BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE. (Hansard, 26 October 1939)

§ EARL STANHOPE
My Lords, yesterday I informed your Lordships that I thought the meeting of this House on 1570 Tuesday next would be purely formal. Since then I understand that the noble Lord, Lord Strabolgi, has given notice that he intends to put a Motion on the Paper dealing with the postal and cable censorship and its effect on foreign trade, and also with the machinery for export and import licences. He wishes to call attention to matters of that kind. Therefore there will naturally be a debate on that Motion. There is also a starred Question by the noble Lord, Lord Snell, put down for that day. I suggest, therefore, that the House should meet at four o'clock on Tuesday, and there will be a Royal Commission, probably about five o'clock or a little later. On Wednesday the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Winchester has a Motion on the Paper calling attention to the problems arising out of the evacuation of women and children, and I suggest that the House should meet at half past three that day. On Thursday there will be the Second Reading of the Prices of Goods Bill, which will have been received from another place on the previous day; and that will be followed by the usual Government statement on the international position. I suggest, therefore, that we meet on Tuesday at four o'clock, and on Wednesday and Thursday at our usual hour, during the war, of half past three. I beg to move that the House do now adjourn.
Moved, That the House do now adjourn.—(Earl Stanhope.)

LORD STRABOLGI
My Lords, I am speaking on the Question that the House do now adjourn, if the noble and learned Lord Chancellor will permit me for one moment. I am very much obliged to the noble Earl, the Leader of the House, for arranging for the House to meet at four o'clock on Tuesday. I hope it will not be thought that we are specially calling the House together for a small matter. This question that I propose to raise has been exercising my party very greatly. We are rather congested in another place, and it is of great importance to the merchants and traders of this country. I hope the debate will do some good. It is not a factious Motion, but one which it is urgent to bring before the notice of Parliament.

VISCOUNT ELIBANK
My Lords, before the noble Earl replies I should like 1571 to say that I have a Motion down for another day on the question of what the Government are doing to help export trade in this country.

LORD STRABOLGI
My Motion does not impinge on the noble Viscount's. It is a different matter.

VISCOUNT ELIBANK
The noble Lord may be right, but may I just say this? The points raised by the noble Lord, as I have heard them at this moment, deal very largely with the points that I shall have to deal with on the question of export licences and so on. Export trade is bound up with export licences and so on. I only wish to ask whether it will be better if, with the permission of the House, I were to place my Motion on the Order Paper after the noble Lord's Motion, so that we may have a full debate on the whole subject.

LORD STRABOLGI
If the noble Viscount will forgive me: his Motion is for the week after. I have carefully studied his Motion, and I am dealing with a quite different matter. My Motion only deals 1572 with machinery, and not questions of policy. I should never think of putting down a Motion on a subject that the noble Viscount already had on the Paper.

VISCOUNT ELIBANK
I understood that: it was only that I thought that the two might clash.

LORD STRABOLGI
There is no clash at all.

§ EARL STANHOPE
My Lords, I was not aware that I made any suggestion that the Motion of which the noble Lord gave notice was a trifling one, or anything of that sort. So far from that being the case, I gave him the publicity I did although his Motion is not yet on the Paper and otherwise your Lordships would know nothing about it until tomorrow morning. I hope the noble Lord recognises that I thought it was a definitely important question, and that is why I mentioned it.