Lords Sitting of 27 July 1936

Preamble
The House met at three of the clock, The EARL OF ONSLOW on the Woolsack.
COVENTRY CORPORATION BILL.
Read 3a, with the Amendments, and passed, and returned to the Commons.
THORNTON CLEVELEYS IMPROVEMENT BILL.
Read 3a, with the Amendments, and passed, and returned to the Commons.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
THE LORD PRIVY SEAL (VISCOUNT HALIFAX): My Lords, I beg to move the Motion which stands in my name on the Paper.
Moved, That Standing Order No. XXI be considered in order to its being suspended, and that for the remainder of the Session all Government Bills which are entered for consideration on the Minutes of the Day shall have precedence of other Bills and Notices.—(Viscount Halifax.)
On Question, Motion agreed to, and ordered accordingly.

TITHE BILL.
Returned from the Commons, with the Amendments agreed to.
CATTLE INDUSTRY (EMERGENCY PROVISIONS) BILL.
Brought from the Commons, endorsed with a Certificate from the Speaker that the Bill is a Money Bill within the meaning of the Parliament Act, 1911; read 1a; and to be printed.
EDUCATION BILL.
Returned from the Commons with certain of the Lords Amendments agreed to, and one disagreed to, for which disagreement the Commons assigned a Reason.
ABERDEEN CORPORATION (STREETS, BUILDINGS, SEWERS ETC.) ORDER CONFIRMATION BILL.
Brought from the Commons; read 1a; to be printed, and (pursuant to the Private Legislation Procedure (Scotland) Act, 1899) deemed to have been read 2a and reported from the Committee.
ABERDEEN CORPORATION ORDER CONFIRMATION BILL.
Brought from the Commons; read 1a; to be printed and (pursuant to the Private Legislation Procedure (Scotland) Act, 1899) deemed to have been read 2a and reported from the Committee.
DOVER CORPORATION BILL. [H.L.]
Returned from the Commons, agreed to, with Amendments: the said Amendments considered and agreed to.
MORTLAKE CREMATORIUM BILL. [H.L.]
Returned from the Commons, agreed to, with Amendments: the said Amendments considered and agreed to.
AXBRIDGE RURAL DISTRICT COUNCIL BILL.
Returned from the Commons, with the Amendments agreed to.
CHELTENHAM AND GLOUCESTER JOINT WATER BOARD, ETC., BILL.
Returned from the Commons, with the Amendments agreed to.
LONDON AND NORTH EASTERN RAILWAY (GENERAL POWERS) BILL.
Returned from the Commons, with the Amendments agreed to.
LONDON AND NORTH EASTERN RAILWAY (LONDON TRANSPORT) BILL.
Returned from the Commons, with the Amendments agreed to.
LONDON PASSENGER TRANSPORT BOARD BILL.
Returned from the Commons, with the Amendments agreed to.
SURREY COUNTY COUNCIL BILL.
Returned from the Commons, with the Amendments agreed to.
GAS LIGHT AND COKE COMPANY (No. 2) BILL.
Returned from the Commons, with the Amendment agreed to.
SEA FISHERIES PROVISIONAL ORDER (No. 1) BILL.
House in Committee (according to Order) on re-commitment of the Bill: Bill reported without amendment.
SEA FISHERIES PROVISIONAL ORDER (No. 2) BILL.
House in Committee (according to Order) on re-commitment of the Bill: Bill reported without amendment.
MINISTRY OF HEALTH PROVISIONAL ORDER (HEATHFIELD AND DISTRICT WATER) BILL.
House in Committee (according to Order) on re-commitment of the Bill: Bill reported without amendment.
MINISTRY OF HEALTH PROVISIONAL ORDER (HELSTON AND PORTHLEVEN WATER) BILL.
House in Committee (according to Order) on re-commitment of the Bill: Bill reported without amendment.
MARRIAGES PROVISIONAL ORDERS BILL.
Read 3a (according to Order), and passed.

MIDWIVES BILL.
Order of the Day for the Third Reading read.
VISCOUNT GAGE: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be read a third time. I understand that the noble Earl on the Woolsack wishes to ask a question in regard to the measure.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 3a.—(Viscount Gage.)
THE EARL OF ONSLOW: My Lords, the point. I wished to raise was with regard to Clauses 5 and 6. Clause 5 says that no midwife who has received her compensation and been taken off the list shall afterwards practise as a midwife. Clause 6 says that persons who are registered nurses and who have had a midwife's training may practise for remuneration. I wish to ask my noble friend how these two clauses agree. I understand his reply may be that Clause 5 prevents any woman from practising for remuneration even though she has the qualification under Clause 6 (1) (c). It seems to me that there is a certain difficulty here because very often midwives are trained nurses and obtain their Central Midwives Board certificate as an additional qualification, whether they mean to practise as midwives or not, for it is an advantage to obtain the Central Midwives Board certificate.
A woman who has retired from the business of midwife may be a fully trained nurse and still on the register, as provided in Clause 6. Now supposing she wishes to go back to nursing, she would not be in the same position as any untrained woman would be. The latter could go forward and obtain her C.M.B. certificate, but the retired midwife would be debarred under Clause 6 entirely from practising and her position may be much damaged thereby. Many hospitals prefer, if they do not insist on, their nurses obtaining a C.M.B. certificate. Now any trained nurse can get the certificate except a trained nurse who has been a midwife and has retired. She seems to be in a worse position than other nurses. For example, she may be offered the post of matron and be unable to accept it if a C.M.B. certificate is one of the conditions. Of course she has got her C.M.B. certificate but she is technically no longer qualified as a midwife, and I venture to think that there is some hardship there. I do not know that it is a very great one. Of course the result may be that institutions will not be so insistent on having nurses who are also trained midwives as they have been in the past.
VISCOUNT GAGE: My Lords, owing to the short notice at which we considered Amendments on the Committee stage—for
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which I must disclaim responsibility on behalf of the Government—I promised Lord Aberdare that I would examine the report of what he had said and if there was any new point which my answers in Committee had not covered, that I would give a further explanation on Third Reading. I also gave a similar undertaking to Lord Onslow. I must quite frankly say that my advisers can find very little in what the noble Lord said that has not been previously discussed, not once but several times, in another place and in private conversations between representatives of the midwives and my right honourable friend the Minister, but we wish to be as courteous as possible to the midwives' representatives, and perhaps I might amplify one or two points, and at the same time answer Lord Onslow's question.
I think it would be easier to understand these points and the answers to them if we bore in mind some of the statistics about the midwives whose circumstances we are trying to improve in this Bill. The definition of a midwife is a lady who holds a certificate of the Midwives Board. There are at present nearly 60,000 of such ladies on the roll. Any of these can practise, but before doing so they have to notify the local supervising authority. Now it is important to realise that the large majority of those who take the certificate merely do so to add to their ordinary nursing qualifications, without having any intention of practising as midwives, and in fact out of the 60,000, over 40,000 have not notified their local supervising authority that they desire to practise. Accordingly they do not do so although they can do so at any time by merely putting in an application to the authorities. This class will be unaffected by the Bill.
We now come to the practising class of about 15,000 midwives. Of this number, approximately 6,000 are salaried and the large majority of them salaried not only as midwives but as nurse-midwives employed by hospitals, village nursing associations and so forth, while about 9,000 are in independent practice; and by far the most important effect of the Bill, as far as the midwives themselves are concerned, will be on the 9,000 independent midwives. As the discretion of the supervising authorities will be unfettered I cannot give any accurate figures, but

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what we anticipate will eventually happen will be that about half these independent midwives will be absorbed into the salaried service and the other half will either disappear from the roll altogether or will continue in independent practice.
I should like to refer in a little more detail to the midwives who will eventually come off the roll as the result of this Bill. There are some who will be compulsorily retired, but your Lordships will see that the conditions under which this may be done are very strictly governed by Clause 5. The local authority may not retire them compulsorily unless they are satisfied that by reason of age or infirmity of mind or body the midwife is incapable of performing her duties. Her position will be safeguarded by the fact that she may obtain compensation based on five years' average emoluments, and she has a right of appeal. This is the only class that can be retired compulsorily. There is another portion of these 9,000 independent midwives who we think will retire under subsection (1) of Clause 5, that is to say, who will retire voluntarily, subject to compensation, and I must point out to your Lordships that the whole object of this provision is in the interest of these independent midwives themselves, who in some cases, owing to the overcrowding of their profession, have become the victims of competition; and what we are doing by devoting money to help the supervising authorities to pay this compensation is merely an act of grace towards these midwives.
Having reminded your Lordships of these figures I would like to refer once more to one or two of the points made by the noble Lord in the last debate. His first point deals with notification. He is anxious that every independent midwife should be notified so that she should have a chance of putting in an application for any new salaried posts that may be offered. We maintain that the independent midwives will undoubtedly know if there are any vacancies in the new service, firstly because in Clause 1 we insist that wherever a scheme is made it should be done after consultation with all the organisations interested, including the representatives of the local midwives. That we feel to be really a sufficiently complete safeguard in itself. In the case of local authorities engaging midwives
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themselves, we also require them to send direct notification of such vacancies as they are filling to any independent midwife living within their area. We do not say so in the case of the voluntary associations for two reasons. Firstly, the voluntary associations, as a general rule, are not interested in applications from those who only have the midwives' certificate. Usually they want those who combine a knowledge of general nursing with midwifery. And the second reason is that we do think it is unfair to put on the voluntary associations—it may be small village nursing associations—the duty of discovering and circularising any independent midwife who may happen to be living in their district. Nevertheless, we have no doubt they will be informed through their organisation. That is the answer to the first point.
The second point raised by the noble Lord was the question of compensation in the case of those voluntarily surrendering their certificates. His contention is that the Parliamentary Under-Secretary, in another place, stated that the three years that we are selecting were the best possible three years from the midwives' point of view, whereas the noble Lord produced figures to show that in many cases they are not the best three years. My answer to this point is, firstly, that the Parliamentary Under-Secretary was discussing a different Amendment—namely, whether the compensation should be three times the annual average of the last five years or three times the annual average of the last three years. That is not quite the same point as the noble Lord raised. I am quite prepared to admit that there may be many cases where the average of the last three years would not produce compensation on such a high scale as it would if other years were chosen, though in cases where the midwife was extending her practice it undoubtedly would. The real answer to the point is one that I made before—namely, that what it is intended to do is to compensate the midwife for the loss she would have sustained if she were going on in practice; and if, to use the noble Lord's expression, "the curve of her earnings has been going down," the presumption is that these earnings would continue to go down still more, so that compensation based on the last three years would really more than

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compensate her for what she would earn if she remained in practice.
The last point is one which was raised by both Lord Aberdare and, in a different form, by Lord Onslow. It concerns the question as to whether, if a midwife has voluntarily surrendered her certificate, she could not, in certain circumstances, be allowed to go back on to the roll. Lord Onslow personally is troubled on a point of drafting. He suggested that there is a discrepancy between the wording of Clause 5 (8) and Clause 6 (1) (c). On this point I can only tell the noble Earl that we have looked into this matter and our legal advisers feel it is made quite clear that where a woman has been compensated, and her name removed from the roll, she is entirely barred from ever practising again. Your Lordships must understand that Clause 6 refers to a totally different class of woman, but even so we feel that the wording of Clause 5 (8) is sufficiently definite and clear as to rule out entirely any claim under paragraph (c) of Clause 6.
But having dealt with that drafting point, the noble Earl asked why should they not be allowed to come back on to the roll. My answer is, why should they? One of the main objects of this Bill is to reduce, in their own interests, the number of independent midwives. The women of whom we are speaking now are under no sort of compulsion to surrender their certificates. They will only do so because they feel they will be improving their economic situation by taking the compensation. It seems to be altogether unfair that any woman should be allowed to take this compensation and then say afterwards, "Well, I think I could do better by going into practice again," and thus possibly starting the whole of this problem over again. Furthermore, if she did come back she would obviously have to surrender her compensation, probably with interest, and there would be elaborate calculations to be made. We feel that to try and introduce a principle of this kind on the Third Reading of the Bill would be to lose the Bill inevitably this Session, and as we also think it is undesirable in itself noble Lords will understand why we are resisting the point.
I wish to say only one final word. The midwives are given three years to decide
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what course to pursue. During that time, if any unexpected development takes place, there will be time to review the situation. Secondly, the circular that we shall send out will take into the fullest consideration all the points which have been raised by the midwives' representatives. The real fact of the matter is that in this Bill we are putting the midwives in a much better position than they have ever occupied, and we feel it would be somewhat injudicious and would jeopardise the fate of the Bill if it were now held up because the midwives cannot get every small point they want.
LORD ABERDARE: My Lords, I do not wish unnecessarily to delay your Lordships, for I understand there is a good deal of business to be done in your Lordships' House this afternoon, but it would be discourteous if I did not thank the noble Viscount for having made answer to the Amendments which I put forward on the Committee stage. I realise and understand the position now because, through the noble Viscount's courtesy, I was able to be present at a conference at the Ministry of Health. I quite see that it is impossible to press the Ministry any further, and I am prepared to leave things as they are, but I did get a promise at the Ministry that if any suggestions came from the Midwives Institute to the Ministry, and there was any value in them, they would be used in the instructions which the Minister of Health is going to send to the authorities as soon as this Bill is passed. The noble Viscount covered the points of my three Amendments, but I did raise one other point which I was asked to raise by the Joint Council of Midwifery, and that was as regards preparing for the same inspection of maternity nurses as for midwives. I understand the difficulty there is, that the position of the maternity nurse is rather different from that of the midwife in that the former is so essentially under the authority of the doctor. Finally, I can only hope that baby Bill will be brought quickly into the world, and that, thanks to the careful pre-natal ministrations of the noble Viscount, it will have a long and successful life; and that the noble Viscount may still be where he is in practice after a further three years period. I am very glad to support the Third Reading.
On Question, Bill read 3a, and passed.

DRAFT UNEMPLOYMENT ASSISTANCE (DETERMINATION OF NEED AND ASSESSMENT OF NEEDS) REGULATIONS, 1936.
THE PAYMASTER-GENERAL (LORD HUTCHISON OF MONTROSE): My Lords, I beg to move the Resolution that stands in my name—namely, That the Draft Regulations, as reported from the Special Orders Committee on Tuesday last, be approved. These Regulations have been subjected to debate for more than three days in another place. I venture to say that the Regulations are successful in dealing with the problem which has long defied the efforts of past Governments, and that they form a sound, reasonable, and just solution of this great social problem. Before going on to discuss the Regulations, I should like to draw your Lordships' attention to one or two documents which have been issued by the Government on this subject. Firstly, there are the new Draft Regulations themselves. Then there is a Memorandum explaining these Regulations, prepared by the Minister of Labour. There is also a very admirable Memorandum prepared by the Unemployment Assistance Board. There are in addition a White Paper giving all the payments which have been made in the various areas, and the very admirable Report prepared by the Board for 1935. In elucidating these Regulations this Report serves an admirable purpose. It has been prepared under the able chairmanship of Lord Rushcliffe, who knows a great deal about this matter from his long experience as Minister of Labour in the Government in past days, and I cannot allow this opportunity to pass without making reference to the other members of the Board and to one particularly, Miss Violet Markham, the only lady on the Board, who has devoted so much of her time in the past to work of a social order and who has given up so much of her time to elucidating various troubles which the first set of Regulations produced.
The Report submitted by the Board to the Government is altogether admirable. I think it right and proper that in your Lordships' House I should give quite a short historical sketch of what led up to these Regulations. In 1930 the payment of the extra insurance benefits gradually became a very great strain on our financial resources, and the Labour
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Government, in 1930, appointed a Royal Commission to inquire into the general state of the unemployment system. At that time the borrowings by the Unemployment Insurance Fund were undoubtedly creating a great strain on the national finances. The result of these borrowings was, in part at least, the cause of the troubles that led up to the financial crisis in 1931, and when the National Government came into office one of the first things they did was to bring in what was known as the Economy Act under which, by means of certain Orders in Council, various alterations were made. The unemployed insured people who were receiving benefit under contract were divided from those who were receiving benefit outside contract; in other words the transitional payment able-bodied unemployed were brought on to the National Exchequer, though, as your Lordships know, the assistance to them was assessed by the various local Poor Law authorities. The Government also decided that it was necessary to have a test of means on the basis of the household.
The next thing that happened was that the Royal Commission reported in November, 1932, and as a result the Unemployment Act of 1934 was passed. Part II of that Act set up the Unemployment Assistance Board in order to administer that part of the unemployment scheme which related to those receiving transitional payments. The Act lays down that the need of the applicant must be assessed under Regulations made by the Minister of Labour, and the Board, after due examination and consideration, submitted to the Minister Draft Regulations. The Minister can accept those Regulations of the Board and then submit them to the Houses of Parliament, or, if he wants to alter them, he must explain to the Houses of Parliament why he wishes to do so. At the same time he must submit the various remarks of the Board on the alterations that he wishes to make. The Regulations which we are now discussing were produced by the Board, accepted by the Minister, and submitted to the Houses of Parliament without alteration. If your Lordships see fit to approve and pass these Regulations they will come into operation on November 16 next. They affect two classes. First of all there is what is known as the first appointed day. On the first appointed

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day the Board took over the whole of the transitional payment people—that is, people who have been under the Insurance Acts—and on the second appointed day they take over those people who have never been insured at all, and who are now being dealt with by the various local authorities under the Poor Law.
It is well to remember that the original Regulations are still in existence. They came into operation on January 7, 1935, but they proved to be unsatisfactory from the point of view that the reduction of allowances occurred to a far greater extent than had ever been expected. Therefore the Government, in order to give time for an inquiry to be made into the operation of the first Regulations, passed what was known as the "Standstill" Act. The "Standstill" Act gave the advantage to the recipients of receiving their benefit either under the transitional payment scheme or under the new Regulations' scheme, whichever happened to be the more beneficial to them. It is worth while pointing out that to-day 41 per cent. of these unfortunate people are receiving their allowances under the Board's original Regulations, and 59 per cent. are receiving something more under the old transitional payments practice. Criticism has been made on the ground that a very long time has elapsed since the original Regulations were brought into being, but I venture to suggest that the time has been well spent. It has allowed a very careful survey to be made of the reasons for the various objections. It has allowed the Board to get into close touch with applicants, and it has produced in many cases a happy feeling between the officers of the Board and the applicants. Therefore I do not think those eighteen months have been wasted; in fact they have enabled a real contact and understanding to come about between those who administer the Regulations and the unfortunate applicants.
These Regulations are based on two or three principles. The first principle provides that there shall be an assessment of need. I submit that it is perfectly sound and proper that before payment of allowances is made an assessment of need should take place. Those who are getting benefit under the Regulations and the transitional payment principle to-day number about 620,000 people, and when these Regulations become law, and
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the second appointed day, which is April 1, 1937, arrives, there will be added another 200,000 people. These will be taken over from the Poor Law administration and brought under the operation of these Regulations. I should like to say here that from the time when the Government, in 1931, started the transitional payments until to-day the bulk of the cost has been met by the Treasury from the taxpayer. It is undoubtedly true that these Regulations, in dealing with need, have to take note of what the resources are, and under the 1934 Act the officers are bound to consider the household as the unit. Criticism has been made of this on the ground that really the inquiry into resources ought to be into individual resources, but the fact remains that the Act lays it down that the resources shall be those of the household, and had the Government thought it necessary to make an alteration from the household to the individual it would have meant fresh legislation. The greatest care has been taken to avoid any possibility of requiring such high contributions from members of a household towards the maintenance of an unemployed member of the household as to strain relationships, or, as it has been put, to cause a break-up of the family. Representations from various districts have been very carefully considered, and the reports we have received show that this criticism that there will be a break-up of family life is really not true.
The second principle is that there ought to be equalisation of treatment through-out the country. Administration in the past has been by local boards through the Poor Law and there have been varying assessments of need and variations in the amount of benefit given. There has been very great inequality in dealing with this problem as between one district and another according to the views of the local authorities. Under these Regulations we shall get equalisation of treatment much more closely developed throughout the country but allowance is made for variations in local conditions. In particular that is found in the way in which the Regulations deal with rent. That varies considerably throughout the country—the difference is particularly noticeable between North and South—and the fact has been recognised in the Regulations. I think it may be said that with the allowances made

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for local circumstances equalisation has been properly carried out.
The third principle upon which these Regulations are based is flexibility. Discretion is allowed to the Board and its local officers and the appeal tribunals in dealing with various cases. They are given power under the Regulations to deal with special cases and with circumstances of exceptional character. The local advisory committees, with which I shall deal later, can recommend to the Board's officers that certain cases, owing to their special circumstances, should have special treatment in the matter of allowances. People living alone with no resources, for instance, are to be specially treated under these Regulations. Altogether I think it will be found that the Regulations are much more flexible and much more adaptable to local circumstances than were the old Regulations.
Criticism of the Regulations has been made on the ground that in many cases where adjustments are made a sudden drop in the household income by the reduction of benefit would produce great hardship. That is recognised in the Regulations and a period of eighteen months has been granted to the Board in which they can adjust the scaling down of allowances where there has to be scaling down from the old transitional payment. I think that during those eighteen months the Board will be able to ease and reduce the hardships in cases where reduction has to be made. I would, however, like to say that there are certainly two types of cases where very excessive payment has been made to applicants which certainly ought to be dealt with quickly. Those are cases where the allowances now being received are very much in excess of what they should be, and cases of young men below the age of twenty-five who at present are receiving 17s. whereas the scale rate laid down in the Regulations is only 10s. Those cases will have to be dealt with by the Board fairly quickly.
Before I deal with the method of assessment I would like to say that the chief attack made on the Regulations in another place was developed on the means test. One knows now where my noble friend opposite stands in this matter. Those on the front Opposition Bench in another place made it quite clear where they stand. I am not sure
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where my Liberal friends stand, but at any rate we know that the members of the Labour Party dislike the means test. Most of your Lordships, however, I think will agree with me, that if we are paying out taxpayers' money we must see before making any payment that there is real need. The only way to establish that is to examine resources. The Act of 1934 lays it down that those resources are to be considered from a household point of view. It seems to me only fair and just, not only to the payer but to the receiver, that an examination of resources should take place before payment is made. If, as some of my noble friends opposite say should be done, relief is given without ascertaining need, then I think you get two results: you certainly get an appalling waste of public money, and you get also gross injustice as between applicants who have no resources and those who have considerable resources. The idea of having a standard benefit, no matter what a person's resources may be, is all right when you have an insurance contract. Under an insurance contract you pay a flat rate because you are simply carrying out a contract. But here there is no contract. You are giving money to these unfortunate people, and it seems to me that the taxpayer has a right to demand that we should make some inquiry into resources.
This means test is not a new thing. You have it in the non-contributory old age pensions, you have it in the rents charged by various local authorities, and you have it in the Bill which your Lordships passed only a few minutes ago, the Midwives Bill. Under that Bill the local authorities are given power to remit all the fees of the midwives in the case of people who are not in a position to pay. There is another example of the means test in the Act of 1931 dealing with the raising of the school age. There it is provided that the allowance given to the family on account of a child remaining at school is payable only in case of need. Therefore this need business is no new thing.
The way in which the assessments have been made is very fair. The scale rules are described in the First Schedule. There is a very excellent report of that in the explanatory Memorandum produced by the Board. They lay down

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exactly how the assessments are made, the need of the applicants and of the other members of the household; and of course they take care that certain members of the household who themselves could apply for assistance are not included in the household. Certain things, as you know, have been eliminated altogether in the assessment of need, and all to the advantage of the recipient. These are very carefully laid down in the Memorandum. Of sick pay from the friendly societies the first 5s. a week, and of benefit under the National Health Insurance Acts the first 7s. 6d. a week are eliminated. Maternity benefit under the National Health Insurance Acts is also eliminated. Of wounds and disability pension the first £1 a week is eliminated; and of the weekly payments under the Workmen's Compensation Acts only one-half is assessed. Thus great discrimination has been shown in these methods of assessment before the actual assessments are made.
Then also in the Memorandum you will find the various scale rates which are laid down, with the difference between what is existing to-day and what is proposed under the Draft Regulations. In at least four cases increases have been made in these scales of benefit. The rate for a woman in a household has been increased from 14s. to 15s. and so on, while the rates are in no case reduced from what they were. In arriving at the real need you take the scale rates and deduct the resources of the household, and then arrive at the figure which ought to be paid to that household for relief. At the same time it is always subject to discretionary final adjustments. This shows the elasticity of the scheme; it allows special cases to be dealt with under the recommendation of these committees and also by the Board officers and by the appeal tribunals. There is also the point that the super-cut for large families in the previous regulations, Is. for each member in excess of five, is done away with, which I think is all to the good.
Now I come to the rent rule, because, of course, this has a very great deal to do with the assessing of what ought to be given to these poor people. The rent rule was one of the chief causes of the trouble at the first production of the Regulations. Now it has been laid down
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that, after you take the various resources off the household, the basic rent shall be judged to be a quarter of that amount. To take an example: if you take a man and his wife and one adult son and a child of fourteen years of age, the scale rate is 24s. plus 10s., plus 6s. for the child, making a total of 40s. The normal rent in such a case is regarded as 10s., and if in fact the rent is only 6s., then there is cause for reducing the allowances by 4s. This, however, is not done automatically. It may be that this family is living in an area where something less than 10s. would be regarded as the normal rent, and the local advisory committees are given power to recommend that the basic rent shall be reduced. In fact, in the North of Scotland—and also right through the country, but this will apply largely to those areas—they can reduce the rent to a fifth or even to a sixth of the total resources. You will find that very carefully laid out in the explanatory Memorandum, where examples are given. It is realised that the rent question varies throughout the country and steps have been taken in these Regulations to deal with the difficulty.
The earnings are divided into four groups. First there is the applicant; then there are the husband, the wife, the father and the mother; the third group contains the son, the daughter, the brother and sister with no dependants; and the fourth group are the more distantly-related persons, including the brother and sister who have dependants. In the first group, the applicant himself is allowed to retain 3s. of any casual earnings and he also gets progressive advantage from any earnings up to 16s. That is an improvement on the existing Regulations. In the second group, the husband, the wife, the father and the mother are treated exactly the same as the applicant. The third group—that is, the sons, daughters, brothers and sisters with no dependants—can retain for their personal requirements all earnings up to 12s. and half of any earnings in excess of 12s. if they are under the age of eighteen; and all earnings up to 20s. if they are over eighteen. Thus an adult son of the applicant who is earning, we will say, 42s. a week will be regarded as retaining for his own personal use 29s.; that is 16s. which he is

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allowed to retain, then the half of 26s., and he will be regarded as contributing only 13s. out of his 42s. towards the general household expenses. The fourth group, which consists of those who are more distantly related and brothers and sisters who have dependants, are treated more or less as lodgers and are only expected to pay the expenses of their maintenance as if they were ordinary boarders paying ordinary board and lodging. It should also be remembered in this question of earnings that these are net earnings after the payment of certain things which are necessary for the persons in their employment—that means insurance contributions and other expenses. The scales are certainly generous in the way in which they treat these actual earnings.
Now I come to these local committees. There are 126 local committees being set up throughout the country to help to advise in the administration of these Regulations. Their duties are to advise on the rent rule, differentiation in predominantly rural areas, and the progressive steps by which the "Standstill" allowances are to be brought into line with these Regulations. In addition may I say that I think the Board have made it abundantly clear that they look upon these committees as really effective bodies, who can recommend and advise on the whole field of the Board's activities. I have always felt, and I have expressed my personal view to those whom I have met on the Board, that one of the chief errors in the original Regulations was cutting away from the local committees. You could not launch this whole enormous thing from one headquarters, and I look upon these committees as being of the greatest value. They include, as your Lordships know, people representing the employers and the workpeople, and they also include those who have experience in the handling of public assistance and public health. The people on those committees are really experienced people, who ought to render, and I hope and believe will render, great service in the administration of these Regulations.
Then you have the appeal tribunals. There are 138 of these tribunals, and undoubtedly they have the same powers as the officers of the Board. They have discretion as to dealing with any appeals
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which come before them. One criticism has been made of these tribunals. The critics say that anyone ought to be able to go to an appeal tribunal, whereas now the chairman has got to give leave before an applicant can appeal. I do not think that that is unreasonable. Anyone who has had experience of the handling of these poor unfortunate people must realise how many do put forward points which are not points of substance, and that they do require guiding. I think the chairman is the proper person to say whether an applicant is really justified in bringing an appeal before the tribunal. At any rate we will have, after one year's working, the report on the working of the Regulations, and I am sure that the Government of the day will pay attention to any recommendations which may come from the Board on this particular point.
There is one other point which I would like to deal with before I come to the finance, and that is that there is an interesting provision in the first proviso to Regulation IV. This deals with what is known as the benefit rate fall-back. This, in fact, allows a man and wife whose scale rate is 24s., and who have no available resources, to receive 26s. instead of 24s. It is an exception which is dealt with in the first proviso of Regulation IV. I think your Lordships ought also to note the way in which rural workers are dealt with. The agricultural worker undoubtedly receives smaller remuneration than the industrial worker, and this was recognised in the agricultural workers' unemployment insurance scheme. Under that scheme the unemployed agricultural benefit rate will be 21s. for man and wife. In general the full rate will be paid if and when they fall outside the benefit they would have received under the Insurance Act. That, I think, will be specially watched and guarded by the committees in rural areas. They have a special duty to deal with those particular cases.
Now as to the finance of the Regulations. The increase when the second appointed day comes along, April 1 of next year, will be about 200,000 persons. It is undoubtedly true that there will be cases of reduction when these Regulations are applied, but 200,000 of the present 620,000 will receive increases under the Regulations. The additional cost of the scheme is £750,000 a year—

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that is over and above what we are spending at present, which is £38,000,000, and of course that does not include the additional cost attributable to the eighteen months of gradual adjustment from the transitional payment to the present Regulations. That will undoubtedly add materially to the cost during that period, so that the taxpayer is really providing more money under these Regulations than he is actually paying to-day, but it is true to say that the money will be more equitably distributed, and there will be less hardship throughout the country.
These Draft Regulations can, I think, undoubtedly be recommended to your Lordships' House. How easy it is in political warfare to try to outbid each other, but I think these Regulations produce a scheme which is fair and which ought to be given a chance, in order to see how to deal with these poor unfortunate people. Certainly nobody has greater sympathy with them than have the Government. Anyone who has had anything to do with constituencies—and many of your Lordships have come up from another place—will know the very sad conditions of these people, and I assert that these Regulations produce a system and an extent of payment which have not their equal anywhere else in the world. There is, however, a greater thing yet to be done by these Regulations and by the Board. They have got to deal with the welfare of these people, with the re-establishment of these people, and with the making and keeping of them fit to re-enter industry when they have a chance. Therefore I say with full conviction, that I am satisfied that these Regulations are a very great advance on anything that we have done before, and I confidently recommend them to your Lordships for your acceptance. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Draft Regulations, as reported from the Special Orders Committee on Tuesday last, be approved.—(Lord Hutchison of Montrose.)
LORD MARLEY: My Lords, I do not propose to detain you for very long this afternoon, because there seems to have been considerable discussion of these Regulations in another place, and in all probability almost everything has been said that can be said. We are indebted to the Government for the particularly clear publications which they have issued
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dealing with this whole problem, I do not think I can recollect a clearer statement or a more careful examination than that which has been given on this occasion. There have been two Command Papers and a very clear Memorandum, and there is no excuse for anybody not understanding the position. To make the matter still more clear we are indebted to the noble Lord for the very clear exposition which he has given of what is, after all, a complicated subject.
As your Lordships will remember, about two years ago we had preliminary Regulations introduced into this House, and at that time it was my task to make some brief criticisms of them. I did criticise them on three main lines. I first of all said that I objected—it was not anything to do with the Government—to the fact that you could not amend the Regulations as produced: they had to be accepted or rejected en bloc. I also complained that the local people had no voice in the administration of the Regulations locally; and, thirdly, I complained that the scales fixed by the Regulations were too low. When the Regulations came to be applied there was considerable resentment in certain parts of the country. The Government decided to withdraw those Regulations, to reconsider the matter, as the noble Lord has pointed out, and after a lapse of time—of which I do not complain at all; I think they were very wise to consider them carefully from every point of view—to introduce new Regulations. I think the time was well spent, and let me say definitely that the new Regulations are a very great improvement in a large number of respects on the old Regulations. Particularly I agree with the noble Lord that the lent matter is one of great value. And there are other improvements which I think make the Regulations definitely less unpalatable to those who will have to suffer under them.
But I still think that the scales are too low and I propose to examine the position, as I see it, under which I believe that the approach to this problem is on entirely wrong lines. Given an approach along the lines adopted by the present Government, I think on the whole there are great improvements, and I do not think that we can complain except in one particular aspect which I shall deal with in a minute. I quite realise that these Regulations have to be worked—

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they are going to be worked—and what we must do is to extract from them the maximum we can for those who will be under the Regulations, and make full use of the machinery for local examination to which the noble Lord has drawn attention. I think the committees which have been referred to may, if they are properly used and properly run, be of great value in mitigating the undoubted suffering which is an inevitable part of unemployment and an inevitable part of all the miseries which must come to those who have been accustomed to earning a good wage and are now compelled to live on very much less.
The one principle to which I wish to refer for a moment is, I quite admit, part of the Act of Parliament, not part of the Regulations—that is the household means test. I believe that to be a very serious blot on the whole of the organisation of unemployment payments in this country. I quite seriously believe that the household means test is bound to inflict a great deal of suffering on the families involved, and I personally feel uncomfortable at the discussion of the private lives of these individuals in circumstances under which we are examining the shillings and pence upon which they have to live. I have no doubt that the noble Lord feels the same discomfort. We have no exclusive concern for people who are out of work; we do not claim that we have. We know that any individual considering this matter must have instincts of humanity which will make him, if he understands the position, realise the suffering involved. What we object to is that to some extent we are being insulated from the expression of those sufferings by Regulations which we have to accept en bloc, and which, even though they may be considerably more generous than they were, are to some extent going to cause hardship and suffering because they rule out what was the law of this country before—namely, that the transitional benefit can be increased from public assistance, bringing up the sum of money available to what it is necessary for the family to live on. But under these Regulations I think I am right in saying no such additional amount is possible and therefore we are faced with a take-it-or-leaveit-it position which, unless there is careful administration, is bound to cause a certain amount of hardship.
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What we object to in this household means test is that, in the words of the Regulations, "all the resources of the applicant and of all the other members of the household of which he is a member shall be aggregated." That is in the Regulations, and we believe that the result is going to be the compulsory recognition of family responsibility. There is not the slightest doubt that in the past the smaller the income the greater has been the willingness voluntarily to recognise family responsibilities. There is an old saying that it is always the poor who help the poor. And it has always been a fact in this country that when in a community of working people one family finds itself in difficulties, it is the neighbouring families who come to their help. And not only the neighbouring families. We know, for instance, that it is always the wretched little shopkeeper who gives credit to the families to tide them over at difficult periods. We know that, whereas out of our income we may contribute a certain proportion to help other people, yet, when it comes to actual sacrifice, the sacrifice made by the less well-off sections of the community is infinitely greater both proportionately and actually, than that made by those who are better off. We on these Benches do resent making these contributions by the family compulsory.
Let me illustrate what I mean by that. The noble Lord gave one or two examples of the results of the working of the scales. As far as I understand the position, if a son, for instance, is earning £3 4s. a week, and his father is the applicant, then the father will get no money at all under the Regulations, or possibly a shilling or two only, because if you take the £3 4s. and deduct the 18s. and divide the balance by half, the amount is the equivalent of the scale paid, 24s. a week. Therefore the worker gets nothing. Now what is the position of the old father? He is, we will say, living with his son, and he feels a burden on that son who is just getting on, just getting a decent wage. The son is compelled to contribute the whole of the upkeep of the father and mother. He probably would do it voluntarily or, at any rate, to some considerable extent, but when he is compelled to do it, it introduces a feeling of resentment between the two, and a feeling of shame in the mind of the father that he has

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got to be a compulsory legal burden on the earnings of the son. The son may not unnaturally say that all the decent instincts he may have to help his father are taken and commercialised by being included in the Regulations under which he is compelled to sacrifice the further education of his children or a higher standard of life for his own family; compelled by law to sacrifice some at least of that development by being forced to contribute to the father through the father getting no payment at all under these Regulations.
It seems to me that it is going to introduce into a considerable number of families a tension, an unhappy feeling, which none of us would desire but which are inherent in this method of dealing with the problem. That is why we on these Benches know that the household means test is a wrong method. We know that even if we cannot prove it. None of us can say more than we have said, but in point of fact, whatever may be said in this House, whatever may be said in the House of Commons, whatever may be said up and down the country, the household means test is, and is bound to remain, an unjust, unfair, and definitely wrong method of dealing with the people who have exhausted their benefit under the Unemployment Insurance Acts and are compelled to come under these Regulations.
Let me give one or two additional examples. Let me remind your Lordships, for example, of the position in certain of the coal districts where a number of miners are getting a wage which is only raised to the amount they are getting because they are on what is called the subsistence rate. The subsistence rate is calculated to be that amount which must be added to the wages actually earned, based on the value of production of coal, to bring the wages up to a level which is sufficient for a bare living in the coal mining area and particularly in those areas where unemployment is widespread. There is going to be deducted from the subsistence wage, which was an amount calculated for them to live on, the appropriate amount under the scales in the Regulations to keep those who are dependants and unemployed and consequently come under the household means test. That cannot be right. I wish we could got from the
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Government some assurance that the discretion of the committees to which the noble Lord referred—the flexibility to which he drew attention—will be exercised in such a generous way that that type of injustice will not be allowed to operate and that to that extent at least the household means test will not be allowed to cause actual under-nourishment in the families of those who are, as in the example I have given, actually living on a subsistence level.
One other point I would like to mention. Again I know this point is to some extent at least included in the Act, but nevertheless I believe it to be a matter which could be dealt with by some modification under the Regulations. The matter to which I refer is contained in the Second Schedule, Part I, Clause 1 (3) (b). In other words, if noble Lords will turn to the middle of page 7 of the Paper numbered H.C. 145, or to Command Paper No. 5229, page 8, they will find it laid down there that in taking into account the available resources which have to be taken into account, the method of taking into account savings has not been altered in the new Regulations from the method in the old Regulations. Let us see what it says:
"In so far as that value"—
that is the value of all money and investments treated as capital assets—
"exceeds £25 but does not exceed £300, [it shall] be treated as equivalent to a weekly income of one shilling for every complete £25."
When we analyse that—and I am not a financial expert—it seems to me that it is based on a calculation of dividends from investments which is far higher than I myself am able to get from any investments I am fortunate enough to have. It comes, as a matter of fact, to £10 8s. per £100—that is to 10.4 per cent.
That seems a terrific rate of interest from investments. I cannot see that it is fair to apply to these people a rate of interest from investments which is far higher than any one can get in any part of the country. If, for instance, I have £100 invested, and I enter in my Income Tax return that I am getting 3 per cent. on it, that is about as much as I can expect to get; but if, for my £100 invested, the Commissioners of Income Tax say to me: "On the contrary, you have got to pay tax on interest at the rate of 10.4 per cent. for every £100 you have

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invested," I should feel a justifiable resentment. I am going to ask the noble Earl who will reply if he will explain why, in fact, this high interest rate is charged. Is it the intention to use part of the interest to reduce the savings of the individual as a sort of inverse sinking fund so that gradually his savings will be exhausted through having to contribute 10.4 per cent. and so that he may be adequately punished for having dared to make savings in the conditions under which he lives? It does, on the face of it, look as if that were so. I have no doubt there is some explanation, though I have not grasped it.
I would like to call attention to Part II of the Second Schedule on the next page of the House of Commons Paper No. 145, where it will be found under paragraph 2 that the interest charged is quite different. In that case only the actual interest obtained from the investment is to be reckoned. If in one case it is only fair to take the actual interest, why should it not be fair to take the actual interest in the other case? I cannot see the justice of having two completely different computations of interest in the Schedule—10.4 per cent. in Part I, and probably, if you take the Post Office Savings Bank as a criterion, somewhere about 2½ per cent. in Part II. I think it is a justifiable complaint and that we are entitled to an explanation.
I want now for a moment to turn to Section IV of the Draft Regulations, and to try to explain a rather difficult objection that we have to this matter. We know that the unemployment insurance benefit is not based on the cost of living, on subsistence. Unemployment insurance benefit—that is, the sum of money distributed from the Unemployment Insurance Fund—is based entirely on maintaining the solvency of that Fund, and it is not pretended that it is all that is necessary for a man to live on. That, of course, is universally admitted. The payment is a good payment, a considerable payment, but it is an insurance, and it would be absurd, for example, for us to claim that because we insured our lives for payment of £100 a year after we are dead, that therefore our widows had a right to have a full living income thereafter. The Insurance Fund is based on the payments coming in, and the benefits paid out are based on the solvency of that Fund, but in Section IV of the Draft Regulations
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we find what I believe to be a dangerous proviso. We find that, apparently, there is a new departure in the Regulations, and that in future the amount paid under the Regulations is to be linked with the amount paid out under the Unemployment Insurance Fund.
It is true that at the present moment the unemployment insurance benefits paid out are higher than payments under the Regulations, but how do we know that we are not going to have a very great increase in unemployment with a resultant drain on the Unemployment Insurance Fund and a consequent cutting down of the unemployment insurance benefits paid with a lowering of the amounts payable under the Regulations? The Regulations are supposed to be based, broadly speaking, upon the cost of living. If, therefore, they are going to be limited by Section IV (2) (a)—and if my reading is right there is a limitation—then I think it is a dangerous new departure. I hope very much that the noble Earl will explain to me that I am utterly and completely wrong in this matter, and that in no circumstances will the amount payable be cut down below subsistence level merely because unemployment insurance benefits are cut down.
I will now say a word about finance. The extra amount available to be distributed of £750,000 a year is a considerable sum, but, when we analyse it and apply it to those persons involved, what it actually comes out at is somewhere about three farthings a day per person. That does not sound quite so much. Yet in a way the tremendous extent of the problem we are facing is shown by the fact that £750,000 a year only comes to about three farthings a day for each of those involved under the new Regulations. I admit that is not all that is going to be available as additional money, because we must add the amount that is going to be saved by the immediate cut for the "under twenty-fives" and, to use the terms of the Order, in "the grossly excessive allowances" which are to be cut at once. The noble Lord said that he had two special cases, and I have no doubt, from the point of view of this type of legislation, there are many more. I have made a calculation of my own that to that £750,000 can probably be added £1,500,000 which will be saved

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from the "under twenty-fives" and "the grossly excessives." I may be wrong in that amount; it is only a sort of idea of my own; but even with £1,500,000 added it only comes to about 2¼d., or whatever the amount is, additional per head available under the improvements outlined in the new Regulations.
I do not believe, however, that there is much profit in discussing the farthings, the pennies and the shillings of the details of the Regulations. I want to end this part of what I have to say by once more submitting that the whole policy of considering the household as a unit in calculating the sums to be paid out is utterly wrong, is really unjust, is really going to inflict hardship, and ought not to have been adopted by a country with the immense wealth which is at the disposal of this country. The amount which is available for other expenditures should have been made available for this vital aspect of our whole problem. It is going to mean the breaking up of many of these homes. I mentioned just now the case of the father. How much more are we going to have the case of the son and the daughter who, staying at home, feel they are a burden on their parents, whereas if they go away from the family home and live in lodgings at once there is a pecuniary benefit to each. It is wrong that this should be so. It is just as bad as lumping together the incomes of husband and wife for calculation of Income Tax, under which, if I am married to my wife, I pay much more Income Tax than if I am what is technically called "living in sin." In that case I take my income and calculate it apart from hers, and we both benefit enormously from the financial point of view. I submit that it is wrong that we should apply literally to hundreds of thousands of families—I do not think I am exaggerating, but at least to tens of thousands of families—a criterion which will result in breaking up the family, in forcing the son to go into lodgings elsewhere and forcing the daughter away from family influence. That influence may be bad, I dare say it often is, but it might even be good, and in many cases we may do a considerable amount of harm by breaking up families.
Finally I want to approach the whole of this problem from a different point of
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view. We believe that the only justification for the system of private capitalism is that it shall work adequately and fairly for all people. In the past in many cases it has functioned not too badly. It has done it because as we applied machine production so we sold surplus goods in other parts of the world and built up an Empire, and out of the profits of those surplus goods we were able to absorb workers who otherwise would have been put out of work by the use of machinery in increasing production and pay them good wages out of the profits of trade expansion. But the time has come when there is no longer expansion. We have reached the position in which as we apply to factory production more and more machinery we put workers out of employment, and those who are fortunate enough to own the factories and the machines are able to get the additional profit due to the fact that if you produce articles with only half the wage bill you can partly reduce the prices of the articles and partly increase profits. What we think is wrong is the approach to this system of unemployment as though the owners of capital were entitled to pocket all the profits and to make the workers who remain employed on the machines pay for their fellow-workers who are unemployed.
That is really what it amounts to. They are made to pay for those who are unemployed, in the first place by taking out of their pockets their share of unemployment insurance contributions, and then by taking out of their pockets their share—not an inconsiderable one—of the cost to the taxpayer of the administration of these Regulations, and finally, by making the amount payable under the Regulations so low that workers have to contribute out of their wages compulsorily to keep those who become unemployed by the application of machinery to production under the system of private capitalism. Therefore, we say that the whole approach to this problem is a wrong approach and that the right line would be for capitalists to say: "We can work the capitalist system, we can produce goods that people want, we can supply purchasing power in the pockets of the people to buy those goods, and we can by the reduction of hours or by other means secure that all the people who desire to get work shall get work." They should say, in point of fact, that every-

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body in one way or another shall work for the production of the national wealth which is necessary for all.
I think the capitalist system could do that, and I think, if I may say so, that those who are opposed to us are making a profound mistake on this occasion in not realising the weapon that they are putting in the hands of their opponents. In the past Great Britain has been able to avoid many of the sufferings which we see in countries like Japan, Germany, Spain and so on by continually buying off the opposition of the workers through removing year by year the worst of the injustices. That has been characteristic of the Government of this country for centuries. We saw it in the Chartist movement of a hundred years ago. We have seen it in the various Factory Acts, in the buying off of opposition to the capitalist system by removing the worst of the injustices and thereby limiting the amount of opposition. But I believe in this case a mistake has been made. While I agree that by these Regulations they have bought off some of the opposition, I do not think they have bought off quite enough. I believe there will be a growth of opposition in the country as the full force of these Regulations is met, during the next eighteen months, which will prove that on this occasion I am right. I believe there will grow up a strong body of opinion against the Government. I ought to want that. I ought to be thankful for that. I ought to say: "Thank heaven, in eighteen months time people will so hate the present Government that they will kick them right out and put in another type of Government." But I am not sure that I take that point of view, not because I do not believe that we might form a better Government, but because I do not want the unnecessary sufferings to be applied to the families of the workers which I believe are involved in certain aspects of these Regulations.
I cannot say more than that. I can only say that the line we would take under a Socialist system is to accept the responsibility for providing work for everybody and to make everybody work by saying: "If we offer you work and you will not take it, then no money at all. Not genuinely seeking work, no money at all. But the task of my Government is to offer you work, and if we
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cannot offer you work then we will give you full compensation." We do not demand an excessive amount of compensation. We recommended to the Blanesburgh Committee our scale—20s. for a man, 10s. for a dependent, and 5s. for a child. That is not excessive, it is moderate, it is very limited. I believe the present Government could have saved the whole cost of administration of these hundreds of committees, these hundreds of local councils, these hundreds of administrative bodies for paying out of this money; that they could have saved almost enough money to have paid that scale on the basis of no means test even under the present system with a not-genuinely-seeking work clause.
I believe the right line to take is the right of everybody to work or compensation, and that that compensation should be given—I want to be perfectly clear upon this point—without any means test whatever. I would apply this principle to everybody, so that unless we could find a job for every member of your Lordships' House, then every member of this House for whom we could not find a job would be entitled, no matter what his private income, to full compensation at the rates I have mentioned. I believe that would be far simpler and far more just, and I believe it would be appreciated by some members of your Lordships' House who, I am told, cannot find work and have nothing to fall back upon except the Elizabethan Poor Law. I cannot help thinking that if the Government had had the vision and courage to adopt such a suggestion they would have had a lease of life in this country far longer than they can expect under present conditions.
LORD ELTON: My Lords, I jotted down a few rough notes this morning of what I proposed to say to your Lordships this afternoon in defence of the Regulations, but I am bound to confess that I made those rough jottings after reading with some attention the report of the rowdy but really extremely illuminating debate in another place, and the remarks that I had intended to make were therefore to be couched in rather a militant vein. Your Lordships will remember that elsewhere such words have been used as that these Regulations are a "crime against civilisation"; that they "contain in themselves the seeds of

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revolt"; that they are "fiendish." Of course, to that sort of charge devastating replies are possible. As your Lordships are aware, it will only be necessary to compare the proposed scales with those administered by the last Labour Government or by a number of Labour local authorities to-day. However, the noble Lord who has spoken for the Opposition in your Lordships' House to-day has spoken, if I may venture to say so—although I do not agree with everything he has said—with such courtesy and moderation that I feel that most of what I had intended to say would be out of place here this afternoon.
I will, therefore, with your Lordships' permission, merely confine myself to one or two comments and slight criticisms of my own upon the Regulations. Before passing to them I will only venture one comment on the interesting little essay on Capitalism and Socialism which was offered us by the noble Lord opposite. He explained, probably very rightly, what a large share is borne by the employed worker in subscribing to unemployment insurance. He is probably quite right in that, but I wonder whether he realises the relevance of that consideration to the present tactics of the Party which he represents. I understand that it contemplates a nation-wide campaign against the means test; indeed, I think the noble Lord himself said that he contemplated that some success would result from that campaign. Is he not forgetting that about nine out of ten wage earners in this country to-day are employed, and that they too are perfectly well aware that they bear their full share in contributing to the taxes out of which unemployment insurance benefit comes? They are determined, knowing their share in this, that unemployment insurance benefit shall not be paid without a means test to persons who may in many cases be in possession of resources considerably greater than their own.
The proof that this is the mind of the great mass of the wage earners of the country is, I think, irrefutable. It was clearly explained to them by the Government before the last Election. The Government won the Election very largely on the means test. I myself never delivered a speech in which I was not constantly interrupted with that question. It was the dominant issue, and the Government overwhelmingly won the Election
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on that issue. I therefore think that the noble Lord and his Party are making, at any rate on the short run, a very great tactical mistake if they think that they are going to do themselves very much good by tying round their necks the noose of the championship of this indiscriminate doling-out of relief without the means test to all and sundry.
There was one other remark in the noble Lord's essay on Socialism which I was very interested to hear. He is, I think, the first speaker on behalf of his Party—at any rate within my experience—who has fully faced the logical result of the demand for work or maintenance. (I think the noble Lord called it work or compensation, but the old Socialist cry was work or maintenance). Clearly the logical result of that is industrial conscription. No country in the world can afford to pay the same wage to a man whether working or not unless it retains the right to make him work when, where and at what job it pleases. Even Russia could not carry on work or maintenance without industrial conscription. I think the noble Lord has shown courage as well as logic in accepting that corollary, but I do not know how popular it will be with the trade unions of this country when they realise that the Labour Party is committing itself to a policy which it recognises as directly leading to industrial conscription on the Russian model.
I say no more about the very interesting and, if I may say so, in its way very charming speech of the noble Lord. There are, however, two remarks which I would venture to offer on the Regulations themselves. First I would like, with the noble Lord opposite, to welcome the prospect, such as it is, of greater elasticity in the application of these Regulations. There is no shadow of doubt that the real fault in the last edition of the Regulations was not so much even some of the reductions in individual cases, though those no doubt brought great hardship, as the rigid, standardised uniformity. For centuries this country has been accustomed to local variation, to the discretion of your neighbour, who says: "That's old James White; we know he won't ask unless he has good grounds for it." On that tradition descended the full impact of this rigid, standardised centralisation, and that led to the breakdown. I am very glad to see that in the new Regulations we have these local

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advisory committees, and I hope that they will be given their full head, because we have to face the fact that the unemployed man in London is quite different from the unemployed man in the Rhondda and suffers from quite different problems. One is sometimes afraid that what is going to happen will be that a man, say, in Suffolk who has lost a job through his own fault and has never thought of getting any higher rate of benefit than in the past will suddenly find that he is getting a rise of 2s., while some workman in Durham or in the Rhondda who has lost a job simply owing to the economic conditions of his neighbourhood will find that he has been cut two or three shillings. I hope that the local advisory committees will have very full discretionary powers of advice.
There is one other question I should like to ask before I sit down. I was very interested to hear the noble Lord who introduced these Regulations making some remarks about the importance of restorative treatment to the unemployed, but, to my disappointment, he seemed to shy away from that point after just mentioning it, without telling us what the restorative treatment was to be. I think that this country is in danger of falling behind the vanguard of social legislation in some other countries through this method of thinking of the unemployed as a class to whom you offer some payment, as generous as you can, and with whom you are then finished; through being too ready to forget the importance of work for the moral and spiritual regeneration of the unemployed. We are told that there are 500 places empty in the Government training centres. I should very much like to know from the noble Earl who replies why that is so; whether he has any hopes of filling those places, whether he has any hopes of carrying any further the admirable work which I believe has been done in those centres for young men.
An article in The Times a year or so ago said of those training centres that:
"The authorities are seemingly afraid of trade unions, afraid of agitators, afraid of publicity, afraid it would seem to give the working man what they know at heart is best for him, and what they equally know he would accept with a little leadership."
I should like to hear from the noble Earl whether he thinks that this criticism is
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still justified. I very much hope that he will say that it is not, because I know that these training centres—I am not speaking of the penal centre which used to exist at Belmont, but of the training centres for young unemployed men—are doing very valuable work. Many other countries are doing valuable restorative work for the unemployed, and we are falling behind in that respect for some reason. Apart from that, however, I will only say that I welcome these Regulations as being more generous than those in any other country in the world, more generous than was found possible by the last Labour Government, at least equally generous with those administered by Labour local authorities in various parts of the country to-day. Above all, I welcome them because I believe that the vast majority of the wage earners will welcome them and do desire the maintenance of the means test; and, finally, because they hold out some promise of greater elasticity.
THE FIRST COMMISSIONER OF WORKS (EARL STANHOPE): My Lords, I, like my noble friend behind me, Lord Elton, came down with a speech prepared for circumstances quite different from those we have met to-day. I welcome very much the speech which was made by the noble Lord opposite. He put his views strongly, as he generally does, but he did not try to make Party capital out of this question, and we welcome his speech, because, while showing quite definitely his opposition to some parts of the Regulations, his speech was in other respects one which was most helpful and was intended, I am quite certain, to be so. The result is that having tried to get something into my head about the Regulations I find myself prepared to say that which is not now of much value. I therefore propose to try to follow the noble Lord opposite in some of the remarks which he made.
I am glad that he agrees with me in thinking that the Papers which have been put forward by the Government have been clear and lucid. At the same time I am bound to admit that I struggled with some of the provisos, and that, although the conclusions reached by those who have had expert advice may be different, when you get to legal

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phraseology it is not quite so easy to understand as ordinary lay terms. I agree also with him that my noble friend was so lucid in the speech in which he introduced the Regulations that I am saved a great deal of explanation now. The noble Lord opposite put forward the case of a son earning 64s. and said that in that case the father would get no benefit at all. That is a broad statement which may under certain conditions be true, except that the father may get, say, 3s. for his own personal use.
LORD MARLEY: Not if he is earning something.
EARL STANHOPE: Not if he is earning something, but if the father is out of work and earning nothing. There are, of course, various other things which come into the question which the noble Lord put, such as the extent of the rent and so on; and therefore I could not give him a perfectly definite reply of "Yes" or "No." There are, I admit, certain conditions under which the father would only get what I may call pocket money for his own personal use. There is the other side of it, that you leave the son, according to my calculation, 40s. to put into his own pocket. I think your Lordships will agree that that is not a bad proportion of a wage of 64s. for a son who is not married and who has no dependants. If he is married and has dependants, then of course the noble Lord's calculation is wholly wrong, because a very large amount is kept back for necessary expenses and the commitments of the son in regard to his wife and any children there may be.
Then in regard to the miner's subsistence allowance. I think the noble Lord forgot this point, that the subsistence allowance is paid to each individual miner not only to maintain himself but his family and dependants also in good health. It is a flat rate to cover the ordinary average needs of a man who is married, with a certain number of children. Therefore to say that the subsistence rate of a miner is fully taken up in keeping the individual in good health is wrong.
LORD MARLEY: There will be deducted from the subsistence allowance
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something for any dependent applicant in his household.
EARL STANHOPE: In that case there will be assistance coming in from other sources. It ceases to be a case where there is only the miner, and it is legitimate in that case that the means test should apply.
LORD MARLEY: My point was that the subsistence wage is given for the miner, his wife and family, and therefore if he has got living with him a brother who is an unemployed applicant, or a father who is an unemployed applicant, he will have to contribute towards his maintenance a sum of money which is deducted from his subsistence wage. This may result in the under-nourishment of his family. He will have to take the subsistence wage which he is getting, which is a flat rate and only calculated for himself and his own family's needs, and will have to contribute a part towards the maintenance of the unemployed applicant who is in his household, so that his wife and children, if the applicant continues to share the house, will have to go short.
EARL STANHOPE: That is obviously one of the cases where the Regulations would have to be applied with flexibility, which the noble Lord and all of us would welcome. The whole idea of the Regulations is to meet the case of need. Where a definite case exists the local advisory committee will put forward advice, and it would be considered by the Board's officers and no doubt be given full weight to, so that there should not be any ease of a man not getting sufficient to maintain himself and his dependants. Then the noble Lord asked me with regard to the amounts deducted for capital assets, and why there was the difference between the two rates. It is not intended that where a man has a certain amount of capital—by no means necessarily only savings, because it may have come to him as a legacy under a will—only the interest on that money should be available. Quite definitely the proposal is that a certain amount of that capital should be brought into the case, because, taking it as being savings, they have been savings put aside for a rainy day, and therefore it is legitimate that when it rains the applicant should use some of those savings. When, however, it is the case of a relative, either a

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son or a daughter, who has something put by, it would be very unfair to take away capital from those individuals, and therefore all that is taken into calculation is the interest paid on the capital, and not the high rate which exists with regard to the applicant himself.
Then the noble Lord raised the point of linking these Regulations to the Unemployment Insurance Fund. It is true that in the provisos there is a linking between the subsistence allowance and the Insurance Fund. It is what is called the benefit rate fall-back. That is only so that the increased amount added to the 24s. shall make 26s. for a man and his wife. There is no other linking between the Insurance Fund and the subsistence allowance, nor is it proposed that if the one went up or down the other should follow, one way or the other.
The noble Lord also referred to the financial side of the question, and pointed out that the sum of £750,000 only amounted to ¾d. per head per day for all the applicants. Does not that bring home to him what vast sums would be necessary if payment were made without inquiry into need? Does he not realise that if £750,000 only means ¾d. per head per day impossible sums would be involved if you did not have your test of need to see that the real point of this matter is met, which is that you give only so much as is necessary, and that you do not pour money out into houses which really do not need it and—what is more—collect it, as has been said by my noble friend behind me, and still more by Lord Elton, from houses which themselves are in even worse case than houses to which the money will be paid?
There are cases where, fortunately, sons and daughters are earning very high wages. The father has, perhaps, succeeded in getting his children trained in such ways that they become skilled in various directions and are able to command a high wage in the labour market. Looking at the other side of the question, there is the man whose children, owing to health or some other reason, have been unable to get the training that he would wish them to get and therefore they have difficulty in getting any work at all. They are receiving, perhaps, a very low wage—a wage which all of us would like to improve. That man when he
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goes to the unemployment assistance committee and finds that he can only get a certain sum of money, will naturally feel that he is being unjustly treated if, after all, there is so much money going about that the same sum which is paid to him can also be paid to this man to whom money is flowing from the earnings of his children in such a big stream. The real point is that we should meet need, and need only, and that is why—as I think the noble Lord has shown from the small amount yielded to individuals by the sum of £750,000 spread over the whole area—we really have to take these matters into consideration.
He remarked particularly on the family means test, and that is the point, I know, about which his Party feels very strongly. I think he will realise that here too there is another side to the question. I do not often agree with him in regard to Russia, although I did the other day, but I think perhaps he will agree with me that the worst side of the whole Russian experiment is the break-up of family life in Russia. Why has it happened? It has happened very largely because the State has taken over full control and full responsibility for the family. We here say that children should be prepared to pay something towards their parents' needs, and the parents of course towards the children's needs. Under the family means test, as now provided in these Regulations, we only take what I call the blood relations. As my noble friend pointed out, there are four different types of members of the household who are considered—the applicant himself, the father and the mother, the unmarried sons and daughters, and the remainder of the people living in the household. I might, however, extend the household in this respect—that where someone is and always has been considered as a son, perhaps an adopted son, then he should be taken as in fact a son, although there may be no blood relationship.
Now, supposing the State says to all these individuals: "We do not think it is fair that you should be called on to pay anything towards the provision for your father and mother, and therefore we are going to take on the whole of the responsibility and do everything that is necessary to keep your parents in health and sufficiently well fed without any contribution from you." Would not that really

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increase in the minds of all these young people the feeling that they had no obligation in regard to their parents, or indeed for their family life at all? Personally, one of the things that I regret more than anything else at the present time is this lack of responsibility towards parents and towards each other among certain classes. I agree with the noble Lord that there has been far more generosity and charity among the working people of this country than there has perhaps been among other classes, and where they get into difficulties those are the classes who are most generous. But if the State is now going to come forward and say: "We do not think it right that you should pay anything towards your parents and there should be no compulsion on you to do so," then I think you are going to increase that tendency of the break-up of the family which I and so many others would regret.
LORD MARLEY: The noble. Earl has put a definite question to me, but he will not expect me to agree with him about the break-up of family life in Russia. The fact of the matter is that family life in Russia is simply appallingly familial. In any household in Russia they spend half the time you are there in showing you photographs of themselves. There is far too much family life in Russia. If anything could be done with the appalling bore of being always on the top of your family it ought to be done. That is not the case in Great Britain. And I think I am right that in Great Britain this household means test will have the effect of breaking up the family life.
EARL STANHOPE: I cannot follow the noble Lord as regards Russia, because I do not pretend to understand it, but I thought that there people sometimes did not know who their parents were. But the point is whether these Regulations are right and just to people in general; and if a young unmarried man earns 40s. a week and keeps 28s. for himself and contributes only 12s. for his family, that is really not an excessive amount. In regard to the opposition to these Regulations, it appears to me to be entirely artificial. I think the noble Lord forgets that already 41 per cent. of the people who come under the Unemployment Assistance Act are under the present Regulations, and therefore
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there would obviously be ample room for a very considerable agitation from that 41 per cent., quite irrespective of what others might be getting under the temporary provisions. In point of fact in many cases the temporary provisions differ very little from those which will now come into operation because, although there have been in some cases gross over-payments, particularly perhaps in regard to young people, in many other cases the applicants will get better treatment under the new Regulations than they do under the existing provisions of the "Standstill" agreement.
Some of the agitation, of course, has been due to the feeling that there is too much inquiry. May I point out to noble Lords in general how these inquiries are made? I asked about this matter this morning because I was in fact rather worried about it. The applicant is asked to fill in a form. Well, many of us have to fill in forms, making inquiries about our incomes, and our wives' incomes too. There was a debate about that only a short time ago in your Lordships' House. I wish the noble Lord, Lord Snell, was here because I had a long extract from his speech which I was really going to read to your Lordships' House. It absolutely fits the present arrangements. If your Lordships will refer to the OFFICIAL REPORT you will find that Lord Snell, in the debate on July 15, said quite definitely that:
"The nation could not be run, I submit, without these inquiries into the conditions of people."
He was talking about Income Tax, but of course it applies equally in regard to the payment of these subsistence allowances. And although, as he said, many of us almost get "fatty degeneration of conscience" as soon as we receive a form, still, he says—and I agree with him—that the objector to filling up these forms feels that it is a necessary service, and he gains a higher freedom of security of health, through local government and the Ministry of Health, by doing what is required of him.
That is what happens in this case. The man in the first instance fills up a form. He then has to go to the Board's offices where any difficulties he may have had in filling up the form, or any further information that is wanted, are gone into privately. Many of us, I think, would like to have an Income Tax inspector

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near by to help us with our difficulties when we fill in our forms. These forms are then considered and arrangements are made in regard to them. The local advisory committees, of course, deal with groups of cases and not with individual cases; but the appeals tribunals deal with individual cases. A man, if he feels he is not getting what he ought to have, or if there are special circumstances which he thinks ought to be taken into account, goes before the appeals tribunal, composed of three individuals, and makes his case in private. Nobody knows anything about it except the members of the appeals tribunal who, of course respect the confidence placed in them and reveal nothing which is said in front of them.
I submit that in giving flexibility to the local committees and flexibility to the appeals tribunals and to the officers who have to administer these Regulations, we are working on the right lines. I believe that although there was a very great agitation in another place, it will be found that when these Regulations are brought into effect the people will find they are just and fair, and the agitation will die down just as rapidly as it arose in another place. My noble friend Lord Elton pointed out that before the last Election the voters were asked in regard to their opinion on the means test, and it was shown quite clearly on every Government platform that as we proposed to maintain the general provisions of the Unemployment Assistance Act, 1934, we proposed to go on with the household means test. My noble friend also said that he hoped the local advisory committees would be given full play. I understand that is very strongly the opinion both of the Board and of my right honourable friend the Minister of Labour. Full use will be made of these advisory committees in every way, and they will be asked to submit their advice on many subjects apart from those mentioned in the White Paper.
The noble Lord asked in regard to restorative treatment. That is, as he knows, one of the responsibilities of the Board. The reason for the 500 vacancies under the training scheme is that the attendance at these training centres is voluntary. The Board are trying, and will continue to try, to persuade young men to enter these training depots. I must say that I feel with him that I
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should like more than an effort to persuade in regard to these cases, because I believe that in many cases it would do an immense amount of good to the individual and finally to the nation if strong pressure were brought to bear on these young people so that they might get the training they ought to have both in regard to their physical attainments and in regard to various skilled directions. I feel that both they and the nation would do nothing but profit if they went to these training camps.
I have tried to deal with the questions that have been brought forward by the two noble Lords who have spoken, and I can only say in conclusion that His Majesty's Government feel that in putting forward these Regulations they are carrying out, both in the letter and the spirit, the promises made at the General Election. They feel that the Board, in recommending these Regulations, and the flexibility which attaches to them, are putting forward a perfectly reasonable and sound scheme and one we can fully commend to your Lordships' House.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

UNEMPLOYMENT ASSISTANCE (TEMPORARY PROVISIONS) ACT, 1935 (TERMINATION) ORDER, 1936.
LORD HUTCHISON OF MONTROSE: My Lords, I beg to move that the Order, as reported from the Special Orders Committee on Tuesday last, be approved. As your Lordships know, this Order simply terminates the operation of what is commonly known as the "Standstill" Order. The Regulations which your Lordships have just approved not only supersede the existing Regulations, but they also do away with the "Standstill" Order.
Moved, That the Draft Order, as reported from the Special Orders Committee on Tuesday last, be approved.—(Lord Hutchison of Montrose.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

DRAFT UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE (ANOMALIES) (SEASONAL WORKERS) AMENDMENT) ORDER, 1936.
LORD HUTCHISON OF MONTROSE: My Lords, I beg to move that the Draft Order, as reported from the Special

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Orders Committee on Tuesday last, be approved. Your Lordships will remember that Section 55 of the Unemployment Insurance Act, 1935, gives powers to impose special conditions on seasonal workers claiming unemployment benefit. The effect of this Draft Order is to enable agricultural benefit (but not other benefit) to be drawn whether or not the special conditions imposed by the Seasonal Workers Order are fulfilled by the claimant. Quite recently a Draft Order excluding agricultural benefit from the operation of the Seasonal Workers Order was submitted to your Lordships, and consideration was adjourned for the insertion of the date of operation of the Order. This date has now been inserted.
Moved, That the Draft Order, as approved by the Special Orders Committee on Tuesday last, be approved.—(Lord Hutchison of Montrose.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

FOREIGN OFFICE REPRESENTATION IN THE HOUSE.
LORD NEWTON LORD NEWTON rose to ask His Majesty's Government if they will consider the advisability of appointing an official Foreign Office representative in this House. The noble Lord said: My Lords, the question to which this Notice has reference is a very familiar subject in this House, and out of consideration for noble Lords who are present I will cut my observations down to a minimum. If the Government wore constituted on rational principles, and appointments were made simply with a view to the national interest, there could be no doubt whatsoever that the Foreign Secretary would be a member of this House. The increased work which is being continually thrust upon him, the increased interest which is being taken by the public generally in foreign affairs, and the fact that a large portion of the Foreign Secretary's time, increasing every year, is wasted at Geneva, all support this contention that we ought to have the Foreign Minister in this House. His position is different to that of any other Minister, and he ought to have ample time to study the questions entrusted to his care.
If in spite of this it is found necessary to have the Foreign Minister in another place, and if in addition to that the Prime Minister is always in another place, and
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if, again, in addition the Foreign Minister has the assistance of the Parliamentary Secretary to the Overseas Trade Department, which is really a branch of the Foreign Office, it seems to me fairly evident that we have a claim, without being arrogant, to representation of the Foreign Office in this House. I do not suppose anybody will dissent from that view. We emphatically require a representative of the Foreign Office in this House, and it is a lamentable fact that we have just been deprived of a direct representative of that office. The annoying part of it is that this state of affairs has been created by the virtues of my noble friend Lord Stanhope, who in accordance with the immemorial practice of this country, had no sooner grasped the minutiæ of his duties and thoroughly understood the work of his Department than he was transferred to another Office. I may point out that the office to which he has been transferred is one which will give him more trouble than any other in view of the approaching Coronation, and, if he is a person of a nervous disposition, I should think he already must be passing sleepless nights thinking of the incredible number of enemies he will create when it is his task to allot places and make the arrangements for the Coronation. In these circumstances how can he possibly discharge the duties adequately of representing the Foreign Office? It may be described almost as a ludicrous proposal that he should combine these two positions.
I take it that everybody is agreed, theoretically at least, in principle that we ought to have a representative here. There is no question about that. The question is how are we going to get him? I have seen various suggestions made, and one of them is that an additional Under-Secretary should be created. I rule that suggestion out at once, because I do not think there would be any sound reason for appointing a second Undersecretary at the Foreign Office. He takes no part in the administration of the office, and it would really amount to this, that you would be creating an extra Minister merely for the purpose of answering questions. But there is another reason against such a proposal and that is that there is a very strong feeling in the country—I think it is almost universal—against the continual multiplying of offices and of officials. I

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remember that only a few years ago the present Prime Minister, Mr. Baldwin, announced that at some time he was going to abolish four Departments. I think they were the Ministry of Transport, the Overseas Department, the Pensions Department and the Mines Department. It was said to be in his favour that he was going to do that because it was a movement in favour of economy. But not one of those Ministries disappeared. On the contrary, they are all retained, and are much bigger than they were before. I should not be surprised if the Ministry of Pensions is not larger than it was, although the pensions are diminishing in number. The Ministry of Mines, which was originally, to use a vulgar phrase, a "one-man show," has developed into a complete Department with a representative in another place, a Parliamentary Secretary, although in reality the Ministry of Mines is only an adjunct of the Home Office.
LORD HUTCHISON OF MONTROSE: The Board of Trade.
LORD NEWTON: I apologise. Anyhow, I venture to express the opinion that, if anything, the various Departments are over represented. Every Department almost has got two representatives, and some of them have got three. There is the War Office. It has three representatives, although the Army is much smaller than it was. The Admiralty is in the same position. The Admiralty has three representatives. I often wonder what the duties of the Civil Lord of the Admiralty are. Perhaps my noble friend will enlighten me upon that point when he gets up. Yet the Admiralty has a Navy much smaller than it had, and one would have thought that some reduction could have been effected in that representation. It really comes to this: there are so many Under-Secretaries and Parliamentary Secretaries of this and that kind that I believe I am correct in saying there are something like sixty placemen in another place. It seems to me quite incredible that amongst these sixty placemen somebody could not be found to answer unimportant questions relating to the Foreign Office when they are put in another place.
If the Foreign Secretary is a member of the House of Commons naturally he will be worked very hard. The Opposition will see to that. They will insist
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upon his answering everything he can possibly answer, and what is left over is practically negligible and could be done by almost anybody else. Therefore the suggestion which I venture with great diffidence to put forward is that a substitute should be found for the present Under-Secretary in another place and his duties be undertaken by one of the sixty persons whom I have enumerated. I do not know who decides these questions, but I suppose it is the Prime Minister, and I have a lurking suspicion in my mind, amounting almost to a conviction, that the Prime Minister does not think much of this place. I think he has rather a poor opinion of it on the whole, and I expect he will retain that opinion until he enters it himself. In the meantime, I have always been under the impression that my noble friend the Leader of this House exercises considerable influence upon him, and I hope he will do his best to carry out the suggestion which I have ventured to put forward. I observe that he practically gave a promise that there should be a representative of the Ministry of Agriculture here sometime in the future, and I hope he will gratify me and the House by saying that the same privilege will be accorded with regard to the Foreign Office.
LORD RENNELL: My Lords, I only want to add a very brief word in support of the suggestion of my noble friend Lord Newton. I will not go into any of the reasons which he has given for it and with which for the most part I agree, but would like, if I might, to add one or two additional reasons. It seems to me that your Lordships' House is essentially a place where one of the representatives of the Foreign Office in the Government should have his seat. Your Lordships' House is always likely to have among its members a large number of people of very wide past experience in foreign countries and in the Dominions, which very often overlap to some extent with foreign issues. The majority of the Permanent Under-Secretaries of State in the Foreign Office that I can remember have been promoted to your Lordships' House. There is, therefore, here a large body of opinion of great value for maintaining contact.
I am perfectly aware that Administrations, and especially Government offices,

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rather dislike any suggestion of consultation with any people of former experience, and it does not very often take place. I remember my own chief, the late Lord Cromer, telling me that, after twenty-seven years in Egypt, once he came back to England his opinion was never asked by any official person on any official question again. Still I think there is a certain loss of valuable material through this lack of contact. That contact should be maintained in your Lordships' House and such information as can be derived from the experience of people who have passed through the mill, but who very often still keep in touch with their old associations in other countries, should remain available by our having, if not the Secretary of State, whom I would prefer to see in your Lordships' House, at any rate an Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs permanently established here. I therefore beg to support the suggestion of my noble friend.
THE EARL OF ONSLOW: My Lords, I would also say a word in support of Lord Newton's suggestion. I remember that twenty-five years ago, when I happened to be private secretary to the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, the Under-Secretary was Lord Edmund Fitzmaurice who came here and became Under-Secretary of State in your Lordships' House. Shortly after that he became Chancellor of the Duchy, and was succeeded as Under-Secretary by Mr. McKinnon Wood who was a member of the House of Commons. There was at that time a great outcry in your Lordships' House. I was not a member of this House at the time, but I remember that a strong representation was made that someone should be appointed who sat in this House to answer the less important questions put upon foreign affairs. Questions of importance were always dealt with by the Leader of the House.
The experiment was made and one of the Lords-in-Waiting—I think Lord Herschell—was appointed to represent the Foreign Office. He was given the run of the office, but I think it is quite impossible for any man who is not a member of the office—it is not always an easy job even for the Under-Secretary himself—to obtain full knowledge of what is going on in the Department. I am speaking of a good many years ago. It
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was a good sized office then, but now of course it is infinitely larger. I am quite certain that no one can adequately represent the Department unless he is a Minister engaged in the work of the Department who has everything going through his hands every day. When I was at the Foreign Office all Despatches and papers that were put before the Secretary of State returned in a box through the Under-Secretaries who in that way were kept in touch with the various departments. I think that is the only way in which a Minister can adequately represent the Foreign Office.
Up to the time when Sir Edward Grey became Foreign Secretary it had been the general rule, if not the invariable rule, that the Secretary of State should be a member of your Lordships' House. That was the case with Lord Salisbury, Lord Kimberley, Lord Rosebery, Lord Derby, and one has to go back a good many years before coming to a member of the other place as Foreign Secretary. It has been said that there is a difficulty about appointing another Under-Secretary because he might become a fifth wheel to the coach. When a member of the House of Commons did become Foreign Secretary the pressure of work was so great that it was felt necessary that the Under-Secretary should also be a member of the House of Commons. I do not know the Foreign Office at the present time, but I should imagine that there is work enough there for another Under-Secretary, especially if he gives his mind to becoming fully acquainted with all the work of the office. Now that the representation of this country at Geneva and elsewhere is entrusted—not, to my mind, very desirably or successfully—to members of the Government and not to professional diplomatists, there is a great deal more work for Ministers in the Foreign Office than was formerly the case. Therefore I am tempted to think that if a second Under-Secretary was appointed, as was done in the case of my noble friend who has just left the office, the system would work admirably and give that satisfaction to your Lordships' House which my noble friend Lord Newton asked for in his speech.
VISCOUNT HALIFAX: My Lords, it will be within your Lordships' recollection, as my noble friend reminded us, that it was only some three or four days ago

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that it fell to me to answer a not dissimilar Motion in regard to another office, and I am sure all your Lordships will agree with me in expressing regret that the noble Lord in whose name that Motion stood should so soon have passed away from us. The noble Lord who asked this Question to-day did so, if he will allow me to say so, in one of the speeches that we have learned to expect of him and that combine much wisdom and shrewdness with a felicity of wit and expression which all of us who listen to him always wish we could command ourselves. It is quite true, as he said, that the lack of representation of the Foreign Office in this House at this moment is due to the superlative merits of my noble friend Earl Stanhope who until lately was such a direct representative, and I am sure that on behalf of my noble friend behind me I can express his gratitude to the noble Lord who asked the Question for the sympathy expressed with him in entering a more difficult and more strenuous life at the Office of Works. I think I can to this degree reassure him that, so far as I have been able to judge, the noble Earl is not of a very nervous disposition and I hope he will be able to surmount the difficulties which will undoubtedly await him in his new responsibilities.
It is quite true, as has been said, that foreign policy, more to-day than at any other time, is the centre of interest both inside and outside this House, and it is also true, as the noble Lord, Lord Rennell said, that this House does, for reasons that are very familiar to us all, command a degree of knowledge in foreign affairs of which it would be the height of unwisdom to fail to make use. The fact that that is so, I readily admit, constitutes a strong case for your Lordships to claim direct representation of this office as well as that other to which reference was made a few days ago, in order that when matters of that sort are in debate it may be possible for us to be given information by one who is directly connected with the affairs to which attention has been directed. I think it is indubitably true, as the noble Earl, Lord Onslow, said, that it is extremely difficult for anybody to give that information and speak with that degree of intimate knowledge and authority unless he is intimate with the day-to-day working of the office and is in the habit of seeing the passage
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of events from day to day at close quarters.
Your Lordships will remember that there was a very considerable debate on this subject in this House at the end of 1933, when my noble friend Earl Peel moved a Resolution in the sense of my noble friend's Question to-day, and I think that he himself supported the Motion on that occasion. The reply on behalf of His Majesty's Government at that time was made by the noble and learned Viscount who habitually sits upon the Woolsack, whose temporary absence we greatly deplore. We hope soon again to see him here. Replying on that occasion he admitted as fully as I have done this afternoon that absence of direct representation of the Foreign Office was a great disadvantage to this House in view both of the complexity and the delicacy of the questions that from time to time are involved. On that occasion he very definitely said what I must again, on my own behalf, say this afternoon: that it was not possible for him to give any definite promise on behalf of the Prime Minister that the matter should be redressed in the sense in which the noble Lord desires; but he was willing to say that the matter was engaging the Prime Minister's attention and that he hoped that it would be possible before long to meet your Lordships' wishes, if such they were, in that regard.
I can go no farther than that to-day, but I can assure my noble friend that I shall convey his representations to the Prime Minister, that I do not think the Prime Minister is as tempted to be neglectful of the interests of this House as my noble friend was perhaps disposed to think, and that I have good hope that if my noble friend would allow the Prime Minister lime for reflection on what he has said this afternoon it may not be impossible to meet his wishes in this regard.

HEALTH RESORTS AND WATERING PLACES BILL.
Read 3a, with the Amendments (according to Order), and passed, and returned to the Commons.

WEIGHTS AND MEASURES (SCOTLAND) BILL.
LORD MARLEY LORD MARLEY had given Notice that he would move, That Standing Order

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No. XXXVIII be considered in order to its being dispensed with, and that the Bill be now read 2a. The noble Lord said: My Lords, I have to apologise for this Motion. It is due entirely to my fault in omitting to put down this Bill for Second Reading within the time limit allowed by Standing Orders. In consequence I must begin by asking permission to consider Standing Order XXXVIII so that it may be dispensed with. Standing Order XXXVIII says:
"When a Hill brought from the House of Commons shall have remained on the Table of this House for twelve sitting days without any Lord giving notice of the Second Reading thereof, such Bill shall not any longer appear among the Bills in Progress …."
I beg therefore to move that Standing Order No. XXXVIII be considered in order to its being dispensed with.
Moved, That Standing Order No. XXXVIII be considered in order to its being dispensed with.—(Lord Marley.)
On Question, Motion agreed to, and ordered accordingly.
LORD MARLEY: My Lords, I am greatly obliged to the House for giving me permission to put this Bill before you in order that it may be read a second time. It is a simple measure which is designed specially for the Scottish people, who are a kindly and unsuspicious nation, neither calculating nor grasping, who need to be helped with regard to weights and measures because they are not experts in judging these matters. They need protection. Therefore the Bill is introduced in order that we may apply to Scotland measures which the more suspicious English have had for a long time, under which bags of coal can be weighed either during the course of transit or at the time of sale and a penalty may be applied in case anyone is found guilty of the pernicious practice of attempting to sell bags of coal which are less heavy than they purport to be.
We had an example in a part of Scotland the other day in which a county inspector of weights and measures was somewhat suspicious of the look of some bags of coal and demanded that they should be weighed. The lorry driver, the
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salesman, performed Herr Greiser's famous salute to this county inspector and drove off. There was no penalty, and the unfortunate people who bought these bags of coal probably got several pounds less than they paid for. Another ease occurred in which there was an actual finding of short weight; but no penalty is allowed in Scotland for attempting to sell bags of coal at short weight. This little Bill will cure one other matter also, if your Lordships are good enough to allow it to be read a second time. In Scotland they have had, from time immemorial, various other methods of weighing coal. The reason I do not know, but apparently there are certain parts of Scotland where coal is sold in bags weighing about ¾ cwt. instead of 1 cwt. It is therefore perfectly permissible to hawk this coal around in bags filled with ¾ cwt. of coal. The. Scots, some of whom have learned from the English and are very clever, then take these carts, filled with bags only holding ¾ cwt. of coal, into the neighbouring district, where the people imagine they are buying 1 cwt. This, again, is a fault against which there is no remedy, and the Bill is designed to secure that this practice shall not be allowed in the future. I beg to move that the Bill shall be now read a second time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Marley.)
THE UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (LORD STRATHCONA AND MOUNT ROYAL): My Lords, the House would probably like to have an indication of the views of the Government on this Bill. The Government recognise that this Bill is designed to improve local government administration in Scotland with regard to the sale of coal, and that it is desired by Scottish local authorities. The Government therefore regard it as a useful measure. The Bill has reached its present stage by general consent, and I commend it to the favourable consideration of your Lordships.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.
House adjourned at four minutes before six o'clock.