Lords Sitting of 4 March 1959

Preamble
The House met at half past two of the clock, The LORD MERTHYR on the Woolsack.
Prayers

GLAMORGAN COUNTY COUNCIL BILL [H.L.]
Read 3a, and passed, and sent to the Commons.

CURRENCY RESTRICTIONS IN WEST INDIES
VISCOUNT MASSEREENE AND FERRARD: My Lords, I beg to ask the first Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
[The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they will remove currency restrictions in the British West Indies, since the West Indies now earn more dollars than they spend.]
THE JOINT PARLIAMENTARY UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS (THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE): My Lords, currency restrictions in the British colonial territories, whether in the Caribbean area or elsewhere, are enforced under local legislation, though the Governments concerned act in consultation with Her Majesty's Government.
The purpose of currency restrictions is to maintain the strength of sterling and to protect the foreign exchange reserves of the sterling area as a whole, thus ensuring that all territories in the sterling area can be provided with dollars and other Foreign exchange for all necessary expenditure whether they are themselves net dollar earners or not. The fact that territories in one particular area are net dollar earners is not really the relevant consideration in deciding whether further relaxations can safely be made. It is, however, the aim of Her Majesty's Government to proceed as fast as possible with the removal of currency restrictions on the lines announced at the Commonwealth Trade and Economic Conference in Montreal and the colonial territories would be advised to follow a parallel line in this respect.
VISCOUNT MASSEREENE AND FERRARD: My Lords, I thank the noble Marquess for that reply. I feel that I ought to declare an interest here, as I have a small property in Jamaica. My object in asking the Question was to facilitate trade between the West Indies and the dollar area, especially Canada.

GOLD £5 PIECES
2.36 p.m.
VISCOUNT MASSEREENE AND FERRARD: My Lords, I beg to ask the second Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
[The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they will consider the issue of gold £5 pieces into the United Kingdom currency, in view of our improved gold position and the prestige to the Nation which would accrue from such a policy.]
THE MINISTER WITHOUT PORT-FOLIO (THE EARL OF DUNDEE): My Lords, as a matter of sentiment and prestige the noble Viscount's suggestion may have attractions. But I am afraid that the issue of a new £5 gold piece would put too great a burden on our gold reserves, in spite of their increase in the past year. I am not in any case sure that gold coins of the denomination suggested would be more generally convenient than bank notes.
VISCOUNT MASSEREENE AND FERRARD: My Lords, I thank the noble Earl for his reply, but may I ask him one or two supplementary questions? If, for instance, gold reserves are insufficient to issue £5 gold pieces in our currency, why is it, as is common knowledge, that last year we exported several million golden sovereigns? I would further ask the noble Earl whether Her Majesty's Government can give some information as to how much our reserves would have to be before they could consider issuing £5 gold pieces into the currency.
THE EARL OF DUNDEE: My Lords, in reply to the first question, gold sovereigns are a valuable export as collectors' pieces, and in certain countries, such as Arabia, they are sometimes used as currency. It is a profitable matter to this country that we should coin and export them. But as the noble Viscount knows, our exchange

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position makes it necessary to continue the Exchange Control Act, which prevents people from keeping gold, although golden sovereigns are still legal tender. With regard to the second question, I cannot say what figure our reserves would have to reach before it would become practicable even to put an end to the Exchange Control Act, much less to consider the question of having a £5 gold issue from the mint for ordinary domestic currency transactions.
VISCOUNT ALEXANDER OF HILLS-BOROUGH: My Lords, may I be clear in my own mind as to what the noble Earl meant when he said that the gold sovereign is still legal tender, as apparently it is in Arabia and other places? Is it not still illegal in this country to retain sovereigns in private possession?
THE EARL OF DUNDEE: Yes, my Lords; and I thought I said that in my answer. Nevertheless, they are legal tender. They are held by the Bank, and it is important that that position should be maintained in order that we should be in a position successfully to prosecute foreign forgers, who could make a large profit out of minting forged British sovereigns and selling them abroad if they were able to argue that they are not legal tender in this country.
VISCOUNT ALEXANDER OF HILLS-BOROUGH: My Lords, do the Government pay any commission to traders who obtain payment in gold for goods exported?
THE EARL OF DUNDEE: My Lords, I am not sure how that arises out of the Question.
VISCOUNT MASSEREENE AND FERRARD: My Lords, may I ask the noble Earl whether he considers, in the interests of national savings, that if we had gold "fivers", the people would probably hoard them, which would be a cheap way, without the Government paying any interest, of making the people save?
THE EARL OF DUNDEE: My Lords, if the noble Viscount will promise to hoard them all, and not to spend them, I will ask my right honourable friend to consider that point.

DISMISSAL OF MEDICAL CONSULTANT
EARL WINTERTON: My Lords, I beg to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
[The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they will introduce regulations or, if that be necessary, legislation to ensure that where a court has held that a consultant or senior hospital medical officer in the National Health Service has been wrongfully dismissed by a Regional Hospital Board or board of governors of a teaching hospital he should be immediately reinstated in his original post.]
THE EARL OF ONSLOW: My Lords, under the National Health Service Act, 1946, a statutory responsibility rests on Regional Hospital Boards and boards of governors of teaching hospitals for the provision of specialist services in the hospitals under their control, and Section 14 (2) of that Act specifically reserves to the Boards the power to appoint consultants and similar staff. In addition, the terms and conditions of service of hospital medical and dental staff provide that a consultant or senior hospital medical officer who considers that his appointment is being unfairly terminated has the right of submitting his ease to the Minister of Health before a decision to terminate the employment can be carried into effect. If in spite of these safeguards a consultant or other officer considers he has been wrongfully dismissed, his remedy lies with the courts which may award damages. In those circumstances Her Majesty's Government are not satisfied that it would be justifiable to introduce regulations or legislation for the purpose the noble Earl suggests.
EARL WINTERTON: My Lords, may I ask my noble friend Whether he knows that I am fully aware of the present situation? Is he further aware that what I am asking him to do is to deal with the situation which has arisen in a certain case, in which a distinguished consultant was held by one of Her Majesty's Courts to have been wrongfully dismissed, and was awarded damages; and the Judge made some wounding observations, not only about the particular hospital board, but about the Ministry of Health? Will he give further consideration to this

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matter in order to avoid the possibility of a similar case arising in future which might easily result in great unpopularity both to the Government and to the Ministry of Health?
THE EARL OF ONSLOW: My Lords, I am fully aware of the case to which the noble Earl refers. It is almost impossible that it could happen again, because the contracts now are all the same, which they were not then, as this was a takeover case from the voluntary hospitals to the National Health Service. I wonder whether the noble Earl is as fully aware of the case as I am, because it was a very strange circumstance. This came about because the documents were not produced by the man concerned five years ago.
VISCOUNT STANSGATE: My Lords, is the noble Earl aware that this case is creating considerable concern, and is reaching the stage of a scandal? This obstetrician was dismissed. Mr. Justice Barry, in the Queen's Bench Division, declared that he had been wrongfully dismissed; he awarded him damages. Yet there is no means by which he can secure redress. What my noble friend is asking is whether, by a simple alteration of the regulation, this injustice can be remedied.
THE EARL OF ONSLOW: My Lords, I can answer the noble Viscount on that point. The situation is this. At the time, this doctor was operating in a hospital—a voluntary hospital taken over by the National Health Service—and he had been taken on with the Service when the hospital became nationalised. The trouble arose, and the doctor was eventually dismissed by the Board and told that he had a right of appeal. This, I may tell your Lordships, was in 1952. He produced no documents of his contract for service at that time, and the then Minister thought that he was not entitled to a right of appeal under his then alleged contract for service. In 1957—that is, some years later—he produced a letter from the hospital board saying that they were taking him over on the new form of contract for service and the papers would be sent to him shortly.
VISCOUNT STANSGATE: My Lords, does the noble Earl consider that anything he has said—no doubt it is quite accurate—can excuse the case of a man who the Queen's Bench Division has declared was
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wrongfully dismissed and entitled to damages? The noble Earl has nothing but an explanation, which may be no doubt very good; but it does not redress what is a major grievance.
THE EARL OF ONSLOW: My Lords, I can answer the noble Viscount quite happily. I said that if this doctor had produced this letter at the time he was dismissed by the hospital board who told him he had the right of appeal, the Minister would certainly have heard the appeal. What the Minister's views would have been I cannot say. But the doctor did not produce these papers, and at the time he was thought not to be eligible for this appeal.
LORD SILKIN: My Lords, this is a general question, and is not particularly related to an individual case. The general question is that if such a thing should happen in the future, and a doctor is found to have been wrongfully dismissed, can it be right that he should not be reinstated? Will not the Government consider making regulations so that in such a case in future a doctor will be reinstated?
THE EARL OF ONSLOW: My Lords, I understand that all the doctors are now under this particular form of contract, and it is almost impossible that they could be wrongfully dismissed. But what I can tell your Lordships, which I think is of great value, is that the possibility is now being considered of amending the regulations to enable Boards, where the appointments of consultants are terminated, through no fault of their own, but owing to redundancy, to put these doctors into other jobs, without their having to go through the paraphernalia of answering advertisements.
VISCOUNT ALEXANDER OF HILLSBOROUGH: My Lords, I should really like to know, in view of the decision of the Court, what steps the Ministry have taken to see that this particular professional man is properly rehabilitated. Has he been so rehabilitated? Has he been reappointed? Has he suffered no loss of status in his reappointment? What is the position?
THE EARL OF ONSLOW: I understand that he has a large private practice—
SEVERAL NOBLE LORDS: Oh!
THE EARL OF ONSLOW: May I finish? He is also
employed by a local authority on certain work. After the judgment the Minister wrote to the hospital board and said that he felt there was a moral obligation, and that should this man apply in the ordinary way for any work that was going, if he was as good as any other applicant that moral obligation should weigh in his favour.
LORD BALFOUR OF INCHRYE: My Lords, arising out of the answer given by the Minister, and now that the question seems to have got on to this particular case, could the Minister answer two questions? First, has this doctor received his damages; and, secondly, is the Minister now prepared to reconsider retrospectively the case of this doctor who, according to the Court judgment, has been wrongfully dismissed?
THE EARL OF ONSLOW: My Lords, I understand that this doctor has received substantial tax-free damages, as awarded by the Judge, who at the time said that there was no possibility of reinstatement. After all, one has to remember that he was in a post which the hospital chose to divide into two separate posts. Do your Lordships really consider that it would be sensible, after five years, to tip out two perfectly good men, who were doing the work admirably, and to put him in, when the Judge himself, in this purely technical case, awarded him some £7,000 damages and he is earning a good living in his own profession?
EARL WINTERTON: My Lords, in thanking my noble friend for the care he has given to this matter, and in view of the obvious feeling on both sides of the House, may I ask him one further question? Will he ask the Minister to give full consideration to taking every step necessary to avoid similar cases arising in future?
THE EARL OF ONSLOW: My Lords, that, I can assure the House, is certainly being done at the moment.
VISCOUNT ALEXANDER OF HILLS-BOROUGH: My Lords, I think this is a good suggestion and promise. Would it not be wise, in view of the extent of the Service now, and the doubts about these matters, to have a Departmental Committee to inquire into what should
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be the proper basis of discipline of professional men and to submit a report to Parliament?
THE EARL OF ONSLOW: My Lords, I think that is something of which the Minister will obviously take notice.

PRIME MINISTER'S VISIT TO RUSSIA
VISCOUNT ALEXANDER OF HILLS-BOROUGH: My Lords, I beg to ask the Question of which I have given Private Notice: namely, to ask Her Majesty's Government whether they have any statement to make on the Prime Minister's recent visit to Russia?
THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR COMMONWEALTH RELATIONS (THE EARL OF HOME): My Lords, as I understand it the Prime Minister will be making a short statement in another place, some time between half-past three and a quarter to four, and with the leave of the House I will repeat that statement here.

PLIGHT OF STATELESS PERSONS AND REFUGEES
2.49 p.m.
THE LORD BISHOP OF SHEFFIELD THE LORD BISHOP OF SHEFFIELD rose to call attention to the continuing plight of stateless persons and homeless refugees in many parts of the world; to urge Her Majesty's Government to give the High Commissioner for Refugees liberal help in carrying out his commission, and to keep the permanent solution of the problem actively before the United Nations; and to move for Papers. The right reverend Prelate said: My Lords, in rising to move this Motion, I do not think I need apologise for putting it on the Order Paper. We have had discussions on various aspects of the refugee problem from time to time as part of our foreign policy debates, but I do not think the whole subject has been before us for debate for a good many years.
Our post-war world is haunted by the homeless man. He is no ghost; he is a reality. Sometimes he is emaciated and infirm, but he is flesh and blood such as we are. As Doctor Elfan Rees, who has given many years to refuge work since the war, has said:
"The refugee problem is the largest single human issue facing the world of our time,

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and yet there has been no full confrontation of it by the world community".
Yorkshire is only a small part of the world, but in a Yorkshire town last year there was a flag day for refugee service. A passer-by in the street stopped in front of a lady with a tray of flags, not to buy one but to deliver himself of the sentiment: "I do not believe in refugees." Twenty-five or thirty years ago your Lordships probably hardly believed in the possibility of homeless and stateless persons in Western Europe, and we were horrified when the Hitler regime in Germany began to turn members of the Jewish race out of their jobs and out of their homes and to give them almost the choice of leaving the country or taking the risk of a concentration camp.
Since those days the political climate has changed. The victorious Allies, by Article 12 of the Potsdam Agreement, allowed the movement of large populations from their homes and thereby set a most baleful precedent. So much so that to-day the practice is endemic in our post-war world. It has occurred in Central Europe, Finland, the subcontinent of India, Palestine, China, Korea, and more recently Indonesia. Nearly 160,000 women, children and old men have fled from Algeria to Tunisia and Morocco; 10,000 Tibetans into Nepal, 5,000 Assyrians into Lebanon, and so on. There seems to be no end to this process. The flight from East Germany to West is running at the rate of 800 a night, and it is a rather interesting fact that in 1958 there were over 11,000 professional people who made that sad journey; and, if I may just say so in passing, I am rather proud of my brethren of the ministry of the Christian Church because among those professional people there were no pastors or priests; they stuck by their congregations, for better, for worse.
Even those of us who regard all this as a crime against humanity are in some danger of accepting it fatalistically: the astronomical figures blunt our imagination. We fail always to recognise the amount of vicarious suffering which is entailed. It is very hard for those of us who accept as a matter of course our national status and our home to understand how life appears to people who are homeless and stateless. Even if one is face to face with such a person there is a
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great gulf. I remember some years ago in Austria turning aside from the gay centre of Salzburg, in the middle of its lovely musical festival, down a side street into a camp site of dilapidated army huts. There, among others, one came across a distracted woman, four children, one noisy idiot child and her husband, a T.B. case in a hospital; and one asked oneself, "So what!" I do not think I need take up any time in underlining the intensity and extent of human suffering in this situation, or how masses of homeless and stateless people in the world contribute to the political unrest in the world.
But, dark though this picture is, it is lightened and its grimness alleviated not only sometimes by the heroic patience of refugees, but also by the care and compassion and generosity of people all over the world. We all remember the wonderful way in which the Jewish people in the world stood by their persecuted brethren before and during the war. To quote just from two of the largest operational agencies, last year the refugee service of the Roman Catholic Church in the world contributed £8 million worth of goods—and no doubt cash in proportion. The Inter-Church Refugee Service Department of the World Council of Churches, whose concern is to care for homeless people, whoever they are and wherever they are, passed on £800,000 and about £6 million worth of goods. Then each of these two operational agencies has been responsible during the last ten years for moving over 300,000 refugees into new countries and new homes. In our own country last Christmas the Churches associated with the British Council of Churches gave £80,000 to this purpose.
The useful distribution and spending of this vast sum of money and goods has called out the devoted personal service of a great number of men and women in many countries who have spent themselves on serving the refugees. The intransigence of some Governments and some Government officials makes this work very tedious and slow requiring a good deal of patience. I was told last year that merely to arrange for the movement of one man in Germany somewhere or other took 105 letters. I think very often of a young friend of mine—though not so young now—who, years ago, served with me in trying to befriend the long-term unemployed families in Northumberland. Since the war he has given himself

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to the service of refugees, first in Austria, then in Korea, and, more recently, in Malaya; and he has just gone to Hongkong. There are many more, of many different countries and religious beliefs, and without them, who are doing that kind of thing. The spirit of humanity has received many hard blows and wounds during and since the war but, thank God, it is still alive. But I would suggest that it needs a little more encouragement from some Governments in the world.
There are three places or situations at the present time which call for urgent and special attention. The first is the fact that there are still 160,000 unsettled refugees in Europe. A month or two ago 38,000 of these were still in camps maintained by Governments or by local authorities. I must say, in passing, that those in the camps are often far better off than those outside. As your Lordships know, many of these are elderly and infirm folk, or families who are unwilling to be broken up. No doubt there a re some who have got so accustomed to this vacuous existence or have been so frequently disappointed in their hopes that they prefer to stay where they are, rather than face the unknown in some unknown land.
But the main reason why there is still this residue, or hard core, in Europe is the difficulty experienced in getting them received into other countries and the general cost of carrying it through. As a matter of fact, there are still in European camps 10,000 refugees who belong to a family having at least one handicapped member. It is most difficult to get countries to accept a family as a unit. Your Lordships may have seen in the Press last week that the New Zealand Government had agreed to accept twenty such families, consisting, so we are told, of fifty-five persons. That is all to the good; but it leaves, if my arithmetic is correct, 9,945 still to be moved to other countries, including the United Kingdom.
The second place where the matter has become very grave, as I think we all know, is Hong Kong. Of the total population of the Crown Colony two out of seven are now refugees: obviously, the place is terribly overcrowded. Most of these are Chinese, and it is not going to be at all easy, even if it is possible, to disperse the majority of them to other parts of the world. A much smaller number,
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8,000 to 9,000, are Europeans. Most of these are still on the mainland, and are of the Orthodox faith. Their movement has been held up by the difficulty of getting visas, and finance to transport them. In the middle of last year, the Chief Commissioner for Refugees was so denuded of financial support by the Governments who are supposed to support him that the operation was very nearly held up, and he had to borrow or get money from various voluntary organisations.
Thirdly, there are the Arab refugees in Palestine: these, we are told, now number over one million, and the birthrate among them is rather high. There is here a desperate situation, for which nearly everybody is to some extent to blame—Israel for turning some of them out and being reluctant to let them back, and the Arab countries surrounding Israel for maintaining them as Stateless people in order to keep an open political sore. That is a classic example of a humanitarian situation being bedevilled by politics—and by bad politics at that. Those are three situations requiring urgent attention. Moreover, until the trend of political opinion in the world has been reversed, and the moral conviction has been re-established that it is a sin against God and man to treat innocent people in this kind of way, the United Nations Commissioner and the voluntary societies must always keep in hand some emergency fund for some new situation which may arise.
One way to change this political climate, not overnight but gradually, would be for the Governments of the United Nations to tackle the situation more vigorously, both by relaxing some of their restrictions on emigration and by providing the High Commissioner for Refugees with the finance he needs to deal with it efficiently. Your Lordships may know that at the present time he is asking for an all-out effort to deal particularly with the European camp situation and the Hong Kong situation, radically and thoroughly, in this year and next. For the former he is asking (I am sorry to have to quote dollars) for 5,700,000 dollars in the two years; and for the twofold Hong Kong operations he is asking for just over 5 million dollars. In addition, he is asking for 700,000 dollars this year for some of those outside the camps in Europe. In other words,

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he is asking for 6 million dollars for this year and for next year.
Last year, contributions from the United Nations to the High Commissioner's Fund, which is known as U.N.R.E.F., was running at the rate of 3,300,000 dollars from regular contributions, plus another half a million of special contributions; so there is a pretty wide gap between what was needed last year and what he is asking for as an urgent necessity this year. As someone has said, I think not untruly,
"The history of U.N.W.R.A. is a clinical study in frustration. Far too few Governments contribute far too little."
And, up to date, they are not showing any great alacrity in meeting this special demand for these two years.
So I come to the question: What have the Government of our country done? May I, without appearing to be not minding my own business, try to say a word upon that subject? I believe that we are all glad to know that our Government have been far less "sticky" than some about receiving refugees, although possibly not very markedly sympathetic to receiving family units. In addition to many considerable contributions to U.N.R.W.A. for Palestine refugees, they have, since 1956, been giving £100,000 a year to the High Commissioner's Fund for Refugees. That is the highest regular contribution from any country except the United States of America—at least, it was until last year, when the Government of the Federal Republic of Germany topped our contribution. Nevertheless, these contributions are still far short of what is required.
The question I would respectfully and urgently put to Her Majesty's Government is this. Is it too much to ask them to consider not only giving United Nations a stronger lead in general but, in particular, this year and next, when the High Commissioner is asking very especially for a large sum for Hong Kong, a Crown Colony, stepping up our regular contribution from £100,000 to £250,000, and perhaps, in addition, making a special contribution this year and next of the same amount—namely, £1 million over the two years?
There is one other reason, beyond the general claim of humanity and the need to do anything we can to reduce the
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amount of political unsettlement in the world, why our Government should give a strong lead in this matter. As a result of an initiative which started in this country there is to be opened on June 1 next a World Refugee Year. The United Nations Assembly at its last meeting gave full support and approval to this project. Churches of all kinds throughout the world have promised to give their full support. The aim of the World Refugee Year is to get Governments to step up their financial contribution and ease some of their immigration restrictions, and also to create a stronger public opinion to encourage Governments to take action of that kind.
It was disappointing to read not long ago that the Secretary-General of the United Nations, who had been instructed by his Assembly to "assist in promoting the World Refugee Year," had decided that his representative should wait and see what initiative various Governments took on their own. So I would ask: Could not our Government, who have already shown their special interest in the Refugee Year by contributing £100,000 annually, possibly exercise some initiative in New York to get the office there to try to persuade the fifty-nine nations who voted in favour of the World Refugee Year project to validate their votes? I will not say more on this subject of the World Refugee Year, because the noble Baroness, Lady Elliot of Harwood, is Chairman of the Executive Committee in this country and, therefore, can speak with an inside knowledge of all that has been planned and is hoped for.
In conclusion, I would make this point. The refugee problem is so deeply embedded in the wrong-headed thinking of the contemporary world that it will take more than one year to solve it, although a special effort in one Refugee Year may enable us to go a long step forward. Is it too much to hope that Members of this House will give it their support, in their different localities, and will also find my Motion one of which they can approve? Those of us who are not involved in the political arena realise that many of the choices which responsible politicians have to make in the field of foreign policy are between a greater and a lesser evil. But here is one very important issue in the field of foreign policy—this solving of the

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refugee problem—which would be a positive and certain good, both as to its means and as to its end, and one which would be in line with the very best in our British political tradition. My Lords, I beg to move for Papers.
3.16 p.m
LORD SILKIN: My Lords, this House has earned a very high reputation for discussing vital questions of humanity and social problems, and it is in keeping with that tradition that the Motion moved by the right reverend Prelate is before us this afternoon. I am sure that every one of us will be grateful to him both for having put down this Motion and for the manner in which he has presented it to us. He has told us that the refugee problem is the largest single human problem of our time. It is not only a large problem numerically, it is a large problem from the point of view of the difficulties which confront its solution. He has dealt with the financial aspects of the problem—and I put them least of all—and the difficulties with which we are confronted in dealing with the final problem of resettlement.
The right reverend Prelate has divided the problem into three parts. I want to confine my remarks to one of the three parts to which he referred—namely, the problem of the Arabs. This problem is, of course, familiar to every one of your Lordships, but I hope the House will forgive me if I go through its history and give some of the facts connected with it. The Arab problem really began early in 1948. At that time it appeared probable that a State of Israel would be set up. The Arab States objected very strongly, and were threatening to take up arms and go to war if and when the State was created. In fact, the State of Israel was set up in May, 1948, and on that very day was attacked by the armed forces of Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, and Iraq; and there were also contingents from Saudi-Arabia and the Yemen.
The avowed intention of the Arab States was stated by the Secretary-General of the Arab League. He said—to use his own words:
"This will be a war of extermination. It will be a momentous massacre to be spoken of like the Mongolian massacres and the Crusades."
That was the intention. But before the actual attack the Arab population in
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Palestine were warned that it would be desirable, in their own interests, that they should for a short time leave Palestine and go into the Arab territories; and they would be in a position to come back, they were told, within a few days with the victorious armies to share the spoils of the abandoned Jewish properties. As your Lordships know, this never happened. Some 500,000 or 600,000 Arabs did in fact leave Palestine; about 100,000 remained; and the 500,000 or 600,000 who left were the foundation of the Arab refugee problem. I need say nothing about the 100,000 or so who remained in Palestine. They have settled and become integrated into the Israel State, and no problem arises in connection with them.
The problem is about the 600,000 or so who left Palestine. These 600,000 have now become, according to various estimates, 900,000 or 1 million. They have grown by natural accretion, 25,000 or 30,000 new births every year, so that in the twelve years in which this Arab problem has been with us there has been an addition of something between 300,000 and 400,000 births. To-day the people under the age of twelve constitute a very large proportion of the total refugees.
This problem has been one which the United Nations Assembly have considered almost every year. They have set up a Special Agency to deal with it: the United Nations Work and Relief Agency. The function of this Agency was twofold: first, to give relief to the refugees; and, secondly, to try to work out the permanent solution. So far as relief is concerned, it has functioned fairly well, and as the right reverend Prelate has said—and this applies particularly to the Arab refugees—those who are in receipt of relief are, generally speaking, better off than the population in whose area they are. The vast majority of the refugees are in Jordan and they represent more than half the existing population. There are relatively small numbers in Lebanon and Syria, but in Gaza they represent practically the whole of the population. There are very few native Egyptians in Gaza. The refugees represent—I think this was the figure given—260 per cent. of the native population. Jordan has given the refugees Jordanian citizenship, but I am afraid that that is all she has been able to give them. The refugees in Gaza are Egyptian, but as

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to the others they neither have got citizenship nor have they been able to get any other kind of help.
I think that no praise is too high for the work of U.N.W.R.A. They have not only fed and clothed the refugees and housed them; they have provided schools and have done their best to provide training. The education is of a fairly high standard. The refugees are very willing and eager to take work if they can possibly get it, but of course there is no possibility of their getting work either in Jordan or in other countries to any substantial extent. So gradually there has accumulated among this 1 million or so people a feeling of anger, hatred and bitterness, not only against Israel but against the world at large. They feel, in spite of the efforts of U.N.W.R.A., that they are neglected and forgotten and they are entirely without hope. That is the problem.
What about a solution? There are three possible solutions—three possible solutions for every refugee problem. The first is repatriation. Is there any hope that these 1 million or so refugees will ever be accommodated in Israel? In the view of the United Nations Organisation and others who are best able to judge, repatriation has never yet been found to be a satisfactory solution, and in this particular case that is even more so. Let me put some of the difficulties which would confront any attempt at repatriation on any substantial scale. First, the State of Israel has itself had to accept 450,000 Jews who were refugees from the Arab States, having been virtually driven out of Egypt, Yemen and the other adjoining Arab States. They have had to resettle them, and they are in process of resettling many other refugees from other countries, to-day particularly from behind the Iron Curtain. This year Israel is accepting 100,000 refugees from Roumania, and one can never be certain that there may not be very large numbers coming from other countries behind the Iron Curtain, particularly from the Soviet Union. Also. Israel has opened her doors to Jewish refugees from any part of the world, and she is going to have all her resources taxed in finding accommodation and enabling resettlement to take place for all those who will naturally come to her State. She has also accepted about
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50,000 Arab refugees, mostly in order to reunite families, some of whom were left behind, and to enable them to get their men and womenfolk together.
Furthermore, even if it were possible for Israel to accept additional Arab refugees at the present time it would be a very dangerous thing for her to accept people who have become so embittered and who are full of hatred and who would undoubtedly not make good citizens. They would become virtually a fifth column inside Israel, and until this legacy of grievances and bitterness has been alleviated, and until there can be a general settlement of the whole of the difficulties between' Israel and the Arab States, it would be extremely foolhardy, even if she were in a position to accept some refugees, for her to do so. We can only hope that the atmosphere will change in due course so that she can make some contribution of that kind.
The second method of dealing with the refugee problem is immigration. Here, unfortunately, there are very limited possibilities. At the best, the possibilities of emigration are restricted. Countries are very unwilling to take in refugees. We ourselves have taken a fair number; but in conditions of unemployment it is very difficult for a country to accept the additional burden of able-bodied persons, mostly unskilled, for whom work cannot be provided. In the case of the Arab refugees, the difficulties are even greater because of language, tradition, habits, and so on. It is equally as great a burden for any country to accept the sick, the disabled, and children. Emigration, therefore, is not really a satisfactory or a possible solution, and certainly is not one which will provide an answer to the million or so Arab refugees.
The third possible solution is by integration, and that, given good will, is by far the easiest and, in fact, the only one. By faith, by language, by race, and in social outlook, the Arab refugees are indistinguishable from the natives of the countries in which they are at present living. There is ample room for them and land available in Syria and Iraq, and there is ample work, too. There is a great deal to be done by way of irrigation of new areas, and by the creation of new farms and of village communities with agricultural and industrial activities. If money is required, I have no doubt

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that the necessary money could be found. I have no authority to speak for any particular country, but I have no doubt that Israel herself would be prepared to make a substantial contribution to a solution. Indeed, I understand that she has offered to do so unconditionally—not conditional, that is, upon the settlement of the general question. So I believe that, if it were possible to get integration, that would be a solution to this particular problem. It has been done on a much bigger scale so far as other refugees are concerned. In the case of the Moslems fleeing from India and of the Indians fleeing from Pakistan, millions of people have been resettled in those respective countries. Then there is the case of the Chinese in Hong Kong, the Koreans, and many others.
What is stopping a settlement? I think there can be no doubt that a settlement is being prevented on purely political grounds. The Arab States have persistently refused to make a peace treaty with Israel and have refused to recognise Israel; and they feel that, if the Arab refugee problem were disposed of, there would be nothing to stand in the way of their giving such recognition. It is undoubtedly the fact, as the right reverend Prelate has said, that the refugees are being used as political pawns in this battle between the Arab States and Israel. It is only politics which is standing in the way of a settlement. Many proposals have been put forward by U.N.R.W.A., by the United States of America, and by the United Nations, as to the comprehensive development of Jordan, which would have provided for the irrigation of some 225,000 acres, and would have benefited all the nations within the Jordanian area. It would have been an immense boon to have had this large area irrigated. However, they have been rejected by the Arab League, with the result that a billion cubic metres of water—precious water, in that area—continue to be wasted and to roll down into the Dead Sea.
I have said that it is not a question of money. I have no doubt that the necessary money would be found. It is being found today for the relief of the refugees; and it would be a very sound business proposition (if one likes to put it that way) to get the refugees settled and earning their own living once and for all. In
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fact, the mandate for money for U.N.R.W.A. comes to an end in June, 1960, and it will be for the United Nations to decide what, if anything, is to take its place. So the problem is becoming urgent, and something must be done, because it is unthinkable that a million or so people should be left to rot without any help at all.
Year after year the United Nations General Assembly has passed resolutions calling upon the Governments in the area in which the refugees are to make determined efforts to seek and carry out projects capable of supporting a substantial number of refugees. Nothing has happened. I believe that the individual members of the United Nations would be prepared to assist generously towards a settlement scheme for integration to be agreed upon: and I hope and believe that we as a nation would play our part in endeavouring to use our influence, such as it is, upon the Arab States to induce them to take this problem seriously and to deal with it in a humanitarian manner. We are entitled to feel some pride in the fact that we have been largely responsible for the inception of the World Refugee Year for solving the refugee problem generally. May I hope that we will do all we can, and will exert all our influence, towards securing a solution of this, the most intractable refugee problem of all, and so help to put an end to the potential danger which subsists by the very existence of these million refugees? They are always a potential danger, and there is always the possibility of their bringing about a state of conflict in that area. Apart from that, I hope that from a humanitarian point of view we shall use our influence to help bring happiness, contentment, and a sense of human purpose and human dignity to a million or more of our fellow human beings. I hope that, as a result of this debate, both this country and others may look at this problem more seriously and will take every possible step to ensure that something is done.
BARONESS SWANBOROUGH: My Lords, in facing your Lordships this afternoon—
VISCOUNT ALEXANDER OF HILLSBOROUGH: My Lords, I thought we were going to have a statement, though I do not want to interrupt the speaker.

PRIME MINISTER'S VISIT TO RUSSIA
3.39 p.m.
THE EARL OF HOME: My Lords, I am sorry to interrupt the noble Lady, and I fully appreciate how she must be feeling at this moment, but, if she would allow me, perhaps we could have the statement now. With the permission of the House, I will repeat a statement which the Prime Minister is making in another place. For convenience, I think I should read it in the Prime Minister's own words. The Prime Minister says:
"I must express my gratitude to the House for their indulgence in allowing us to be away for a considerable number of days at a time when Parliament is sitting. Unfortunately, we shall have to seek the same indulgence when my right honourable friend the Foreign Secretary and I make our proposed visits to Paris, Bonn and Washington for further discussions there. But I feel these visits are essential.
"The Soviet Government accepted my suggestion for a visit at comparatively short notice. Despite this, careful and well-planned arrangements were made for us to see something of the country and the people and also for us to have long and private talks with the Soviet leaders. The hospitality we enjoyed was traditionally generous. In the course of our stay in Moscow, and of our tour to Kiev in the Ukraine and to Leningrad, we were given a broad picture of their industrial and social activities, especially work of construction and development.
"It is, however, about our discussions that the House will wish particularly to hear. At their conclusion we signed the communiqué which has been published. This covers both certain questions of Anglo-Soviet concern, and also wider international issues. The House will have noted that we made a modest but definite advance towards improving what are called 'cultural relations' between the two countries, together with an agreed procedure for reviewing future progress in this matter. On the important question of trade, it was agreed that a Mission led by a United Kingdom Minister should visit the Soviet Union in the near future to
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investigate in more detail the scope for increasing the volume of trade between our countries.
"The wider questions we discussed concerned the problems of Berlin and Germany, disarmament, and nuclear tests. I made it clear before my visit that our purpose was not to negotiate. It was to try to seek a better understanding of our respective views on these grave issues and the reasons underlying them. This purpose was achieved. On some matters, such as the control of nuclear tests, some tentative ideas emerged in the course of our informal conversation with the Soviet leaders. Of course, these will need further consideration, since our two countries are not the only ones concerned. But the main point is that on these wider problems we reached agreement that the great issues that separate East and West must be settled by negotiation. In my speech at the Kremlin reception on the day before our departure, I described this as follows:
'Negotiations based on knowledge gained in full discussion, and conducted with a sincere desire to reach fair agreements.'
This agreement is, I think, reflected in the latest Note to the Western Governments from the Soviet Government. The House will not expect me to comment on that Note at present, since it is clearly a matter for consultation between us and our allies.
"I must refer to one specific subject which arose in the course of the talks—the possibility of a Pact or Declaration of non-aggression between the United Kingdom and the Soviet Union. I stated that we were willing to agree to a declaration on the following lines: First, that in all matters of dispute our two countries should act in the spirit and letter of the United Nations Charter; secondly, that neither Government should seek unilaterally to prejudice the rights, obligations and vital interests of the other. Thirdly, on the basis of these principles our two Governments should agree to settle disputes by negotiation and not by force. Such a declaration would in no way prejudice our firm resolution to stand by our existing defensive alliances. In the time available we were not able to agree on the terms of a declaration. These

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will be the subject of further discussion between our Governments.
"As I have already mentioned, my right honourable friend the Foreign Secretary and I now propose to visit Paris and Bonn during the course of next week and hope to arrange a visit to Washington soon after that. I believe that these visits also are part of the essential preparation for wider talks. We must not of course disguise from ourselves that, as the communiqué indicates, our talks with the Soviet leaders revealed wide differences between us. It is nevertheless a great gain that we have reached agreement on the principle that differences between nations should be resolved by negotiation. I believe that in the outcome it will be seen that these preliminary discussions have played a valuable part and that it was right for the United Kingdom Government to take this initiative."
I am sure the House would like me to say something that the Prime Minister cannot say: that, irrespective of Party, we are full of admiration for the way the Prime Minister has carried out this most exacting mission.
SEVERAL NOBLE LORDS: Hear, hear!
THE EARL OF HOME: He went away with a very bad cold, and much of the time was not feeling well, but I am glad to tell the House that he has returned well and full of energy.
3.47 p.m.
VISCOUNT ALEXANDER OF HILLSBOROUGH: My Lords, we are much obliged to the noble Earl the Leader of the House. We associate ourselves with what the noble Earl has said about the Prime Minister's visit to Russia. The contents of the statement, in all the circumstances, were, of course, bound to be almost completely tentative. Not only is there the matter mentioned specifically by the Prime Minister as needing consultation with our allies, but it would be impossible for him to say anything much to Parliament about much of the rest of the matter covered by the statement before the forthcoming meetings at Paris, Bonn and Washington.
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In the visits which he is making we should like very sincerely to give him our good will, in the hope that the information he personally has acquired of the state of affairs in Moscow may help in getting more general agreement in the matters that come up for consideration. We feel that the general treatment which opened the visit in Moscow and which the Soviet authorities accorded to the Prime Minister and the Foreign Secretary was very much to be welcomed. We cannot hide from ourselves the fact that the whole country was anxious as to whether the temperature had descended too far. We were very glad indeed that it was restored to a better level before the end of the visit, and we hope that good in general will come out of it. Therefore, I would summarise the position in this way. I would say that the country must surely feel, and Parliament will feel, that the visit proposed by Mr. Macmillan and which was so readily accepted by the Soviet Union was the right thing to do, and we hope it will have right and lasting effects.
LORD REA: My Lords, in supporting the noble Viscount's remarks I do not propose to go over the same ground again. I entirely agree with him and am glad to have the Prime Minister back in good health. The excitement we endured was a passing, one and we must all feel convinced that this mission in the end was a good thing to have undertaken and should have eased the atmosphere. May I turn to a particular hobby horse of mine? It is said that cultural relations are going to be extended. Several of the Members of this House think propaganda has no use in this country. Unfortunately, it has come to have a rather sinister meaning, but we must reveal the truth, and intelligently put before all peoples what we think. I think the Prime Minister's visit has done a lot to start that and I hope it will develop from now on.
THE EARL OF HOME: My Lords, I am sure the Prime Minister will be very grateful for the reception given to his statement and will be greatly encouraged in his future work.

PLIGHT OF STATELESS PERSONS AND REFUGEES
3.50 p.m.
Debate resumed.
BARONESS SWANBOROUGH: My Lords, I feel very worried that the first thing I have to do in rising in your Lordships' House is to apologise. All I can say is that my lack of realisation of the behaviour followed was due to my apprehension in speaking for the first time in a House in which my husband spoke often, and where his speeches were welcomed because of his wisdom and his skill, and in which his son, in turn, has played no small part. As I address your Lordships I am conscious that in the weeks I have had the honour of sitting in your Lordships' House I have been constantly impressed, not only by the courtesy of the House but by the great generosity that it shows. Although I know I need not ask your Lordships for the former, I do beg for the latter in great measure, because I have no right to speak, except for my experience over many years with a great number of very strong common-sensical women.
I want to support the Motion standing in the name of the right reverend Prelate because, having worked for over twenty years with a voluntary service which has done a great deal of work for refugees, I feel that I have seen a little of the problem. Britain has always been recognised as the country that has opened its doors to refugees, not only from the point of view of giving them hope for the future, but by giving them an entry into the ay-to-day life of the community. In the last twenty-five to thirty years this country has taken in well over 300,000 refugees: 70,000 to 80,000 refugees from Germany and Austria, mostly Jewish; 120,000 Poles, mainly members of the war-time Polish forces, and their dependants; 75,000 European volunteer workers, mostly of Western European origin, who were in the displaced persons' camps at the end of the war; and then, subsequent to that, 2,000 from the "hard core" camps of Austria and Germany, 2,000 Czech refugees, and, as all your Lordships will remember, just recently, 21,500 Hungarians. These figures take no note of the war-time refugees who came to this country, representing thirty-eight countries and numbering 23,800.
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No one who has worked with refugees can ever forget the first impact one feels. It is one thing to discuss refugees; to sit at a table and make a plan for them. But paper plans and reality have a great gulf between them, and it is quite another to find your feet aching with the hard work of trying to cope with the immense problem; to find your head buzzing with trying to deal with the innumerable human problems; and to realise that the person looking at you so piteously has so many problems that you yourself will do anything under the sun to try to help solve them. Whether it was Ukrainians or our own Allies, the Dutch; whether it was people coming in from Finland or from Norway; whether it was Frenchmen or Poles, one was always aware of the same thing—the dreadful, dull, opaque look in eyes which meant complete absence of hope.
The method of handling refugees in this country has been that the Government of the day have set the policy; and they 'have played their part well. They have evolved new methods to meet changing circumstances, and they have given Government Departments all sorts of unaccustomed tasks to carry through, which they have done on a humane and practical basis. The voluntary services of this country have done unequalled and wonderful work; they have used every strength at their disposal; they have spent themselves generously, both in cash and kind, and through their untiring zeal they have supplied a limitless help to the people who have come into our country. But I believe, my Lords, that there has been insufficient recognition of the part local authorities have played in this work. It is to them that, in the final analysis, the implementation of Central Government decisions falls, and I feel that the way they have settled refugees in their localities has been quite magnificent. Both elected member and official have played a part which could never justifiably have been asked of them.
If anyone were to try to trace these refugees, I do not 'believe he could discover them easily, because in each small community the persons have been made so much a part of the locality that today they are an integral part of the whole. This has been done by a combination of efforts, but it has not been

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done without encountering many difficulties: whether it has been the question of language, or the anxiety of health; the worry of getting work, or the misery of separation; the sadness of home-sickness or the terror of dread memories; the lack of housing or the absence of finance, or even the unforeseen hardship of climate. All these problems have had to be dealt with; and whether physical, mental or spiritual, they have needed individual help and sympathy.
This need has been met—and I think this is the most important thing of all—to a most staggering degree by the ordinary men and women of Great Britain, who have not only opened their hearts, but have opened their hands and minds and have visualised for the first time, perhaps, what it must mean to have lost everything. And as they have realised that picture and steeped themselves in the work of trying to help settle the foreigner in their midst, they have understood what it must mean to be without hope. It has been touching to watch, in one of the great Midland cities, a girl who cannot talk a word of English, who is about to have a baby, and who is fearful because she has been separated from her husband, being looked after by a woman who speaks the sort of English that no foreigner would ever understand; and as that woman has looked after the refugee, with the full science of understanding, the refugee has once more had hope established within her because of the way the English woman has helped her. It is wonderful to see a young man being looked after by a very much older man—a rough man, perhaps, and of few words, but a man of great heart—who, by extending a helping hand to a youth raw enough to resent any sort of authority, has helped him to start afresh in a new country.
These British men and women, each in his or her own way, have played a part, and I believe that the aggregate result has been a great achievement. Much prominence has been given in the Press, and in other ways, to the shortcomings of the foreigners in our midst; but we are seldom told the success stories, which are thrilling, as well as being a record of which we can all be proud. I believe that, with their entry into the country, the refugees whom we have accepted have brought us many skills, and have made
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a definite contribution to the life of the nation. They have also taught us something that we have perhaps been a little slow to learn, though it is something that we should not forget but should use to help those who are still in the tragic plight of being the stateless persons of the world. They have shown us the tragedy of having no country they could call their own and no place that they could call home; the terror of lack of opportunity; the agony of the absence of the right to work and the bleakness of having neither possession nor position. And through it all we have learned that loss of hope is the worst of all things to face.
Dr. Lindt, that great leader of work for refugees, the United Nations High Commissioner, is trying to solve the plight of stateless persons of the world. I believe that we, as a nation, should support him to the utmost. And I believe, also, that all the men and women—yes, and the children—who have known refugees and learned something of their tragedy as they have worked with and for them in Great Britain, would agree with me. This is a human problem: that has been said already, but it can never be said often enough. It is a human problem which every man and woman of the world should examine, to see what part they can play in solving it, for it is the responsibility of each one of us, inasmuch as we declare that we believe in freedom.
It is the habit to-day to say that other nations have taken over leadership in the strategic strength and material wealth of the world, but I cannot cede to any country in the world the leadership which this country has to give and which, I believe, excels all other. In the field of refugees leadership has been given by us since the days of the Huguenots and before, and I trust that we shall continue to show the world what we can do, because we believe it right, and in that way help those who are still without home and without hope.
4.0 p.m.
LORD AMULREE: My Lords, before I begin on the rather short speech which I propose to inflict on your Lordships, I should like to offer my congratulations to the noble Baroness, Lady Swan-borough, who has just addressed us for the first time. If she will forgive my saying so, she is a very old friend of mine. I have known her for a long time,

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and I have been extremely impressed with the work I have seen her do connected with the magnificent organisation which she started during the war, the Women's Voluntary Service. I am sure that the sight of those women, with their dark green uniform with red piping, has done more to bring a great deal of hope and comfort to people than many other things which have occurred in the world. The noble Lady said that she was addressing your Lordships from her own experience. I can assure her that that is what we like in this House. We are full of people with experience, and we like them to draw upon it as frequently as they can. I trust that we shall have many more speeches from the noble Lady, drawing upon her very great experience.
There is one point I should like to pick up from the noble Lady's speech. She paid a tribute to the work done by local authorities for the refugees. I think that that is an aspect which is sometimes forgotten. The Government get the credit, the voluntary bodies get the credit, but the local authorities are left in the cold, and they have done a great deal of work in order to assist the refugees taken into this country. I do not know a great deal about refugees, but I learnt a certain amount from one or two things. Some of your Lordships may remember that a year or two ago there was a model of a refugee hut in a camp next door to St. Martin's in the Fields. I went and saw it, as no doubt did many of your Lordships. One got a feeling of the hopelessness and despair if that was all one had to look forward to. It was perfectly tidy and decent and perfectly all right, but one got the same feeling as when one went into the old poor law institutions and found patients who had been institutionalised for ten, fifteen or twenty years. They were well taken care of, but there was nothing to look forward to. That is what we see in the refugees now. The ones I came across most were the refugees from Gibraltar during the war, when the whole population was evacuated to this country. They at least knew that they were going back again, and were in a perfectly friendly country, but they were absolutely miserable from the time they arrived until the time they went back five or six years after the war. If those people could be miserable, how much more miserable
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Would be the people who have no hope of going back!
I think that Her Majesty's Government, and the British Governments in general, can look with a certain amount of pride on the work they have done. But I should like to make the appeal again that we do more and do not rest upon our laurels and leave it to other people. It needs one of the big countries in the world—and we are one of the big countries—to give a firm lead to the less fortunate countries in what to do, and try to bully them and jockey them along to make them do as much as we are doing ourselves.
The noble Lady has referred to the work of the Women's Voluntary Service. I am pleased to see in his place the noble Earl, Lord Woolton, who is to speak about the work of the Red Cross. That is an organisation in which I have done a certain amount of work; but I leave that subject to the noble Earl who knows so much more about it than I do. One of the things which impressed me in the speech of the right reverend Prelate was his point about the amount of money the High Commissioner required. I think I am right in saying that it is 6 million dollars each year for two years, which is about the cost of one or two—I am not quite sure which—big jet aeroplanes. If that amount of money can make all that difference to those people, I think it is extraordinary that it cannot be raised by the fifty-nine countries in the United Nations. Just think of it; two fewer aeroplanes flying in the air and it could go a long way to solving this problem!
The noble Lord, Lord Silkin, and the right reverend Prelate referred to the question of Arab refugees, which I think is one of the most shocking examples of the use of refugees for purely political purposes. They could be absorbed easily into the economy of the Arab countries, and I think it is a noble gesture for the Israelis to be prepared to take a certain number back and to offer a big sum of money towards their resettlement. The fact that that was not accepted shows what the Arab world feels about them, and that they are not prepared to take any steps at all, but allow them to exist in those miserable conditions. I do not want to take up any more of your Lordships' time, but I should like to urge upon Her Majesty's Government to do all they possibly can to get this matter settled. I

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give my strongest support to the Motion put down by the right reverend Prelate.
4.7 p.m.
THE EARL OF WOOLTON: My Lords, all of us who are here this afternoon are grateful that we are here. We have heard speeches of great distinction and of great human, as well as political, importance. With the right reverend Prelate who introduced this subject, and who spoke of it with such understanding, I am sure the whole House found themselves in agreement—at least, I found myself in agreement with him until he arrived at the end. Modesty among the Lords Spiritual is a proper thing, but not financial modesty. After the very moving speech, when I heard the right reverend Prelate talk in terms of £100,000, when my mind was soaring into millions, I thought one of us was wrong; and, with great respect, I do not think it was I.
I hope the noble Lady who made her maiden speech will permit me to add my tribute to what surely was one of the most moving speeches that we have heard in this House for a long time. As we listened to her, we could not think in terms of refugees; I found myself thinking—and I am sure she intended that we should—in terms of the individual person who was facing the problem of life and death, wondering whether he or she had any place or value in the world. These people make a special appeal to the British mind and conscience. For who are they? They are, for the most part, people who are in this lamentable position because they have demanded freedom of thought, and the bolder of them freedom of expression of that thought. I am sure that, as we listened to the noble Baroness, we could not but think how precious it is that we in this country have that freedom in complete abundance.
I should not have trespassed on your Lordships' time had it not been for the fact that for several years now, because I have had the privilege of being the Chairman of the British Red Cross Society, I have been closely associated with the problems that arise from these refugees all over the world. Let me say at once, however, that this association arose not as a result of my own work but as a result of the work of other people in the Red Cross. I am sure that when the noble Lord, Lord Silkin, spoke of the
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work that U.N.R.W.A. has done he was right in praising it, and I know that he would be equally anxious to pay tribute to the extraordinary work that British people in voluntary societies have undertaken amongst these refugees. I thought, as the noble Lord was speaking, of the medical mission, of some forty-seven people whom the British Red Cross Society sent to the Middle East, opening a hospital. That is all comparatively easy; but the task of going round the camps day by day, administering the medical relief, is something that calls for very high quality of people. And how fortunate we are in this country that we are able to produce those people who are prepared to go at such short notice, whether it be to India, to deal with the trouble that arose between India and Pakistan; to the Middle East or to Korea, or wherever it may be, always ready to take up this work!
If the noble Lord, Lord Silkin, will not think it impertinent of me, I should like to thank him for the speech that he made about the people in the Middle East, because for a long time I have regarded that as possibly one of the insoluble problems; indeed, it grows and grows. At the present moment, I am told, there are 1,053,000 of these people—let us face it, my Lords, breeding fast, the population growing, and there they are. What a tragic position it is! What a reflection it is on man's humanity to man that these refugees should be in that position! And what a dangerous political situation it is to have so many people who feel that the world has nothing to give them, who feel rebellious! What follows is, I think, just a matter of fortune, and may indeed be very serious.
This problem will not be solved by making speeches about it, or by using pleasant phrases. I think the first thing to do is to look at the problem: to see why it has arisen—because it has arisen from different particular causes in different parts of the world—and what can be done to solve it. And this is where I part company with my right reverend friend. Whether the problem can be solved depends very largely upon our having the means to make a solution possible. The means are of two sorts. The first requirement, obviously, is that the host Governments must want to solve the problem, and must be prepared—I

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think I may say this—to recognise that world opinion requires them to make some effort to solve the problem. They cannot just leave it and say, "Well, these people are here. We did not ask them to come. They are here in our midst; and we hope that something will happen, and that the United Nations or somebody else will conic along and do something about it." The first requirement for success, therefore, is that the Governments of the places in which the people are situated will want that solution to happen and will be prepared to recognise that the world expects that of them. In return, of course, these Governments have the right to say to the world, "If you expect us to do that, how much are you prepared to help us—because this is not a problem of our national creation?".
What do the people want? They are outcasts seeking freedom, and what they want, it seems to me, are two quite simple things—the things that we ourselves should want in those circumstances. They want homes to live in and work to do. Let me take as a particular instance the people in Austria. There are in Austria, I believe, some 200,000 refugees. They now have 8,000 in camps, and another 8,000 in homes of some sort. The Austrian Government, I am told, are very willing to keep these people, and to try to embrace them in their national life; but that cannot be done with people in camps; they must be got into homes. So it seems to me reasonable that an appeal should be made to provide the homes for the people to go into. In this country, as the noble Lady said, we have done well. We took 25,000 Hungarians; already 15,000 of them have been absorbed into our national life. No one is asking any more whether they are refugees; they are just people earning their living. We have given a good example to the world of what willing hosts and generous people can do.
The refugees in Tunisia and Morocco, I believe, represent a problem that ought to be solved within a comparatively short time if the financial means are available and if peace comes in Algeria. There is no reason why those people should not be absorbed. The White Russian refugees who are in China are a different problem. They want help to get to a country where they can have their freedom. I was most impressed by what the noble Lord, Lord
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Silkin, said about the people in the Middle East. Those people are deteriorating rapidly, and yet they are in a part of the world where, if funds were provided, a tremendous amount could be done by irrigation to make Jordan a much more prosperous place, and a place that might well provide a considerable livelihood for many of these people.
There, my Lords, is the problem. May I remind your Lordships that when the Hungarian trouble arose the people of this country produced in a comparatively short time a sum of over £2 million for the Lord Mayor's Fund in order to help solve this problem. I do not want to press the Government unduly financially, but I hope that they are going to discard the right reverend Prelate's demand for £100,000—
THE LORD BISHOP OF SHEFFIELD: My Lords, I did not ask for £100,000. I said they were giving £100,000 now, and that I hoped they would increase it by five times this year and next year.
THE EARL OF WOOLTON: Well, I hope they will not; because I do not think that five times is going to be nearly enough. If this problem is to depart from the realm of speeches into the realm of reality during the year—if we are, in fact, going to close the refugee camps in the world—then let us think big about it; and let us realise that the nations of the world are all involved. Not only their humanity but, I believe, their security is involved; and let them try to solve it as a major social operation. I hope that the United Nations will not talk about 6 million dollars but something nearer 60 million dollars. What could have been more encouraging for such a view than the comment of the noble Lord, Lord Silkin, who said he was quite certain that substantial funds might be produced in Israel to help solve the problem of the Middle East?
4.21 p.m.
LORD DENHAM: My Lords, I should like first, if the noble Lady will allow me, to add my voice to what has already been said to the noble Baroness, Lady Swanborough, on her maiden speech. May I also add how grateful all who work for refugees will be that she has seen fit to choose this subject upon which to make her maiden speech. I should like to support the Motion of the right

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reverend Prelate. There are a vast number of refugees in different parts of the world for a large number of whom the only hope of getting any help and support is to rely on voluntary help from free countries. Those who are appealing for funds to relieve refugees are all too often met with the catch phrase, "Charity begins at home." The World Refugee Year which begins in June will be a unique opportunity to bring home to people in this and other free countries that it is our duty to solve the refugee problem so far as money can do it.
The noble Lord, Lord Silkin, has dealt with one branch of refugees—the Arab refugees. I should like to draw your Lordships' attention to another branch which I feel has a special claim on our sympathy and our help, namely, the displaced persons from the countries of Eastern Europe who are now in Germany. The displaced persons arrived in Germany as the result of and during the war. In many cases they were carried off from their homes as slave labourers, and when they were set free at the end of the war they were then forced to stay where they were because their countries had been taken over by Communist regimes. So, for these two reasons, I feel that they deserve our special sympathy: first, because many of them were our Allies and fought with us, and secondly, because they are now victims of the present cold war and are excluded from their homes by the Iron Curtain.
There are three possible solutions for these refugees, as with all refugees—repatriation, emigration or integration. As the noble Lord, Lord Silkin, has said with regard to the Arab refugees, the first two are not really an answer. Of course, repatriation behind the Iron Curtain these particular refugees will not, or dare not, accept. Emigration the majority of them are prohibited from by old age or illness, or because their occupations are not those needed by the country of immigration. The third alternative is left to them, integration in the place where they are, Western Germany. Here, there is no political bar such as exists in the case of the Arabs. All that is needed to integrate these people in Germany is enough money to pay for housing, furniture and training.
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees has been doing what he can with the funds that have been
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available, and because he has been short of funds he has decided to concentrate his help on those refugees who are inside the camps, to the exclusion of the refugees outside camps. As the right reverend Prelate said, the situation of refugees who are out of camps is often much worse than that of those inside the camps. I think that in Germany there are under 20,000 refugees in camps and approximately 50,000 refugees outside camps. There are very few welfare officers, or many fewer than are needed, and they just cannot get round to all the out-of-the-way places where the out-of-camp refugees live. As a result, these refugees cannot get the attention and help that is needed. Often people do not know where they are. Secondly, they miss what few amenities and company there are inside the camps.
There is a third point. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees has, as his aim, to clear the camps because they are such black spots in Europe at the moment. But there is a much bigger problem outside the camps, and there is a danger that once the camps are closed down the bigger problem may be forgotten. When the World Refugee Year starts and money is raised, I hope it will be borne in mind, if money is to be sent to the refugees in Germany through the United Nations High Commissioner, that there is this problem of the out-of-camp refugees, and I hope that the stipulation will be made that these people are to be helped as well as those inside the camps. I have said that this is a problem the solution to which has no political bar; all that is needed is enough money. This is one problem that can really be settled and solved in World Refugee Year. The displaced persons have made their choice to stay on the free side of the Iron Curtain. We must never let them come to regret that choice.
4.29 p.m.
LORD SHACKLETON: My Lords, it is fitting that we should be discussing refugees in this House in World Refugee Year, because this is by way of being a British invention. Since I do not think it has been given the publicity that it should have, I should like to pay my tribute to the Bow Political Group, which comes from a stable, politically speaking, with which I am not in sympathy but

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which showed in the article which triggered-off this development a fine quality of idealism and imagination. I believe that those who were responsible for that idea can be gratified at the remarkable effect that is springing from it—not that I should like to suggest that on this occasion their thoughts and action did not chime in with the work that devoted people, particularly those associated with the Churches, have been doing in this most difficult and in some ways most rewarding field of human sympathy and human endeavour. But the displaced persons—refugees—have been so much with us for the last forty years that we are, I believe, as the world is in so many ways, inured to their sufferings; and I hope that when we go from this debate to-day we shall not get up with a feeling of comfort but with the feeling of urgency for which the noble Earl, Lord Woolton, asked in his speech, because it is an astounding reflection that there are still to-day men and women dating their state as a refugee, their unhappiness and their displacement, from the days of the First World War.
When the International Refugee Organisation was closed down a few years ago it was thought that the work of resettling and re-establishing these people, both refugees from a previous age and modern refugees, would soon be over. Yet, so far, this problem, if not as intractable as ever—because it is capable of solution—is at least as far from solution as ever. We find new refugees appearing on the scene. Who would have thought, a few years ago, that there would be 170,000 Algerians in Tunisia and Morocco, or that there would be Tibetan refugees—and there are Tibetan refugees to-day; and we may be on the eve (though I hope we are not) of another age in which, perhaps, there will be refugees in Africa.
We have had a great many figures in this debate, and the right reverend Prelate who introduced it gave enough figures for us to realise that the amount of money required is not such as to defeat the Chancellors and Finance Ministers of the world. But it is not solely in their hands; it is in the conscience, the sense of urgency and the sense of indignation which we, as legislators, and the people of our country, and of all countries, feel. It
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is that urgency which will decide how far this problem will be solved.
I do not believe that these problems, and particularly the problem of the Arab refugees, will be solved quite so easily as has been suggested. It is going to take a tremendous amount of money to house these refugees who have been turned out of the fertile parts of the Middle East, where they were living successfully before and who are now in areas which, without very heavy capital investment, are incapable of supporting them. I hope that the suggestion of the noble Lord, Lord Silkin, that the Government of Israel might well make their contribution, is one which he personally will vigorously take up. I hope that the many men of good will and idealism in that new country, who must feel terribly concerned about the consequence of the creation of their country in terms of the unhappiness of these refugees in the Gaza Strip and elsewhere, will make a move to contribute towards the financing of U.N.R.W.A., because U.N.R.W.A. urgently needs money in very large quantities, and the amount of money which it is receiving at the moment is not capable of sustaining even the very limited programme with which it has to compete.
So, while we must admit that these problems are capable of solution, we must recognise that they are not easily capable of solution. It is not enough to say that if we get the policy right we shall solve it: it requires a great deal more than that; and many of the political problems will not be easily solved. There has been reference to refugees, in camps and outside of camps, in Europe. It is a tragic note that the High Commissioner's programme calls for money not to close the camps but merely to settle those who have been in them the longest, and that, even if the present programme is completed, there will still remain many refugees who have been there, perhaps, for as long as five or ten years for whom further efforts will still be necessary. If we look at all these different problems—and they are different, each susceptible of a different solution—it is quite clear that it is in the determination of the people of this and other countries really to face up to the financial obligations that we can hope to meet them.
I should like to turn to another aspect of refugees: their admission to countries. We take a good deal of credit,

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I think properly, for what we in this country have done, and I was greatly impressed by the speech of the noble Baroness, Lady Swanborough, who described the work of the voluntary agencies. But our reputation in this matter, of which we are so proud, is not held by all to be as good as we think it is. It is quite certain that when refugees are admitted to this country they are treated with the dignity of citizens until they receive citizenship. But we have never taken into this country a single blind refugee; and, so far as I know, we have taken only 25 tuberculosis cases. They went to Scotland. It was left to the Scandinavians, particularly Sweden, to take the tuberculosis cases. Until we are willing to take some of these people can we really be satisfied that we are doing enough? That is the real heart of the problem.
Two or three years ago there was a proposal to take about 30 incapacitated people from the Far East. The British Government were prepared to put up the money. Then came the Hungarian wave, and the emotions of the world were, quite properly, so aroused over Hungary that the world went ahead and to a large extent solved the problem of the Hungarian refugees. To-day these 30 incapacitated people, who were to have come to this country, are still waiting, because the British Government were no longer prepared to produce the funds to finance them.
It is also true that out present limited scheme for the admission of 2,000 refugees is coming to an end. May I ask Her Majesty's Government, when the High Commissioner comes to negotiate with them, that they will agree very readily to take another 1,000 and will be prepared to take some of the more difficult cases, some of those who will be a charge on our society, perhaps as long as they are alive? This is a responsibility which is fully recognised by a number of people in the world. It is recognised by those devoted people in welfare agencies—the World Council of Churches, the Red Cross, the High Commissioner's Office, and particularly by Dr. Lindt who, as I expect many of your Lordships know, is a most distinguished, effective and warm-hearted man. All these understand the problem, but how can we convey it urgency to the rest
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of the world and to our fellow-countrymen?
I was greatly struck by the phrase used by the noble Lord, Lord Amulree, when he said that it would take perhaps only the cost of a couple of aeroplanes to solve at least the immediate problem that confronts the High Commissioner for Refugees. It reminded me of a phrase used by that great humanitarian, Fridtjof Nansen, when he appealed to the League of Nations for funds—on that occasion to deal with a Russian famine. He said that it would cost the Governments of the world only the price of half a battleship to save some of the millions who were faced by starvation in Russia. Yet the following year he had to report that, because of the failure of the Governments, 2 million people were dead.
My Lords, we are not confronted with a crisis quite so great as that; but we are confronted with a long-standing problem. It is, however, a problem that can be solved, and I urge noble Lords to do their utmost to support this cause, not merely in debate here but in the discussion and in the movements in the country during World Refugee Year. I hope that the Government will realise that the speed of advance is set by the Government which does the most. The problem that the High Commissioner is confronted with all the time is the fact that other people are hanging back because they do not want to do more than their share. Let us do more than our share on this occasion. If we do so, that will strengthen the hands of those who are able to put pressure on other Governments and people who can help the refugees.
4.41 p.m.
THE MARQUESS OF READING: My Lords, I had no intention of introducing a family duet into this programme, especially after so successful a solo, and even now I shall intervene for only a few moments. But as I have listened to the debate—originally I had no intention of taking part in it—one particular aspect has impressed itself upon my mind; and if I do intervene now it is because the number of your Lordships who have had the privilege of visiting the country of Vietnam is probably limited. At one time that country had a refugee problem of very extensive dimensions and great urgency. Your Lordships will remember that, as a result

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of the Geneva Conference in 1954, there came a moment when, at the Seventh Parallel, a division was constituted between the North or Communist part of Vietnam and the South of the same country; and as a result of the exclusion of one part from the other there began a very great movement of refugees from the North to the South, which in the end amounted to very nearly 900,000—not much less than the figure which the noble Lord, Lord Silkin, gave in connection with refugees in the Middle East. Certainly there was to some extent a corresponding efflux from the South to the North, but not in any way of the same dimensions.
If we are considering this problem, as I quite agree we should, as one in which what matters is not to be frightened of the scale upon which the problem has to be approached and solved, we have at the same time to realise that it is no good saying, "Here is this problem. Something must be done about it", but that we have to do something about it. Then, I think it may be useful just to glance in passing (which is all I can do) at the situation which arose in Vietnam as a result of the circumstances to which I have referred, and the way in which the problem has been solved. It is quite true, of course, that in that connection we are dealing with people of the same nationality who up to that moment had lived as citizens of an homogeneous country. But, at the same time, in the instance which the noble Lord, Lord Silkin, gave, the citizens of the various Arab countries of the Middle East did, after all, up to the time of the end of the first war, themselves inhabit one country and were very largely of the same ethnical origin and cultural development. So we had much the same factor in existence there.
In Vietnam they had to get over a difficulty of something like 900,000 refugees, and they have succeeded in a fairly short space of time in coping with it, because the Geneva settlement took place in July, 1954, and when I was in Vietnam towards the end of 1957 those 900,000 refugees had, to all intents and purposes, been absorbed. I was given the privilege of flying in a small aeroplane (loaned for the purpose of my being able to observe with greater ease) over one of the main schemes which had pro-
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vided for the settlement of some 50,000 of these refugees in one particular area. It is quite true that they had the land; and there is land in other parts of the world which is unoccupied. They had developed the land. They had not been frightened by the financial implications, although no doubt they had had a good deal of help from outside. In the case of other refugees, also, we should not make up our mind that no money would be available from other sources than the country immediately concerned.
They had tackled the problem, had mustered their resources and had gathered together outside resources in order to tackle it. They had in that relatively small space of time—within a very short period of having become an independent country, setting up their own administrative machinery and organising their own Government—tackled this immense problem and had brought it, so far as a traveller could observe (who was given every facility to observe as far as possible), to a successful conclusion. I thought it was just worth mentioning that example because it shows that, with determination, a sense of self-dedication and a sense of urgency, and with a refusal to be frightened by the scale of the problem a great deal can be done in a relatively short space of time.
4.47 p.m.
LORD BIRDWOOD: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Marquess for intervening before I spoke, because he has drawn attention to a most important principle in this problem: the aspect of the problem which suggests that "God helps those who help themselves". If I might draw attention to another outstanding example of that kind of situation I would refer to the situation in India in August and September, 1947, when probably the greatest migration of refugees of all time took place. India got down to the problem, and settled her refugees, whose numbers ran into not one million but several millions.
It had not been my intention to touch on the problem of the Arab refugees, as I usually have done on similar occasions. The noble Lord, Lord Silkin, has dealt with them fairly fully, but while I agree almost entirely with his solution to the problem, I think it is perhaps up to me to put his analysis in some perspective, because I would challenge one or two points he made in regard to the way in

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which this problem arose. I think the picture of a wise Arab dispensation outside Palestine advising Arabs to withdraw from their country, in order to be able to return at a better moment, is a false one. There may be some truth about advice being given in certain circumstances; but I would suggest that the main motive which drove the Arabs out of Palestine was the massacre in Deir Yassin village on April 9, 1948, to be followed by another massacre in Beit Sureik village on April 20, 1948. We all know that in the East that kind of event is like a spark spreading through a forest; and the forest caught fire.
That, I think, is the background. But as to the solution, I would agree entirely with the noble Lord. I think that the only way this problem is going to be solved is through a sum of money being put up by the United Nations, a sum which is so imaginative as to be able to force Arab countries into an acceptance; a sum of money which would be bound to tempt them to settle refugees on their own soil. If that could be worked alongside an offer from Israel to put up an imaginative sum—shall we say, for a limited number of 50,000 or 100,000 refugees—we might begin to see the solution to that problem.
However, I thought that, instead of concentrating entirely on this problem, it might be more useful if, for a few minutes, I tried to put across the idea of a principle behind the operation for this coming Refugee Year. The community I shall refer to in illustration is the community first mentioned by the right reverend Prelate, and mentioned more specifically by Lord Denham—that family of 50,000 stateless Europeans who, for one reason or another, are the victims of political expediency and political crime.
In so far as I would refer to an organisational matter, I would say this. In this country we operate our charities on a friendly and competitive basis. It is the British way of doing things: the cult of the individual. Very wisely, I think, in this Refugee Year we are approaching the problem by trying to induce the many organisations to develop their own programmes and make their own appeals. But I sometimes wonder Whether Chat process cannot be over-
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worked. I can think of two organisations which, so far as I can judge, cover identically the same field, each regarding the other with some suspicion, and each, as I see it, limiting to a certain extent the activity of the other. The result is that the public say: "Why should I give to A when I have already given to B? Why should I encourage A when B is already doing this kind of work?" It seems to me that if, as the dramatist told us, "The quality of mercy is not strained", then the mood of those who are administering mercy in this particular sphere, at any rate, is occasionally very much strained.
My Lords, I come now to the principle which I should like to suggest as the background to our endeavours this year. The community to whom I am drawing attention are those people who were the victims of both Hitler and Stalin. Perhaps the best way I can illustrate my point is to quote a personal experience. While it is invidious, on this sort of occasion, to single out any particular organisation, I am mentioning the Adoption Committee for Aid to Displaced Persons only because they, among others, as I see it, work according to one quite indispensable principle. They seek out individual societies in this country—towns they name; families they name; or it might even be the case of a single individual—and seek to provide those agencies with the facility to take under their care a society, a town, a group of people, a family, or even a single individual, on the other side. In that manner, a direct and a very personal link is formed.
The particular case to illustrate my point concerns a couple that came to the knowledge of my wife and myself through the agency of the Adoption Committee; and a correspondence was started. This particular couple were Russians; a brother and a sister, aged 70 and 65. They had fled from Russia in 1920, and they had settled in what they regarded then as free Latvia. In 1944, the Communists caught up with them, and on they had to move, to Western Germany. Their father was a Member of Parliament in the old Russia of the Czars; and in 1917 the man himself was about to take his commission in the Russian Army. To-day, that couple are prematurely aged. They could, I

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suppose, have been in a camp, but, like many others, they opted out of a camp because they regarded independence at any cost as better than life in a camp. To-day they live in a little brick hut of two rooms, built on to a barn outside a rather isolated farmhouse some 35 kilometres from Hamburg. They have no lavatory, and no running water. At this moment the woman is desperately ill. They are people of education and culture, and have a quiet charm. They do not speak of the world they have lost. They make no complaints, even though they have to live on an income of about £15 a month, for the two of them, provided by the Federal German Government.
The Adoption Committee found that couple, and put them in touch with my wife. We wrote, and sent parcels, and they wrote back. It was pathetic to know that the receipt of a letter was such a great event in their lives. Then, just about a month ago, when we were passing through Hamburg, we managed to arrange for them to come into Hamburg and have lunch with us. We put them on the train afterwards, with a parcel. That was the first time and, I suppose, the last time that we shall ever see them. My Lords, I suppose that the most tragic in all human experience is to feel that you are not wanted—certainly it is far worse than mere physical poverty—and one did feel that, for a brief hour, those people had been returned into the great current of life and human contact. The fact that, after all these years, these two suddenly felt that, somewhere in the world, there was another couple who wanted them to live, gave them, for the first time in about forty years, a purpose to live.
That is the only point I want to make—the principle of the value of the direct and personal link. I hope that, when we as a nation respond, as I know we shall, in this coming Refugee Year, we shall do so not as a prosperous community of "haves" making a routine payment to the "have nots", but as people imagining ourselves meeting and talking with—and perhaps actually arranging to meet and talk with—those we hope to help. It may be that in that way we shall be calling them back to the dignity and purpose of a full life.
4.58 p.m.
BARONESS ELLIOT OF HARWOOD: My Lords, this debate has been of tremendous interest and also, I think, of very considerable significance. So far as I know, we are once more leading the world by discussing this vital problem of refugees just before we launch World Refugee Year. I do not think there has been a discussion on this subject in any other of the great Assemblies of the world before to-day; and, as Lord Shackleton has said, it was our initiative that started the idea of concentrating this year upon World Refugee Year. Once again, therefore, we are giving a lead to the other nations, which I am sure will be of great value in the work to which we have set our hands.
As I listened with great interest to the whole of this debate, I was thinking all the time of the three years during which I listened to, and also took a part in, the debates in the United Nations General Assembly, both in the Plenary Session on the occasion of the Hungarian crisis, and in the Third Committee—the Committee charged with the refugee item every year. Looking back on those debates, there seemed to be two things which were fairly constant throughout: first, the keenness and willingness of the free nations of the world to help the High Commissioner with his plans for refugees; and secondly, the monotonous repetition of the U.S.S.R. and its satellites, assuring the world that refugees did not exist; that they were the invention of the imperialist States, and that if all who were called refugees were sent back to their country of origin everything in the garden would be lovely. This monotonous refrain did not, and never will, impress the free nations of the world, who are well aware of what would happen if non-Communist people were thrown back against their will behind the Iron Curtain in the way suggested by the Soviet bloc.
During the debate noble Lords have given figures of the way in which, historically, we have acted as a country of asylum for many refugees. These figures are impressive in view of our small area and great population, and I think we can be well proud of what we have done. We have also given considerable sums of money, figures which I think the noble Marquess will give to the House

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when he replies. But in spite of all our efforts and those of other nations, this problem which has been described still remains. I can remember in 1954 when Dr. Van Hoven Goodhart was High Commissioner, how he started a five-year programme which he hoped would deal with the refugees. As the noble Earl, Lord Woolton, pointed out, the need then was for the countries receiving the refugees to be anxious and willing to keep them and settle them and give sufficient opportunities in life. In 1957 the problem was made more difficult by the Hungarian situation. We urged nations not only to help Hungarians but not to forget the plight of the long-standing refugees. At the Twelfth Session we again urged that nations should redouble their efforts and we gave the High Commissioner a new mandate. Dr. Lindt put forward practical plans for permanent solutions. On that occasion I spoke for the first time on behalf of the United Kingdom about the plight of refugees in Hong Kong.
The 1958 Session was distinguished by the strong initiative of the British delegation in getting a resolution adopted by the Third Committee, and subsequently by the General Assembly, to make an all-out drive for the refugees and to designate the year June 1, 1959, to June 1, 1960, as World Refugee Year. The speeches and support from other nations were considerable. Our delegate from another place spoke in the Third Committee and Assembly and she managed to get 56 nations to support our resolution, with only 8 in the Soviet bloc against us. So now, all over the world, nations are beginning to make plans for an all-out drive to try to settle this tragic problem. Here in She United Kingdom I have been asked, and have agreed very nervously, because it is a very big job, to head the Committee for World Refugee Year—to be Chairman of the Executive Committee here.
We have great support. I am glad to tell your Lordships that Her Majesty The Queen has agreed to be Patron of the Committee and of our World Refugee campaign. The Foreign Secretary and Foreign Office are giving all the help they can. We have the active help of all the political Parties. The Prime Minister, the Leader of the Labour Party and the Leader of the Liberal Party are all Vice-Patrons of the appeal. Leaders
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of industry, trade unions, churches, voluntary agencies—which many noble Lords know of and work for—and all the denominational and non-denominational groups are helping. Many individual leaders in different walks of national life have agreed to give support, and some of your Lordships are among them. The B.B.C. and the T.V. authorities have said that they will help, and the Lord Mayor of London will launch the Year on June 1 at the Mansion House, with all political Parties and others represented and, I hope, with the support that night of Television and the B.B.C. Thereafter, all through the country the societies and organisations for refugees, with the help of the civic authorities, will begin a great campaign to raise money.
Like Lord Woolton, I am going to soar into millions. I hope he will help me. We have set ourselves a target of £2 million for our World Refugee Year contribution. These funds will be allocated in the first place as to the normal amounts; expended annually by the refugee organisations—approximately £900,000. The additional sum—over £1 million—will go to the permanent solutions for the refugees under the mandate not only of the High Commissioner but of the United Nations Organisation for Arab Refugees in the Middle East, and to the Governor of Hong Kong responsible for the administration of the refugees there.
What are the practical solutions which we are going to support? In a speech made by the High Commissioner in Geneva in January, 1959, he outlined them as follows. First, to clear the camps in Europe by the end of 1960. This can be done if there is money. In 1958 there was a reduction in these camps of 5,900 under the High Commissioner's scheme, and at present 7,600 are being settled outside the camps under U.N.R.E.F. During 1959–60 there will remain 12,000 refugees who will qualify for the camp clearance programme sponsored by the High Commissioner. Countries of residence and voluntary agencies are all helping. A total of 5,700,000 dollars are required. The money is needed, plans are in existence, and if in World Refugee Year we can achieve this it will certainly be a great event.
Then there are refugees outside camps. These are the specially handicapped categories. The total sum estimated for that work is at the moment uncertain, but

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1,200,000 dollars should be spent in the next twelve months. Then there is the residue of Hungarian refugees—15,000 in Austria, 5,000 who wish to settle overseas, and 1,000 in countries other than Austria. The High Commissioner, in a speech in January 1959, said that the number of Hungarian refugees wishing to settle in a particular European country is relatively small, and if each country will accept a proportion of them the Hungarian problem may be solved.
The question of China has been mentioned. There are 9,000 White Russian refugees on the Chinese mainland who, if funds were available, could be transported to countries willing to take them. Four thousand exit permits have been granted. There are still 5,000 to make plans for and to move at an approximate cost of £200 per person. All the other Hong Kong refugees, of Chinese origin, are a colossal burden on the Colony: one in four of the population. In 1957 I made an appeal to the nations of the world to help solve this problem. So far little help has come from outside, but the British Government are trying to do what they can to mitigate the appalling hardships. But much more money is needed, and much more help from all nations. Then the question of the Arab refugees, about which the noble Lord. Lord Silkin, knows so much and spoke so movingly, is largely political, but no doubt money can help to alleviate hardship.
So World Refugee Year is to focus the eyes of the world on these problems and attempt to find permanent solutions. If all the nations of the world work together great sums of money can be raised, and with a little good will and effort much can be done. The legacy of war is a tragic story, and for all of us, secure in our own country, it is a great challenge which we have to take up in sponsoring the idea of World Refugee Year. The first promise received for the fund is £100,000 from Her Majesty's Government. I hope, as the noble Earl, Lord Woolton, said, that this is only an instalment and that more money will be forthcoming. In the meantime, we have enlisted as chairman of the financial side of the appeal Mr. David Robarts, Chairman of the National Provincial Bank, and as Vice-Chairman of the appeal, Sir Vincent Tewson, General Secretary of the
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Trades Union Congress. All the refugee agencies are setting out to double their annual target of money raised, and with the support of the Press, the B.B.C., and the television authorities, and the good will and interests of the ordinary citizen, we hope to show the nations of the world that, although a small country, we have generous hearts and will bring a message of hope to the refugees all over the world. To-day in your Lordships' House we have given a lead to the nations of the world. I should like to say, in the words of the noble Marquess, Lord Reading, who has just spoken, that we must not be frightened by the scale of the problem. I am sure that we can make a great contribution to this World Refugee Year.
5.15 p.m.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: My Lords, I am sure that we are all grateful to the right reverend Prelate the Lord Bishop of Sheffield for calling the attention of your Lordships to this tragic human problem, and I sincerely hope that full publicity will be given to this matter throughout this country and, indeed, throughout the whole world. With our minds filled by the momentous problems of international security, and perhaps sometimes rather bewildered by the contemplation of fantastic scientific developments in inter-planetary travel, there is a risk that we may forget the simple human misery of the many thousands of people in this world who are homeless and stateless, deprived of any roots at all.
It is nearly two years since your Lordships last discussed this important problem, and the present time is particularly suitable for a further debate, in view of the preparations which are now being made for the World Refugee Year, which, as we have heard, is to start on June 1. This problem has, alas! existed throughout the ages, and at almost any period in history we can read the sufferings and tribulations of refugees who have fled from the scene of some form of oppression or from some natural disaster. Sadly, we have to face the fact that nearly always the refugee problem has been man-created—man seeking refuge from man. It is also an ugly fact that in the twentieth century, when man has made greater strides within the material sphere than at any other period of history, the refugee problem has attained dimensions hitherto

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unknown. I submit that this problem must now claim the active intervention of all freedom-loving men throughout the world.
In the years immediately following the Armistice of 1945 it was one of the primary tasks of the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration—U.N.R.R.A., as opposed to U.N.W.R.A., about which I shall talk later—to attend to the needs of many thousands of men and women who had been displaced by the war; to repatriate those who wished to return to their homes, and to find new homes for those who did not by resettling them elsewhere. When U.N.W.R.A. was wound up in 1947, however, although it had repatriated more than one million persons, much still remained to be done. A new international agency was therefore formed, the International Refugee Organisation, to take over the work of U.N.R.R.A. relating to refugees. In the four years of its existence the I.R.O. resettled no fewer than 1,209,000 refugees and assisted 410,000 more.
In 1949, and before the work of the I.R.O. was terminated, the United Nations General Assembly created the office of United Nations High Commissioner of Refugees. The functions of this office were primarily protective, aimed at assuring fair treatment for stateless refugees, wherever they might be. Unlike U.N.R.R.A. and the I.R.O., the High Commissioner's office was set up solely as a co-ordinating and supervising body. Such funds as the High Commissioner has had at his disposal have been disbursed, with the General Assembly's approval, for the benefit of refugees either through voluntary charitable organisations working in this field or through Government agencies set up for the same purpose.
There are some 38,000 refugees in Western Europe living in camps. I know that these figures have been given, but I think it would be improper for me to wind up this debate from the Government Front Bench without just dotting the is, and I hope that your Lordships will forgive me if much of what I have to say is repetitive of what has already been said. The High Commissioner has good hopes that it will be possible to close all these camps and to resettle their inmates by the end of 1960, provided that
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he is furnished with the requisite funds. In addition, there are still about 100,000 other refugees, not living in camps, who are not yet permanently resettled. These people are living in Austria, France, Germany, Greece, Italy and Turkey. I am sure that in this connection all of us will have been particularly interested in what was said by the noble Lords, Lord Denham and Lord Shackleton, when they referred to the plight of refugees outside the camps. I feel certain that their remarks will receive the publicity and attention that they deserve.
Another group of refugees is composed mainly of White Russians, who have been living in China since 1917 and who are now anxious to be resettled elsewhere. Since the I.R.O. was wound up in 1951 the Inter-Governmental Committee for European Migration has moved over 12,000 of these people to new homes, mostly in Australasia and Latin-America. There are believed to be about 10,000 of them still in China, of whom 5,000 have already been promised admission to countries of resettlement. For these refugees the problem, therefore, is simply one of money. I should like, in passing, to pay a sincere tribute to the generous and unflagging efforts of the World Council of Churches, without whose help this resettlement programme would hardly have been possible.
There are two other large groups of refugees who are not regarded as falling within the High Commissioner's mandate. One of these groups, the Arab refugees, living principally in Jordan and the Gaza Strip, of whom there are over a million, are the concern of another United Nations organisation, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency. I should like to pay my tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Silkin, for what he said on this subject—a most helpful and valuable contribution.
There are the Chinese refugees in Hong Kong, who are now estimated to number about one million. That is, I believe, one-third of the total population of the Colony. I think there has been a slight divergence in the figures; but, be that as it may, the figure I have is one-third of the total population of the Colony. For reasons relating to the political situation in the Far East, this group has never been completely recognised as coming within the mandate of the High Commissioner for Refugees. Nevertheless, as a result of the resolution

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of the United Nations General Assembly in November, 1957, the High Commissioner is empowered to use his good offices to collect funds on their behalf, and all Governments who are members of the United Nations and of the Specialised Agencies have been invited by the same resolution to contribute towards their welfare.
As we have been told, the response to this appeal has, unfortunately, been very limited, and the responsibility of caring for these refugees—many of whom are homeless and virtually destitute—continues to be borne by the Government of Hong Kong, who estimate that approximately one-third of their annual budget, that is to say, about £13 million sterling, is devoted to this purpose. The figures that I have given do not take into account the so-called "national" refugees in countries which are divided, such as Germany and Korea.
Grave as the situation is, my Lords, it is not one of unrelieved gloom. The problem of the refugees in Western Europe and of European refugees in the Far East is at least within measurable distance of a solution. The Executive Committee of the United Nations Refugee Fund decided two years ago to authorise the High Commissioner to concentrate his efforts in Europe on resettling those refugees who are in camps and who, as I have been led to understand, are, in general, in greater need than those refugees who have been temporarily resettled outside the camps. But I most certainly take the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Shackleton, and the noble Lord, Lord Denham.
Provided that Governments continue to support the High Commissioner in his programme, there is hope that all the remaining camps in Germany and Austria will have been closed by the end of next year. Once again, let me repeat that the plight of the refugees outside the camps has not been forgotten. They also will be helped by the High Commissioner to the extent that his funds are available, and priority in this group will be given to the old and infirm and to those with special family difficulties.
I should like to take this opportunity of reaffirming Her Majesty's Government's wholehearted support for the High Commissioner for Refugees and for his pro-
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gramme. We have full confidence in Dr. Lindt, and we warmly welcomed his reelection to his onerous post last December.
Now a word about the contribution that is being made by the United
Kingdom to the solution of this problem. Since the war, the contribution of Her Majesty's Government to a solution of the refugee problem has been made, as we all know, in two ways—by admitting alien refugees to the United Kingdom for permanent resettlement, and by giving financial support to international relief and resettlement programmes. In the years immediately preceding the war, as we have been reminded earlier this afternoon, we gave asylum to some 80,000 refugees, largely of Jewish origin, who had fled from the racial and political persecution of Nazi Germany. Since the war, we have taken in close on 250,000 more refugees, of whom about half come from Poland. At the time of the Hungarian uprising in 1956, we again threw our doors wide open to the refugees from Hungary, of whom over 22,000 arrived in a little over four months, a larger number than any other European country received, excepting Austria herself. Some of these people have since moved to Canada and elsewhere, but 14,000 of them are still with us. I am glad to say that the great majority of them have settled down to useful lives and productive work in their new surroundings.
EARL WINTERTON: My Lords, may I interrupt the noble Marquess at this point? Would he emphasise the fact that, when he refers to the pre-1939 refugees, they were brought here through the agency of the Inter-Governmental Committee for Refugees, on which I had the honour to serve for six years, of which His Majesty's Government, as it was then, and the United States Government, were the principal contributors to the Fund? Both Governments have every reason to be proud of their action in this respect.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: My Lords, I am obliged for the noble Earl's addition to the remarks that I have been making. It is clear that in this small and overcrowded island, which has the second highest population density in Europe, and an annual increase of the order of a quarter of a million, we cannot allow unrestricted immigration of

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refugees. Refugees are admitted provided that they are eligible under normal immigration policy, but we do not feel able to make further special arrangements to admit them. In future, our assistance to the refugee problem must be rather by way of finance than by way of immigration.
In the sphere of financial aid also our record is good. As we have been reminded, we are the second largest regular contributor to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, just as in the past our contributions to U.N.R.R.A.—£153 million—and to the I.R.O.—£22 million—were second only to those of the generous Government of the United States. To the High Commissioner's Fund we have contributed £580,000. In addition, we made special grants, totalling £338,000, for Hungarian refugees at the time of the Hungarian rising.
Now I come to the project which I mentioned at the beginning of my speech—the World Refugee Year, to which the noble Baroness, Lady Elliot of Harwood, has referred and the work of which she has described in such detail. I should like to join with the noble Lord, Lord Shackleton, in paying our tribute to those three young men from whose minds this idea sprang—Christopher Chataway, Colin Jones and Trevor Philpott, in the article which they jointly wrote in the magazine Crossbow. The suggestion they made was conceived in an entirely humanitarian spirit, and it was immediately acclaimed by the voluntary organisations working for refugees, and by leading members of all political Parties, who requested Her Majesty's Government to further the proposal by sponsoring it in the United Nations General Assembly. This Her Majesty's Government gladly did, and last December the General Assembly adopted by a large majority a resolution commending the plan to all Governments, and requesting the Secretary-General of the United Nations to support its formation.
I will not weary your Lordships with details that have already been given about the purpose, the scope and the hopes that we all have—and when I say "we" I associate Her Majesty's Government with it—for the success of the World Refugee Year. I think we have been greatly encouraged by the fact that Her Majesty has graciously consented to give her
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Royal patronage to the World Refugee Year. My right honourable friend the Prime Minister has agreed to become a Vice Patron of the Year. My right honourable friends the Foreign Secretary and the Colonial Secretary and the Joint Parliamentary Under-Secretary for the Home Office have undertaken to serve on the Advisory Council of the United Kingdom Committee, and Her Majesty's Government particularly welcome the decision of the Leader of Her Majesty's Opposition and the Leader of the Liberal Party to become Vice-Patrons of the Year.
It has always been our tradition to give voluntary service and voluntary contributions to causes such as this. I listened with great attention to, and I was deeply moved by, the speech of the noble Baroness, Lady Swanborough; and, if I may, with great humility, be permitted to add my personal tribute, I should particularly like to do so. The noble Baroness referred with complete humility to the fact that she was speaking only from her personal experience; indeed, most speakers to-day, excluding myself, have been speaking from personal experience, and it has been quite obvious, from the tone of the debate, that there has throughout been that thread, that sense of wishing to contribute towards a solution of this great world-wide human problem. And I have been relieved to note that it has not all the time been "What is the Government going to do about it?". There has been quite an emphasis on what we men and women are going to do about it as individuals. Your Lordships have heard that Her Majesty's Government has already been first in the field in promising a contribution of £100,000 towards the World Refugee Year.
Perhaps it is improper for me at this Dispatch Box to express any personal views about finance, but I confess that I find it difficult not to share, at least to some extent, the views expressed by my noble friend Lord Woolton. I hope that if we in this country can make a substantial voluntary contribution—indeed, more than the figure mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Elliot of Harwood (£2 million I think it was)—I sincerely hope that perhaps it may be possible to persuade those people who control the moneybags in all Governments to make

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an additional contribution to this most important cause. I think it would not be inappropriate for me just to remind your Lordships of the words of the noble Lord, Lord Amulree, earlier on this afternoon, when he said that the equivalent of the cost of two aircraft, 12 million dollars, would solve at least a part of this problem. May I remind your Lordships that the cost of four cigarettes contributed by every single member of the population of this island would also produce something in the neighbourhood of £2 million. A wonderful response was made to the Hungarian tragedy—£2½ million was given by private citizens in this country in response to the Lord Mayor's Appeal. Surely we are not going to fall down this time.
I believe that this debate, if it has done nothing else, has been intensely valuable in focusing the attention of the country on this problem. I sincerely hope that the maximum publicity will be given to what has been said here to-day, so that not only the people of this country but people throughout the world will feel impelled by the sense of urgency to which noble Lords have referred to make personal contributions, and will not simply rely upon action on the part of their Governments. Once again I should like to thank the right reverend Prelate for having introduced this very important Motion.
5.35 p.m.
THE LORD BISHOP OF SHEFFIELD: My Lords, it only remains for me to thank those of your number, and very specially, if I am say so, the two noble Ladies, who have spoken in the debate for your contributions. I knew I could assume the good will and general support of all Members of this House for a Resolution of this kind. I am grateful to those who spoke and who underlined, emphasised and elaborated some of the things I said and filled in some of the gaps, because the subject is so broad that it is necessary to leave a good many things out.
May I just say three things, very briefly? First, there is obviously no one remedy. The noble Lord, Lord Silkin, pointed out, quite truly I think, that as regards the Palestine situation the remedy is integration, plus, as I think was indicated by other speakers, probably a large
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capital outlay to finance economic developments in Palestine. In Europe I very much doubt whether integration will be possible for the remaining hard core. They happen to be living in countries which have already absorbed a very large number of refugees. The achievement of Western Germany has been staggering. Therefore, it has to be by migration, and countries must be prepared to take not merely refugees of economic value but a very few who probably are of small economic value on account of age and infirmity. I hope our own Government will keep that small point in mind when this situation arises. The example of Vietnam, referred to toy the noble Marquess, and also the example of Germany shows that it is possible to solve this problem given a sustained and determined effort.
I have been involved in raising money for this sort of thing for the last thirteen years, and realising how generous has been the support of this country towards it one has to go on to say that as far as some of the schemes of the High Commissioner are concerned they must be supported not by voluntary contributions but by Government contributions. I hope very much, realising that our Government has been not ungenerous, certainly not unsympathetic, that it will consider not only increasing its contribution to the World Refugee Year Fund in this country, but stepping up its contribution to the High Commissioner's Fund also, because I think that that example might do a great deal more than words. With our record, I believe that we could at this point really help to get this problem well on the way towards solution. But I would remind your Lordships that behind the organisational and the financial difficulties there is the fact that in the world to-day there is a sort of dynamic power making for refugees. Again I think that our country, with its record, has got to throw all its energies into trying to change that inhuman political point of view which is getting rather worse, not only in totalitarian States but in some of the new nationalisms which are arising in the world.
I hope that we shall take what the noble Lord, Lord Shackleton, said most seriously, and that we shall not go away from this debate feeling that we have had a good debate and now it is all right.

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We ought to go away feeling that here is a desperate human problem, and never to feel comfortable in ourselves until it is solved. Finally, may I thank the noble Marquess who spoke for the Government for the things which he said? I hope that he and the Government will give this cause their sustained support, not only within the country but in the United Nations Assembly, because, on the whole the Assembly has spoken fair words but, measured by actions and finance, it has not done what it ought to have done up till now. My Lords, I beg leave to withdraw my Motion.
Motion for Papers, by leave, withdrawn.