sea. The Committee also say:
"It is chiefly from Ethiopia that slaves introduced into Arabia can come."
Those are, I think, the main passages dealing with the particular point which the noble Lord raised.
It is true, as the noble Lord has said, that all the Red Sea outlets on the African side opposite Arabia are held by European Powers. There are the Soudan, Eritrea, French Somaliland, British Somaliland and Italian Somaliland, in that order. There you have the whole coast on that side of the Red Sea. Much has been said to-day about the Emperor of Ethiopia and his position in regard to this matter, but the Emperor has made this point I believe—and it seems to me with some force—that if the traffic across the Red Sea is going on, at any rate he cannot be held altogether responsible for that, because he has no outlet to the Red Sea. As I say,
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it is the European Powers who have the control over the outlets to the Red Sea. The noble Lord asked: How is it possible for these things to be happening, if that is so? I am not going into that. There are various ways which occur to me in which it can happen, and I think, as far as we can be humanly certain, that to some extent it is happening. I will read to your Lordships a sworn statement from a Chief Officer on board a cargo liner trading between Europe and the Far East. Obviously I cannot give any of the names. it is not very old—the date is July 24, 1934, and it relates to something that happened in 1933.
This is what he says:
"I am Chief Officer on board the … a cargo liner trading between Europe and the Far East.
"On or about the fifteenth day of August, one thousand nine hundred and thirty-three, the … on which was then Chief Officer, was passing through the Red Sea on a voyage from China to London.
"At about 6 o'clock a.m. when the … was about thirty miles north of Abu Ail I saw a large dhow speeding tinder sail …"
this was a large dhow; not a vessel carrying only three or four slaves, which the noble Lord referred to—
"across the Red Sea from the African side to the Arabian side.
"While looking at the dhow through my telescope the force of the wind broke the main halliards of her lateen mainsail and caused it to come down with a run, and the dhow flew up in the wind under the influence of her mizen sail. The Master of the vessel who had now come on deck gave orders that she should run up close to the dhow as we suspected that she was engaged in the slave trade. The vessel came to within about 100 feet of the dhow—"
100 feet is very close; it is not very much longer than your Lordships' House, so that it is possible to see very clearly what is happening—
"and I could clearly see that the dhow was packed from end to end of her open waist with negroes. The negroes were seated on thwarts or benches and appeared to be fastened by their ankles to the bottom of a compartment. About twelve or fourteen negroes were stowed abreast, and there were about twenty rows of them, so that considerably over 200 were being transported in tins one vessel.
"The crew of the dhow having effected the necessary repairs, the dhow continued on her voyage towards the Arabian coast with her human cargo. A wireless message was sent out from the vessel, giving the position of the dhow, in the hope that it might be received by some vessel which would

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intercept the dhow before she reached the Arabian coast.
"I make this solemn declaration, conscientiously believing the same to be true, and by virtue of the provisions of the Statutory Declarations Act, 1835."
Statements like that—and I think that can be accepted—go to confirm the fear that slaves are being transported across the Red Sea.
I want particularly to emphasise—and this is the point I am coming to in regard to the reply of the noble Earl—that officers and others engaged in antislavery work in the Red Sea are often in great perplexity because of the difficulty of not knowing exactly what the legal position is. The question which I should like to ask the noble Earl is this: What is the legal position? Possibly that cannot be said this afternoon, but I want it to be considered. Under what Treaty has Great Britain the right to stop and to search vessels suspected of slave trading? There seems to be no general rule. It depends on what flag the suspected vessel is flying, and our rights vary in different cases. They derive apparently from a whole number of bilateral treaties with different Powers. Our general obligation to suppress the slave trade rests on the clause in the Treaty of St. Germain, which has superseded the Brussels Act, and on the 1926 Geneva Convention. We are relying more and more on the Geneva Convention. As regards detailed procedure, the matter rests on usage and on those two bilateral treaties of which I have just spoken. In most cases, for instance, we have the right to send the boat back to its own port to be dealt with by its own authorities.
In some cases, without having the right of search, we have the right to ask to see their papers and verify their flag. If they are not flying their correct flag we can complain to the Power concerned, probably a signatory of the Convention. Therefore it is not easy to see what the legal rights in the matter are. If we here in your Lordships' House do not really know that, how are officers on these two sloops in the Bed Sea, which have been referred to by previous speakers, to know precisely what their legal rights are. Surely the time has come when something should be available much less confused and less confusing so that they may know exactly where they stand. This
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matter has been pressed on the Government—it is referred to in the Committee's Report—the question of the three European Powers, ourselves, France and Italy, possessing African territories on the shores of the Red Sea, considering the possibility of concluding a special agreement for this purpose, an agreement such as is envisaged in paragraph 3 of the Slavery Convention. I do want to ask the noble Earl whether the British delegation at Geneva cannot press that that should be done. As the noble Viscount, Lord Cecil of Chelwood, has said, nine years have now elapsed since 1926. That is a long time, and nothing has been done. This Convention is badly needed. So far as I know there is no objection to its being made, and, if this Convention were made, it would, I think, have great value. If, as the result of this debate, that should happen, it would be a very satisfactory outcome of our deliberations this afternoon.
I want in one minute to refer to a matter which has not been touched upon so far or, if so, has only just been mentioned. That is the question of pilgrims and their servants going into Arabia to the holy places, to Mecca and so on. I am afraid there is only too much reason to believe that pilgrims going to the holy places across the Red Sea, taking servants with them, in some cases take servants who are in reality slaves, and these slaves may be left in Arabia and become definitely slaves there. Not a great deal can be said about this matter, because the Committee are so hampered, as previous speakers have said, in getting at the facts. That is another reason for their having more powers. But something has been done to deal with this very problem. I am glad to see that Great Britain in various territories over which she has control has encouraged a system of transports. A list of those travelling has been sent, I think, to the British Legation in Arabia so that the matter can be checked, and it may be seen whether the people come back or not. One Government actually sends an officer who accompanies the ships and then waits until the last ship has returned to cheek the whole position. That seems to be a very excellent plan. There are other ways in which something can be done to deal with this evil in so far as it exists. In this matter of the pilgrims, the Committee should have more powers to get

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information. If they have more powers to get information it would be possible to do more in this and other respects to remedy the evils to which attention has been drawn by my noble friend this afternoon.
LORD STRICKLAND: My Lords, I rise to offer a personal explanation. I have not advocated slavery. I have respectfully submitted that there are some who wish to suppress it by greater evils, evils more repugnant to the natural law, to the Decalogue, anti to the precepts of Christianity.
THE UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS (EARL STANHOPE): My Lords, no one who has to speak from this box on behalf of the Foreign Office ever welcomes a debate, but I think I can, at any rate, say that the debate which we have bad this afternoon is one which I welcome far more than any other I can remember. It is quite true that several of your Lordships have trodden on dangerous ground, and perhaps have not fully realised how widely your words would be read and followed in many parts of the world. I was glad indeed that the most reverend Primate was good enough to remind us of the difficulties with which we are faced at this moment, and how serious they really are. I think every member of your Lordships' House is agreed that this is not a Party matter, far less a Party matter even than foreign affairs. It is the general rule with regard to foreign affairs that we agree with the policy of successive Governments although we sometimes criticise the methods by which that policy is pursued. In this case think every one of your Lordships has emphasised the work done by successive British Governments, and now being carried on by His Majesty's Government at the present moment.
I was glad indeed that my noble friend Lord Cecil of Chelwood, who has had to leave the House to attend a Committee, emphasised the great work which has been done by this country over a long period of years and drew attention to the fact, which was also mentioned by the noble Lord who introduced the debate, that there would have been no Committee for Slavery, and no Report before us to-day, had it not been for the action of successive British Governments. I should like, too, to support what
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was said in thanking Sir George Maxwell for the admirable Report which he made on the mui-tsai system which appears as a final appendix of this Report. I think we were extremely lucky to have got someone with such wide experience in Malaya and elsewhere to become a member of the Permanent Committee. One more word of commendation perhaps might be allowed, and that is upon the work being done by His Majesty's sloops in the Red Sea. Thirty-eight thousand miles, which was not, I think, done in one year as the most reverend Primate thought, but in three years, is none the less a tremendous performance, and when we, who sometimes are inclined to complain of the heat of the weather in this country, think of what the Red Sea is at this time of year in a small vessel, I think we will realise that the officers and men of His Majesty's Navy are doing strenuous work in covering that distance.
I am not going to pretend that the work which they are doing in the Red Sea has definitely brought the slave trade to an end, but what I think it has done is to reduce it from a big stream to a trickle. I think it is true that dhows may slip across during the hours of darkness, and, of course, as only a few of our ships cover this very wide area, there is always a chance of some of these dhows slipping through. But even taking the cases that have been quoted, apart from that given by Lord Arnold who talked of a dhow filled with people, the fact that there are dhows with one or two natives on board who may be slaves is obviously a very different story to the story that used to be told in old days when dhows were constantly crossing crammed with individuals going to be sold as slaves. As your Lordships are aware, the Report of the Slavery Committee was only signed on the 10th of April, and was submitted to the Council of the League of Nations by the Minister for League of Nations Affairs, my right honourable friend Mr. Eden, on the 22nd of May. There has not been a great deal of time therefore to get in touch with authorities all over the world to see what action should be taken, but the idea of a Convention with the Powers round the Red Sea is a matter which is receiving consideration at the present moment.
Your Lordships will note that the Council of the League, at its meeting on

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May 22, gave full effect to the conclusions of the Committee. If your Lordships have looked at the report of the proceedings, you will have seen that my right honourable friend drew attention strongly to the lack of evidence which was received from various Governments, and proposed a Resolution to the effect, first of all, that those who had not acceded to the Slavery Convention should do so at the earliest possible moment, and that those who had acceded but had not ratified, should also do so at an early date. Then the Resolution went on, in paragraph 7 (e), to say:
"Trusts that the Governments will continue to supply full and precise information on the basis of Article 7 of the Convention and of the various resolutions of the Assembly."
Paragraph (f) was as follows:
"Requests the Governments concerned to be good enough to note the suggestions put forward in the Advisory Committee's Report, in conformity with Article 16, paragraph 1, of the Committee's rules of procedure, for obtaining such further light as the Committee has deemed desirable on points arising in the documents supplied by those Governments."
Several of your Lordships have drawn attention to the rules of procedure of the Committee. That, as I must point out, is a matter for the Committee itself. My noble friend Lord Cecil, I think, thought that we should have to get unanimity at the Assembly before these rules could be changed. As I understand it, the terms of reference were drawn up by the Assembly, but the rules were made by the Committee on Slavery itself, and, therefore, it appears to be a matter for the Committee on Slavery to make a recommendation saying that they wish to alter their rules in such and such a manner and to make that recommendation to the Council. I need hardly say that if the Committee decide to take such action His Majesty's Government will give them every possible support, because they are anxious to increase the influence and power of this Committee to the utmost possible extent. As your Lordships will see, it is not a matter upon which we can, first of all, take the initiative, because it is one that the Committee must themselves start; then we can give them our support. I can definitely tell your Lordships that we are anxious to give the fullest possible support to the work of this Committee. If they make a recommendation we shall do our best to use all our influence to
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get it received and, I hope, accepted by the Council.
So far as we ourselves are concerned, I think we have always forwarded any evidence that we have received which we think is suitable—when I say "suitable" I mean reliable—whether it is in accordance with our views or whether it is not. For instance—I am not suggesting that we disagree with them—any reports and recommendations which are made by the Anti-slavery and Aborigines Protection Society are always forwarded to the Committee. I understand that so far as we are concerned we by no means rely only on official evidence, but we are only too ready to send any evidence which we think will be valuable to the Committee. I think your Lordships have noted that in this Report of 92 pages no less than 70 pages are taken up with matters which were communicated by either His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom or other parts of His Majesty's Dominions. Your Lordships will therefore see that this country is maintaining the lead and the share that it has always taken in the attempts throughout the past hundred years to abolish slavery. The lack of information which is due to the non-communication of information by other foreign countries of the world causes this Report to be little more than a preliminary Report, and the Committee say that they are not yet in a position to decide exactly how far they can be of value until they get more information and see how that information can be used. That appears in the preliminary note to the Report. It is obvious that the small amount of documentary material has definitely limited the work of the Committee in the past.
As regards the more frequent meeting of the Committee, my right honourable friend the Minister for League of Nations Affairs himself recommended at this meeting that there should be a special meeting of the Committee on Slavery next year, and this will come up for consideration before the Assembly at its meeting in September next in order that financial provision shall be proposed for the meeting of that Committee. As the Committee at present is to meet every alternate year, that will mean that, subject to the approval of the

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next two years, we shall get what is equivalent to an annual meeting. At the end of that period, or before no doubt, the Committee will be in a position to consider whether they can do useful work by meeting annually, or, indeed, even more than once a year; but it will depend how information comes in. It is obvious that it would be of very little use if the Committee were to meet and have no reports from the countries on which they could make recommendations. I am not sure that I would quite agree with the noble Lord, Lord Noel-Buxton, in saying that slavery is as widespread as he intimated to the House So far as I have been able to gather, slavery exists in various forms in many parts of the world, but it is being reduced and slavery as we used to understand it is very much less than it was, although there are a good many cases of systems analogous to slavery. At any rate the purchase aril sale of slaves and the slave trade are, I am glad to think, steadily getting better thanks to action taken in various parts of the world.
Both the noble Lord and the most reverend Primate referred to the mui-tsai system in China. It is quite true that the officials of Hong-kong viewed the proposals put forward by His Majesty's Government with considerable dismay, and thought they would lead to a number of difficulties which in fact have not eventuated. But it is fair to say that one of the predictions they made turned out to be true. They said that as the distance from Hong-kong to the mainland was so small there would be a considerable traffic and it would be difficult to keep in touch with the mui-tsai girls. The last report is that the addresses of 754 of these girls were unknown, so that registration was not quite so easy as would appear on the surface and it was difficult to keep in touch with these girls. That is even more the case when you get to the international settlements on the mainland. I need hardly say that the Government will take what action seems possible to see that the method adopted at Hong-kong shall be brought before the International Treaty Ports for adoption by their municipalities if we can manage to persuade them to do so, but it will nut be easy in view of the widespread nature of the system throughout the whole of China.
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I think the noble Lord behind me was right when he said that it is not advisable to press these things too fast. The report of Sir George Maxwell in fact rather suggests that when these proposals were brought forward at Hong-kong for the registration of the mui-tsai girls a good many of the owners were frightened into thinking that some drastic action was going to be taken against them. They were rather inclined, therefore, to hide these girls and not to give the information required. When it was found that we were going to behave in a perfectly reasonable way, that all we wanted was to know where the girls were and to see that they were properly treated and looked after as they should be, then the owners came forward and registered their names freely. Sir George Maxwell suggests that when similar procedure is brought in elsewhere in China and in Malaya it might be desirable to give more time so that the owners of mui-tsai girls may discover what is intended and not be frightened into opposition. We want to educate them to our views and not send them into opposition, which makes the task of looking after these girls, and others in similar conditions, so much more difficult.
The noble Lord, Lord Arnold, asked me under what treaty we stop slave trading. I am afraid I cannot give him that information off-hand. I should imagine that a good deal depends on custom. We have for such a long period of years taken to ourselves the duty of performing this service both in the Arabian Sea and the Persian Gulf that I think nobody now is inclined to dispute it, unless we get right up against the Persian coast and interfere with Persian vessels. Even there I understand the Shah and others feel in accord with us in trying to suppress this traffic. There was a case in which a dhow was engaged in the slave trade and we dealt with the owner and publicly burned the dhow. I doubt whether there is provision for that in any treaty. It was probably the most effective method, though I do not suggest that it is a method we are going to adopt in all parts of the world. It does, however, show that we take drastic action whenever we find a suitable case. I think there is very little I can add in the way of definite information to what I have already stated. I am most grateful

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to the noble Lord for having brought the matter forward, and I hope he will recognise that the Government, no less than their predecessors, are going to give their utmost support to the suppression of slavery in all forms and are going to support the Committee at Geneva.
LORD NOEL-BUXTON: My Lords, I desire warmly to thank the noble Earl. Before I go further perhaps I might be allowed briefly to reply, to the question put to me as to how the trade succeeds in passing through European Colonies. Apart from other reasons there is a very evident geographical reason—the coast line is of immense length, extremely broken, and has a peculiar feature unknown in Europe of coral reefs along a great part of it. A small dhow, perhaps twenty feet in length, can pass into an immense number of small harbours, and it is extremely difficult to control such dhows without a very large number of reliable officials of the country concerned. I am sure we are all greatly obliged to the noble Earl for the sympathetic reply he has given, and I would repeat how much all of us concerned about the question feel indebted to His Majesty's Government and to previous Governments and to the Foreign Office for the great activity they have shown in this matter. I am glad to know that the noble Earl is in favour of burning dhows that may be concerned with the slave trade.
He has given a lead to the Advisory Committee that it should ask for further powers in regard to obtaining information. I understand that a certain amount of hesitation was felt by the members of the Committee in regard to making that proposal themselves, but what the noble Earl has said ought to be an encouragement to the Committee to ask for further powers. I am quite sure that we may take it that His Majesty's Government will instruct their delegates to take any opportunity of putting forward proposals particularly because of what the noble Earl has himself said in regard to frequency of meetings. He said the need for meetings would depend on the information for them to deal with, but unless there are further powers for obtaining information the information will not be there. I am sure he will be good enough to bear that in mind. We all know that if His Majesty's Government will press for-
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ward this cause, they will be contributing to the alleviation of human suffering on a vast scale. I thank the noble Earl very warmly on behalf of us all, and I beg to withdraw my Motion.
Motion for Papers, by leave, with drawn.

IMPERIAL AND COLONIAL DEVELOPMENT.
THE EARL OF MANSFIELD THE EARL OF MANSFIELD had given Notice that he would draw attention to the lack of any policy on the part of His Majesty's Government for Imperial and Colonial development, and of any long-term proposals for the permanent reduction of unemployment in this country, by a scheme of properly organised settlement overseas, in co-operation with His Majesty's Governments in the Dominions; and move for Papers.
The noble Earl said: My Lords, if there were anything beyond the importance of the question itself which would justify my raising it to-day in your Lordships' House, it is the result of the by-election which has been declared in today's papers. The result of that by-election is yet another proof that it is quite useless to expect a democratic electorate to remember past benefits; one can only expect them to look to what they are promised in the future. Had the Government received at this by-election the just results of all the good work they have done during the past three and a half years, there is no doubt that their candidate would have been returned with a triumphant majority. It is quite obvious that the solution for all our problems put forward by noble Lords on the Socialist Benches entirely failed to appeal to the electorate, but unfortunately it was obvious also that a great many of them, while not attracted by Socialist nostra, were still of opinion that the Government have not to-day a programme for the future sufficiently attractive to enlist their suffrages at the moment.
It is not my intention to make an attack on the Government. I am a supporter of the Government and I fully recognise all the great and good work which they have done since they were returned to office. But I have never taken the view, either since I became a member of your Lordships' House or when I was a member of

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another place, that it was an act of heresy to criticise the National Government. I will remind them and your Lordships that "whoso loveth his child chasteneth him" and I hope that the Government will accept my quasi-paternal correction in the friendly spirit in which it is offered!
In dealing with the problem of unemployment, which is one which has utterly defeated every Government in this country since the War, there are three orthodox views. The first is the one of the ultra-pessimist who maintains that you must expect to see, as a natural part of our social system in the future, the permanent presence of a large number of unemployed, very likely stabilised round the present greatly seduced, but still deplorable, figure of 2,000,000. That type of person shrugs his shoulders and seems to think that we have to accept that, and that it is not worth while to do anything really serious about it. For such a person, I think, no one ought to have anything other than unlimited contempt, because that anyone should contemplate that. 2,000,000 of our wage-earners And their dependants should remain in a state, not of absolute destitution but very often of some destitution and malnutrition, is to me a sin Against the Holy Ghost.
Now we come to the second set of theories. These are mainly to be found in those who support, in fact or in theory, Mr. Lloyd George. There is a cartoon in one of the great daily papers to-day which shows Mr. Lloyd George, in the garb of a clergyman, about to perform a marriage between a very fat woman representing Idle Capital and a very thin man representing Idle Labour. The idea is a magnificent one, but I am afraid that in this particular case the marriage is not likely to be legal, for the clergyman performing it has certainly long since been proved to have been politically unfrocked. At the same time the idea is a right one, to join idle money and idle labour. But, my Lords, those who claim—and they, I believe, include most members of the Socialist Party—that we can overcome our unemployment difficulty merely by indulging in vast quantities of public works are, I am certain, committing a very grave error.
Mr. Lloyd George, I understand, wants to raise some £250,000,000 for the purpose of carrying out a grandiose scheme. Formerly it was always supposed, and
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accurately, that for every £1,000,000 you provided 4,000 man-years. That is to say, Mr. Lloyd George, if all his plans produced that result—and it is very doubtful whether at the present time they would—might produce work for 1,000,000 men for one year, or, of course, equally for half a million men for two years, or whatever proportion it worked out at. But when Mr. Lloyd George's schemes had been tried, what would the result of them be? They would merely mean that an enormous expenditure had been undertaken, that men had been given work for a limited time, but that when that work was finished we should have very little permanent employment to show for it And should merely have burdened our country with a much greater load of debt. Public works in the past, upon a system like that, have been proved to be a failure. Public works in the future will, I see no reason to suppose, be anything less of a failure than in the past.
Now we come to the third school of the orthodox politicians, and that, I think I may say without offence, is more or less the school represented by His Majesty's Government. That school maintains that as a result of the admittedly admirable measures undertaken by the present Government, especially in protecting the trade and industry of this country by tariffs against unfair competition; and by the negotiation of the Ottawa Agreements, which although not perfect, have nevertheless done a very great deal for the trade of this country with our Dominions; and by what they hope will be the return to prosperity of the rest of the world, we shall be able in due course to assimilate the greater portion of those who are at present; unemployed. That is a very pleasant theory, but unfortunately I cannot see very much which in point of fact renders it likely to be a complete success. I propose as briefly as possible to give your Lordships one or two reasons why I hold that belief.
There are, in our great staple industries to-day, a very large number of unemployed. In the coal-mining trade the average number for the last year, ending at the end of last month, is, I believe, That is 264,000 unemployed 264,000 unemployed on an average throughout Great Britain for the last year. What hope have those men of ever regaining their own occupation in the pits? I am afraid that they have very little hope, because, so far from

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there being a great increase in the consumption of coal in the future, it is quite likely that there will be a decrease. How have we lost our markets up-to-date, the markets abroad upon which perhaps one-third of our trade used to depend? We have lost them through unfortunate trade disputes, especially the stoppage of 1926. The responsibility for that stoppage is not one which has to be considered to-day. All we have to say that it did take place, and with lamentable results. One of the results was that our foreign competitors started developing their mines in a way that they had never thought it worth while to do before, and as a result of cheap labour and new mines they are able to undercut us in many of the markets which we had with justification in the past regarded as particularly our own.
Those markets, many of them, are gone for good. Then we have to remember that the consumption of coal is reduced by the infinitely more effective grates, fires, furnaces and the like which are employed to-day; it is reduced by coal substitutes taking the place of coal, and also to a large extent by the way in which hydroelectric schemes are replacing those in which coal was formerly used. We know also that in very many ships—battleships and mercantile vessels—oil has replaced coal to a very great extent and, although it is possible that some small increase might take place if and when we really get a successful and economical process of distillation of oil from coal, I still do not think that we should be able to have any expectation of absorbing more than a very small number of those colliers who are unemployed to-day.
The position in other industries is very much the same. We have, to-day, in the textile trade, very little short of 160,009 men unemployed, two-thirds of them in the cotton trade, largely as a result of Japanese competition. It is practically impossible to hope to regain the markets where the goods used to be absorbed. So we might continue, but I do not wish to weary your Lordships, through a great many of these staple trades, the heavy engineering, shipbuilding and the like. In shipbuilding, while the gross figures might not be so bad, the percentage of unemployment is something like 45 per cent., which is very high. That brings us to the fact that we have many hundreds of thousands of men in the staple in-
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dustries alone for whom there is little prospect of ever finding work in their own trades again. I submit there is no indication whatsoever that trade abroad, and world-trade generally, can within a measurable distance of time improve to such an extent that we shall be able to recover our former foreign markets, or make new ones in a sufficient degree to absorb more than a fraction of these unemployed workers.
What then is to be the solution? Let us turn from this country for a moment and look at our Dominions. One of the most salient facts is this, that almost entirely to the stopping of emigration from this country since the War do we owe the problem of unemployment. If emigration had continued since the War at the same rate as during the five years before the War, three million additional persons would have emigrated, and instead of our having two million unemployed in this country we should have had a shortage of three-quarters of a million workers, so that the Government would have had to take steps to put an end to emigration for the time being.
We are told that it is useless to try to consider the question of emigration at the present time, for two reasons. Firstly, that people in this country do not wish to emigrate; and secondly, that even if they did the Governments overseas would be unwilling to receive them. Both of those ideas are completely wrong. The political group with whom I am associated, and who are largely represented in both Houses, the Imperial Policy Group, has lately been conducting investigations in practically all the industrial areas of Great Britain, and wherever we have put forward suggestions that there should be a new and modified scheme of assisting emigration to the Dominions, and possibly in some cases to our Colonies, there has been no place from Lancashire to Lanarkshire, or the Eastern Counties to South Wales, where the idea has not met with favour. It is untrue to say that people are unwilling to emigrate, and even to face difficulties and privations at the other end, if they can be sure that they are going to emigrate under a proper system, under which they will be getting a fair chance at the other side.
Then I come to the question of the attitude of the Dominions themselves. A

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few days ago in another place the Dominions Secretary, with that super-suavity which characterises his Parliamentary replies, informed a friend of mine that there was no reason to believe that any one of the Dominions was willing to take our people, and equally that there was no truth in the rumour that other countries were preparing to supply workers to our Dominions, if we were unwilling to do so. Both of those statements are far from being the fact. There is no doubt that what the Dominions objected to, and will continue to object to, is the recurrence of a haphazard system of emigration. In the past we had large numbers of people leaving this country with insufficient capital and insufficient experience, who were in many eases unsuitable for the Dominions. No one can blame the Dominions for one moment for objecting to a renewal of such haphazard emigration; but they are undoubtedly in favour of this scheme of assisted emigration from this country—assisted by the Government to some extent.
I have beside me a large number of resolutions from various municipalities, townships and others all over Canada, expressing the view that that country cannot recover her prosperity until she gets more British settlers. It may seem a paradox, but most far-seeing Canadian politicians are convinced that Canada will not be able to absorb her present unemployed until she gets more settlers. So far from Canada and her leaders being unwilling to absorb people from this country, it is the definite objective of Canada to double her present population of 10,000,000 in the shortest possible time. Mr. Mackenzie King has definitely stated that her ideal is a population of 80000,000, which she can support. There are various schemes which have been thought out so far as Canada is concerned. One there is, that of General Hornby, which aims al; bringing out numbers of people to work ground which is more or less already cultivated, and these schemes have the approval of practically every section of opinion in Canada, except a section of unorganised labour and of certain farmers. It was suggested by a certain Canadian Member of Parliament that any such scheme was absolutely visionary. For this statement he was taken to task severely by the leading Conservative newspaper in Canada, which asked him
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if he had never observed the words over the door of the Canadian Parliament House, which are: "Where there is no vision the people perish." That is the text of my sermon this evening. Mr. Mackenzie King and the leaders in Canada have vision. They recognise that it is impossible for Canada to recover unless she gets more men, and therefore they are willing to assent to any sound scheme of emigration.
Again, it is sometimes said that Canada cannot take any mere men because should she increase her production she would be unable to increase her consumption in equal measure. Chat argument again falls down. Consider what is the present position with regard to the home consumption of Canadian products. Apart from wheat, which is a special subject, Canada consumes 96 per cent, of her own beef; 94 per cent, of her own oats; 95 per cent, of her own pork and bacon; and 99 per cent, of her own mutton and lamb. This, too, at a time when there is great unemployment in Canada, and when Canadian people are not, many of them, in a financial position to buy as much meat as they desire. It is quite obvious that a very small rise in the standard of living in Canada would more than absorb what surplus there is. Canadians maintain that only by getting new and properly financed schemes of settlement will Canada be able to get the standard of living raised, so as to absorb the surplus, and not merely recover the standard which she had in the past, but even to exceed it. The two great railway systems in Canada are enthusiastically in favour of emigration. Everyone in Canada is in favour of it. There is practically no responsible man in Canada, to-day, who would venture to say he was not in favour of a scheme properly drawn up.
Then there is the question of Australia. It is true that there have been failures there, but Western Australia has proclaimed that, if given an opportunity, she alone could settle 5,000,000 men in fifteen years. Those figures are, I fear, outside practical politics. But it is sufficient to say, first, that there is a belief in Western Australia in the practically unlimited resources of that State, and, secondly, that there is no objection whatever in Western Australia—or I believe in any other part of the Australian Com

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monwealth—to properly run schemes of emigration.
Various people have been considering these schemes. I have already mentioned those of General Hornby and of the Committee presided over by that great Imperialist, Sir Henry Page Croft. Sir Henry Page Croft's Committee considers that roughly it costs £800 to put a, family of four into a decent economic position in the Empire. If one works that out and if one sees what can be done with a loan of, say, £250,000,000, it is obvious—if those figures are correct, and they have never been successfully challenged—that we shall be able eventually to establish 1,000,000 of our citizens overseas. And when one considers that those people would themselves either be drawn from the unemployed, or else would leave vacancies for the unemployed to fill up, it is obvious that there would be a very great saving indeed to this country in unemployment benefit alone. Let us take the interest on that £250,000,000 at something like 3 per cent. That would cost £7,500,000 per year. But if the figures were worked out, it would be found that we should save over £16,000,000 against the expenditure of £7,500,000, a margin sufficient to provide for an ample sinking fund, even if the figures I have given are on a somewhat optimistic scale, which there is no reason to suppose.
I have pointed out to your Lordships that I have not brought this Motion forward with the idea of suggesting that the Dominions should be the dumping ground for our surplus population. Nothing is further from my thought, and it is quite obvious that the Dominions themselves would not consent to any such scheme, even if we were foolish and inconsiderate enough to attempt to force it upon them. But they have shown, and shown most definitely, that they are absolutely in favour of a really good scheme of controlled emigration from this country, and that emigration need not be confined to the ranks of those who are unemployed, although, heaven knows, there are plenty of them who would be glad to get out of their present situation. If one takes, for example, the Rhondda Valley, where I was something less than three weeks ago, there you will find unemployment in side valleys, not at the rate of twenty or fifty, but of something approaching one hundred per cent, of the population—men who can never hope to obtain em-
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ployment again because the mines at which they have worked are completely worked out, from which every man who could get a job in other parts of Wales has hastily departed, and where there are men who have not the slightest opportunity of ever obtaining employment again. We may be quite certain, as I know from personal experience, that they would be only too eager to accept a really good scheme of emigration, and especially as we hear to-day that the situation in South Wales is likely to become even worse in the near future by the removal of the tinplate industry to Lincolnshire.
What is the result of all this? What, after all this criticism, if I may so call it, do I suggest that His Majesty's Government should do? We cannot expect that very much that is definite can be undertaken until after the next General Election, but I suggest that it would be well for His Majesty's Government to sound the Prime Ministers of the various Dominions, and some of the Governors of our Colonies, to see whether they would be willing—as I know they would be—to attend an ad hoc Imperial Conference to be held on this point some time during next year. Not merely can we expect Australia and Canada, but I know from his own lips that the Premier of Southern Rhodesia wants 100,000 more settlers in that country. There the position is different, and it would be preferable that those who went out should have a certain amount of capital of their own. But unemployment is not confined to those who are normally called the labouring class. There is a good deal of unemployment among office workers, clerks and the like, and there are many in slightly superior positions in life who are finding it extremely difficult to obtain employment, even although they, or their families, may possess a certain amount of capital. For people of this type emigration to Southern Rhodesia would be suitable.
There is no doubt—and others with much greater experience than myself agree with me in this—that unless we set up some form of emigration again, we can never hope to overcome the difficulties of unemployment. That is why I ask the Government to approach the various Dominion Prime Ministers and all those who are likely to be of assistance, to sound them as to whether they

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will attend this Conference, the Conference to be followed up by the setting up of a permanent Imperial Commission to superintend the details of emigration. I have not attempted to give details today; first, because I am not qualified to do so; and secondly, because in dealing with a scheme as great as this it is always a mistake to go into details before you have the principle worked out. All I have tried to do is to point out ways whereby I believe we can definitely and for the first time since the War make a real hole in unemployment. I suggest to the Government that by the adoption of a long-range policy such as I have sketched, they will be not merely going a very long way towards solving our difficulties, but they will completely rehabilitate themselves with the people of this country, who are by no means anxious to see a Socialist Government, and, at the same time, would like to see a. definite and considerably more constructive policy, especially as regards this Empire, than we have at the present time. I conclude with the words that I used before, words which I think ought to be engraved on the hearts of every one who has the interests of his country and the Empire at heart—"Where there is no vision the people perish."
THE EARL OF IDDESLEIGH: My Lords, the noble Earl commenced his speech by saying that he had no intention of making an attack on His Majesty's Government. It is just as well that we had that assurance, for he has put upon the Paper what certainly amounts to a Vote of Censure on the Government. He draws our attention to the lack of any policy on the part of His Majesty's Government for Imperial and Colonial development. If there were one subject which all Parties would admit to be of the greatest importance it is this very question of Imperial and Colonial development, and a Government that had no policy on so vastly important a subject would certainly not deserve to retain the confidence of this House. If the noble Earl had deplored the lack of success which had attended the efforts of His Majesty's Government in this sphere, he might have hoped to command a wider measure of agreement. I do not suppose that the noble Earl who is to answer for the Government will claim that in the matter of emigration His Majesty's Government, has been very strikingly successful, and I sup-
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pose that the noble Earl will point out the enormous difficulties that, have stood in their way. But when we see on the Paper a Motion which practically amounts to a Vote of Censure, we surely expect to have some very convincing and particularised facts pot before us.
We would not readily accept such a Motion, and we should not be asked to accept such a Motion, unless the noble Earl is prepared to show us exactly, or fairly exactly, what the Government might have done, and exactly how they have failed to do it. We should surely hear something of the opportunities that were theirs, and something of their failure to seize those opportunities. I am afraid we must admit that in the speech of the noble Earl we have not had any very definite or very valuable information upon the actual facts of the situation as far as emigration is concerned. We have heard, for example, some economic fallacies which certainly surprise me, coming from a representative of so well-informed a group as the Imperial Policy Group. For instance, it has been suggested by the noble Earl that if emigration had continued on the pre-War scale we should have had no unemployment problem. Surely it is not necessary for anyone to instruct a member of the imperial Policy Group in the elements of economics, or to inform him that unemployment is caused by dislocation between consumption and supply, and that it is comparatively little affected by the population of the country concerned? Surely the noble Earl does not imagine that if you were in quite a, short time to eliminate the present 2,000,000 of unemployed from this country, there would remain no unemployment problem? Of course the unemployment problem would probably assume an even more critical character because so many more consumers would have been taken away.
Then we heard a great deal from the noble Earl about Canadian opinion in the matter. The noble Earl was not able to quote any official Canadian opinion, but he did quote Mr. Mackenzie King, the Leader of the Opposition in Canada, and he spoke of the number of resolutions that had been passed in Canada. But the answer that you get from Canada must depend entirely on the way in which this question is put. I imagine the question that was put was: "Will you

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welcome what I describe as a properly-assisted form of immigration—in other words, if we are prepared to buy large tracts of land in Canada, bring over our settlers, spend money on the development of those tracts, and keep the settlers alive during a number of years, in fact be responsible for them, would you in that case welcome increased immigration? "I suspect that the question put to the Canadian public was expressed very much in those terms, and if you express it in these terms you will get a very favourable answer indeed. It must have occurred to your LordShips that if His Majesty's Government are to spend large sums of money in rendering habitable and in developing large tracts of land in Canada, and in settling unemployed from this country in Canada, they might at least consider whether the same sums could not be with greater advantage expended in developing this country. In fact, I do not know that I see very much difference between the policy which the noble Earl is prepared to advocate and that policy of public works which he declared to be a grave error. There is not so very much difference between spending vast sums of money in order to gain employment for our workers in Canada and spending large sums of money with the same object in this country.
In point of fact, it is not correct to maintain that the return on money expended in the Dominions would necessarily be very much greater than the return on money expended in this country. There are in Australia comparatively few districts that are now ripe for development, or, rather, which would be ripe for development if the primary products which can be obtained from these districts could be cultivated on a more economic basis. It is altogether a mistake to look upon Australia as an empty land in the sense that European settlers have only to go there with a little capital supplied by the Government to make an instant success of farming. There is still a world glut of many primary commodities which they would be producing, and it is very little use settling people on the land until the economic position of the world is considerably improved in that respect. I will not take up much more of your Lordships' time on this question, but there is one matter on which I cannot forbear to comment. That
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is with regard to the statement of the noble Earl that the railways in Canada have expressed themselves strongly in favour of a planned and properly assisted system of immigration. The railways in Canada own most of the land on which the settlers would be put, and it is purely a case in which special interests are involved. There is, at least, every temptation for the Canadian railways to take an optimistic and rosy view of the chances of settlers coming on to their land.
I am afraid that in these debates on emigration I generally have to assume a pessimistic rôle. I do so because I am quite convinced that schemes of emigration promoted at enormous expense, as they would have to be, in the long run cannot flourish because they are naturally unhealthy at birth. I very much trust that His Majesty's Government will not pursue too active a policy in this matter at present, because it would be very likely to prejudice the possibilities of large and successful emigration at a time when the world economic situation has improved. We have to remember that every unsuccessful emigrant, every emigrant who is sent out and only kept alive by "doles" from this country, or every emigrant who, attempting to farm in a new country, fails and returns to England, has enormous influence in deterring other people from emigrating. I believe that a few more unsuccessful emigration schemes—and, after all, we have seen some emigration schemes which were far from effective—will go far to prejudice permanently our people against the whole idea of emigration. That would, of course, be in every way the greatest possible calamity, because when, as we may reasonably hope, in a few years the price of primary commodities improves, I believe there will be every possibility for large and successful emigration from this country, or, as I prefer to call it, Empire settlement. It is a matter which it would be very unwise for us to prejudice by hasty and ill-conceived schemes which, at the best, would involve us in very large expenditure, and, at the worst, might do permanent injury to the cause which both the noble Earl and I have at heart.
LORD PONSONBY OF SHULBREDE: My Lords, I only intervene for a few moments, because it has fallen to my lot in years past to reply to speeches such as that made by the noble Earl who

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initiated this debate, speeches which seem to imply that there is an easy and ready solution for the question of unemployment in Empire settlement. It does always sound very plausible to those who have not very closely examined the matter that the vast territories of our Dominions would seem ready to receive the crowded population of our own islands, that the great continent of Australia, with a. population very little bigger than that of Greater London, would seem to be able to absorb the hundreds of thousands of our unemployed. It is not quite so easy as all that, and I think those who have devoted a good deal of time and attention to it will see the underlying fallacy of supposing that you can ship a population from a crowded area into territories where there is room for them. There is a great deal more in it than that.
The noble Earl who initiated this debate seemed to be unaware that there is a Government Department, the Overseas Settlement Department, devoting its time and energies to the examination of this question. He spoke very glibly of the willingness of the Dominions to receive numbers of our unemployed. He may have heard of certain interests in the Dominions, such as those spoken of by the noble Earl who has just sat down, who would like to see British emigrants, but I do not think he was speaking on behalf of the Dominion Governments. The Dominion representatives when they have been over here have had many an opportunity of consulting with representatives of successive Governments in this country with regard to this question, which naturally exercises their attention, and has exercised the attention of successive Governments in this country. But the solution is not so easy.
To begin with, what is involved in this transfer of population? You prejudice the whole case to begin with by talking of it as a solution for unemployment. If that is placed in the forefront as a reason for Empire emigration, as it was by the noble Earl, then the Dominions are suspicious at once. The Dominions think that you are going to ship out the unemployable who are not wanted in this country, and that puts them on their guard. You have first of all to find out whether your emigrants are willing to go. The noble Earl said lie had conic across in various parts of the country a
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number of people who were willing to go. I do not know that that was my experience some years ago when I tested meetings in industrial areas as to whether people were willing to go to the Dominions. A suspicion on their side was at once aroused that the Government of this country thought that the best way of getting rid of the unemployed was to ship them off elsewhere. That produced a feeling of resentment, which is very easily aroused among the workless in this country.
Having got the willingness of the emigrant to go, you have got to get the willingness of the Governments of the Dominions to receive him. You have got to get a scheme which will be satisfactory. The noble Earl who has just resumed his seat has said that we have had the experience of many schemes that have been unsatisfactory. But that has not been the fault of the Government officials in this country who have done their best to guide and to construct schemes which they hope may eventually be successful. Having got a scheme, you have got to secure the maintenance of your emigrant; you have got to see him over the trial period; you have got to see that he has money in his pocket and is not put on the scrap heap in the particular Dominion to which he has gone. You have got to see that he is cared for. In many cases you have got to train him before he goes out. This complex matter is one which naturally engages the attention of successive Governments. It is futile whether in this House or in another place or in the country for anyone to get up and say: "Here is an easy solution of unemployment; you have so many millions of unemployed; you have room for so many millions overseas; just ship them over." People keep on doing that.
I fully admit that the noble Earl said that the schemes must be properly drawn up. Every imaginable society is anxious to help. A lot of voluntary institutions have their own schemes which they subsidise and which the Government help, and there is a flow going on, under carefully thought out schemes, of emigrants from this country to the Dominions. The time may come when circumstances will allow the Dominion Governments to receive more, and, if there is a sufficient number in this country willing to go, they will be helped to go. This must

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be a natural flux and not an artificially stimulated political move. I have intervened, not to go into all the questions about the cures for unemployment which the noble Earl discussed, but just to warn him that his short-cut is not one which any responsible Government in this country could possibly adopt.
LORD ROCKLEY: My Lords, I have long taken an interest in the subject matter of this Motion and would like, therefore, to address to your Lordships a few remarks upon it. I always welcome a Motion directing attention to this matter, because I think it is one of really great importance. Empire settlement is a matter of which we can never lose sight. The more continuous attention we direct to it the better it will be for its ultimate solution. The noble Earl who has moved the Motion has given us a very full description of many of the facts which have hitherto appertained to it. He also said that he was addressing them to the Government from a quasi-paternal point of view. I could not help feeling that lie is delightfully and fortunately young to adopt that attitude so soon in his life, but, while much of what he has said deserves very careful consideration, I do not altogether feel able to endorse some of his rather dogmatic statements; for instance, when he told us that the scheme of General Hornby in Canada was very widely accepted; I gathered practically unanimously. I venture to question that in spite of its having many merits. I am not by any means so sure myself. I have seen the scheme and it involves enormous expenditure on Government guarantee, and, while having an excellent object in view, is probably not feasible at the present moment.
I want to say another thing at the outset which strikes me about this Motion. The noble Earl has drawn attention to the question of Imperial and Colonial development and in the same breath talked about a permanent reduction of unemployment in this country. I entirely agree with what the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, said, that, these two matters ought not to be, and cannot be, treated together. It is an annoyance in some of the overseas Dominions, as I personally know, when these subjects are put side by side as though the Dominions were merely a dumping ground for our surplus population. They do not like it. They therefore would not be impressed by a Motion
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framed in these words, although both the problems independently need careful treatment and attention. They are not connected with, and ought not to be connected with, each other, and I want to make that as clear as I possibly can. Then, when it is suggested that there is a lack of policy on the part of His Majesty's Government, I am not so sure. For myself I should say the proper policy is one of active watchfulness, and there is no lack of watchfulness. Whether this is exactly the moment to bring forward a motion for active movement, is to my mind a very debatable question. Certainly the overseas Dominions have not shown a desire for it. In Australia the tendency of public opinion is rather the reverse. In Canada we know there are many economic and other difficulties which make a very large expenditure of money on this matter at the present time vary problematical.
There is a good deal to be said on those lines, to whatever country you may refer. On the other hand, I think this is a very useful time for carefully considering what can be done in the future. How is it best to assist the individual migrant? It may be very helpful to work out some more careful system of community settlement by which migrants can be selected and the Governments both of this country and overseas can exercise a general supervision over them. You may encourage mixed farming—milk and chickens as well as wheat—so that if the price of wheat falls, the situation will not be desperate. Many other suggestions can be made, and I dare say an Imperial Committee might help to make them. But I am quite sure that to vote at this moment an enormous sum of money to carry out general schemes of this kind is not really the most diplomatic road to success in the long run. I think in General Hornby's scheme that he would buy fifteen thousand acres of land in many places in Canada or elsewhere—I am not quite sure who was to pay, but I rather gathered it would be the British Government. Any financial suggestion of that kind requires very much consideration and expert knowledge and opinion. The Government can continually consult with overseas Dominions how best to promote and finance a sound scheme at the right opportunity, and indeed mutually to finance it generously, but I do not think that at this moment any

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Government in this country can wisely do more.
LORD STRICKLAND: My Lords, not because I am young, but for another reason, because I have spent a great part of my life in three Australian States, I think it would be a dereliction of duty on, my part not to give my experience with brevity. The reason why emigration cannot be on the same standard to-day as before the War is that the standard of living has increased very largely in Australia and elsewhere since the War. That is a very cogent reason. There is doubt as to whether, in Australia, immigration is wanted. Immigration of artisans is not wanted. Immigration of agricultural labourers and of people who will go on the farms and stop on the farms may, or may not, be welcomed but certainly is not opposed. The immigrant who goes on the farm produces cheaper food for the artisan in the towns, who commands the political machine, and knows where his interests lie. His interests do not lie in encouraging immigration of a class that can compete with him, but they do lie in the immigration of others who will supply his factories with customers.
I do not criticise the Government for their emigration policy. They have done a great deal by not doing too much. I praise them for that; and I should like them to continue, not trying to do too much but trying to discover by experiment where practical administration can be applied. No one since the seals of the Colonial Office were held by Mr. Joseph Chamberlain has done such splendid work as Mr. Amery in regard to emigration, but Mr. Malcolm MacDonald has also done first-class work. Now that I have said that, some of your Lordships may ask what I would recommend should be done. I say encourage that movement which has been successful, the movement that is called the "Big Brother" movement. Let Government encouragement be given to the system by which, before you send out an emigrant, you find someone on the other side who will be a good brother and help him to make a good start. But let it be clearly understood that that start must be made by people who will go on the land and remain on the land and not go for the attractions of high wages and more pleasure in the cities.
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Let there be no delusion that the Government official who has got into his job by a competitive examination is going to, be a successful member of an organisation for the mass settlement of farmers or even for the settlement of single farmers. The training of civil servants precludes them from understanding what farming requires and what farming means. Let there also be a development of a system of advancing money upon collective security so that two or three may share each other's indebtedness, in the hope that some day they may flourish and the money may come back. That can be done without waiting, and I beg the Government to consider that as a practical step.
THE PARLIAMENTARY UNDERSECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE COLONIES (THE EARL OF PLYMOUTH): My Lords, I do not wish to detain the House for long, in view of the time and of the fact that there is important business still to be dealt with, but nobody can deny that the importance of the problems which have been raised during the course of this debate is very great, and I therefore cannot dismiss them in a few sentences. I do not intend to follow the noble Earl who initiated the debate in his criticism of Mr. Lloyd George's schemes and his analysis of the coal industry and of other depressed industries. The main feature of his speech was that he linked up the position with regard to unemployment in this country with the question of emigration to various parts of the Empire. In dealing with this question he spoke as if there were no liaison whatsoever between His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom and the Governments of the Dominions. That is a complete fallacy. There has for a long time been the closest liaison between the various Governments of the Empire on this question, and we are fully aware of the views of the various Dominion Governments upon the question of migration. Successive Governments in this country have for a great many years fully realised the importance of this question, and as a result of various actions taken by successive Governments between the years 1919 and 1931 a very large number of people—I think it was something like two and a-half million people—migrated from this country to the Dominions and the Empire overseas.

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In those circumstances it is very natural that there should be great disappointment at the fact, that stagnation has come to this Empire emigration movement. It is, of course, perfectly right that we should explore every avenue in order to see whether it cannot, to some extent at any rate, be revived. But it must be realised that the position has in recent years fundamentally altered. In the first place, most assisted emigrants from here to the Dominions become primary producers when they reach the Dominions. Unlike the time before the depression, when I think it is fair to say that there was an almost inexhaustible market for primary products, at the present time there is actually an oversupply of these products in relation to the demand. Then, again, the amount of labour which is required for any particular unit of production has, as a result of the introduction of labour-saving machinery on a large scale, been reduced.
Moreover, and this is perhaps the most important of the changes that have taken place: most Dominion Governments—in fact, I think I may say all Dominion Governments—have at the present time serious unemployment problems of their own, problems which were quite unknown in days before the War but Which have now arisen and have radically altered the situation. In spite of these facts the Government have taken advantage of this period of lull to make an extremely careful examination and investigation into the principles which should underly any policy of assisted migration in the future, and of the best methods of carrying out this policy when economic conditions alter and become favourable. They have, in coming to their conclusions, taken into consideration all relevant facts. They have taken into consideration the experience which was acquired during the years of depression, and the economic causes and effects of that depression. That examination was made by a Committee of which the present Secretary of State for the Colonies was Chairman, and has reported.
What I want to point out, however, is that the Government do not intend to rely solely upon official advice in this matter. That Report has been circulated to the different Governments of the Empire, those which are most chiefly concerned in a matter of this kind, and to a
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number of voluntary, organisations and individuals who have shown an interest in this question and who have experience of migration problems, for their observations. The question has also been very carefully considered, naturally, by the Overseas Settlement Committee. Although there are still a number of replies to come from Dominion Governments, a large number of replies have been received and observations have been made which go to show that the principles and recommendations made in the Report are generally approved and supported.
Briefly speaking, the Committee have taken the view that this question is not an isolated one; it is not a question which can possibly be dealt with as a separate problem. They feel that it is an integral part of the general economic problem which confronts not only the Empire but the whole of the world as well. One view they have expressed, which I think will receive the general approval of all people who have given really full consideration to this subject, is that migration is a symptom of prosperity rather than a cure for depression. As far as we are able to judge from the replies which have been received, that is a view that is acquiesced in by the Governments of those countries to which migration has mainly flowed in the past. Migration can only be carried on with the full approval and co-operation of the overseas Governments. That is an incontestible fact, and nothing could be more harmful than that the impression should become general that the United Kingdom Government wished to make use of migration as a convenient method of ridding themselves of the burden of unemployment. I know that the noble Earl was at pains to point out that he was not arguing that the Dominions should be made a dumping-ground for unemployed. But still, in almost every sentence he uttered he linked the two questions together, and indeed it was perfectly obvious that he was dealing with this particular problem from the point bf view of solving our unemployment difficulties in this country. If it became the general feeling in other parts of the Empire that that view was held here, it would do an infinity of damage.
Then, in the course of his remarks, he was guilty of what I venture to say was a most extraordinary statement, with which the noble Earl who sits behind me, Lord Iddesleigh, dealt: that if we had

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been able to transfer during the past ten years some 2,000,000 more people from this country to the Dominions, we should have no unemployment problem here at all. That seems to me an extraordinary economic proposition, and a very dangerous fallacy indeed. To my mind there is not the slightest doubt that a transfer on that scale would have dislocated, to an enormous extent, the economic structure of the Empire as a whole, and in my view it would, not have tended to decrease our problems but very greatly to aggravate them.
If I may, I would like to quote from the Report of the Committee which dealt with this subject, to show what in their view were the principles that should underlie any system of assisted migration between this country and the Dominions overseas. They say this in their Report:
"The right line of approach to a more desirable redistribution of the white population of the Empire, therefore, is not to endeavour to transfer men and women from the United Kingdom overseas regardless of economic conditions such as the possibility of marketing their produce, and to maintain them there until (if ever) they are in a position to maintain themselves, but to do all that lies in our power to assist in creating the conditions overseas which have in the past provoked and will in the future provoke a large volume of spontaneous migration, and then to see that every obstacle which lies in the way of such migration is removed and that every facility which can increase it is provided."
I do want to emphasise those words. I feel very strongly that any attempt to force the situation with regard to migration is bound to do harm. It would, in my view, jeopardise the possibility of sound future plans being formulated, which may in due time be possible, with a view of once again instituting a flow between this country and the Dominions. It is absolutely essential that people who emigrate must have the, prospect of a remunerative living in the country to which they migrate, and I venture to say that at the present moment those prospects cannot be considered good. For those reasons it is my view, at any rate, that the action which was taken at the Ottawa Conference, and results such as those which were achieved there, which were calculated, and are calculated, to increase the general prosperity of the Empire, are of far more value at the present moment than any number of assisted emigration
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schemes to the Dominions. As I have stated, the principle upon which we should work, as the Committee have already said, is that once there is a spontaneous movement towards the resumption of migration we should not only remove all obstacles but grant every facility which is likely to increase that movement.
With that object in view the Committee have made certain proposals, which I shall not enumerate to your Lordships this evening, devised to achieve that very object; but, as I have said, they do take the view that these measures can only be taken when the position becomes more favourable. The Report of this Committee has received, on the whole, very general approval, but I must admit that there have been a number of criticisms, and the main one is perhaps that to which the noble Earl referred—namely, that the recommendations are not sufficiently far-reaching, and that they do not include any large schemes of group-settlement upon the land.
VISCOUNT ELIBANK: May I ask where that criticism comes from? I am not quite clear. Is it a Government criticism, or a general criticism?
THE EARL OF PLYMOUTH: It is not a Government criticism. It is a criticism which comes from outside the Government, and one which the noble Earl who initiated this discussion made. These questions of group-settlement on a large scale are questions which have to be very carefully examined by experts, and all I want to say at the present moment with regard to them is that there are weighty reasons which can be adduced in favour of the view which the Committee express—namely, that the concentration of assisted migration on land settlements at the present moment would be extremely unwise. As your Lordships know, it has become necessary lately to consider the regulation and even the restriction of production of commodities normally produced by those settling on the land overseas. Therefore, to say the least of it, it is doubtful whether this is a good time to push forward schemes which can only result in considerable additional production of those commodities, and I know that that is a view strongly taken in many of the Dominions. I would, however, make a qualification of that rather general statement which I have made—

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namely, that this question of the reintroduction of group-settlement on any considerable scale must depend upon future economic development in the Empire and the world, and any change which might result in increasing the demand for primary products would undoubtedly alter the whole situation and justify reconsidering the position in consultation with other Governments interested.
I want to conclude by saying that the Government are riot in the least apologetic because they have not taken active steps to stimulate migration in the last three or four years. It certainly is a matter of fact that activity of this kind would have been unwelcome to the Dominions. The noble Earl has said to us that the Dominion Governments—I think he used the words "Dominion Governments"—would welcome the introduction of schemes of properly organised and controlled migration. I do not know exactly what he means by those words. If he means schemes one of the conditions of which is that no charge is at any time to fall upon a Dominion Government in connection with them, I am not in a position to say, but generally speaking, I can assure the House that the view which the noble Earl expressed, that the Dominion Governments would welcome emigration of this kind, is not borne out by the facts as I have been given them.
It is generally agreed that a resumption of movement must depend upon the good will and co-operation of the Dominions. It may be perfectly true, as the noble Earl has said, that there are not only individuals but organisations in the Dominions which have expressed themselves strongly in favour of migration, but I can only repeat what I have said, that no Dominion Government has demanded such resumption of migration, nor has any Dominion Government shown any readiness to acquiesce in a demand on our part. I am perfectly certain that if they did wish for a resumption of migration they would come to us, and I can assure the House that the Government would not, in any way, be slow to take advantage of any opportunities which were forthcoming in that respect. I can only repeat that in my view any activity towards the stimulation of emigration in recent years would have aggravated the situation rather than have alleviated the
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difficulties with which we were faced. I would like to conclude on a more optimistic note; that is, that the Government definitely feel that we are now within sight of better times. Things are improving, though they are improving slowly, and such informal discussions with representatives of overseas Governments as have taken place give reason to hope that it may be possible in the comparatively near future to look to a revival of some emigration. That definitely will not be on a large scale at first, but it will be a beginning, and it may do something at any rate to offset the inward flow which has unfortunately been such a distinguishing feature of the last four years.
THE EARL OF MANSFIELD: My Lords, there are certain points in the debate which I must answer, although I will be as brief as possible. I must protest against the no doubt unwitting injustice which has been done me by the noble Earl, Lord Plymouth, and the noble Lord, Lord Rockley, in suggesting that my whole purpose in initiating this debate has been to find an outlet in the Dominions for surplus British workers. What I was endeavouring to show to your Lordships, albeit apparently unsuccessfully, was that the Dominions require people to populate their open spaces just as much as we require to find work for our unemployed. The Dominions not only must have more people from an economic point of view, they must also have them from a strategic point of view, because other countries are casting envious eyes upon those undeveloped lands, especially in Australia; and, though the Secretary of State for the Dominions denied it in another place not long ago, I have myself since then met and spoken to a German who is endeavouring to organise the sending out to Australia of one hundred thousand Germans. It is evident, and the Dominions appreciate it, that if we do not populate our Empire, other nations will do so in the future. Canada, as I have said, wants to double her population. Australia also wants immigrants, and nothing that the noble Earl has said has in any way refuted, or indeed touched upon, the statements in regard to the economic position of industry in this country with which I began my speech.
As regards the speech of the noble Earl, Lord Iddesleigh, I would remind him,

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when he talks about the reduction of consumption if many people emigrate from this country, that the people who would go would be for the most part those who, having had in the past very small amounts on which to live, have not contributed largely to consumption. As regards the difference between my suggestions and those of Mr. Lloyd George, the difference is that" whereas Mr. Lloyd George's proposals would merely employ a number of men for a short time and pile up a lot of debt at the same time, a proper emigration scheme would mean permanent employment in the Dominions for a vast number of people, and a consequent opening up of new markets for British goods. I must say, without wishing to be offensive or derogatory to the noble Earl, Lord Iddesleigh, that his speech did seem to me to be a magnificent example of laissez faire. He seems to think that everything will cure itself. At the present time there can be no greater fallacy, and no view which it is less helpful to propagate. The noble Lord the Leader of the Opposition said that he found some years ago that a certain section of the people of this country were unwilling to emigrate. Events nowadays change with bewildering rapidity, and a few years ago is not to-day. I think if he repeated his investigations he would find a very different state of affairs. It may be, of course, that the people of whom he spoke did not wish to emigrate, because, being of the same political opinion as the noble Lord, they were waiting for the noble Lord and his Party to provide the bigger and better "doles" which would seem to be their only solution of the problem of unemployment.
As regards the flew of emigration at the present time, to which the noble Lord alluded, I hardly think that 2,400 emigrants from this country to Canada last year can be considered sufficient; and what are we to think of the emigration to Australia—74 in 1933 and 174 in 1934. Before that trickle becomes a flow, some much more drastic action will have to be taken. The noble Earl in his reply for the Government made the most remarkable statement that emigration was a sign of prosperity. I should not have thought that that could be substantiated, especially when one considers what happened in the Ireland of the potato famines. But there has, I submit, been no adequate reply to the contention I
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have put forward, neither have we had an explanation of why the Government are unwilling to come forward and at least support a general official consultation with the leaders of the Dominions. I am afraid that there is a certain lack of enterprise, it may be a certain lack of courage. It may be that certain vested interests, political or other, are hampering them. But I submit that until we have a real argument given in reply to the facts I have stated, until we have some prospect of being able in the future to absorb those hundreds of thousands of unemployed men, miners and others, it is incumbent on the Government to show a little more enterprise than they have done.
I do not wish, of course, to force a Division on my Motion, but I hope that in spite of the discouraging reply of the noble Earl, Lord Plymouth, the Government may take this question a little more to heart, and take steps to make at least the preliminary investigations, which is all I ask, into this great problem. If they do so, they will find, I am convinced, that there is far more good will in the Dominions towards a properly worked out scheme, instituted only with their consent and approval, than they appear to imagine. Let them go forward in this direction, and then let them come back and tell us the result. But in these difficult times I suggest that it is hardly helpful to the solution of our problems when any suggestion of a constructive character that is put forward is received with a pailful of cold water. I beg leave to withdraw the Motion.
Motion for Papers, by leave, withdrawn.

WEIGHTS AND MEASURES BILL. [H.L.]
Amendments reported (according to Order).
Clause 3 [Restrictions on use of vehicles for conveying sand or ballast]
LORD TEMPLE MORE: My Lords, my first two Amendments are drafting.
Amendments moved—
Page 4, line 34, leave out ("by means of") and insert ("in or on")
Page 4, line 42, leave out ("by means of") and insert ("in or on").—(Lord Templemore.)
On Question, Amendments agreed to.
Clause 8 [Marking of bottles for use as measures]:
LORD TEMPLEMORE LORD TEMPLEMORE moved to add to the clause:
"Provided that this section shall not affect the operation of the Weights and Measures Acts, 1878 to 1926, in relation to the use of any bottle as a measure otherwise than for the purpose of a transaction whereby some liquid is sold or supplied in the bottle, or in relation to the possession of any bottle for use as a measure otherwise than for that purpose."
The noble Lord said: My Lords, during the debate on the Committee stage of the Bill I promised to consider a suggestion made by the noble Earl, Lord Courtown, who, I observe, is not in his place. That suggestion, as I understand it, was that the use as measures of bottles marked in accordance with the provisions of the Bill should be legalised for the purpose of selling liquids in these bottles but not for any other purpose. This Amendment has that effect.
Before explaining it, I should like to deal with another point raised in the course of the debate on the Committee stage, which has some bearing on the subject. Several noble Lords expressed a fear that the Bill might have the effect of depriving the consumer of some of the protection which the law now very properly gives to him. This, I am advised, is not the case. In the case of milk, for instance, the protection given under the existing law is furnished by the fact that it is an offence for a dairyman to use, or have in his possession for use, an unstamped measure, or even a stamped measure which he knows to be inaccurate, or knowingly to sell milk which is deficient in measure. Apart from this, the consumer would, of course, have his ordinary rights against the dairyman for breach of contract where less than the stipulated quantity had been supplied. The Bill does not change the position in any way, except that it places the marked bottle on the same footing as a stamped measure, and this is justified by the fact that, when the precautions provided by the Bill are taken, the risk of a marked bottle being inaccurate will be no greater than the risk of a stamped measure being inaccurate.
The Bill does not, therefore, diminish the protection given to the consumer. On the contrary, it increases it. When all that is said, however, I recognise that
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there is some force in the noble Earl's contention that these bottles should be used as measures only for the purpose of selling liquid in them. It was for this purpose that the scheme embodied in the Bill bas been framed and this scheme, as your Lordships will appreciate, represents a new departure. It is, in a sense, experimental. There is, therefore, no need for the Bill to provide that bottles marked under this scheme should be used as measures for any other purpose than that for which they are really intended. After all, no one wants to use a milk bottle for measuring out oil into a can or beer into a jug. It is not a convenient shape for this purpose and there are other forms of measure which are much more suitable for this sort of use. Accordingly, the Amendment provides in effect that the recognition of a bottle marked under the Bill as a legal measure shall be confined to the purpose of transactions by which some liquid is sold or supplied in the bottle. My noble friend Lord Eltisley had put down certain Amendments to Clauses 10, 11 and 12, but has withdrawn these Amendments. They have been put down again by my noble friend Lord Strachie, but I venture to hope, after the explanation I have given, that the noble Lord will be satisfied and may see his way not to press his Amendments. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 9, line 23, at end insert the said proviso.—(Lord Templemore.)
LORD STRACHIE: My Lords, I was asked by the County Councils' Parliamentary Committee to put down the Amendments which appear in my name on the Paper. While I cannot admit that the noble Lord in charge of the Bill has entirely met our objections in this matter, yet at the same time he has to a large extent done so. As I understand the position of the county councils and other local authorities, what they feel is that they are not allowed sufficient discretion in this matter. Even under the Amendment proposed by the noble Lord, this discretion will still be rather limited. Therefore it does not entirely do away with the objections of the County Councils Association. The principal objection taken by the local authorities, from the county councils downwards, is that they are subject to Departmental control by regulation. That, of course,

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is a thing which no county council likes. It is bad enough when such control is provided for in an Act of Parliament. The view of the local authorities is that these regulations might have the effect of requiring inspectors to spend a large part of every day in factories where these bottles are manufactured in large numbers, and might add enormously to the staff and duties of the county councils.
I should not be willing to withdraw my Amendments were it not for the fact that, on looking into the Bill very carefully, I find that he fears of county councils in this respect are really not justified, for this reason. I notice in the Bill, and I hope it will appear in all Bills, that these regulations have to be placed on the tables of both Houses of Parliament, and, if either House of Parliament takes objection to them, then they become null and void. Speaking as a county councillor myself, I am perfectly certain that if the Board of Trade were to bring in any regulation which in the eyes of the county councils were objectionable, members of both Houses of Parliament would not be slow to move the ejection of these regulations. It may not be so easy to do so in another place because of the difference of procedure, but in your Lordships' House there is no difficulty at all; and as this is a question in which Party considerations do not arise, I feel that, if such objectionable regulations were tabled, most of your Lordships would be prepared to oppose them and they would be thrown out and made null and void. That being so, I feel I am justified in not moving these Amendments, particularly as the noble Lord has gone some way to meet our objections. There is also the fact that the hour is late and there are five other Notices of importance on the Paper, including a very important Scottish Bill. I think it would be rather futile for me, and really be obstructive, if I were to press these Amendments when the noble Lord has already informed me that he is not prepared to accept them.
LORD ELTISLEY: My Lords, two points seem to have crept into these debates. The original point on which considerable discussion took place on the Committee stage was on whom responsibility for errors should rest. Those of us speaking on behalf of the Municipal Corporations Association and the County Councils Association took the
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view, and still hold the view, that the responsibility for errors should rest on, and remain with, the manufacturer of the bottle. We therefore tabled our Amendments again so that they might be reconsidered on the Report stage. As the result of an undertaking given by the noble Lord in charge of the Bill, he has to-day tabled an Amendment which goes some way towards meeting our point—namely, that a marked bottle may only be used for measuring the quantity of liquid in the bottle and not for measuring liquid to be sold in some other receptacle. Shortly, a bottle so marked shall not be used as a general measure. This Amendment does not go quite so far as we wanted, but it dues go sonic way to meet our objections, and is a sort of half-way house. Therefore we do not wish to press the Amendments which we tabled on the first occasion.
As regards the second point, which seems to arise on a later Amendment—namely, the question of regulations and the objection of local authorities to being tied hand and foot, which apparently will be the case—we feel that local authorities should be allowed the fullest possible measure of discretion in the performance of those duties which have been assigned to them by Parliament. They should not be subject to the views of any particular administrator who may be presiding over the affairs of the Board of Trade. We are fearsome that regulations may be enforced which will necessitate the appointment of a great many inspectors and that these inspectors will have to have their salaries paid by the local authorities. We think that the fullest possible measure of discretion should be allowed to rest with the local authorities, who are such important bodies and have such excellent officers. In view of what Lord Strachie has said, these Amendments are not now being pressed, but I have thought it right to ventilate the views of the fecal authorities on this matter.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 9 [Licences to mark bottles]:
LORD COZENS-HARDY LORD COZENS-HARDY moved to insert in subsection (1):
"Provided that the qualifications, conditions and restrictions which may be prescribed for the purposes of this subsection shall be limited to such as appear to the

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Board of Trade to be necessary or expedient for the purpose of giving effect to this Part of this Act."
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I had put down this Amendment in a more specific form, limiting the conditions which may be imposed by the Board of Trade to those which, I understand, are actually contemplated by the Board of Trade of to-day. These conditions would deal with such matters as the applicant's ability to comply with regulations, his financial standing, making provision as to fees, as to the facilities for the inspector's work, and. as to the extent and frequency of inaccuracy which would justify the withdrawal of the licence. I have had the advantage of a conversation with the Board of Trade, and I gather that the Government are not opposed to the intention of this Amendment.
LORD TEMPLEMORE: We accept it.
LORD COZENS-HARDY: I am very grateful for the intimation that the Government are prepared to accept it, but I still think it gives the Board of Trade too wide and too absolute a discretion. I hope before the Bill gets further, that the Government will agree to omit the words "as appear to the Board of Trade" and the word "expedient," which seem to give the Board of Trade more complete and absolute power than is necessary.
Amendment moved—
Page 9, line 32, at end insert the said proviso.—(Lord Cozens-Hardy.)
LORD TEMPLEMORE: I accept the Amendment.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME moved to insert at the end of the clause:
"Any person aggrieved by a decision of the Board of Trade to revoke or suspend his licence may apply to the County Court of the district in which he resides for an order for the removal of such revocation or suspension and the Court may make such order thereon as may seem just."
The noble Viscount said: My Lords, if your Lordships will look at subsection (4) of Clause 9, on page 10, you will see that:
"The Board of Trade may at any time revoke or suspend a licence if the holder thereof has contravened or failed to comply with any of the restrictions or conditions prescribed by virtue of this section, or has been convicted of an offence under this Part of this Act."
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It is not necessary, therefore, that he should have been convicted by a Court before he has his licence revoked or suspended, so there is all the more reason why he should have access to a Court. I suggest that the most Court suitable Court is the County Court of the district in which he resides. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 10, line 5, at end insert the said paragraph.—(Viscount Bertie of Thame.)
LORD TEMPLEMORE: My Lords, I am afraid I cannot accept this Amendment for a legal reason which I will give as shortly as possible. The noble Viscount, Lord Bertie, during the debate in Committee, proposed that there should be an appeal to the Court from the arbitrary decision of a Minister to revoke a licence. To give effect to this principle the Amendment is unnecessary. Clause 9 as now worded obliges the Board of Trade to grant to any person, and to renew, a licence, if that person possesses the prescribed qualifications and complies with the prescribed conditions. Further, the Board are only empowered to revoke or suspend a licence if in fact the conditions prescribed by the clause arise. Consequently, if the Board fail to comply with this statutory duty of granting or renewing a licence or wrongly revoke or suspend a licence, the person aggrieved can already, under the existing law of the land, obtain redress by the appropriate proceedings in the High Court.
Such proceedings, known as mandamus, certiorari or declaration proceedings, according to the nature of the circumstances giving rise to them, are of a special order and are regarded as falling solely within the jurisdiction of the High Court. They relate either to the inherent jurisdiction of the High Court to supervise the exercise of judicial functions by subordinate Courts or other bodies entrusted with such functions, or to the public interest involved in compelling public bodies to carry out their statutory duties of a public nature or to refrain from acting in contravention of such duties, and it would be a serious departure from principle to confer jurisdiction of this kind upon the County Court.
This Amendment in terms provides for something much more than a right to appeal to the Court against decisions of

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the Board of Trade wrongly given It would confer upon the Court the right to review any and every decision of the Board to revoke or suspend a licence quite apart from any question as to whether there had been compliance with the terms of the Statute. It is submitted that there can be no reason for conferring upon the Court as a mere matter of discretion the right to review and modify an order made by the Board of Trade in accordance with the terms of the Statute. This reply has beer, given in somewhat legal terms. I do not pretend to be a lawyer nor do I think is my noble friend—
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME: I am.
LORD TEMPLEMORE: I beg the noble Viscount's pardon. Then he will understand what I have read.
LORD COZENS-HARDY: My Lords, the legal statement which the noble Lord has given lends point to my request that he would consider before a later stage omitting the words "appear to the Board of Trade" and the word "expedient." If that is done the legal remedy which Le has elaborated would be greatly facilitated.
VISCOUNT BERTH OF THAME: My Lords, I am not going to press the Amendment. At the same time I think an application to the High Court would he much more expensive than one to the County Court. I beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 19 [Interpretation]:
LORD TEMPLEMORE: My Lords, this is a drafting Amendment. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 13, line 15, leave out ("carrying") and insert ("conveying").—(Lord Templemore.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.

HOUSING (SCOTLAND) BILL.
Order of the Day for the House to be put into Committee read.
THE UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (LORD STRATHCONA AND MOUNT ROYAL): My Lords, I beg to move that this House do now resolve itself into Committee.
Moved, That the House do now resolve itself into Committee.—(Lord Strathcona and Mount Royal.)
THE DUKE OF BUCCLEUCH: My Lords, I must make a protest on behalf of the Scottish Peers against the way in which we have been treated over this Bill. A few days ago it was put down, I think, for Second Reading as the first Order of the Day, and then a Standing Order was suspended, practically without any notice, and it had to be taken later on. Now I think everyone must admit that this is an important Bill, yet it is being taken at this late hour not long before the time at which your Lordships' House, as a rule, adjourns—namely, a quarter to eight. It is not as if this was the only instance in which Scottish business has been dealt with in this way. In the past Scottish business has always, I think—and I believe I shall be supported in saying this by most of my fellow Peers from Scotland—been treated more or less with contempt, and if His Majesty's Government are in favour of Home Rule for Scotland there is nothing they can do more to advance it than their present conduct. I must point out that a large number of Scottish Peers—I do not include myself amongst them—have come here at very considerable inconvenience and also very considerable expense, and it is only fair and reasonable that their Bills should be taken at a time when they can receive a fair and proper discussion.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: My Lords, I would like to join with the noble Duke in the protest that he has made. I agree with every word he has said on the general question as to the way in which Scottish questions are usually treated. At the same time, to-day, I must say that it is a little unfortunate that a Scottish Peer should have kept us for an hour and forty minute; on a matter which we particularly asked him to put off until another day. Even if he had not agreed to do that he need not have kept us waiting so long. He has now gone away, and is the only Scottish Peer who has not remained.
EARL STANHOPE: My Lords, I can only say on behalf of His Majesty's Government that we very much regret that this Bill should come on at this late hour. I think it was almost impossible to foresee that the two Motions on the Paper were going to take so long as they did. I knew that there were to be three Peers who would take part in the debate on the first Motion in regard to slavery, but other members of your Lordships'

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House, whom I did not know were going to speak, also took part in that debate. As regards the second Motion on the Paper, I think I must leave the noble Earl who moved it in the hands of his Scottish colleagues who, perhaps, will deal with him adequately without my saying anything further. I can only say I am extremely sorry that this should have happened. As your Lordships know, just before a Recess it is always difficult to arrange business, and we are very much in the hands of your Lordships as to how long a time will be taken upon a particular Motion.
THE DUKE OF BUCCLEUCH: What are you going to do about the Bill? Are you going to take it now?
EARL STANHOPE: I suggest we should go on and see what progress we can make. We are very businesslike in this House, and get through a great deal of business in a short time when we have to do so.
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly:
[The EARL OF ONSLOW in the Chair.]
Clause 1:
Duty of local authority to inspect and to make reports and proposals as to overcrowding.
1.—(1) It shall be the duty of every local authority before such dates as the Department may, after consultation with the authority, fix as respects their district, to cause an inspection thereof to be made with a view to ascertaining what dwelling-houses therein are overcrowded, and to prepare and submit to the Department a report showing in such detail as the Department may direct the result of the inspection and the additional housing accommodation required in order to put an end to overcrowding in their district, and, unless they satisfy the Department that the additional accommodation required, in so far as it is required for persons of the working classes, will be otherwise provided, to prepare and submit to the Department proposals for the provision thereof.
(3) Any proposals under this section for the provision of additional housing accommodation shall be accompanied by a statement of the steps which the local authority propose to take to secure that the rehousing of families living under the worst conditions as regards overcrowding is provided for first.
LORD POLWARTH LORD POLWARTH moved to insert at the end of subsection (1):
"Provided, however, that there shall be no obligation to submit such proposals for
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additional accommodation for farm and other rural workers who occupy their houses as part of their remuneration until legislative provision has been made enabling the local authorities to remedy overcrowding in these houses."
The noble Lord said: I will endeavour to move this Amendment in the briefest possible terms, as we are beginning the business upon this Bill at a late hour. I move it as Chairman of a local authority and housing committee because I feel that the clause as it stands imposes upon local authorities an impossible obligation. The clause requires us to complete a census and examination of all houses, and to report on all eases of overcrowding which exist within our area, and then to prepare and to submit to the Department of Health proposals for the provision of houses to meet that overcrowding. I move as a proviso that there shall be no obligation to submit such proposals for additional accommodation for farm and other rural workers who occupy their houses as part of their remuneration until legislative provision has been made enabling local authorities to remedy overcrowding in these houses.
I am all for remedying overcrowding in farm workers' houses just as much as in other houses, but I think it was practically admitted by the Government in another place that this Bill does not make any provision whereby we can remedy overcrowding in the case of these houses, which, as many of your Lordships know, are occupied almost throughout Scotland by farm workers as part of their remuneration, and are situated on the farm where they work. Local authorities cannot build houses for a particular class of workers. Even if they could, the chances are that the man with a large family would have removed elsewhere before the house was built. It has been said that the Housing (Rural Workers) Act will meet the case, but I think that is hardly so. In my own county, we stipulated that most of the houses built should have three rooms and the rest two, but houses with three apartments will only accommodate five people under the standard of this Bill, and I am afraid many farm servants will have to seek work elsewhere. You cannot expect the farmer, or the landlord, to be at the expense of providing larger houses when the farmer can so easily get a man with a smaller family to do the work required.

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I fear that the man with the large family will have a hard time of it.
It is obvious that some fresh proposals must be made. The Government propose an Advisory Committee to consider the matter. By all means let that be done, and then fresh legislative proposals can be introduced which will make it possible to deal with this difficulty. But, in the meantime, it is not fair to call upon local authorities to submit schemes which they really have no possible means of carrying out. They can only say that they cannot do it. There is no provision in the Bill which enables this real difficulty to be met. I will not enlarge on it further, because I believe your Lordships are fully familiar with it, but I move this Amendment with the object of putting on record that, as the Bill stands, it cannot deal with the problem of farm servants' houses. I hope the noble Lord in charge of the Bill will see his way to accept the proviso and not impose upon us an impossible obligation.
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 12, at end insert the said proviso.—(Lord Polwarth.)
LORD STRATHCONA AND MOUNT ROYAL: I am quite aware of the difficulty which the noble Lord, Lord Polwarth, has raised, and of course it will all come up again in other forms in later Amendments. The overcrowding provisions in the Bill as it stands apply to tied houses as they apply to other houses on the principle that the enactment of one standard of accommodation for one section of the community and another standard, or none at all, for another section can hardly be justified.
LORD POLWARTH: I agree to that.
LORD STRATHCONA AND MOUNT ROYAL: The noble Lord's Amendment would merely have the effect of excluding tied houses occupied by farm workers and other rural workers from the operation of the Bill, in that: it would destroy the only means of making the overcrowding provisions effective in these cases—namely, the duty which is placed on local authorities to provide the additional accommodation that is necessary to put an end to the over in the houses in question. The arguments against the exclusion of tied houses from the Bill will be fully dealt with in a statement which I propose to make on another Amendment, and f also propose later to
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deal with the question of large families. In the circumstances I hope the noble Lord will not press the Amendment.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: I gather that the noble Lord does not want this Amendment put in the Bill here, because he wants to have the same rules for all and does riot wish to divide Scotland into two halves, but I suppose he will tell your Lordships that the Bill is not going to be operative as far as farm servants' houses are concerned.
LORD STRATHCONA AND MOUNT ROYAL: I do not say that the Bill is not going to be operative as far as farm workers' houses is concerned, but the Bill will not be operative until the appointed day is reached.
LORD POLWARTH: I do not wish to exclude them from the Bill, but only to defer the matter until the Government can make some provision to enable the local authorities to remedy this overcrowding.
THE DUKE OF BUCCLEUCH: I am sorry the Government will not accept the Amendment, because I think that what it really means is that any farm worker who has a large family will be thrown out of employment. There is another difficulty which has not been mentioned. It takes a very long time to improve rural housing, especially in what are generally called "out-by" positions, where you can only get certain tradesmen to take the work. There is another thing which is quite disregarded by the Government. It is the custom in Scotland to have larger rooms than in English houses. In England people prefer more rooms and smaller rooms. That may be right or wrong, but there it is. If the Amendment is not accepted, I think it will have a very serious effect on a class of people for whom I think your Lordships will agree that a very strong effort should be made—that is, the man in rural employment, the ploughman or shepherd or whatever he may be, who has a large family—because, after all, it is these men with large families who work on the land who are going to make the future of this nation.
THE MARQUESS OF ABERDEEN AND TEMAIR: There are several reasons why I think my noble friend should press the concluding portion of this Amendment. All who have had anything to do with agriculture in Scotland know that the

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engagement of married men is for one year. Therefore, it is possible that in one year the house will be overcrowded, and next year it will not be overcrowded. It is obvious, I think, that you cannot deal with the problem of farm servants' houses in Scotland so long as the present custom is maintained without special legislation, for the simple reason that you have a changing population from year to year. It is the custom to engage a married man for one year, and a single man for six months, so that you may easily come across cases where the unmarried men's quarters are also affected. The whole question requires special treatment, and I press the Government to realise that.
LORD BALFOUR OF BURLEIGH: I think the noble Lord, Lord Polwarth, put a question to the Government which has not been answered. The case for the Amendment as it stands seems a very strong one, but I should like to ask the noble Lord in charge of the Bill whether there are not provisions in Clauses 4 and 5 which would enable some relief to be obtained. If noble Lords will look at the marginal note to Clause 4, they will see that it reads "Power of Department to increase the permitted number temporarily to meet exceptional conditions," and the marginal note to Clause 5 is "Power of local authority to authorise the temporary use of a house by persons in excess of the permitted number." I think we should all agree with the noble Lord, Lord Polwarth, that under the Bill as it stands these particular houses cannot be dealt with, but I do think that the more desirable course, rather than the omission of these houses from the operation of the Bill, would be to put in a clause, as my noble friend suggests, to allow the operation of the Bill to be suspended. It comes to the same thing, as far as I can see.
LORD MARLEY: If a mere Sassenach may be allowed to intervene for a moment, I would like to say it is rather difficult sometimes for us to understand the actual effect of some of these Amendments. Is it not possible that this Amendment may have the effect of tempting the local authority to take no action because by not taking action they will not have to apply the terms of Clause 1? It looks to me as though, since it says "until legislative provision has been made enabling the local authorities to
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remedy overcrowding in these houses," that nothing need be done. They might be tempted to do nothing in order not to have to remedy the overcrowding. That seems a possible effect of the Amendment.
THE MARQUESS OF LINLITHGOW: There seems to be a great deal of force in the argument with which my noble friend has supported the Amendment. On the other hand, in my judgment there is much in what was said by the noble Lord, Lord Balfour of Burleigh, and I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Polwarth, will not press this matter to a Division at this stage.
THE MARQUESS OF LOTHIAN: May I ask the noble Lord a further question, more by way of elucidation than for any other reason? I understand that the general purpose of this Bill is to prevent overcrowding and to enable local authorities to make provision for new houses. As I understand Clause 29, whereas the central administration undertake to make contribution towards providing housing accommodation required for the purpose of putting an end to overcrowding, yet they are to be specifically debarred from doing it in the case of the houses now under consideration, houses tenanted by farm servants as a part of their remuneration. In other words, the Bill makes it impossible for the Government to make provision for those houses which we all want to see, although it is possible to make provision for houses in urban areas. If that is so, it is a very serious disadvantage of the Bill. Some provision should be made to enable local authorities to remedy this overcrowding instead of leaving us in the position of having large numbers of houses tenanted by large families while, because the Government has said that they are not going to allow people to live in them, the local authorities are unable to make financial provision whereby the evil can be remedied.
THE EARL OF AIRLIE: I understood from the noble Lord in charge of the Bill that he would answer my question when I moved my Amendment in Clause 4. I suggest that he should answer it now and, if it meets with his approval, I need not move my Amendment, but if he does not approve, then I shall be able to move.
LORD HUTCHISON OF MONTROSE: The Marquess of Aberdeen put his

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finger on the spot when he said that the real trouble is that you cannot make any arrangement under Clause 4 whereby you can meet the changing population from year to year. This is a real difficulty which is not met in this Bill.
LORD STRATHCONA AND MOUNT ROYAL: I cut short my answer on this Amendment because I see on the Paper an Amendment in the name of the noble Duke" the Duke of Atholl, later on in Clause 2: and also the one to which the noble Earl, Lord Airlie, has referred dealing with the question of rural areas. Now, with regard to the question which has been raised by a great many noble Lords, about the difficulty of forcing a situation wherein unemployment would be caused among rural workers, I think there are these two safeguards. First of all, on the general point, from information we have received as a result of investigations which have been made, we do not see any reason to believe that there is a much larger proportion of farm labourers with large families than there is among the urban workers. The percentage shows a very small increase. Secondly, there are the provisions to which the noble Earl, Lord Airlie, and the noble Lord, Lord Balfour of Burleigh, referred.
In addition to that I was going to tell the noble Earl, Lord Airlie, when I came to his Amendment, that the question of the relaxation of safeguarding under Clause 4 cannot arise until the standard itself has come into operation; that is to say, upon the appointed day to which I have already referred. After that there is a duration order made under Clause 4, which provides that relaxation of the standard after the appointed day must not, exceed three years. Moreover, there is power under Clause 5 for local authorities to grant licences to permit the standard to be exceeded in individual cases. There are obvious difficulties, from the point of view of keeping in proper touch with the different parts of a district, in the way of making an order postponing the provisions for as long as ten years, which is what the noble Earl, Lord Airlie, suggests. No local authority, however, is likely to take the risk of bringing the standard into operation before ample accommodation has been made for their people, and I hope that the noble Earl
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will rest assured that every application made under that clause for extension of the period will be carefully considered.
LORD POLWARTH: Will the extension of time be made for any particular class of house? We are anxious to bring in the decrowding provisions as soon as we can. I speak for a county that has an industrial population as well as a rural one—even perhaps greater. We do not want the appointed day postponed for a long time. It is only in regard to this particular class that I am anxious to see the Government bring in provision to enable us to deal with the rural houses as soon as possible. I am not anxious to postpone it for ten years or longer for all classes of houses.
LORD STRATHCONA AND MOUNT ROYAL: The noble Lord and are in agreement that the Government want to provide new houses as soon as possible where they are necessary. In the rural areas the operation of the Bill must be postponed beyond the appointed day, as long after it as necessary, but in the urban areas, the provision must be made as soon as possible.
LORD POLWARTH: That does not answer my question. I am anxious to see the appointed day quite soon for urban areas, but we have to wait for it in rural areas and may have to wait a long time.
THE EARL OF LEVEN AND MELVILLE: The Bill says that the order may specify different classes of houses.
THE MARQUESS OF LOTHIAN: Will the noble Lord answer my question? I understand that this Bill makes no financial provisions for meeting the particular difficulty with which the noble Duke dealt. Whereas financial provision is made for any other situation, it does not make any for this particular difficulty; is not that the case?
LORD STRATHCONA AND MOUNT ROYAL: I should like to look into that question which the noble Marquess, Lord Lothian, has raised, but I am afraid I cannot give an answer at the moment.
On Question, Amendment negatived.
LORD STRATHCONA AND MOUNT ROYAL LORD STRATHCONA AND MOUNT ROYAL moved, in subsection (3), after "overcrowding," to insert "or otherwise living under unsatisfactory housing conditions." The noble Lord said: This Amendment was put down to implement

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a promise given in another place. The subsection is designed to secure that, in framing the proposals for the relief of overcrowding, local authorities shall make provision for dealing with the worst cases of overcrowding first. The question was raised in another place whether, in considering what was the worst case of overcrowding, the local authorities were able to look merely at the numbers of persons in the different houses. It was pointed out that there were other factors which could be taken into account. For example, it might be more urgent to re-house a family containing a number of members suffering from a disease such as tuberculosis; it would be difficult to re-house a large family under such conditions. Again, there might be two families of the same size and different sex composition, and from this point of view one family might be regarded as more overcrowded than the other. The intention of this Amendment is to secure that local authorities shall not be restricted to looking at mere numbers. The Amendment will enable them to take other relevant factors, such as those I have mentioned, into account.
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 28, after ("overcrowding") insert ("or otherwise living under unsatisfactory housing conditions").—(Lord Strathcona and Mount Royal.)
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: Might I ask the noble Lord if this is in accordance with the preamble of the Bill?
LORD STRATHCONA AND MOUNT ROYAL: I think it is quite in agreement with it.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 1, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 2:
Definition of overcrowding.
2.—(1) A dwelling-house shall be deemed for the purposes of this Act to be overcrowded at any time when the number of persons sleeping in the house either—

(a) is such that any two of those persons, being persons ten years old or more of opposite sexes and not being persons living together as husband and wife, must sleep in the same room; or

(b) is, in relation to the number and floor area of the rooms of which the house consists, in excess of the permitted number of persons as defined in the First Schedule to this Act.

(2) In computing for the purposes of this section the number of persons sleeping in a house, no account shall be taken of a child
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under one year old, and a child who has attained one year and is under ten years old shall be reckoned as one half of a unit.
THE DUKE OF ATHOL THE DUKE OF ATHOL had given Notice of an Amendment, in subsection (1), at the beginning of paragraph (b) to insert "in the case of a house situated within a burgh" and of another to insert in subsection (2):
"Provided that paragraph (b) of subsection (1) of this section shall not apply to houses of farm workers or of other workers who as a condition of their employment are required to occupy a particular house."
The noble Duke said: On Clause 2 I have two Amendments and, although I feel strongly that this Bill should not apply to rural areas, I do not propose to move the first now, because it is late and we have not much time, and also because I know perfectly well that the Government have not the slightest intention of accepting it. But I am going to move my next Amendment to insert a proviso at the end of subsection (2). As the Government have not agreed to the omission of the rural areas as a whole, or rather as I have not moved my Amendment, I beg to move the omission of those houses which must be occupied by farm workers and others as a condition of their employment. These others are, of course, shepherds, gamekeepers, head gardeners, lodge keepers and so forth, whom I might call generally estate servants, who are given these houses as Dart of their wages. It is obvious that here we have a problem which is totally different from anything in the towns. A man has to live in a particular house, and if the house provided in relation to a particular job on a farm or estate is not large enough for the applicant and his family, according to the standards here laid down, it must inevitably make it very improbable that he will be given the job, or retain it if, like a ploughman, he has to go away and be again engaged.
A large proportion of ploughmen's houses in particular consist of only two rooms, with a third room too small to be counted, and the Bill would only allow for three people to sleep in this—a married couple, that is, with one child of ten or over. The estate owner may well find it difficult to enlarge the house, and in consequence will prefer to take a man without a family, or with a smaller family, in order to avoid pressure from the local authorities, in which case he

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will, of course, be quite within the law; or the farmer may wish to avoid being urged by the local authorities to put pressure upon his landlord. It seems to me unquestionable that unless tied houses are excluded, young married men with families still at school or families which are likely to increase, will be handicapped in finding employment, and they are the last people one would wish to see handicapped. The handicap may not be so serious in the case of shepherds and gamekeepers, as this work can be done by older men, although I think we should legislate for them just the same. Ploughmen, however, by reason of their work, have to be men in the prime of life. That means that they will probably have large families, or be at a time when they are having families, and it will be a serious matter for many of them if tied houses are not exempted.
It will also be a serious matter for the farmers, as they will necessarily be restricted in their choice of workers, and this is assuredly not the time to place any obstacle in the way of farmers getting the best men they can to work on the land. I therefore fear that this clause, unless it is amended, will place a serious handicap on the employment of married ploughmen, and in doing this will seriously handicap the farmer and also Scottish agriculture at a difficult moment in its history. We are told that this will not come in until the appointed day, but we are not told when the appointed day may be, and if there is going to be an appointed day then in that case when it does come it will mean that half of these men will lose their jobs. If, on the other hand, there is not going to be an appointed day, why trouble to deal with this matter at all? It seems to me that it is utter humbug to waste our time in dealing with this matter if the Government have not the slightest intention of trying to work the Bill in rural Scotland.
My point is this. Most of these houses are two-roomed houses with possibly a bed closet at the back, very airy as a rule but very small. The Act only allows three people to sleep in that house. Most of these ploughmen's houses are of that description. There are two large rooms both well within the Bill and bigger than most rooms outside. It seems to me that if we allow these ploughmen's houses to have four people
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sleeping in a house which at present is scheduled for three, then you would get over a great deal of the difficulty with regard to ploughmen. I think the matter is so important that I am going to press this Amendment in the ploughmen's interest. Surely we want to see their houses improved if we can, but as the Bill stands many people will be very careful not to take men having families or who are likely to have families, and so bring them under the Bill. If the excuse is that that they are not restricting the employment of these married men, because they are not going to bring the Bill into operation, then it is waste of time to discuss these matters.
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 44, at end, insert the said proviso.—(The Duke of Atholl.)
LORD BALFOUR, OF BURLEIGH: I hope the noble Duke is not going to take this Amendment to a Division, particularly as it is a manuscript Amendment, of which none of us have had any notice.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: It has been on the Paper for a week.
THE LORD CHAIRMAN: The Amendment before the House is that on the Paper, to line 44 of page 2.
LORD BALFOUR OF BURLEIGH: I am sorry that I misunderstood the noble Duke. I thought he had withdrawn that Amendment. The Amendment being on the Paper, it entirely removes that objection. At the same time I think this Amendment was debated on the Amendment of Lord Polwarth. I do not see anything in the Bill to prevent the giving of the subsidy which is provided. I see no reason why the Bill should not be worked, and during the delay which is provided by the clauses adequate houses be provided for this class of worker. The subsidy of £6 15s. for forty years is an adequate subsidy.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: Is this subsidy to be given to the owner, or to the local authorities? If it is to the local authorities, then they will have to take over all the private houses everywhere, and they will be responsible for making those houses big enough for the biggest family any proprietor wants to put in.
THE EARL OF LEVEN AND MELVILLE: The point is that the farm servant would in these circumstances be the tenant of the local authority.
THE MARQUESS OF ABERDEEN AND TEMAIR: I must point out that my question has not been answered. These houses vary in the number of people they have to accommodate every year. You build on, say, two more rooms, and next year those rooms may be empty. We must be practical 'and try to help agriculture at the present time, and not thwart it. I would ask the Government to back up the agricultural policy of the Secretary of State for Scotland by making things as easy as possible for those who work the land. If you tie the farmer's choice to a farm servant who possesses a family which meets the accommodation of the house, you are really practically enforcing uneconomic business on the farmer, on the landlord, and on everybody concerned. I think we need, a little common sense as to how we treat these houses in Scotland, and we must face facts as they are. Do not pass legislation which cannot be enforced, and which brings the law into disrepute.
VISCOUNT ELIBANK: I do not quite understand how this £6 15s. Is paid. Is it paid to the local authority? If it is, does the local authority take over the house? And supposing the local authority declines to take it over: what is the position then? Is the house left with the landlord, and has the landlord to assume the responsibility of including the house with the land?
LORD POLWARTH: Speaking as one who has very extensive practical knowledge as to what the local authority can, and does, do, may I say that it is impossible for the local authority to take over these houses. They cannot keep them as tied houses. We have been asked by coal companies to build houses and let the companies have those houses for their employees, but we cannot do it. I confess I do not altogether like the Duke of Atholl's Amendment, because it seems permanently to exempt these houses from the operation of the Bill. It seems to me that the noble Duke's object would be better obtained by some alteration of the standard, allowing people to go into these two-roomed or three-roomed houses, as the case may be; and that was the re
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commendation made by the County Councils Association and rejected by the Government. If we have a clear understanding that this exemption is to be only for a time until legislation is granted, or if the Government will undertake to introduce legislation, then we could accept this in the meantime. Failing that, I think we must rely on the clause mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Balfour of Burleigh, endeavouring to get a postponement for a particular class of house.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: If the Government can give us a definite period of years, then I should be quite prepared to withdraw the Amendment.
LORD STRATHCONA AND MOUNT ROYAL: I am not in a position to name any definite period, but I think it is fairly obvious that the appointed day is a very long way off. It will give us time to get the situation cleared up in the rural districts. The standard in the Bill will not be applied in any district until the greater part of the additional accommodation required for decrowding purposes in the locality has been provided. Even after the appointed day the application of the standard can be relaxed in connection with particular classes of houses in a district, and therefore if, when the time comes to apply the standard, it is still necessary for some time to exclude farm workers' cottages, that can be done within the provisions of the Bill as it stands. Moreover, there is power, under Clause 5, for local authorities to grant licences to permit the standard to be exceeded in individual cases. This power can be used in exceptional circumstances to allow a particular farm cottage to be occupied in excess of the standard until suitable arrangements can be made for the proper accommodation of the family.
The provisions of the Bill are, therefore, sufficiently flexible to enable local authorities to deal with the peculiar difficulties connected with the housing of persons living in tied houses. The Government realise, however, that the housing of these persons constitutes a special feature, and they intend to seek early advice of the Rural Sub-committee of the Scottish Housing Advisory Committee, to be set up under Clause 22 of the Bill, with regard to the further steps which should be taken in the matter. In

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the meantime the grants available under the Housing (Rural Workers) Acts for the reconstruction and improvement of agricultural workers' houses are being continued for an extended period up to June, 1938, and it is proposed to secure that these grants will, as far as possible, be used for the enlargement of farm workers' houses. That, I think, answers the point which one noble Lord raised that there was to be no grant made to the landlord himself. I may add that no one is more desirous than I am of seeing better agricultural conditions in Scotland. I hope the noble Duke will not press his Amendment.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: I should point out that the ploughman is a migratory person. He goes away, and you cannot tell what size of family the next man has. It is very difficult in such circumstances to determine what size of house is wanted. I am prepared, in view of what the noble Lord, Lord Polwarth, said, to withdraw this Amendment, but I shall divide later on on a manuscript Amendment which I have handed in to a later clause.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 2 agreed to.
Clause 3:
Offences in relation to overcrowding.
3.—(1) Subject to the provisions of this Part of this Act, if after the appointed day the occupier of a dwelling-house causes or permits it to be overcrowded, he shall be guilty of an offence and shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding twenty shillings.
(3) The occupier of a dwelling-house shall not be guilty of an offence under this section in respect of any overcrowding thereof which is occasioned by the residence therein for a period not exceeding sixteen days of a person to whom lodging is afforded by the occupier otherwise than for gain.
LORD POLWARTH LORD POLWARTH moved, in subsection (1), after "day," to insert "or prior to the appointed day in the case of a house which has ceased to be overcrowded through the action of the local authority. "The noble Lord said: This Amendment was put down in consequence of a question that was raised at a recent conference held with the Secretary of State for Scotland, attended by a very large number of local authorities, both rural and urban, and the need for such
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an Amendment was supported by a large number of representatives. As the Bill stands, there is nothing to prevent the house, once it has been decrowded by the local authority from being again let by the owner to a large family, again becoming crowded, and the local authority having again to step in to provide another house for this new family. Of course, that does not apply to the case of a house owned by the local authority, but cases of the kind are common. Perhaps we have a colliery company's house, or a private owner's house, with a large family. We are asked to begin with the worst cases of overcrowding as soon as we can. We are even now in my county making plans for building sufficiently large houses, and we shall as soon as the houses are ready endeavour to get the people moved into those houses out of the smaller ones, but we shall have no control over a house which has been emptied. The moment it is empty, the owner will be besieged by applicants to let it again, and there is nothing to prevent him letting it again to a large family, and very likely that family will come in from a neighbouring district.
If it were one of our own families, it would not much matter, because we should have to provide for their accommodation in any case. But if a family comes from another district and fill up that house, it will again be the duty of the county council to provide accommodation for that family.
So I propose to insert the words:
"or prior to the appointed day in the ease of a house which has ceased to be overcrowded through the action of the local authority."
We have just been told that the appointed day may be postponed for a long time. We are not anxious to see a long postponement. We are anxious to begin with decrowding as soon as we can, but we do not want to decrowd the same house again and again. That will be the case unless some such provision as I suggest is made. At the conference we were told that the Government would take this into consideration, and I should have thought some proposal would have been submitted to us to meet this very real objection.
We may be told it is dealt with under Clause 8, but that does not to my mind remove the difficulty at all. If the owner wishes to let the house again to a large family after it has been decrowded, there

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is nothing on earth to prevent his doing so. All sorts of appeals will be made to him to do so. I myself have had a case in which an appeal was made to be allowed to occupy just such a house on behalf of a large family. The larger the family, the more urgent the plea will be. I suggest this as a perfectly simple. way of meeting the difficulty, so that once a house has ceased to be overcrowded through the action of the local authority, it shall be an offence for the occupier of that house to overcrowd it again. The alternative, which of course would be rather absurd, would be to say that the local authority shall not be called upon to decrowd a house once it has been decrowded.
Amendment moved—
Page 3, line 2, after ("day") insert ("or prior to the appointed day in the case of a house which has ceased to be overcrowded through the action of the local authority ").—(Lord Polwarth.)
LORD STRATHCONA AND MOUNT ROYAL: The noble Lord's Amendment appears, on the face of it, rather attractive at first, but there are one or two reasons which I should like to give for resisting it. It would have the effect of bringing the penal provisions of the Bill into limited operation sooner than otherwise need be and before there is a sufficiency of houses in the local authority's district as a whole to warrant penal action against particular tenants. It is the policy of the Government to use the penal provisions, not as an instrument of punishment, but in the last resort as a compulsitor to secure the removal of recalcitrant occupiers from overcrowded conditions. Further, the Amendment would lead to anomalies in that a situation would arise under which it would be an offence to overcrowd some houses and not an offence to overcrowd others in the same local authority's district. It would be difficult to justify penalising one occupier for overcrowding his house when his next-door neighbour, living under exactly similar conditions, might be immune from prosecution.
In the third place it is surely better to avoid any piecemeal introduction of the "appointed day" provisions and, indeed, having in view the Amendments made on Clause 8, the proposal in the present Amendment is not necessary. Clause 8 (3), as amended in another place, gives the local authority power
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before the appointed day to obtain an order from the Sheriff for the removal of a tenant from an overcrowded house which has been overcrowded for at least six months, if the Sheriff is satisfied that the tenant's removal is reasonable and an offer of suitable alternative accommodation has been made to him. This provision will give the local authority all the control they need until the appointed day has been fixed for their district. For these reasons I regret that I cannot accept the Amendment.
LORD POLWARTH: I do not see how that provision will meet the case if a house becomes overcrowded again. We can move the first large family but, if it is let to another large family, have we to go to the Sheriff again for an order? We hope to get over this overcrowding by offering alternative accommodation.
On Question, Amendment negatived.
LORD STRATHCONA AND MOUNT ROYAL: The next Amendment is drafting.
Amendment moved—
Page 3, line 27, leave out ("passing") and insert ("commencement").—(Lord Strathcona and Mount Royal.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL THE DUKE OF ATHOLL moved in subsection (3), after "person" to insert "or persons (not exceeding two units)". The noble Duke said: This clause means that people can stay for a holiday of sixteen days provided "lodging is afforded by the occupier otherwise than for gain." This clause brings home to one how serious may be the interference, because of this Bill, with family life. It will allow one person more than the standard number to sleep in a house for sixteen days if "lodging is afforded by the occupier other than for gain." This would allow an elder son or daughter who had gone away to work to come home for a holiday, which is an excellent idea, but it would not allow a married daughter to come home and bring with her a child of over twelve months. A child of two or three could not be left behind, and therefore a married daughter would never be able to visit her parents in certain circumstances and bring her child with her for the grandparents to see. This Amendment would enable her to come with two small children or with her husband. As such an interference

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with family intercourse seems to be likely to be much resented., I am moving this Amendment, and I think it is one the Government ought to accept.
Amendment moved—
Page 3, line 37, after ("person") insert ("or persons (not exceeding two units)").—(The Duke of Atholl.)
LORD STRATHCONA AND MOUNT ROYAL: I am informed that this Amendment is not really necessary. I understand that under the Interpretation Act, 1899, the singular includes the plural, and therefore the word "person" includes "persons" That being so, the provisions of the subsection are not limited in the manner which the noble Duke suggests.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: Do I understand that under this clause, in spite of all that there is in the Bill, a married daughter can go home and bring her children with her, even if her children are in excess of the number allowed, for a period of sixteen days?
LORD STRATHCONA AND MOUNT ROYAL: That, I understand, is the case.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 3, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 4 [Power of Department to increase the permitted number temporarily to meet exceptional conditions]:
THE EARL OF AIRLIE THE EARL OF AIRLIE had given Notice of an Amendment to enable the application of the First Schedule to be suspended in the rural areas for ten years in certain circumstances. The noble Earl said: In view of what the noble Lord in charge of the Bill has said, the more one hears about this Bill, the more it prompts one to believe it was "cooked up" in England and does not apply to Scotland at all in any way. The fixing of the appointed day seems to be a matter of some surmise, rather like the Day of Judgment. We should all like to know when the Day of Judgment will be. We should all be better, and probably better off, if we knew. It seems we may have to wait for a long time for the appointed day. The time factor is a very strong factor in the case, because it affects the landlord as well as the farm worker with a large family. I believe, myself, that in a great many cases the landlord will wish to do the work that may possibly be done by the local authority, for the reason that
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he will do it much better and more suitably. The question of practicability has already been discussed, and I cannot believe that the local authority can possibly make a practical affair of the whole thing. I do not move my Amendment.
Clause 4 agreed to.
Clauses 5 and 6 agreed to.
Clause 7:
Information with respect to the permitted number and certification of number and floor areas of rooms.
(4) The Department shall prescribe the manner in which the floor area of a room is to be ascertained for the purposes of the First Schedule to this Act, and a certificate of the local authority stating the number and floor areas of the rooms in a dwelling-house, and that the floor areas thereof have been ascertained in the prescribed manner, shall, for the purposes of any legal proceedings, be evidence of the facts stated therein.
LORD STRATHCONA AND MOUNT ROYAL LORD STRATHCONA AND MOUNT ROYAL moved, in subsection (4), after "Act, and," to insert:
"the regulations may provide for the exclusion from computation, or for the bringing, into computation at a reduced figure, of floor space in any part of a room which is of less than a specified height.
(5)"
The noble Lord said: This Amendment has been put down to implement a pledge given by the Secretary of State in another place. It has, throughout, been the intention that the rules of measurement to be prescribed by the Department under Clause 7 (4) of the Bill should provide that in certain cases, for example, rooms with sloping roofs, only so much of the actual floor should be measured for the purposes of Table II of the First Schedule as was more than a minimum distance from the ceiling. This intention has been declared in the House of Commons and elsewhere, but it is now considered doubtful whether the present wording of the Bill would authorise the Department to take such action and for that purpose the Amendment has been put down.
Amendment moved—
Page 6, line 21, after ("and") insert the said words.—(Lord Strathcona and Mount Royal.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 7, as amended, agreed to.
Clauses 8 to 10 agreed to.
Clause 11 [Duty of medical officers to furnish particulars of overcrowding]:
LORD STRATHCONA AND MOUNT ROYAL LORD STRATHCONA AND MOUNT ROYAL moved to insert:
" (2) Before furnishing particulars under the foregoing subsection the medical officer of health shall consult with, or obtain a report from, the sanitary inspector of the authority."
The noble Lord said: This Amendment proposes to leave the duty to report on the medical officer of health, but it provides that, before reporting, he must either consult the sanitary inspector or obtain a report from him. The Amendment in this form is acceptable to the representatives of the Sanitary Inspectors Association with whom a conference recently took place on this matter.
Amendment moved—
Page 8, line 10, at end insert the said subsection.—(Lord Strathcona and Mount Royal.)
THE EARL OF ELGIN AND KINCARDINE: This Amendment certainly makes the clause more feasible than it was previously. The clause as it was originally printed in the Bill was one which seemed to me to be in controversy with Clause 1 of the Bill, which left on local authorities the duty of carrying out inspections and making reports. Then in Clause 11 it is the duty of the medical officer, quite apart from his responsibility to his local authority, to make a report in accordance with instructions from the Department of Health. I know that this is a procedure which is adopted in other Public Health Acts, but it is a procedure which is certainly not conducive to very harmonised work on the part of a local authority. Over and over again the Department of Health may issue instructions to the servants of the local authority, quite regardless of their terms of appointment to that authority, to make reports direct to the Department. I merely wish to enter a protest, but, as the Amendment has included the sanitary inspector also, it has made it more workable than it was previously.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 11, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 12:
Definitions for purposes of provisions relating to overcrowding.
12. In the foregoing provisions of this Part of this Act, and in the First Schedule
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to this Act, except where the context otherwise requires, the following expressions have the meanings hereby assigned to them respectively:
"Suitable alternative accommodation" means, in relation to the occupier of a dwelling-house, a dwelling-house in which the occupier and his family can live without causing it to be overcrowded, being a house which the local authority certify to be suitable to the needs of the occupier and his family as respects security of tenure and proximity to place of work and to be suitable in relation to his means.
THE LORD CHAIRMAN: I have been handed a manuscript Amendment to line 14 in page 8 to insert the words "'Local authority' means county council or town council or burgh council or any special committee to whom a county council may delegate its powers."
THE DUKE OF MONTROSE: I beg to move the Amendment to which the Lord Chairman has referred. This Amendment has been handed in because it was not thought to be quite clear what was meant by the term "local authority" If this Amendment is adopted "local authority" would mean "the county council, or town council, or burgh council or any special committee to whom a county council may delegate its powers." County councils, I may remind your Lordships, do delegate powers over roads, education, public health, and other matters to special committees, and I think that in order to administer this Bill when it becomes an Act efficiently in distant parts of counties we should include "district commitees." When I say this I am particularly thinking of the Islands. It is in their interests particularly that I am anxious to get this special committee included. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 8, line 14, insert (" 'Local authority' means county council or town council or burgh council or any special committee to whom a county council may delegate its powers").—(The Duke of Montrose.)
LORD STRATHCONA AND MOUNT ROYAL: This is the first time I have seen or heard about the Amendment in question. I would like to postpone it to a later stage, and I hope the noble Duke will agree to that being done.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
LORD BALFOUR OF BURLEIGH LORD BALFOUR OF BURLEIGH moved, in the definition of "suitable alternative accommodation," after "work,"

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to insert "and otherwise." The noble Lord said: The point of this Amendment can be stated in very few words. "Suitable alternative accommodation" is defined in the definition as relating to three specific things—security of tenure, proximity of buildings and work and suitability in relation to means. With the definition, as it stands, it is quite possible that the alternative which would have to be certified as being suitable might in fact be much less suitable than the accommodation already occupied by the family. The object is to give a wider discretion to the local authority. I think it would be a useful addition.
Amendment moved—
Page 8, line 33, after ("work") insert ("and otherwise").—(Lord Balfour of Burleigh.)
LORD STRATHCONA AND MOUNT ROYAL: The words "and otherwise" used by the noble Lord are in the opinion of the Government too wide for what is a definition clause. If the noble Lord can produce more specific words, or if he would agree to act consultation with the officials at the Scottish Office and would like to have suitable words added, I shall be glad, and will put down any agreed words on Report, but I cannot accept the words "and otherwise" as they stand. I agree with the sense of the Amendment entirely.
LORD BALFOUR OF BURLEIGH: I am much obliged to the noble Lord and in view of what he has said I will consult with the Scottish Office. In the meantime I withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 12 agreed to.
EARL STANHOPE: I do not know what the wishes of your Lordships are. I suggest that we should resume the House now and adjourn the debate on the Committee stage of this Bill until either Monday or Tuesday of next week. It is obviously going to take a considerable time to get through the Amendments on the Paper, and I think we should find ourselves very late if we tried to get through them to-night. I suggest that Tuesday is probably the best day on which to resume the Committee stage. The Government of India Bill is likely to take the whole of to-morrow both before and after dinner, and it may take a good deal of Monday as well. There
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are two other matters on the Order Paper on Monday which take precedence. These are the Unemployment Insurance (Crediting of Contributions) Bill, Second Reading, and the Diseases of Animals Bill, consideration of Commons Amendments. I suggest that we should adjourn the Committee stage of this Bill until Tuesday and that it should be the first Order for that day. If that is your Lordships' desire I will move accordingly.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: I cannot be here on Tuesday and I know one or two other noble Lords who cannot attend then. If we could have the Committee stage resumed on Monday, there is little left to be done, and I think we could do it on Monday evening.
EARL STANHOPE: I might suggest that we put it down for Monday and see how we get on with the Government of India. Bill to-morrow.
NOBLE LORDS: Yes.
EARL STANHOPE: I move that the House do now resume and that the Committee stage on the Housing (Scotland) Bill be resumed on Monday next.
Moved accordingly and, on Question, Motion agreed to.
House resumed.

HOURS OF EMPLOYMENT (CONVEN TIONS) BILL. [H.L.]
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
THE EARL OF FEVERSHAM: My Lords, I do not think it necessary to detain your Lordships for any length of time in moving the Second Reading of this Bill. The purpose of the Bill is to carry out two Conventions which were adopted by the International Labour Conference last summer and which the Government have announced their intention of ratifying, subject to the necessary legislation being passed. The first of these Conventions, contained in Clauses 1 and 2, is a Convention as to the employment of women at any industrial undertaking and it embodies the Convention on the same subject adopted at Washington in 1919 and later ratified by the British Government and also by many other countries. The substantial difference between the new Convention and the old one which necessitates this Bill is that the new

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Convention contains a specific examination for women holding responsible positions of management who are not ordinarily engaged in manual work. Effect is given to the old Convention by the Factory and Mines Act, which was supplemented by the Employment of Women, Young Persons and Children Act, 1920. The purpose of Clauses 1 and 2 in this Bill is to modify those Acts so as to exempt from certain of the provisions women holding responsible positions of management who are not ordinarily engaged in manual work.
The other Convention dealt with in the Bill is of a technical character and is of a limited application. It relates to the system of shift working for persons employed in continuous operations in sheet-glass works where the machinery is automatic. The only firm of glass manufacturers affected in this country are the well-known firm of Messrs. Pilkington, who supported the proposal for the Convention and who are understood to agree in its ratification. In fact the Convention is substantially, if not entirely, in conformity with their present practice. I hope with that short explanation of a comparatively simple Bill your Lordships will not hesitate to give it a Second Reading.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a—(The Earl of Feversham.)
LORD MARLEY: My Lords, on behalf of the Opposition I need hardly say that we welcome most heartily this Bill and the decision of the Government to ratify the Convention. There are just one or two points that I want to raise. I will not detain for more than a few moments those of your Lordships who have remained. I think the pathetic belief which the Government have in the general lines of organisation of one firm, Messrs. Pilkington Brothers, is a little touching. They may have accepted this in full, but it does not follow that it is perfectly satisfactory to the workers engaged by Messrs. Pilkington, and it is important, when we are ratifying an International Convention, that we should apply very strictly the rules of that Convention to prevent other countries who adopt similar legislation providing loopholes through which unfair competition might be applied to this country or might adversely affect our trade.
The loopholes I venture to suggest are these. First of all it does not seem to
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me that there is adequate provision in regard to the variations or extensions mentioned on page 3 of the Bill. For example, Clause 3 (1) (a) makes reference to a change over of shifts. A firm might change over every few days. I should have thought it would be a good thing—perhaps the Government will consider this—to put in something to ensure that notice is given to the Home Office or to the inspector concerned of arrangements or alterations of the periodical change of shifts. Again, there is the case of urgent work. We do not know what that means. There might be urgent work every day of the week for a year. Again, force majeure is mentioned in this clause, but it is not properly defined. Then there is a reference in the Schedule to raw materials subject to rapid deterioration. That, it seems to me, should be made the subject of inquiry. I refer to these points in order to show the need for safeguards in order to prevent loopholes being left through which a less reputable firm than Messrs. Pilkington's might escape from the conditions imposed upon them. The inclusion of some words which would ensure things being brought to the knowledge of the Home Office inspector would show that this country at least did not intend to leave any loopholes, and then other countries might perhaps follow suit.
THE EARL OF FEVERSHAM: My Lords, I agree with the noble Lord that if this Convention is to be ratified, it is necessary for all parties concerned to have a statutory right to make any representations that they may find necessary. The noble Lord is somewhat concerned as to whether such a right belongs to the employees of Messrs. Pilkington, which I understand is the only firm affected by this particular Convention.
LORD MARLEY: At present.
THE EARL OF FEVERSHAM: At present. I think perhaps the noble Lord might be satisfied if he reads Clause 3 (3). He will see that that subsection says:
… compensation for the hours so worked shall be granted by the employer in such manner as may be agreed between the organisations of employers and the workers concerned, or as may, in default of such agreement, be determined by such method as may be prescribed by the Secretary of State after consulting the Minister of Labour."

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I think that such a decision arrived at between the Department I represent and the Minister of Labour must rest upon the facts of the particular case. It seems to me that there is little doubt that the point raised by the noble Lord will be met by the provisions already contained in Clause 3, but if he so desires, I should be very glad to consider the point further, so that, if it is found necessary, an Amendment may be moved at a later stage.
LORD MARLEY: My Lords, I am extremely obliged to the noble Earl for his very helpful answer. The proviso to paragraph (d), however, does not seem to apply to the periodical change over of shifts. If he would look into the point and perhaps make the proviso in Clause 3 (1) applicable to the whole subsection, I think that would meet the case.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

HOUSING BILL.
Order of the Day for the Third Reading read.
VISCOUNT GAGE: My Lords, on behalf of my noble friend Viscount Halifax, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a third time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 3a—(Viscount Gage.)
THE EARL OF KINNOULL: My Lords, of course it is obviously useless to say anything at this hour with so few noble Lords in the House, but I do not want to let this Bill be read a third time without giving it, shall I say, a good kick, although we wish the Bill well. This Bill is a confession of failure on the part of the Government. I will not say more than that. The Act of 1924 I believe abolished subsidies, and now we have to reintroduce them. We, on these Benches, strongly object to the standard of overcrowding set out in the Bill. The noble Lord, Lord Balfour of Burleigh, who, I am sorry to see, is not now in his place, certainly did a great deal to improve matters, but I would like to make a formal protest against this standard of overcrowding. With regard to the clause giving power to local authorities to hand over housing schemes to housing associations, I would like to point out that under
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this Bill apparently they cannot regain control. Under the Scottish Bill they can. I have seen no real argument why a thing which is right in Scotland is wrong in England and Wales. I have been told on fairly good authority that the big local authorities much prefer the 1930 Act. It is much more workable than this Bill. Although I wish this Bill well, I do not think it will be really workable by local authorities.
On Question, Bill read 3a, with the Amendments.
Clause 20:
Extension of power of local authority to acquire houses and other buildings for housing purposes.
(5) Where a local authority acquire a house or other building, which can be made suitable as a dwelling-house for the working classes, or an estate or interest in such a house or other building, they shall forthwith proceed to secure the alteration, enlargement, repair or improvement of the house or building, either by themselves executing any necessary works, or by leasing or selling it to some person subject to conditions for securing that he will alter, enlarge, repair or improve it.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME moved, in subsection (5), before "alter," to insert "forthwith" The noble Viscount said: My Lords, if it is thought necessary, as it appears to be by this clause, that a local authority who acquire houses and land shall forthwith set to work to carry out certain works, then surely, a fortiori, if they sell or let it to some other person, that other person should also be bound to do the work forthwith. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 18, line 2, after ("will") insert ("forthwith").—(Viscount Bertie of Thame.)
VISCOUNT GAGE: My Lords, I quite agree with the noble Viscount's contention, but I cannot agree that the interpretation which he places on the wording of this clause is correct. I am informed by legal advisers that the words "forthwith proceed to secure the alteration," and so on, govern the action of a local authority whether they do it by themselves or lease out the duty to some other person. But I should like to point out that they would, in leasing the house, normally put in a specific date by which the repairs should be completed. I think that the noble Viscount, as a lawyer,

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would probably know better than I that to include a definite date of that kind in a lease would be preferable to including the word "forthwith," which in a lease has a somewhat vague meaning. Anyhow, it is perfectly clear that the local authority will be compelled, so far as the wording of the clause goes, to apply the same expedition to a lease under which these operations would be conducted as if they were doing the repairs themselves.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME: My Lords, I cannot quite agree with my noble friend, because he says that a date will be put in. There is nothing to force the local authority to put a date in. They may not wish to carry out these works forthwith, and they may have a fellow-feeling with the person to whom they sell or let. But there does not seem much good in pressing the point, so I beg leave to withdraw.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 25:
Power to establish Housing Management Commissions.
25.—(1) Where it appears to a local authority to be expedient that a Housing Management Commission should be established with a view to the transfer to and the performance by the Commission of all or any of the functions of the authority under the enactments relating to housing with respect. to the management, regulation and control, and the repair and maintenance, of working-class houses and other buildings or land provided in connection with such houses, the authority shall prepare and submit to the Minister a scheme making provision for the establishment of the Commission, and for the incorporation thereof, under the name of the Housing Management Commission with the addition of the name of the district of the local authority, with perpetual succession and a common seal, and power to hold land for the purposes of their constitution without licence in mortmain.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME moved, in subsection (1), after "repair," to insert "alteration, enlargement, improvement." The noble Viscount said: My Lords, if your Lordships will look at Clause 20, page 17, line 18, you will see that there are certain distinctions made between altering, enlarging, repairing or improving. Surely, if it is necessary in that place, it is as necessary, or more prudent, to have the words included throughout the Bill. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 23, line 35, after ("repair"), insert ("alteration, enlargement, improvement")—(Viscount Bertie of Thame.)
VISCOUNT GAGE: My Lords, I should like to point out that the two clauses to which the noble Lord has referred, 20 and 25, refer to different matters. The clause the noble Lord seeks to amend refers to Housing Management Commissions, and it is not intended that they should be given these extended functions. The functions of the Housing Management Commission are rather, as is stated in the clause, to effect repairs; it is not contemplated that they should have these extended powers of improving and enlarging houses. I hope that with that explanation the noble Viscount will be satisfied.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME: Force majeure, in this case!
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 26:
Definition of housing association.
26. For references in the Act of 1925 and in the Act of 1930 to a public utility society there shall be substituted references to a "housing association," that is to say any society, body of trustees or company established for the purpose of, or amongst whose objects or powers are included those of, constructing, improving or managing, or facilitating or encouraging the construction or improvement of, houses for the working classes, being a society, company or body of trustees who do not, trade for profit or whose constitution or rules prohibit the issue of any capital with interest or dividend exceeding the rate for the time being prescribed by the Treasury, whether with or without differentiation as between share and loan capital.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME moved, after "constructing," to insert "repairing, altering, enlarging." The noble Viscount said: My Lords, the same sort of arguments apply here. I do not know whether my noble friend is prepared to accept them, and to save time I formally move.
Amendment moved—
Page 26, line 14, after ("constructing"), insert. ("repairing, altering, enlarging").—(Viscount Bertie of Thame.)
VISCOUNT GAGE: My Lords, I do not want the noble Lord to place force majeure in this immense majority which we had over him to-night, but I must point out to him that this is the reverse

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of the argument which he was advancing on the last Amendment. This Amendment refers to housing associations, which are quite different from Housing Management Commissions. Indeed, they have very different powers, which are already defined in the clause. We are advised that the words which the noble Lord suggested are already covered in Clause 26. He will observe them in line 14: "constructing, improving or managing, or facilitating or encouraging the construction or improvement of, houses for the working classes." We maintain that there will hardly ever be an occasion where a society, whose objects include repairing, altering or enlarging working-class houses, will not also include in them construction, improving or managing. We think that would be an impossible situation, and we think that the housing associations will discover powers in the clause to give them all that is necessary.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME: I am certainly not going to press it, but I hope that no difficulty will arise!
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
VISCOUNT GAGE: My Lords, I beg to move, That this Bill do now pass. I only wish to refer to the remarks of the noble Earl: I think that probably every point he made was answered in Committee.
Moved, That the Bill do now pass.—(Viscount Gage.)
THE EARL OF KINNOULL: If I may say so, I do not think they were answered.
On Question, Bill passed, and returned to the Commons.

SALMON AND FRESHWATER FISHERIES BILL.
Read 3a (according to Order), with the Amendments, and passed, and returned to the Commons.
ASSURANCE COMPANIES (WINDING UP) BILL. [H.L.]
Read 3a (according to Order); Amendments (privilege) made: Bill passed, and sent to the Commons.
MONEY PAYMENTS (JUSTICES PROCEDURE) BILL. [H.L.]
Read 3a (according to Order), and passed, and sent to the Commons.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
EARL STANHOPE: My Lords, before the House adjourns, I should like to remind your Lordships that it is proposed that we should meet to-morrow at three o'clock.
House adjourned at twenty-eight minutes past eight o'clock.